Telco Exec Gets Broadband In Market Snubbed For Years British Telecom Chairman upsets the apple cart by getting special treatement... In 2008, UK telco British Telecom announced a widely lauded plan to invest in "fiber" (to the node), though the specifics weren't particularly impressive when you looked a little closer, and the "fiber to the press release" announcement was more about getting a regulatory back rub from the British Government and lots of taxpayer subsidies. Upon inspection, British Telecom's plan still left a lot of potential customers out of reach of broadband. Unless of course you're a Chairman for British Telecom, in which case, as the Register notes, you get to take part in a special trial nobody else can participate in: Sir Michael Rake bought a home in the Oxfordshire village of Hambleden, near Henley-on-Thames, a year ago. One of his neighbours has been trying to get broadband installed for five years, even though Hambleden has been classified as a 'not spot' where the service is not available. 'At the moment we are trialling broadband enabling technology (BET) at 10 locations in the UK. We can confirm Sir Michael Rake is trialling BET at his home. The pilot is very small and involves a handful of users at this stage.' The fact that a British Telecom exec can suddenly get a "trial" of 1 Mbps SHDSL service in a town that's been asking for broadband for five years has apparently upset a lot of people, judging from the significant British news coverage of the snub. It's good to be the King.
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 geonaplolatidiots
join:2005-12-14
Glendale, CA
kudos:1 | funnies wow, i'd befriend him and convince him of other things i wanted.. if they dont have running water, they will probably build out an aqueduct for him | |
|  | | | Re: funnies now you know who is getting 50 megabit rogers
its not who you think
its actors , musicians , execs they know are rats and narcs | |
| | | | | Re: funnies "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
George Orwell, "Animal Farm" | |
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bgraham
join:2001-03-15
Smithtown, NY | When you are the boss you can do anything. I bet the CEO of a car company gets to drive any car he feels like. Whats the big deal. | |
| |  SabreDi relung hatiku bernyanyi bidadari
join:2005-05-17 | Re: When you are the boss you can do anything. Sure, there's nothing illegal about it, but someone in the company should have said "hey, this could be a big nasty PR hit if it gets out. Maybe we should think about this?"
It's a big deal because, rightly or wrongly, it makes them look bad. | |
| | Host:
Road Runner
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1 edit | said by bgraham:I bet the CEO of a car company gets to drive any car he feels like. Whats the big deal. He's driving his new car around a neighborhood his company, which holds the monopoly sales control over all "cars," supposedly doesn't want to sell cars in.
It's public relations idiocy. | |
| | | Reviews:
 ·Comcast
1 edit | Re: When you are the boss you can do anything. Yep, pure stupidity. I can't believe they can stand by and say a "rural" area outside London is unservicable...except for this guy. Like he just happens to sit in the one and only spot they could get service to.
Edit:
Also, if they are running a "trial" in the area (for him), why not the whole village? You're gonna spend money for one guy to get the service there... oh wait, it isn't profitable. Just convenient. | |
| | | | | said by Karl Bode:He's driving his new car around a neighborhood his company, which holds the monopoly sales control over all "cars," supposedly doesn't want to sell cars in. It's public relations idiocy. AFAIK anyone can LLU (i.e put a DSLAM in) any exchange they want, it doesn't depend on BT themselves having a DSLAM there first. I seem to recall a few exchanges in exactly that situation before BT decided to push the boat out when it came to DSLAM rollouts.
So it's more like "the only company that would be likely to sell cars in that area doesn't want to" | |
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|  BF69Premium
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN | said by bgraham:I bet the CEO of a car company gets to drive any car he feels like. Whats the big deal. The big deal is that the ISP has told the area they are not profitable enough to offer service ther now they are putting service ther? Well in at last one house. You don't see anything wrong with that? | |
| | |  MrMoodyFree range slavePremium
join:2002-09-03
Smithfield, NC | Re: When you are the boss you can do anything. Yes, this is the key: How much did that service cost him? Would anyone else living there be able to order that service at that price had he not been there? For anyone else to get service in an unserved area can cost well into the 5 digits to install and/or hundreds per month on a medium-term contract.
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Logical fallacy #237: Any change is always better than no change. | |
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| | SOP Don't employees normally trial new services?  | |
| |  JoeIacPremium
join:2009-03-02
MA
 ·Verizon FiOS
| Re: SOP said by mod_wastrel:Don't employees normally trial new services? i've heard rumors of employees trialing some very cool new services, but in this case i think it hits a nerve because they've been stalling the community for years, then a bigwig moves in and in a few months he has his own connection, while others have been in line for 5+ years.
I live in a neighborhood that was passed over by fios for 3 years because of our underground utilities, and if we got service installed because a verizon bigwig lived in the neighborhood i'm sure no one would have complained. but if they ran the fiber only to his house, stopped, and didn't sell the service to anyone else. Then we would have all had quite a problem. i think that's why people are mad, not because his moving in finally made some real progress, but because his moving in got him internet, and did absolutely nothing for everybody else. | |
| | | | | Re: SOP said by JoeIac:i've heard rumors of employees trialing some very cool new services, but in this case i think it hits a nerve because they've been stalling the community for years, then a bigwig moves in and in a few months he has his own connection, while others have been in line for 5+ years. ...hence my facetious "wink, wink" (though, still, not as kewl as the "fiber to the press" or the "not spot" hits  )
then again, how "very cool" is 1mbps anyway?  | |
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| dynodbPremium,VIP
join:2004-04-21
Minneapolis, MN | said by mod_wastrel:Don't employees normally trial new services? Yes. It's also normal for the employees to be senior management.
I understand the way this looks in terms of PR, but it's a quite ordinary practice in the telcom world. | |
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iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Golden, CO
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Comcast
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| Did anyone look up the definition of "SHDSL"? Guess not.
SHDSL is effectively a typical T1 without all the branding, SLAs, etc. Last I checked 1 Mbit SDSL (lower-grade tech than SHDSL) was about $200 per month around these parts, where broadband is plentiful.
So it's more like the owner of a WISP getting his own PtP wireless link that he doesn't share with anyone, or a telco exec getting a T1 to his house because he's too far out for DSL. The capacity of such a link is one subscriber, it's expensive stuff and I wouldn't go yelling and screaming about how it's not fair.
That said, if the guy got a FTTH feed direct to himself (large upfront cost, passes by other houses) I'd call things unfair. But it isn't that; it's just a plain old copper circuit with some expensive equipment on both ends.
Speaking of expensive equipment, anyone know whether this area is covered by 3G? I know it's not ADSL2+ and the UK's HSPA networks are pokier than EvDO over here for the most part, but it's better by far than nothing. | |
|  maartenaElmoPremium
join:2002-05-10
Orange, CA
kudos:1 | I don't care if it is fiber, copper or something else.... as long as I get my friggin 100 Mbps symetrical. Like next week. 
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"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" | |
| |  ParogadiWhat? Stop Looking At Me Like ThatPremium
join:2003-03-31
Racine, WI | Re: I don't care if it is fiber, copper or something else.... I'd be happy with 5Mbps/5Mbps FTTH just for the 0~1ms ping times... | |
| | | nickfie
join:1999-11-23
Wynnewood, PA | Re: I don't care if it is fiber, copper or something else.... FTTH does NOT guarantee low ping times. I have about 8 msec ping time to the Verizon router that connects my FiOS to the rest of the Internet.
This equates to over 100 miles of optical cable to cover less than 10 miles between my local exchange and Verizon's network hubs in Philadelphia.
I'll run a traceroute next time I'm home and attach it. | |
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