| TheStockFairy ain't exaggerating all that much: the barriers to getting high speed bandwidth through 'the last mile' are tall and wide. I've gone through a few dozen DSL installations, a couple of fixed wireless, a hand full of cable modems, and will now be giving the satellite boys a try. I expect incompetence from each and every one of them and am rarely disappointed. The screw ups would provide content for a sitcom, except that it's more pathetic than humorous. On my scorecard, the cable modem guys are modestly ahead of the rest of the bozos, but try telling that to the folks in Fremont, CA where @Home ran one of the first pilots--people weren't mad, they were livid. You want to get a DSL line into a high rise office building in a major metro? The obstacle course is about six "service" providers deep, and each of them has to do their thing right (and get paid) or the Fat Lady doesn't sing. We've had Qwest, Covad, and Earthlink screaming at each other in The Mile High City (aka, The Telecom Capital of the World) for about six weeks now and still don't have squat to show for it except for lots of frustration. Each of those crack organizations now tell me the problem is with the building which happens to be a Class A high rise of modern vintage. As far as I'm concerned, the information revolution is on hold until the bandwidth is really, truly, and finally deployed and I'm not holding my breath. mike doyle |
