To: George Dawson who wrote (26120 ) 2/14/2000 6:14:00 PM From: Joe Wagner Read Replies (1) | Respond to
Interesting post George. I like posts like this. I am no expert obviously on these issues, but in a world of converging ecosystems, when overlap starts to occur, like between the telephone industry, the cable industry, the broadcast industry, corporate LAN & WAN industry, etc.. I think the possibility exists for technology to be unleashed from one ecosystem into another ecosystem, that flourishes and results in spreading to all the overlapping ecosystems. Each ecosystem has technologies fighting to dominate within the ecosystem, and fighting to dominate over the other ecosystem's technologies as they converge. It is inevitable that as the ecosystems converge, new crossbreeds of technology, and new mutually beneficial combinations of technology arise, that best exploit the opportunities created by the new emerging ecosystem; and these will multiply and dominate, while the other less robust technologies will not become extinct, but will only survive in certain niche areas. I don't think Sonet would disappear overnight, just like copper phonelines won't disappear overnight, but I do think that purchasing decisions will trend towards the solutions that are most cost effective. The customers that make the most accurate cost analysis and take steps to migrate to the best implementation of the "best of breed" solutions will begin to dominate and be lifted up in an evolutionary process. GE and Sonet could both be the most cost effective until the market evolves and economies of scale kick in, and then maybe Fibre Channel, DWDM to the neighborhood node, with Ethernet or Fibre Channel to the Desktop or SetTop. When I mentioned things lining up like a rubics cube, I meant that the marketplace is very dynamic with a lot of variables, and that sometimes a technology just needs the marketplace to evolve before it can take root and start to grow.
