Hi Mike,
Thanks for the Tom Nolle article. It rings true.
As far as i-TV is concerned, you need to be a bit less blanket in your condemnation of government intervention, IMHO. With a change of administrations, we will see a change of the direction of policy at the FCC, FTC and DoJ.
For the most part, existing companies will benefit. MSFT comes to mind at DoJ. At FCC, Colin Powell's son will be handed Kennard's post, most likely. Mike Powell will be a tool for the ILECs. With FTC, you can expect a much greater leeway for mergers & acquisitions activities. Larger fish will be eating smaller fish, CLECs, with their oxygen cut off by the financiers, as Nolle described, will be lining up to put themselves on the auction block before their stub assets are totally worthless. It will be a period of brutal consolidation and a lot of broken dreams about competition.
As far as i-TV is concerned, I couldn't care less if it lives or dies. What is the point of it anyway? If you want to think and interact you use the Internet. Like we are doing here. If you want to vegetate and turn your mind off, you turn on the TV. Joe Six Pack couldn't give a hoot about interacting with his TV. Not until on-line betting on the sports events he's watching is made available. So, until I see this, or another killer app for i-TV, I can't imagine it having any real success. Just look at how far WebTV has come in the last 5 years. Exactly nowhere, from a revenue perspective.
Best, Ray |
