, we wouldn't want to claim that you could go all the way from Krakow to San Fran- cisco without losing the call. There aren't enough cellular base stations in the Atlantic Ocean. And even if there were, you'd have to go by boat because, as we all know, cell phones must be turned off when an airplane is in flight. Downloaded from Digital Engineering Library @ McGraw-Hill (www.digitalengineeringlibrary.com) Copyright © 2004 The McGraw-Hill Companies. All rights reserved. Any use is subject to the Terms of Use as given at the website. General Cellular Standards General Cellular Standards have 3G cellular networks operational worldwide by the year 2000, but this did not happen. Significant large-scale deployment of 3G technology was just beginning in 2002. Let us look at the rate of deployment first and then turn to high-speed data ser- vices and the effort to create a unified world standard. 9.2.3.1 Slow deployment. Some of the reasons for the delay had to do with general market conditions: Almost everyone already has a cellular telephone. The GSM market is reaching satura- tion, according to GSM telephone manufacturers and service providers. Not that many people want to use data on their cell phones. Cell phones are for talking. Wireless networking for personal digital assistants (PDAs) in public places is not that es- sential. Most heavy mobile data users are satisfied with plugging in at a hotel, and within an organization, wireless local area networks (LANs) make a lot more sense than cellular systems. Since 2001, the slump in the economy has slowed both demand and supply. Initially, prices were way too high. New pricing plans, including flat-rate plans, are mak- ing cost more reasonable as of summer 2002. Among marketing people who promote technology, there is a general assumption that people will be as excited by the next enhancement to technology as they were by an earlier, truly revolutionary technology. This is unrealistic. Affordable portable cel- lular telephones were a real breakthrough with obvious, im