NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] Re: Subject: Re: [IP] "Entry level pricing"
In europe some businesses, which are natural monopolies, are run by private companies and their prices to end users are monitored by public agencies. for example, highways: the companies which run the highways can charge amounts authorised by the agency; these amounts are defined so that the profits have a nice return on invested capital (much lower than the ROIC of any risky business, anyway), after financing a set of developments, enhancements, maintenance, etc. that are requested by the agency. it quite works, when you cannot have real infrastructural competition. one problem is that the ONP (Open Network Provision which opened the Telco market in europe back in the early 90s) was based on idea that a sustainable infrastructure competition could have developed in the telco business and so the possibility to have this kind of concessions was ruled out. As now they have understood that infrastructure competition is not likely to happen (except in major metro areas) theres' an ongoing work in Brussels to try to define rules so that we can start evolving networks and remunerate them - something very difficult to achieve. In some countries, there's up to a 50% of the population who are not interested in the internet and they're closing their fixed line contracts to use just mobiles; furthermore, the EBITDA margin of POTS is significantly higher of that of DSL. As network costs are essentialy fixed, we face the risk of having, in some countries, over the time, a drop in the ebitda contribution which might be well over 60%, something very tough do deal with, given the debt levels telcos have accumulated in the last 10-15 years. no easy way ahead. ciao, s. ssc wrote: > The only problem with this idea, (and I personally like the concept) is > tax-and-spend munis will use this to fill their coffers, even more > voraciously than the mob cable and telco outfits. > You think taxes and surcharges are high now, wait till they get in this > business, the arrangement looks like a cash cow for them, as Internet is > NOT a necessity like water or sewer, thus they'll tax the crap out of it. > In reality the only way to promote better service and lower prices is > competition, and cable, telco and wireless should be included in the mix. > > Robert J Berger wrote: >> That was one of the most bogus and nonsensical responses I've seen in >> a long time. >> >> That's like saying, those who live in rural areas should not be >> concerned that they don't have electricity. >> >> And Shannon is not talking about being 100's of miles from some metro >> area. She's somewhere in the realm of 15 - 20 miles from the heart of >> Silicon Valley and just off a major road. I'm less than 10 miles from >> the heart of Silicon Valley and only 3 miles from the heart of >> Saratoga CA and less than 2 miles to an AT&T U-Verse VRAD or the >> Comcast cable plant and have no choice of any high speed Internet. >> >> My company is literally in the heart of Silicon Valley (Mt. View, near >> the corner of El Camino Real and San Antonio Rd in the same complex >> where Interop had their original offices) and the best Internet >> connection we can get is 3Mbps down and 500kbps up DSL. We can't even >> use that to do remote work on our computers at work and the overall >> thruput is severely limited by the ridiculously low upstream bandwidth. >> >> When I talk to Comcast to see if we could get their service they won't >> consider bringing service in for less than $10,000. >> >> If its this bad in Silicon Valley, what is it like 20 miles out of >> most third tier cities in the US? >> >> We make sure that there are roads, water and electricity to most >> people in the US. High Speed Internet is now a critical element to >> economic viability and growth. Why is it considered ok not to have >> world class connectivity to most people in the US? >> >> China hasn't stopped building out hight speed internet to their lesser >> cities. The US is now behind Lithuania in broadband deployment. >> >> Its because we allowed the CableTelcos to re-monopolize the >> fundamentals of electronic communication and to have completely >> captured their regulators. Its time for proper divestiture. AT&T aka >> SBC, the company that accumulated the capital to buy the other Bells >> by not building infrastructure and Comcast who is more interested in >> extending their content control by buying NBC than building >> infrastructure are obviously not going to fix that. >> >> And we the taxpayers and ratepayers should not be giving these >> oligopolies government money based on promises by the oligopolists to >> build more networks. That has not worked for all the other billions of >> dollars given directly or thru rate changes to the Telcos for similar >> promises. >> >> Its time to structurally separate content from transport. Transport, >> particularly "First/Last mile" needs to be treated as a "common good" >> like roads, sewers and water. Built and operated by municipalities >> and/or regulated monopolies. Note this would be just the physical >> plant, not the Internet service. Just the rights of way, conduit, >> utility poles and dark fiber. It would be the substrate for a vibrant >> marketplace of services on top of the physical plant that would be >> leased at prices based on 20 - 50 year amortizations in open access. >> >> This is where government bailout money should be going (along with >> renewable energy infrastructure, but that's another story). We need to >> be building the infrastructure for our future. Not stuffing the >> wallets of cronies and corporate campaign contributors. >> >> __________________ >> Robert J Berger >> http://blog.ibd.com >> >> On Oct 2, 2009, at 7:27 PM, nnsquad-request@nnsquad.org wrote: >> >>>> Begin forwarded message: >>>> >>>> From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> >>>> Date: October 1, 2009 10:29:40 PM EDT >>>> To: shannonm@gmail.com >>>> Cc: dave@farber.net >>>> Subject: Re: [IP] "Entry level pricing" >>>> >>>> Shannon McElyea <shannonm@gmail.com> wrote: >>>>> I have hughesnet -- the only carrier to serve where I live. It's >>>>> expensive horrible and a threshold of 300 mb per day and if you go >>>>> over it throttles to almost nothing for 48 hours!! Try getting any >>>>> work done with that. >>>> My wife works in Mountain View and takes highway 101 to work -- the >>>> only highway to serve where we live. The gas prices are expensive; the >>>> commute is horrible and the traffic throttles to almost nothing for 48 >>>> minutes!! Try getting any work done with that. >>>> >>>> Nevertheless, we still live in a non-rural part of the SF bay area >>>> because the benefits outweigh the costs. It's true that we have much >>>> faster Internet connections than you do, but I suspect that you have >>>> cleaner air and cheaper acreage. >>>> >>>> If all you care about is speedy Internet access, there are plenty of >>>> new lofts in San Francisco that will be happy to give you 100 MB/sec+ >>>> rates with no caps for a dollar a day. >>>> >>>> I know I'm being a little cute, but there are some important issues >>>> here: If you live in a low-population-density rural area where your >>>> only choice is HughesNet satellite service, should IPers living in >>>> high-density Manhattan condos be taxed to subsidize running fiber to >>>> the hinterboonies? And maintaining it after storm damage? If it's not >>>> economically feasible to wire your house at a profit, who will (or >>>> should) subsidize faster service for you? I know you didn't call for >>>> such measures, but other IPers have. >>>> >>>> BTW, it looks like you might be able to upgrade from the "Pro" to the >>>> "Elite" plan and boost your cap from 300 MB to 500 MB: >>>> http://consumer.hughesnet.com/faq/fair-access-policy.cfm >>>> >>>> -Declan >>>> >> -- blog.quintarelli.it www.eximia.it www.reeplay.it