" I'd say the MSO's have a vested interest in making sure the retail model for cable modem sales fails. They need to be completely in control of the subscriber additions and the rate they are added."
Do you actually think that they are that calculating? Stated another way, are they admitting these inevitabilities "to themselves?" The 7-11 analogy was a fitting one, IMO.
As a tech-head I have to admit that I feel a certain level of empathy for the design and engineering staff. A tremendous amount of time (as you noted) and work went into the HFC/DOCSIS model. As we contemplate a solution for the pending calamity we've come to call congestion, in the way of a Lightwire-like configuration (far fewer homes passed per node than current templates allow), we hear of cutbacks on HFC improvements by T.
This is only a temporary state of affairs, they've stated. I'm not so sure about that. If they lose their momentum and their drive to do the right thing now, given T's present financial and structural dilemmas, upcoming quarters will be no less demanding and they will forego those improvements indefinitely. Especially if they get their initial subscriber numbers posted before the real crunch hits. Then they've got you.
I'm already contemplating the ways in which the MSOs will resort to a 10GbE approach, probably by using some of those spare singlemode fibers in the distribution cable between the Head End and the field node. Of course, that's not where the real problems are. The root of HFC's problems, as it is now constituted, stem from a near-obsolete RF modulation scheme and black coax, in that order, and a spectrum plan that must, by design, match. |
