bandwidth

The nation's biggest telephone companies want you to believe that soaring cell phone bills are in our future -- if their demands for more wireless bandwidth aren't met. Is this a clear signal of what's to come, or just a lot of static?

AT&T will spread its 4G LTE network into a large number of U.S. cities this year, a move that puts it into direct competition with Sprint-Nextel's Wimax 4G product and LTE technology deployed by Verizon Wireless. But will its investment in faster wireless pay off?

Regulators have begun to take a long, hard look at whether the AT&T buyout of T-Mobile would create a quasi-monopoly in the American cellular carrier industry. If those antitrust concerns sink the deal, AT&T could be in real trouble, because cellular is its only clear hope for growth.

Netflix, the largest video-streaming company in the world, has been tracking the download speeds of North American broadband ISPs. On Thursday, it posted a chart of its findings: On average, ISPs in Canada handily beat their U.S. counterparts.

Verizon Wireless is reportedly planning to unveil new, limited data plans next Thursday, according to a report from the tech site Engadget. If Verizon follows in the footsteps of archrival AT&T, this could mean the death of the unlimited data plan option for new smartphone accounts.

An antitrust class action against Apple and AT&T is going forward, charging that Apple's five-year exclusive agreement with AT&T makes a sham of the two-year contracts iPhone users sign with AT&T and is part of an effort to monopolize the iPhone market.

The concept of the videophone is nearly as old as the phone itself, and prototypes predate the Beatles by many decades. But while other new modes of communication, from email to instant messaging to cell phones have been adopted at astonishing rates, video has lagged -- until now.

Verizon is expected to roll out a long-awaited fourth generation wireless network by year end, promising to boost data speeds by 10 times. But watch out. While it may enable sharing hi-def video, say, over cellphones, it could also give the carrier a reason to raise monthly fees.

The only people who don't know about text messages these days are 90-year-olds and infants. Even if you don't use the feature, it is available on nearly every phone in use. Recently, text messaging overtook voice use on cell phones for the first time, indicating that texting is here to stay. Even...