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Technology Stocks : AUTOHOME, Inc -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TWICK who wrote (1055)	1/4/1998 5:22:00 PM
From: Bob Zacks	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 29970

The competition is the telephone co's. ASDL ISDN and any other high speed fiberoptic system they can come up with. Right now though @home has them on speed , content and price. Next comes satellite be prepared to dig deep into your pockets for this one , setup monthly fees and fees per meg download , don't forget the telephone bill for the return line (and all this for a slower system).@home also has a commercial service called @work which is supposed to generate 35% of its revenues . Then there is @Media I still don"t understand this one is this futuristic VOD?

To: TWICK who wrote (1055)	1/4/1998 9:51:00 PM
From: Melissa McAuliffe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 29970

<< My main concern is Microsoft's Web TV. Is it a player in this ? >> I assume (correct me here if this is wrong)that the web TV still needs to have access to the fiber optic cables which are owned by the cable companies. Unless they plan to access the internet via phone lines into the web TV. If they don't have access to the cable, then wouldn't this be their only alternative? But the more I think about it, it is probably how they are doing it today since only a few areas have the fiber optic cable installed at this point. But they will still have to deal with the speed issues. It seems to me that there is something here that we need to figure out. Also, how easy would this be to do. Wouldn't it require major construction? I know that when the fiber optic conversion was beiing done here there was construction and cable crews everywhere. And they have been working on this for at least a year or more and are still not finished in all our local areas. I guess maybe one of the questions here is what are the barriers to entry in this marketplace. One obvious one is the access to fiber optic cables. Also, with respect to the phone companies competing, I wonder how easy it would be for them to even build a fiber optic network? And in what time frame would this be done. But even if they do it, @home may have an edge in the mass market because they offer content vs. only web access. By the time the phone companies can compete, @home may have a lock on the market. Also, would the phone companies still use a dial up concept? If so, you would not have 24 hour on access to the service, thus log ins and log offs. Would they use this system for telephone also or would it be a totally separate system? Using myself for an example, I have AOL..simply because I have had it for four years before ISP's were the rage. It's just easier to stick with it than to switch. Also, there is some of their content that I like. Though I could easily switch now to a regular ISP because I am much more comfortable with the internet and how to navigate, there was a time when I wouldn't have considered it because it seemed to complicated. So sometimes first to market is not a bad place to be even if there is competition down the road. But until I switch to @home I will stick w/ AOL even though I am not happy with them overall. With respect to the satelllite providers, I agree that the cost may be prohibitive. Also, you would have to get a satellite dish and put it somewhere which I think would put alot of people off. Melissa