Steve, that is an absolutely terrific post and captures the reality as well as the 'spirit' of where George Gilders' "dark and dumb" network needs to go to become a reality. Thank you.
What follows is therefore in no way, shape, or form a dig. BUT, SHOW ME THE MONEY! :-) By which I mean, how can we make money investing in this 'dark and dumb thing in the making'? All the telecom carriers are facing a rapidly declining revenue curve; when the bandwidth "glut" becomes a reality, won't the cost of pushing a byte of information from Tiburon to Timbuktu equate with the cost of calling from one to the other? In other words, zip, nada, bubkis?
There's a whole lot about networks that I don't understand, but here's the biggest: the damn things cost gazillions to build but then every user on the planet complains that their marginal cost to use it is so close to zero as to be not worth the cost--so why bill me? So who repays the gazillions says I?
Now I know that earnings, return on investment, orderly retirement of (prudently underwritten) debt, gross revenues, and a quick ratio of not less than 2:1 will instantly date me and disqualify me forever as an EBAY investor, but if you would be kind enough to attach some sordid profit thoughts to your previously eloquent post, I would be most grateful. Regards, Mike Doyle |
