The number of consumers bypassing the traditional phone network and opting for Internet voice service is soaring beyond expectations.
An analysis by the TeleGeography research group found 2.7 million subscribers nationwide in the second quarter, compared with just 440,000 a year earlier.
I’ve used Packet8 for a couple of years – quite successfully.
Boston’s Logan International Airport is trying to kill Continental Airlines enlightened free WiFi service.
But don’t worry – Congress is on the case. It dropped everything last week to pass a bill to protect gun makers from shooting victims’ lawsuits. The fact that the U.S. has fallen to 16th in the world in broadband connectivity aroused no interest. Look, I don’t even like cellphones, but this is not about gadgets. The world is moving to an Internet-based platform for commerce, education, innovation and entertainment. Wealth and productivity will go to those countries or companies that get more of their innovators, educators, students, workers and suppliers connected to this platform via computers, phones and P.D.A.’s.
A new generation of politicians is waking up to this issue. For instance, Andrew Rasiej is running in New York City’s Democratic primary for public advocate on a platform calling for wireless (Wi-Fi) and cellphone Internet access from every home, business and school in the city. If, God forbid, a London-like attack happens in a New York subway, don’t trying calling 911. Your phone won’t work down there. No wireless infrastructure. This ain’t Tokyo, pal.
I’ve seen no serious movement on true 2 way broadband in Wisconsin. We’re stuck with slow service, unfortunately.
The Economist takes a look at the incumbent telco’s ill advised expensive IPTV plans (turning 2 way broadband internet into a one way TV dump) and the possible, subtle methods used to derail competitors:
Stoyan Kenderov, an IPTV expert at Amdocs, a firm that makes back-office software for telecoms companies, says that the telecoms firms are building into their residential gateways new technology that will inspect the packets of zeros and ones passing through. This will let them identify traffic from third-party rivals, which might then end up at the back of the queue and thus be slow and patchy. The only hint that users might have of that going on, says Mr Kenderov, would be some very fine print on their bills explaining, in turgid legalese, that the provider guarantees the quality of its own services only.
The telecoms firms counter such suggestions with well-rehearsed indignation. In a hearing before the judiciary committee of America’s Senate in March, Edward Whitacre, SBC’s chairman, said in emphatic Texan that “SBC would not block any Vonage traffic or anybody else’s and has never done that, would not do that. That’s not the way we do business, and it’s just not going to happen.”
IF Racine, Wis., is not yet the Hamptons of the Midwest, it’s not for lack of effort.
This formerly gritty industrial city roughly 70 miles north of Chicago and 30 miles south of Milwaukee on the shores of Lake Michigan has been trying for much of the last decade to reinvent itself as an artist’s colony and tourist destination.
The efforts have included the opening of the $11 million Racine Art Museum on Main Street in 2003 and the creation of a gallery district centering on nearby Sixth Street, currently home to about a dozen galleries.
Racine Map. Madison based Gorman & Company, developer of the Mitchell Wagon Factory Lofts is mentioned in Sharoff’s article.
Racine is considering county-wide WiFi. Perhaps they’ll have it in place before we Madisonians do?
TDS Metro’s Jim Butman and Drew Petersen raise many useful questions regarding the proposed SBC/AT&T merger:
The proposed purchase of AT&T by SBC has the potential to demonstrably alter the way a majority of our state’s commercial and residential telecommunications customers conduct their daily affairs. For most urban U.S. consumers today, especially residential and small business patrons, the communications market is rapidly deteriorating into a duopoly dominated by the Bells and cable operators. Wisconsin, however, due to a fledging economy and classic entrepreneurial spirit, is fortunate to have some very credible competitive alternative providers operating in the state’s more urban markets like Madison, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Waukesha, Janesville, Kenosha and Racine.
Competition in the telecommunications industry has done wonders for consumers and businesses across Wisconsin, resulting in small business savings of roughly 30 percent annually. Competitors have led the way in accelerating the deployment of world-class technology such as high-speed Internet and the provisioning of outstanding services at value-based pricing. Competition benefits anyone that has selected an alternative provider and even those who have not.
LaFayette, LA will soon start constructing a municipal fibre network (a citywide referendum passed Saturday). Madison, unfortunately, continues to lage far behind in the broadband game.
Americans pay more for less broadband service than citizens of any other industrial country, and our take-up rate for fast Internet service is approaching Third World levels.
The reason? Lack of competition. Phone and cable networks, created under government control, have been made the private monopolies of corporate interests whose lobbyists dominate all capitals against the public interest.
David Isenberg has more.
David Isenberg: FTTH brings Democrats and Republicans together:
“In the U.S. Congress, both parties are enemies of Internet-based progress. The Republicans support the telcos and cablecos while the Democrats side with the Kontent Krabs.
In Lafayette, Louisiana, though, it is a different story, both parties support Lafayette’s Fiber to the Home municipal networking effort!
A joint, bipartisan letter to Lafayette’s voters, authored by the city’s Republican *and* Democratic leaders, says
I find it ironic that SBC, a regional “Baby Bell” and the dominant telco in Wisconsin, that makes its money on two way voice conversations and a growing data business would invest heavily in legacy one way media (more cable TV). SBC is offering customers bundling deals with satellite tv providers along with their Yahoo DSL service. [Stephanie Mehta’s article]:
Whitacre may well be honing his schmoozing skills for his newest—and unlikeliest—role: aspiring media mogul. In a few short months, SBC will unveil what it hopes will be the ultimate weapon in the war between cable and the Bells—a high-tech TV service that Whitacre insists will offer viewers as many channels as they currently receive from regular cable and then some. SBC has anted up $4 billion just to get its network ready to offer the service, known as Internet protocol TV, or IPTV, and it will spend additional hundreds of millions to acquire TV content. But much more is at stake: SBC’s future as a major player.
Ironically, and with perfect timing, it appears that true high speed fiber networks are starting to appear (The US lags well behind other countries on broadband costs and performance).
SBC, in trying to become a TV player when there is little meaningful growth in that market, evidently refuses to spend the money required to upgrade its network (keep in mind that we, the ratepayers, paid for the copper network years ago). Why Yahoo, ironically, a major beneficiary of the two way web, would spend any brand capital on this is a mystery.
SBC, in an effort to keep the cash flowing for these forays, still requires that the purchaser sign up for traditional phone service as a tax on the dsl product. This is a blatant attempt to stifle VOIP service across sbc dsl service.
Meanwhile, IEEE Spectrum says goodbye to AT&T (SBC plans to acquire what’s left of AT&T).
Update: Bellsouth plans to accelerate their fibre rollout.