Hostage Negotiations > Typical Telco market manipulation

reply to oliphant5

Re: Typical Telco market manipulation

No it's when they mindlessly defend the telcos no matter how much evidence is presented countering their claims. They choose to ignore it and move on to the next red herring just to be shot down again...and again...and again. Boogie74 has a LONG history of this nonsense even going so far as to claim that telcos don't take price increases.

It's one thing to feel that ILECs shouldn't have to complete, but to defend them no matter how wrong they are is shilling. I'm favorable to cable companies, but there are no shortage of posts from me complaining about bundling penalties, lack of content competition and price hikes. In fact the topic of this thread (which I started) BEGINS with a slam of my cable provider Comcast, whom I'm very content with. I like Comcast, but I don't hesitate to slam them when I think they're doing wrong by their customers. The same goes for VoIP. I love my Vonage service, but when they started up with the junk fees, not only did I bitch about it here, I cancelled virtual numbers and my fax line over it. I'm also bashing them about 911 faults. That's objectivity.

You can be telco leaning without being a shill so long as the person acknowledges when market manipulation and anti-competitive trade practices occur.

But if you sit there and make claims like they never take price increases, don't take money from the gov't to build infrastructure or other wild claims and just shill for them no matter how wrong they are or how ever much they screw over customers...well...I'm going to call them a shill 'cause that's what they are.

It's about objectivity...and shills like Boogie have none.
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-- Munis Killed the Telco Star -- Powered by Barry McKockenner Racing in association with Jack Mikkokov Motorsports
[text was edited by author 2003-10-29 11:10:30]

I see your point and it is very reasonable to me. I just don't want to get wrapped up with the same tag on that. I do think that both the ilecs and the clecs are wrong on different levels about different things. I personally dis-like all the phone companies because they make my life miserable everyday in some form or fashion. But, until something better comes along and someone else starts to sign my paycheck then I will do what I have to to survive. I have had the unique position to see quite a bit in the wholesale market and have had the opportunity to see a lot of things behind the scenes.
Now, do I think there should be competition amongst the companies? Very much so. That is in the best interest of the consumer. I do think that the ilecs should have to lease out facilities as it would just clutter the market if everyone had to place their own out there. Should an ilec be forced to provide a service in an area to an end user that does not have service with them? No, they shouldn't be forced. But, they should be willing to do so so they can make some money off of the service they spent so much to install rather then just leave it sitting there. I don't think there should be a penalty from telco's or cable co's alike if you subscribe to data and not pots/standard tv. If I buy a car from Ford/Chevy/Nissan or whoever, the car is the same price if I take the extended warranty or not.
If I ran the phone company, the products I offer would be available to everyone that is within the specifications for that service regardless of whether or not they have phone service thru my company or someone else. I don't make money on my product if it stops at the dslam/xbox.
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Spandex - it's a privilege not a right....

I think we agree on many things. But I approach it this way. Should telcos be forced to deploy? No, but they shouldn't then be permitted to sue a muni (like CenturyTel did) when they do deploy in their stead. Do I think there would be bundling requirements for unrelated services? No, it's anti-competitive and it abuses their market position in one industry (ISP) to affect another (POTS). This is no different that what Microsoft got busted for. To me, voice and data are two completely separate services. It's not like voice-mail and voice where there is an obvious requirement to have voice service before you can get caller ID or voice-mail from them. I'm also of the mind that the way to level the playing field isn't to kill off the clecs, but force cable competitors to do the same, open their lines to content competition like Time Warner does. Both Comcast and Time Warner do it in select markets and if they want to continue getting franchise rights, municipalities should force them to open their infrastructure to content competition. I also think the cable bundling is bull crap. You should have to pay $15 more for one service when you don't want another? No way. Comcast is a C.I.P. You pay the $15 penalty if you want HSI and no CATV, but there is no such penalty if you want CATV but not HSI. That to me is crap. It's not about saving money by getting more services since it obviously doesn't work in both directions. It's about Comcast abusing their market position in HSI to compete against satellite with their often substandard and more often overpriced CATV services.

So long as telcos take money from the government and are granted these monopoly rights and easements, then they should have to follow the rules which include those which curb anti-competitive behavior like forcing someone to buy an unrelated service (local toll service) in order to get a completely different service (ADSL).
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-- Munis Killed the Telco Star -- Powered by Barry McKockenner Racing in association with Jack Mikkokov Motorsports
[text was edited by author 2003-10-29 11:56:45]