It's Time to Stop Buying the Capacity Crisis Myth → Comcast and ATT worst offenders

Of the Exaflood myth.

Yep. Until my iPhone is getting 56k speeds, I'm not buying it. My Fios at home is pretty much too fast for just about every web server I download content from.

Given the national data backbone is upgradable by switching out the gear at either end of the fiber runs, and the exaflood becomes as believable as the missile gap or the bomber gap... In 2012.....

Verizon's wireless is catching up fast. Consumers seem addicted to keeping POSTPAID accounts at any price. Millions of consumers now pay higher rates than wired networks for DATA which essentially is internet & ip newtwork access. In major metro areas.. they really don't have to because there are tons of wireless wifi spots they could use locally-- even for free VOIP over an android/ios tablet... even an unactivated smart phone with wifi capability-- and you have free 911 incase of a real emergency. There are more free hotspots than payphones around.. so if you can rollback your lifestyle to 15 years ago you can have free or dirt cheap data, internet AND voice calling without the cost of 15 years ago.

Before i got my iPhone 4 with grandfathered Verizon unlimited Data i tried using an iPod Touch. The free hotspots were NOT dependable . Some of them required an agreement page to be checked which the iPod touch did not support. Other "hot spots" were simply locked and required a password. For further laughs a Dunkin Donuts had a sign in the window Free WIFI with just below it NO LOITERING !!!! In other cases i could log onto the "free WIFI" however it was so congested it was NOT usable. Needless to say the "free WIFI experiment" i conducted FAILED and it was onto the iPhone for me.

I can't really go more than a 1/2 mile in NYC without finding an open free wifi hotspot. Maybe things are different in Rhode Island. YMMV (your mileage may vary) caveats apply.

There's no reason why some muni wireless coudln't fill in the gaps (MICRO REGIONAL WIRELESS ISP'S) left behind by Verizon, for example in West Virginia! Why should Verizon or AT&T be the only ones to put predatory pricing in place for wireless without competition? These things will have to happen at the state level, since the federal government is only interested in being manipulated by 3 industries: war, banks and oil-- regardless of party. It's just that the republicans will sell out the country's national interests for less than democrats will (at least that's current perception).

You forgot another big one. Hollywood with the likes of the MPAA, RIAA, etc. So make that 4.

That is an oversimplification.

Changing out even just the interface cards is really, really....REALLY expensive.

Say you are a service provider with 5 or 6 40G links between two cities. Your capacity has filled up because of stuff like over the top video and cloud access that you make no money on - you didn't get new customers and you don't have a new product line to generate revenue - but you still have to upgrade your backbone because you have to provide a consistent level of service so you decide to upgrade the links to a have 100G capacity...so 5 or 6 100G transponders at each end at around $100k and you just spent about $1.2 million!...

But wait, that's not all!...

Those runs are too long to not have ILAs or Regens and you have to upgrade their interfaces too....let's call it an even $5million at this point to make the math simple....and that's just one leg...if you are a backbone provider you probably have dozens of those to upgrade at the same time.

Great business to be in where you have to spend millions just to satisfy the existing revenue you are pulling in and there isn't any new money to pay for it.

I am not suggesting that caps or price increases are something I want as a user but to not recognize that their is a very real economic challenge to overcome here is naive and one sided

You do these things to keep customers and retain the margin you have. Just because an ISP has built a network doesn't mean they can just sit around and print money.

I wish I could convince my employer that since I've completed what I consider enough projects that they now owe me a liftetime salary.

If anyone has a job like this or runs a business like this, please enlighten me.

I was flipping channels the other night and paused on the Weather Channel (mainly because the reporter was someone who I find very attractive). It was a program about a new kind of "sand bag" that uses (I think) the same moisture absorbing stuff that's in feminine hygiene products and diapers. When they get wet, they expand to many times their former size. Hundreds of bags can quickly be deployed without any back-breaking labor. You can either wait for the rising water to expand the bags or take a garden hose and "activate" the bags. I was dumbfounded how simple the idea is and how effective it is to enable folks to easily buy, transport and RAPIDLY deploy flood barriers. Someone is pure genius.

They also showed large tubes much like the ones that corral oil on water except the tubes were filled with water. Instant dam.

These are examples of why we just can't sit on our rears and print money. Things change and it's natural to invest in your business to make sure it keeps pace with what your customers demand. Isn't this business 101?

Try using WiFi at 80mph on an Interstate Highway, 60 mph on your local parkway, or even 40 mph on city streets. You cannot do it yet. That is one reason we pay extra for cellular data plans, so we can really get information on the go.

I can barely use my "3G" service going 65 mph.

I use it on I-16 between Macon, Georgia and Savannah, Georgia. Average speed is 75mph. I also use it on I-75 between Macon and Atlanta. Average speed of 65 mph. I use a USB760 modem and a netbook to mainly surf the web for maps or business websites. Sometimes make reservations for river cruises or hotels. Obviously I am not driving and am a passenger, so I can deal with the occasional dead zone or overloaded tower between Atlanta and Macon. The problem usually lasts only about 1 minute. There are 5 spots along I-75 I know the signal will fail for 30 to 90 seconds. I just wait until we are through them. If I get permission from the vehicle owner/driver to put a magnetic external antenna on the roof of the vehicle, the signal loss problem is significantly reduced. Usually I just refresh the browser to reload a partially loaded website. I do not try to watch video because it does not work well enough to be enjoyable. Maybe when LTE is fully deployed I will try video watching.