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To: Frank A. Coluccio who wrote (13222)	8/1/1999 4:44:00 PM
From: KailuaBoy	Respond to of 29970

Frank, > The digital economy stands ready to present major challenges to the > MSOs, possibly passing some of them by entirely, and all the while > they have been among the best suited of all venues for meeting these > emerging opportunities, head on. What's wrong with this picture? Same thing that was wrong with one phone option. Cable is paying for having the market to themselves with lost opportunities due to hunkerdown-and-protect-what-you've-got-mentality. You know how hard it is to change that culture. It's almost impossible. Regarding fiber to the curb. I don't think MSO's have completely bought into the 2-way idea yet. They are still TV guys trying to stay ahead of the descramblers. MSO's don't see fiber to the curb. They see another cooking channel. Maybe when they begin to generate substantial revenue they can begin to understand and extend the network. I also don't believe that the stockholders will stand for something that far ahead of the quarterly report. Let me ask you this, do you see any technical disadvantage to pulling fiber to the curb now? Will there be advances in fiber itself that would make it unwise to begin completing the last mile with optical? If not then it could be done gradually. Right? Thanks for the insight. It's first rate. KB

To: Frank A. Coluccio who wrote (13222)	8/1/1999 4:59:00 PM
From: E. Davies	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 29970

What's wrong with this picture? The cable co's and the Bell co's have one major thing in common. They have gotten to where they are by being plodding, boring, and extremely conservative. Who are we to say that that is wrong? As forward looking technically oriented people we want change and we want it fast. Spend the money now and build for the future. Sounds good right? In the real world things always move a lot slower than you would think. Massive capital investment not only requires catching the right trend it requires spending the money at the right time. Build too far into the future and the debt or the unstable technology will kill you before you get the return on your investment. The "right" way economically may very well be to do exactly what we expect will happen- build it assuming only a moderate success then improve it when it overloads, then build the next piece even better. I often compare broadband/dial up to color TV/B&W. Lets not forget that B&W TV in one form or another lasted a good 25 years after the introduction of color. Already there are signs that the mass population has not figured out any significant value in a 200k-1mbit link vs 56k or even 28.8k. They will eventually of course but will it be 3 years or 10? How long before they see the value in fiber to the home? I can only hope that somewhere buried in the labs of AT&T or cablelabs there are secret projects looking into the future similar to the one sprung on us in Salt Lake. It is not at all hard to imagine a system for example where fiber runs to the curb and the user still gets to keep the cable to his house and his DOCSIS modem. Technologically lame and inferior? Sure. Economically optimal? Maybe. Who can say for sure? Eric