The China market:
China Telecom is first among equals
redherring.com
"China started laying masses of fiber-optic cable in the mid-'90s. According to Mr. Robinson, the country is installing the equipment equivalent of a regional Baby Bell each year. A 1999 report by consultancy KMI, based in Rhode Island, says China's fiber-optic network, measured in fiber kilometers, made up 8.3 percent of the world's total in 1996. That climbed to 12 percent in 1998 and is projected to reach nearly 14 percent by 2004.
Much of the optical backbone uses synchronous digital hierarchy transmission technology, but China is also aggressively rolling out dense-wavelength division multiplexing as well. It is one of the first countries after the United States to do so, with planned upgrades of its optical transmission systems from 20 Gbps to 40 Gbps. "What's happening in China, technologically, is definitely not third-world standards," Mr. Robinson says. "The management may be backward, but the technology is cutting-edge.""
The downside, if you are a consumer, is that Big Brother is surfing the net:
"To reach the global Internet, hundreds of domestic ISPs must connect with one of these nine providers, which then connect with the outside world. The government issues ban lists to the national providers to block undesirable sites like CNN.com, the New York Times on the Web, Washingtonpost.com, and sites related to the Falun Gong.
Regulations on Internet companies, published October 1, seem to signal at least a temporary victory for hard-liners eager to restrict the flow of information. The new rules more tightly limit foreign investment, require strict surveillance against "subversive" content, and threaten to close down unlicensed firms.
Mr. Dewoskin points out that beyond the censorship issues, the government's desire to maintain control over the international gateways imposes enormous overhead. Data entering China is routinely diverted to government security bureau servers and scanned for undesirable content, adding delays and costs.
According to a Beijing-based engineer, the network is regularly shut down. In other words, the government can -- and does -- exercise control." |
