This book presents insights, interpretations, concepts, and interdependent views-in the landscape of mobile connectivity and service-that emphasize the significance of a harmonious interplay, cooperation, and coalescing of a variety of interdisciplinary domains of science and art. Mobile Evolution: Insights on Connectivity and Service explores the forward-looking and enabling capabilities of mobile connectivity and service in the context of long term evolution (LTE) systems and multimedia services, as viewed through a lens of human experience. It provides information and guidelines pertaining to the strategies and technologies associated with the next-generation mobile ecosystem.

In less than a decade, mobile technology has revolutionized our cultures, societies, and economies by impacting both personal and professional aspects of human life. Mobile technology has therefore become the fastest diffusing technology in history, expanding and transforming existent possibilities by making technology accessible and ubiquitous. Emerging Perspectives on the Mobile Content Evolution seeks a better understanding of the centrality of mobile content in the recent and coming evolution of both the ICT ecosystem and the media industry. This publication appeals to a broad audience within the interdisciplinary field of media studies, covering topic areas such as journalism, marketing and advertising, broadcasting, information management, media management, media economics, media- and technology-related public policies, media sociology, audience/consumption studies, and arts. This publication presents a multi-disciplinary discussion through a collection of academic chapters covering topics such as mobile communications and entrepreneurship, reflection on wearables and innovation, personal and mobile healthcare, mobile journalism and innovation, and behavioral targeting in the mobile ecosystem.

A unique exploration of teleonomy—also known as “evolved purposiveness”—as a major influence in evolution by a broad range of specialists in biology and the philosophy of science. The evolved purposiveness of living systems, termed “teleonomy” by chronobiologist Colin Pittendrigh, has been both a major outcome and causal factor in the history of life on Earth. Many theorists have appreciated this over the years, going back to Lamarck and even Darwin in the nineteenth century. In the mid-twentieth century, however, the complex, dynamic process of evolution was simplified into the one-way, bottom-up, single gene-centered paradigm widely known as the modern synthesis. In Evolution “On Purpose,” edited by Peter A. Corning, Stuart A. Kauffman, Denis Noble, James A. Shapiro, Richard I. Vane-Wright, and Addy Pross, some twenty theorists attempt to modify this reductive approach by exploring in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution. Evolution “On Purpose” puts forward a more inclusive theoretical synthesis that goes far beyond the underlying principles and assumptions of the modern synthesis to accommodate work since the 1950s in molecular genetics, developmental biology, epigenetic inheritance, genomics, multilevel selection, niche construction, physiology, behavior, biosemiotics, chemical reaction theory, and other fields. In the view of the authors, active biological processes are responsible for the direction and the rate of evolution. Essays in this collection grapple with topics from the two-way “read-write” genome to cognition and decision-making in plants to the niche-construction activities of many organisms to the self-making evolution of humankind. As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”

After decades of liberalization of the telecommunications industry around the world and technological convergence that allows for increasing competition, sector-specific regulation of telecommunications has been on the decline. As a result, the telecommunications industry stands in the middle of a debate that calls for either a total deregulation of access to broadband infrastructures or a separation of infrastructure from service delivery. This book proposes new approaches to dealing with the current and future issues of regulation of telecommunication markets on both a regional and a global scale. This volume represents a valuable compendium of ideas regarding global trends in the telecommunications industry that focus on market and regulatory issues and company strategies. With an international cast of contributors, Regulation and the Evolution of the Global Telecommunications Industry also provides insight into topics including: mobile Internet development, structural function and separation, global experiences with next generation networks, technology convergence and the role of regulation, and the regulatory impact on the balance between static and dynamic efficiencies. The empirical evidence and experiences presented here illustrate the diversity of thoughts and research that characterize this important area of academic and business research. Thus, it will be a critical reference for scholars and students of regulatory economics, policy and finance and researchers and administrators of the telecom industry.

In the telecom world, services have usually been conceived with a specific mindset. This mindset has defined the traditional characteristics of these services; services distinguished by their linkage with the access network, tight control over service use (e.g., authentication, billing), lack of deep personalization capabilities (mass services only) and reliance on standardization to achieve end-to-end interoperability between all the actors of the value chain (e.g., operators, platform manufacturers, device manufactures). This book offers insights into this complex but exciting world of telecommunications characterized by constant evolution, and approaches it from technology as well as business perspectives. The book is appropriately structured in three parts: (a) an overview of the state-of-the-art in fixed/mobile NGN and standardization activities; (b) an analysis of the competitive landscape between operators, device manufactures and OTT providers, emphasizing why network operators are challenged on their home turf; and (c) opportunities for business modeling and innovative telecom service offers.

Syntheses of the geology of major areas of the Earth's crust are increasingly needed in order that the features of, and the problems associated with, the secular evolution of the continents can be understood by a wide audience. Southern Africa is fortunate in having a remarkable variety of geological environments developed without many breaks over 3. 8 Ga, and many of the rock groups are household names throughout the geological world. In one respect the geology of Southern Africa is particularly important: cratonization clearly began as early as 3. 0 Ga ago, in contrast to about 2. 5 Ga in most other continental areas such as North America. This book documents very well the remarkable change in tectonic conditions that took place between the Early and Mid-Precambrian; we have here evidence of the very earliest development of rigid lithospheric plates. This book is a tribute to the multitudes of scientists who have worked out the geology of Southern Africa over many years and decades. Whatever their discipline, each provided a step in the construction of this fascinating story of 3. 8 Ga of crustal development. In the book the reader will find a detailed review of the factual data, together with a balanced account of interpretative models without the indulgence of undue speculation. One of its attractions is its multidisciplinary approach which provides a stimulating challenge to the reader.