Sprint's PTT, aka a return to 8-track tapes: Are you kidding me?

Implications: In general, I think Sprint has made a never-ending flow of tragic mistakes since their merger with Nextel.  But I rarely see a mistake so obviously devoid of consumer misunderstanding that a PTT revival.  These guys need a suitor, fast.

Analysis: Sprint promised the world that they would roll out Push to Talk ... about 5 years ago.  And Cingular, now AT&T, rolled it out at that time as well. 

Do you know what the reception was to Cingular's PTT offering -- admittedly not as strong as the Nextel offering due to a time lag?  A peaceful day in the meadows or my father fly fishing on a mountain river seems aporpos.

No one cared then.  Why would anyone care now?

The technology underlying their offering doesn't matter.  Mass advertising around a feature as dated as PTT will be like an 8 Track tape campaign.  (I almost said a music record campaign, but there is a subtle coolness to such a release that is not present in a PTT campaign.

The public has moved on.  Away from PTT.  Now, we are incorporating SMS into immediate communication.  VoIP Talk applications and IM are gaining steam.  But, most of all, the trend is to ...

... smartphones ... and the mobile Internet.  Data is becoming king quickly, and the mobile phone is becoming more than just a phone.  Let alone a walkie-talkie.

PTT made sense to constuction personnel, to blue collar sects.  It made sense because it was a quick and convenient thing to replace their radios in the field.  How many mom's are walking around with walkie talkies waiting for the advent of PTT for the consumer sector.

This idea gets the big "what are they thinking" award.  Ever since the merger, Sprint Nextel has been so off on the consumer market.  They need to outsource its ideas elsewhere and work on fixing what it can save.

Or, better yet, sell what they can -- as they did with WiMax -- to a company that can do a better job with its assets.