Ray, have you ever watched MS NBC on T.V.? Wow what a dud,it on channel 72 here,is probably the most boring news channel I have seen. MSFT dose not have a corner on content,that for sure. Well those companies ran like monopolies,now competition is licking at their heels. I still think fiber will win out in the long run,HFC is a good bridge to an all optical network someday. But a lot of telephone backbone is fiber,especially GTE and enhanced with WDM. I believe Erbium doped fiber amplifiers really changed the landscape,just as ADSL will change how copper is viewed. TCI deserves to lose customers,and those 80,000 people are talking quite loudly. COX and TWX are moving rapidly ahead as is Continental with HFC systems,2-way cable in the U.S.,the RBOC's also see that they must innovate to stay ahead of competition. There are too many devolopments for anyone to feel secure,data communication is rapidly innovating. TWX's HFC deployments have been to big,too fast,but they are learning from their mistakes. Continental is doing the best job with implementing its 2-way HFC systems,they are upgrading Jacksonville,FL right now.Boston went well I here,I will be up there and check it out this year.
Speaking of utilities, I remember somewhere that a natural gas utility was putting in data lines(fiber) to resell to communications companies.
Tim |
