Reviews:
 ·Optimum Online
 ·Verizon FiOS
| The majority are content providers. There was this paradise idea proposed in telecommunications regulatory reform called: recirocal competition for telco & cableco alike. Cable companies get into Phone Service & internet. Telcos get into cable and develop residential internet. For the longest time, cable companies had the decisive advantage because telco's reluctance, foot dragging, technology blunders and franchise snafu's along the way. It's only as far back as 2003 that Verizon finally put it's money where it's mouth was on "we'll get there" with dsl and changed tracks for FTTP. FIOS is not ideal, but it's as close as you can get because with a bigger telco, you get greed multiplied by the number of companies Verizon is comprised of.
Verizon must walk a fine line here.. they are making money hand over fist in their FIOS internet. Yet, they now sell cable-tv so they're in the content business. They're doubling down on LTE wireless and other projects.. that's alot on their plate.. then bang, a recession hits! They took a very long time to change tracks on POTS over fios as well.. but not too late IMO.
Cable companies actually do have alot to worry about because their core business is selling / reselling content, and it's been hard to figure out how to diversity, specialize and increase revenue without alternative sources such as WIRELESS. The remaining players such as Tmobile, Sprint and Prepaid carriers whom buy surplus network time at wholesale.
That's the state of the market today, but cable must find new ways of bringing in the dollars or they will just have to go Toe to Toe with telco in a broadband war. A war cable loses due to the fact that the killer app is probably going to be unpaid video content. Telco has 4 services it sells, while cable has only 3. Companies such as Cablevision see the future and that does mean having a wireless service in the future, but Sprint and/or Tmobile won't play ball.
Notice I don't discuess Qwest, because by 2010, they'll either be bankrupt, or a sub company of AT&T, with certain assets going to Verizon (you know how these anti-trust things work). Yep, I said it.. you will have 2 major telcos and a handful of cable companies. The worker & consumer will be screwed, because qwest will be last on the Uverse list (with the exception of cherry picked major density metro areas).
It is VERY UNLIKELY that FTTP/H will be a reality for a majority of residential customers. Verizon may just turn a corner in the next 10 years and be what they should have begun what they're doing now 6 years ago (an all IP network with FIOS Internet, VOIP Phone, Wireless, and Cable-Tv in relative order of importance to their long term survival).
I do not feel that cable will get their act together in time for companies like telcos to create the perfect monopoly storm, though Cablevision will give them a good run for their money before TWC come a'callin. The same chance Verizon is taking to begin abaondoning POTS is needed to diversify into a wireless multimedia provider. The longer they wait, the better chance a deal will become something like what TWC did with AOL (AOHELL). |
