[opendtv] Re: Broadband backwater

Craig Birkmaier wrote:

> The best way to achieve the goal that both Bert and
> I seem to desire would be real competition in
> telecommunications across all digital media. But the
> regulatory environment has not been conducive to this.

The Supreme Court seems to be even-handed about having
third parties use the last mile connection. In the 1996
Telecom act, the idea was to open the telco local loop
to service provider competition. But that took away any
incentive the telcos had to upgrade their expensive last
mile(s) of cable plant to homes. As was easy to predict
at the time, IMO. So subsequent to 1996, this opening
of the local loop was not enforced.

The recent ruling on cable systems is consistent with
that. As if to say, "we saw that opening the local loop
doesn't work, so we won't push it on cable either."

One might deduce that one reason cable systems upgraded
their plants sooner than telcos was that cable systems
had not previously been threatened with having to open
their local loops to competing service providers.

Let's see if WiMax providers get into this competition.

> The telcos are running into local walls that make it
> nearly impossible to deploy the services that are
> described in the article that Bert posted. Given the
> current requirement that a telco must negotiate a
> franchise for each market where it wants to compete
> with cable, it could take a decade or longer for the
> telcos to become a competitive factor in TV services.

This is the same thing. The rules that apply to the
incumbent, cable, are being applied to the new guy,
telco IPTV. Perhaps franchise negotiations should be
dropped all around, then. Just as voice telephony
rules and mandates are dropped, when VoIP is deployed.

> The government does not need to subsidize broadband
> to bring prices down and availability up. They just
> need to get out of the way, and stop protecting the
> incumbents.

I think they are getting out of the way. In the case
of opening local loops and of deregulating VoIP
telephony, the govt is clearly stepping aside. That
fact is, deploying broadband isn't cheap, especially
if you have to provide service to individual homes
rather than dense housing complexes, and rural
communities in addition to urban settings.

Bert

 
 
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