As was rumored last week, T-Mobile, TEM and TIM will enter into a world wide Alliance. Sounds fine on paper but leaves much to guess at. Looks like a bunch of PTTs coming together against international operators, mainly Vodafone.

Implications for i-mode are unclear:
- will Telefonica abandon its planned introduction this quarter?
- covering France implies either Bouygues coming on board (which means another operator abandoning i-mode?), or Orange joining (SFR has a minority investment by Vodafone, does not use Vodafone's products, but carrying the Alliance's products seems a stretch too far).

How will the partners pull off the technical challenges?

How about the recently launched campaign for T-Mobile's 't-zones'? ("What will you start?")