grandpinaple
join:2006-01-03
New York, NY
| reply to Warez_Zealot
Re: Crazy
Let me illustrate the cycle for you:
Early 20th century government intervention -> Telco wiring monopoly
Late 20th century government intervention in the form of franchise agreements and exclusive MDU deals -> cable monopoly
Telco + fiber + cable = duopoly, which means it isn't hard for the industries to collude on a psychological level and keep prices stable and churn low
Recently there has been some more turbulence between cable and telco, but this is in part due to Martin who is a Telco shill.
Duopoly that provides internet and TV = conflict of interest as TV can go directly through the internet.
Lack of more than 2 competitors in market = easy for internet providers who also have lucrative TV monopolies/duopoly can screw with 3rd party TV traffic over the internet.
Solution = 1) more government intervention to force net neutrality (doomed to failure eventually unless legislation is temporary oh say 20 years until the internet providers are comfortable as being dumb pipes and will be reluctant to go back to the old content provider business model)
Solution = 2) Cable companies and telcos or in other words the EXACT same thing since they both use high bandwidth medium to deliver media services realize that if they push their one way content cartel on the consumer it will backfire either in the form of net neutrality legislation or if they choose not to screw with traffic they will simply be destroyed (as TV providers) by the free market as 3rd party companies start deals with channels like ESPN to offer IP streamed content. I'm not sure how viable this will be as cable companies are still the largest in terms of Voip holdings, but partly because it is difficult to get things fixed when you have multiple companies as each points the finger on the other.
Internet service companies can still make big profits if they just move the charge of cable over to internet and offer tiered services.
Say 400/100 at 140 dollars per month for those who want TV from a 3rd party company (channels will cost next to nothing in this scenario because of vicious competition by IPTV upstarts).
You would still be able to buy cable TV from your cable company.
I think the problem right now might be that cable companies work on the over subscription model and gouge customers, they wouldn't like it if the tables were turned. |
