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Technology Stocks : The *NEW* Frank Coluccio Technology Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: axial who wrote (14851)	4/27/2006 8:05:31 AM
From: Frank A. Coluccio	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 46821

Hi Jim, Your first comment is interesting concerning proactive and reactive nations. I see it somewhat differently, as the US and Canada were proactive earlier on, but those two nations happen to have hit their plateaus earlier on, as a result, and this was due to their mounting inventories on the way up to saturation of relatively immature and inflexible technologies that contributed to the "paralysis and inertia that would be imposed by legacy constraints of various kinds" as you noted, while Japan, Sweden, Korea and the Netherlands were reactive, coming to the party in earnest some five or six years later than the North American players, and they were further aided by having newer generations of technologies on their side. And not so coincidentally they were further abetted in getting "out of the box", as you termed it, by the added impetus from their respective governments, which have been steadily accelerating the "liberalization" of their respective competitive positions, which has assistin their coming from behind, not only catching up but also surpassing us at our own game in classic leap-frog form. In actuality, what we have is three groups of nations each responding to starter guns that were fired at different times on their respective continents, thus not really engaging in what one might like to call an apples-to-apples horse race. And as the early adopters the US and Canada are now wearing the proverbial arrows in their backs that resulted from being way out in front early on. Of course, there were many other factors stemming from the relative lethargy of the dominant players and the anticompetitive forces that were at work here that were just as, or more, influential in the US, at least, in retarding the path to excellence and sustained hegemony. I just thought I'd highlight this lead-lag aspect since it is seldom mentioned. I thought the remainder of your comments were enlightening and reinforcing of some of my own views on the subject, to a degree. I've passed your comments along to Bob and I suspect he'd like to make some further comments in response to you, as well. Thanks again for a great reply. FAC

To: axial who wrote (14851)	4/27/2006 10:59:26 AM
From: Bob Frankston	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 46821

I go into more detail in frankston.com. My short response is that the key is to avoid getting into the box at all because the box itself doesn't have the concept of the Internet as a way of using the existing networks. The box was nailed shut in 1934 after centuries of presuming that each kind of message had its own special bits (or electrons). The concept of a so-called tele/communications industry is little more than a cover story to protect the participants from antitrust enforcement. After all, at least Standard Oil of Ohio let us drive our own cars. The carriers try to force us to buy billable services (http://www.frankston.com/?name=AssuringScarcity). The highest leverage point is to attack the defining premises of the industry. That may seem impossible but it's far easier than being forever mired in the fetid muck of the Regulatorium. I'm working on short sound bites such as comparing broadband to running railroad tracks to each house instead of allowing us to make our own roads and drive. Perhaps such analogies -- imperfect though they may be -- will get through where technical explanations merely put the learned gentlefolk to sleep. We must frame the debate rather than being on the defensive and begging for neutrality as a concession.