[133933] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Some truth about Comcast - WikiLeaks style
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jeffrey S. Young)
Mon Dec 20 12:19:55 2010
In-Reply-To: <4D0EE8AD.7030706@gmail.com>
From: "Jeffrey S. Young" <young@jsyoung.net>
Date: Mon, 20 Dec 2010 12:19:50 -0500
To: JC Dill <jcdill.lists@gmail.com>
Cc: NANOG list <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
On 20/12/2010, at 12:25 AM, JC Dill <jcdill.lists@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 19/12/10 8:31 PM, Chris Adams wrote:
>> Once upon a time, JC Dill<jcdill.lists@gmail.com> said:
>>> Why not open up the
>>> market for telco wiring and just see what happens? There might be 5 or
>>> perhaps even 10 players who try to enter the market, but there won't be
>>> 50 - it simply won't make financial sense for additional players to try
>>> to enter the market after a certain number of players are already in.
>> Look up pictures of New York City in the early days of electricty.
>> There were streets where you couldn't hardly see the sky because of all
>> the wires on the poles.
>>=20
> Can you provide a link to a photo of this situation?
>>> And there certainly won't be 50 all trying to service the same neighborh=
ood.
>> And there's the other half of the problem. Without franchise agreements
>> that require (mostly) universal service, you'd get 50 companies trying
>> to serve the richest neighborhoods in town,
>=20
> No you wouldn't. Remember those diminishing returns. At most you would l=
ikely have 4 or 5. If you are player 6 you aren't going to spend the money t=
o build out in an area where there are 5 other players already - you will bu=
ild out in a different neighborhood where there are only 2 or 3 players. Th=
en, later, you might buy out the weakest of the 5 players in the rich neighb=
orhood to gain access to that neighborhood when player 5 is on the verge of g=
oing BK.
>=20
> It's also silly to think that being player 6 to build out in a "richer nei=
ghborhood" would be a good move. The rich like to get a good deal just like=
everyone else. (They didn't *get* rich by spending their money unwisely.)
>=20
> As an example, I will point people to the neighborhood between Page Mill R=
oad and Stanford University, an area originally built out as housing for Sta=
nford professors. They have absolutely awful broadband options in that area=
. They have been *begging* for someone to come in with a better option. Th=
is is a very wealthy community (by US national standards) with median family=
incomes in the 6 figures according to the 2000 census data.
>=20
> Right now they can only get slow and expensive DSL or slightly faster and a=
lso expensive cable service.
>=20
> The city of Palo Alto has sonet fiber running right along the edges of thi=
s neighborhood. (see, http://poulton.net/ftth/slides.ps.pdf slide 18.)
>=20
> It's a perfect place for an ISP to put in a junction box and build a local=
fiber network to connect these homes with fiber to the Palo Alto fiber. Bu=
t apparently the regulatory obstacles make it too complicated. THAT is what=
I'm talking about above. Since the incumbents don't want to provide improv=
ed services, get rid of those obstacles, let new players move in and put in s=
ervice without so many obstacles.
>=20
> jc
>=20
>=20
>=20
Having lived through the telecom bubble (as many of us did) what makes you b=
elieve that player 6 is going to know about the financial conditions of play=
ers 1-5? What if player two has a high-profile chief scientist who, on a sp=
eaking circuit, starts telling the market that his bandwidth demands are gro=
wing at the rate of 300% per year and players 6-10 jump into the market with=
strong financial backing? While I believe in free-market economics and I w=
ill agree with you that the situation will eventually sort itself out; thous=
ands of ditch-diggers and poll-climbers will lose their jobs, but this is "t=
he way of things." =20
I do not agree that the end-consumer should be put through this fiasco and I=
am confident that the money spent digging more ditches and stringing more u=
gly overhead cables would be better spent on layers 3 and more importantly o=
n services at layers 4-7. =20
My perception of the current situation in the USA? We have just gone throug=
h an era in which the FCC and administration defined "competition" as having=
more than one provider able to provide service (200 kb/s or better) within a=
zip code. A zip code can cover quite a large area. This left the major pl=
ayers to their own devices and we saw them overbuild TV and broadband servic=
es into the more lucrative areas (because as established providers they actu=
ally do have a pretty good idea of the financial condition of their competit=
ors within an area). Quite often 'lucrative' did not equal affluent, lucrat=
ive is more a measure of consumption (think VoD) than median household incom=
e. The point is that the free-market evolution of broadband has produced a p=
atchwork of services that is hard to decipher and even harder to influence. =
The utopian solution (pun intended) would be to develop a local, state, fe=
deral system of broadband similar to the highway system of roads. Let those=
broadband providers who can compete by creating layer 3 backbones and servi=
ces at layers 4-7 (and layer 1-2 with wireless) survive. Let the innovation c=
ontinue at layers 4-7 without constant saber-rattling from the layer 1-2 pro=
viders.
And as a byproduct we can stop the ridiculous debate on Net Neutrality which=
is molded daily by telecom lobbyists.=
