Jay Eye Sea

Much has been written about the new Asus EEE laptop, causing some debate about whether it’s a new form factor or not. I think the new laptop is great - but I like to think of it as a “second car”, or companion to my desktop - not a replacement laptop.

I noted from a recent article “The Jonney Machine” in Forbes the quote:

“Asustek is also linking with mobile telecom companies to provide a 3g attachment, so users can be connected when Wi-Fi isn’t available.”

This got me thinking. What if I could buy the laptop with 3g and an unlimited data tariff?

Even accepting usage limitations on the data tariffs, T Mobile’s “Walk ‘n Web” tariff (£20 per month) is based upon 3Gb of usage - not substantially different from basic broadband tariffs in the UK.

Now that would be cool - an Asus EEE with always-on mobile Internet access.

If we take this a little further, a telco might subsidise the cost of the laptop for a 24 month contract - actually would they give the laptop away for free. This might seem a little excessive, but a Nokia N95 (retail price £375) is free on most £35 per month tariffs - and that’s almost double the retail price of the EEE.

Now clearly this might be attractive to the odd geek like me, but what about others? What about those who are less troubled by a moment away from an Internet connection?

The Asus EEE could provide users with 3G access to the internet and email. Apart from gaming, what else do non-geeks use computers for. The laptop and connection is self contained and therefore much easier to support - it costs £20 a month (versus £15 for ADSL) and a laptop thrown in for free.

For mobile telcos it would be a completely new revenue stream and you would effectively be paying £20 a month for the rest of your life - sounds like easy money to me.

Jon Bradford