<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 7:38 PM, Michael Mol <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mikemol@gmail.com">mikemol@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br><div class="im">
> Yes, there is DSL and cable in many areas,<br>
> but DSL competes on price, and cable of<br>
> performance. Sort of. i.e., there is no real<br>
> competition.<br>
<br>
</div>That doesn't parse...Would you care to elaborate?<br>
<br></blockquote><div>Not really, but since I brought it up,<br>AT&T has stated that 10 Mbps DSL,<br>where it can be had at all, is fast enough,<br>and doesn't intend to try to offer<br>anything faster for now. And clearly<br>
DSL has distance issues. It seems the<br>phone companies dominate the 768Kbps<br>region, which is much faster than<br>dialup, but not than the 16 Mbps and more<br>that Comcast and others offer.<br><br>The cable companies typically emphasize<br>
the high speed areas, where they can <br>charge techies and others who drool over<br>higher speeds a lot more. And of course<br>uses will be found for the higher speeds.<br>Just 25+ years ago people were asking<br>whether a PC was good for anything <br>
beyond balancing a checkbook, or storing<br>recipes on. Pre Internet stuff.<br><br>DSL could go a whole lot faster over <br>short distances, but clearly AT&T doesn't<br>care to play. Comcast could offer 45 Mbps<br>
over existing infrastructure if there was a<br>reason to - according to its CEO. And it<br>has technology on the shelf, using combined<br>channels, to get up to 160 Mbps or so.<br>Clearly Verizon can go arbitrarily fast using<br>
its FiOS package.<br><br>Anyway, that's the split I see. Two largely<br>none overlapping monopolies, probably <br>dictated by their respective cost structures.<br>They don't play much in each other's domains,<br>
and probably see no real reason to negotiate.<br>Competition would means there was performance<br>overlap, and price competition.<br><br> -- Bob<br><br></div></div>