Bizarre figures on mobile phone vs fixed line penetration

[MagicJ]

MagicJ. I'm sure I heard some booing from the crowd when your marks went up.

They can boo all they want, normally i have no idea what he's talking about (technology stuff) this time i understood everything so the non-bamboozled factor caused the dip in marks, not forgetting the links as they normally distract me from the incomprehensible answer.

[Jukka Aho]

They can boo all they want, normally i have no idea what he's talking about (technology stuff) this time i understood everything so the non-bamboozled factor caused the dip in marks, not forgetting the links as they normally distract me from the incomprehensible answer.

In my defense, I tried to find a sample link to a web page describing such gateway device, but only managed to find much more expensive variants with all kinds of bells and whistles that are perhaps important to enterprises but not needed by ordinary home users...

Oh, and forgot to mention: the reason why this concerns Sonera more than any other telecoms company is that they have lots of subscribers out in the sticks, specifically because they used to be the government-operated national telco that was responsible for providing phone service at a reasonable cost (read: at loss) to the remote areas which no ordinary commercial operator or telephone co-operative would want to touch. And as those long landlines rot in the woods and snap during the storms and blizzards (and whatnot), they’d rather replace them with wireless than keep on maintaining them.

[raamv]

Oh, and forgot to mention: the reason why this concerns Sonera more than any other telecoms company is that they have lots of subscribers out in the sticks, specifically because they used to be the government-operated national telco that was responsible for providing phone service at reasonable cost (read: at loss) to the remote areas which no ordinary commercial operator or telephone co-operative would want to touch. And as those long landlines rot in the woods and snap during the storms and blizzards and whatnot, they’d rather replace them with wireless than keep on maintaining them.

They have sold this out to NMT...

[olofsson]

But then you see that "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access" for Finland is 47%, while the Swedish figure is... wait for it... 0%.

So Finland is second only to Lithuania (48% of households without), while Sweden is off the map at the other end.

How the hell do they arrive at figures like this, and why the hell don't they comment on the strangeness (read: the numbers suck) of it?

I'm convinced the reason is fairly simple:
It is an error, ...or alternatively a misrepresentation.


Imagine, for instance, that the figure for Sweden be 40% or 30%, but the "4" or "3" is lost somewhere in the process.

Or imagine that the questionarie used in Sweden (or in Swedish) happened to leave out that question...

[otyikondo]

But then you see that "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access" for Finland is 47%, while the Swedish figure is... wait for it... 0%.

So Finland is second only to Lithuania (48% of households without), while Sweden is off the map at the other end.

How the hell do they arrive at figures like this, and why the hell don't they comment on the strangeness (read: the numbers suck) of it?

I'm convinced the reason is fairly simple:
It is an error, ...or alternatively a misrepresentation.


Imagine, for instance, that the figure for Sweden be 40% or 30%, but the "4" or "3" is lost somewhere in the process.

Or imagine that the questionarie used in Sweden (or in Swedish) happened to leave out that question...

Ahhhh.. the thread has legs in it yet!

This is, naturally, the answer I am eagerly expecting from a blushing Eurostatcrat just as soon as he sobers up tomorrow morning. Glad we are on the same page, olofsson. I'd go more for the "question clumsily translated in the Swedish questionnaire and people misinterpreted it" scenario meself, but of course a simple typo would be just as delicious. Sorry Jukka, at present the cynics have it.

[Jukka Aho]

Sorry Jukka, at present the cynics have it.

As I already said in my first message, Sonera’s willingness to replace landlines with GSM-based technology in remote areas contributes the numbers, but is not nearly enough to “explain” anything, so I fail to see what the “cynics” have to do with anything... (well, except that I’m probably one of those myself, of course! :)

[otyikondo]

Just to keep the pot boiling while we wait for the definitive answer, I found this in the "full" data:

According to the Eurobarometer survey (64.4 - ECommunications
Household Survey) carried out in 2006,
almost everybody has telephone access from the home
location (either via a fixed or mobile phone) but the
proportion of households having both fixed and mobile
access at home is considerably lower (61% at EU-25 level).
It appears that 18% of households still only have fixed
access. To complement that picture, it is interesting to
examine the share of households that only have mobile
telephone access.
At European level, 18% of households stated they had
access to one or several mobile phones but no fixed
telephone access (the remaining 3% stated not having
fixed nor mobile telephone access). The highest figures for
households having mobile phone access only and no fixed
telephone access were observed in Lithuania and Finland
(see Figure 4.45). Results are also relatively high in the
Czech Republic, Latvia, Portugal and Slovakia where
around four in ten households gave the same response. All
these countries have overall telephone access rates below
the EU average to the exception of Finland where
penetration reaches 100%.
On the other hand, not even one in ten households in
Sweden, Malta, the Netherlands and Luxembourg are
mobile-only users. However, these countries rank highest
for the proportion of households having both fixed and
mobile access.
In the European countries that are not (yet) EU Member
States, the proportion of households only having mobile
phone access at home is more or less in line with the EU-
25 average. Only in Croatia there are fewer households
having only mobile access.

No reference here to any eyebrows being raised on this one, even though the accomanpying graph (Figure 4.45) shows Finland and Sweden at completely opposite ends of the scale, and Sweden's 0% should surely have prompted a LITTLE frisson of concern.

This is btw taken from page 139 out of 194 of:

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ ... 001-EN.PDF and it's pretty dry reading.

It would of course be one hell of a shock and a cause for a crinkly mouth if we were to discover that this is all perfectly above board after all, and the simple fact is that we take a radically different approach to our telephony from that of the Swedes. Who'd a thunk it, eh?

[Hank W.]

I think if the survey was done, was the wording: do you have a land line wiring / do you have a possibility for a land line mistaken for do you have a land line with a number for "access". As in I had a land line to my home, but as only telemarketers called I cancelled it. But if I wanted a land line they'd just need to switch me back on. So yes I am in access of a land line if I wanted one - but am a mobile phone only household.

[Karhunkoski]

I think if the survey was done, was the wording: do you have a land line wiring / do you have a possibility for a land line mistaken for do you have a land line with a number for "access". As in I had a land line to my home, but as only telemarketers called I cancelled it. But if I wanted a land line they'd just need to switch me back on. So yes I am in access of a land line if I wanted one - but am a mobile phone only household.

This is exactly the point I was trying to get across earlier (I think ). In Finland it is quite possible to have a phone line running in to your house, but you don't have a landline number/account/access, but you can still run your ADSL through it. In some other countries, if you want to have ADSL, you must have BOTH a phone line running in to your house AND an activated landline number/account/access.

[sinikettu]

My opinion is that because most Swedes use Ericsson mobile phones, that are poor quality when compared to the Nokia products, unlike us they cannot rely on their mobiles so must retain their land lines.

(I now await my commision payment from the big glass house at Keilalahti 6 and cries of outrage from Jorvas )

[raamv]

This is exactly the point I was trying to get across earlier (I think ). In Finland it is quite possible to have a phone line running in to your house, but you don't have a landline number/account/access, but you can still run your ADSL through it. In some other countries, if you want to have ADSL, you must have BOTH a phone line running in to your house AND an activated landline number/account/access.

Without a Copper wire to your house/apt, you cannot DSL (ADSL, SDSL, etc) as that technology is dependent on this Loop!! This copper wire is the one that provides (or provided) your landline service. Most Finnish households have this wire even in new houses as well as in the sticks.
In really remote areas, There is a new technology deployed called OFDM which provides all of the voice and internet service without wires ( you only buy an expensive wireless card)
This OFDM technology is the one that will also be used for future high speed networks of tomorrow.
As for those copper wires, Only as recently as this year are some companies considering FTTC/H( Fiber to the curb or Home)

[Tiwaz]

This is exactly the point I was trying to get across earlier (I think ). In Finland it is quite possible to have a phone line running in to your house, but you don't have a landline number/account/access, but you can still run your ADSL through it. In some other countries, if you want to have ADSL, you must have BOTH a phone line running in to your house AND an activated landline number/account/access.

Without a Copper wire to your house/apt, you cannot DSL (ADSL, SDSL, etc) as that technology is dependent on this Loop!! This copper wire is the one that provides (or provided) your landline service. Most Finnish households have this wire even in new houses as well as in the sticks.
In really remote areas, There is a new technology deployed called OFDM which provides all of the voice and internet service without wires ( you only buy an expensive wireless card)
This OFDM technology is the one that will also be used for future high speed networks of tomorrow.
As for those copper wires, Only as recently as this year are some companies considering FTTC/H( Fiber to the curb or Home)

Yes, but having coppers coming to your house does not equal having fixed phone.

You can have ADSL without having any phone access in Finland. If you have ADSL but no phone contract you can't plug in phone to wall socket and dial out. And opposite, no ADSL contract and your ADSL modem can't connect from phone socket. They are separate services.

In some countries you need to order phone contract before being able to get ADSL contract.

If information is taken from register, you would then be flagged as person having line telephone even if you do not use it and only got it to have ADSL.

[raamv]

Yes, but having coppers coming to your house does not equal having fixed phone.

You can have ADSL without having any phone access in Finland. If you have ADSL but no phone contract you can't plug in phone to wall socket and dial out. And opposite, no ADSL contract and your ADSL modem can't connect from phone socket. They are separate services.

In some countries you need to order phone contract before being able to get ADSL contract.

If information is taken from register, you would then be flagged as person having line telephone even if you do not use it and only got it to have ADSL.

Read properly what I ve written before you start saying the same damn thing!!! Without that copper wire in the a¤¤ of your home, you can get neither... With the copper wire, its just a matter of "subscription"...

[Karhunkoski]

Look, let's get back to basics and start again.

But then you see that "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access" for Finland is 47%, while the Swedish figure is... wait for it... 0%.

How the hell do they arrive at figures like this, and why the hell don't they comment on the strangeness (read: the numbers suck) of it?

Firstly, let's assume "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access" is defined as "owning a mobile phone but not being able to make or receive telephone calls through a landline", it doesn't matter whether they have the copper wire there or not, it's whether they have an active telephone landline through which they can make or receive calls.

Possible scenarios:

Scenario A - Finland

Tom from Finland has a mobile phone. He also has a telephone landline wire coming into his house, however he doesn't have a contract with a telephone service provider to make and receive landline calls, he has no phone number of course. So under the survey criteria, he is in the "Households having mobile phone access but no "fixed telephone access"" group, part of the 47%. Under the Finnish system though, he can still have ADSL connected through his copper wire landline cable, even if he doesn't have a contract with a telephone service provider.


Scenario B - Sweden

Tor from Sweden has a mobile phone. He also has a telephone landline wire coming into his house. He asks his ISP to connect his ADSL through the wire. However.....and this bit you should read 3 times......the ISP turns to him and says, "Mr Tor, we want your business, yes, but UNDER THE SWEDISH SYSTEM, you must first have a contract with a telephone service provider (which will provide him with with a telephone number of course = "fixed telephone access" group under the survey criteria.). Only then can he have ADSL connected. So under the survey he cannot be counted as someone "with a mobile phone but with no fixed telephone access". Now if you assume that most people in Sweden who have a mobile phone either:

- have ADSL and therefore BY DEFAULT require a contract with a telephone service provider (and therefore cannot be included in the group, "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access" )

or

- live in an area where mobile phone coverage is poor and therefore choose to have a landline telephone, (even if they don't have ADSL) and therefore cannot be included in the group, "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access"


So there you have it, 0% of people in "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access"

But in Finland, where it is quite possible to have ADSL without the requirement to have "fixed landline telephone access" (=a contract with a telephone company, a landline number, etc)....so there are 47% in the group, "Households having mobile phone access but no fixed telephone access"

[Karhunkoski]

Yes, but having coppers coming to your house does not equal having fixed phone.

You can have ADSL without having any phone access in Finland.

Thank feck for that, thank you Tiwaz. I hereby award you the "Star of the Day on FF" for appearing to be the only person who has understood what I've been trying to say. The rest of you get "Plank of the Week".

/ breathes huge sigh of relief that at least someone has grasped this fundamental fact. L

Let's hear it again for Tiwaz

Yes, but having coppers coming to your house does not equal having fixed phone.

You can have ADSL without having any phone access in Finland.