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

To: Frank A. Coluccio who wrote (15641)	6/26/2006 3:31:51 PM
From: fred g	Respond to of 46821

Well, wrt the choices, we know that the Bells have been investigating DPI and other options for creating walled gardens, and they're utterly gung-ho on IMS. And in their mind, "broadband" does not necessarily mean residential high-speed Internet access; it's just high-speed access to something. So the $64B question is what the Bells will get away with. Can they dictate to users, or will they provide Internet? Or will they provide a costly, slow, measured-service Internet (to keep the regulators at bay) while providing a cheap, faster walled-garden "service"? To a large extent, what they do depends on how much competition they have. So if, for instance, muni nets become common, then muni nets will make it competitively difficult for them to wall of the Internet. But that will make muni nets less competitively desirable. So they may only succeed by failing. And yes, a Bell is still an ILEC, even if they try to deny it. Even if, as with Q in Omaha, they get the FCC to declare that they're not. (Q is, however, not the ILEC any more in Terry, Montana, but that was by mutual consent with the coop who grabbed the turf and title from them.