blame that on the local governments and state public utility commissions that force cable companies to offer analog cable. but it's going away this year. Cablevision is killing analog later this month. Time Warner either killed it or will do so this year.
once analog cable goes away there will be a lot more free bandwidth on the cable companies' networks
I'm not so sure. My cable company, RCN, killed analog some time ago, and their cable modem speed is still bad and they charge substantially more for higher-speed service, which is still limited to an advertised speed of 10Mb and a practical speed of probably 6-7Mb. And I just received notice that they're raising their prices again.
The fact is that for both cable TV and cable modem service (as well as AT&T's offerings), fixed pricing simply doesn't work anymore. It doesn't work because of the users who use incredibly high amounts of bandwidth and it doesn't work for cable TV because the cable stations each want a big piece of revenue, which doesn't work when basic service supplies 90 or more channels. Everything is going to have to move to some variant of ala-carte and/or usage based pricing. Or, the MSOs are going to have to install equipment that tracks what we're watching, so that cable channels can be paid not by the number of subscribers, but by the number of watchers of their particular channel.
The only reason ATT can come out and say we are gonna go ahead and wait a couple of years before even starting to think about rolling out 4g, is cause US does not have nearly the competition that Europe does. It's like either you go with Verizon or ATT, everyone else is is too small to even have towers in some places and have to rent them from one of these two players anyways.
Quote:
Originally Posted by daylove22
Please know the fact Europe phone service is the best out there and as far as broadband speed is concerned the US is way behind.
Unfortunately, the time we were ahead technologically is gone..nowadays we are way behind.
Please note that the speed differential is only temporary.
Europe is faster RIGHT NOW because they are jerry-rigging their old DSL infrastructure. But it comes a point where such jerry-rigging will hit the wall.
US is 4 years AHEAD of Europe in FTTH fiber optics deployment.
It is the rabbit vs. the turtle all over again. Europe the rabbit has the bragging rights early on, but it is the US the turtle that will win at the end. It's that simple.
As for wireless network --- you are looking at advertised speed which means nothing. It is also nothing about some nordic country having a 2 city LTE rollout --- we all know that VZW has LTE in Boston and Seattle. Saying that there is no competition in the US is garbage when you look at the iphone plans around the world. The most idiotic comes from Norway (2 national carriers). You want to talk about Sweden --- the Swedish/Finnish government is the largest shareholder of the former landline incumbant/wireless carrier.
Please note that the speed differential is only temporary.
Europe is faster RIGHT NOW because they are jerry-rigging their old DSL infrastructure. But it comes a point where such jerry-rigging will hit the wall.
US is 4 years AHEAD of Europe in FTTH fiber optics deployment.
It is the rabbit vs. the turtle all over again. Europe the rabbit has the bragging rights early on, but it is the US the turtle that will win at the end. It's that simple.
That may be true, but only future will tell. Since the North America has finally adopted the same standards as the rest of the developed world, the barriers for that have lowered considerably. FTTH/B is good for fixed acces. No effect on wireless unless the wireless backhaul is also Fibre (propably is in the same areas yes).
Also bear in mind that in every conceivable field of tech or economics, one area of the world is always in the lead and that lead will change eventually (in Economics, the shift is to Asia after some hundreds of years). The one behind eventually has to make a "rabbit's leap" and then they have a better base to stay ahead for a while before the other makes their leap.
Quote:
Originally Posted by samab
As for wireless network --- you are looking at advertised speed which means nothing. It is also nothing about some nordic country having a 2 city LTE rollout --- we all know that VZW has LTE in Boston and Seattle. Saying that there is no competition in the US is garbage when you look at the iphone plans around the world. The most idiotic comes from Norway (2 national carriers). You want to talk about Sweden --- the Swedish/Finnish government is the largest shareholder of the former landline incumbant/wireless carrier.
Please at least read the lightreading article about HSPA+ and LTE rollouts with thought. The ads at least here in the Nordics talk about realistic maximum bitrates (don't see many adverts for 14.4 or 24Mbps).
Yes, one of the players in Sweden is partly owned by the Swedish and Finnish governments. So? Why is it that the other (private) players in Sweden have deployed latest tech as well? 3 is also deploying LTE in Sweden and Denmark. Finland has allocated LTE frequencies, but none has yet to announce LTE rollout plans. Why the difference between so similar neigbours? Even though TeliaSonera is a player here as well? (I have my thoughts, but it's no use here).
HSPA+ (up to 24Mbps) has already been deployed by over 12 operators across Europe (not to mention networks in Asia) and most deploy during this year. AT&T has just barely deployed standard HSPA (14 Mbps). Why is that? Please no flame war, real reasons for the difference please.
It's not a race as to who has or will get the bragging rights (I couldn't care less). It's all about trying to understand why the situation is as it is and about how and why is it changing and can we do anything to influence it.
About the tiered plans. Tiering on volume doesn't make sense since the average user has a very difficult time comprehending data volume when they are surfing the web and doing email. Tiering on bitrate on the other hand is more understandable and has a similar (maybe even better?) effect on resource usage.
As for the wired iPhone test. Look at the data and apply a bit of statistical analysis and you'll quite quickly see why that test is useful for only a very select networks and countries. Think about the # of data points and penetration of iPhone in said networks at the time of the test and the demographics of those iPhone users at the time of the test.
It's not a race as to who has or will get the bragging rights (I couldn't care less). It's all about trying to understand why the situation is as it is and about how and why is it changing and can we do anything to influence it.
It has a lot with governments in Japan, South Korea and European countries --- trying to promote their wireless technology companies for export sales, ahead of the well-being of their domestic end-users. A lot of these lessons can't be translated into North American context because Japanese, German and Nordic governments are the largest shareholders of their former landline incumbents.
The odds of finding the next GSM is very slim --- much like how venture capitalists lose money on 99 start-ups and hitting 1 jackpot (and yet still come out filthy rich). Europe's 3G dictatorship turned out to be the other 99 start-up --- that's why all these regulators have embraced technology neutral spectrum auctions. 3-4 years ago, WiMax looked every bit as promising as LTE --- and these regulators decided against betting on a single technology.
As for DSL broadband --- the European lesson is that their former landline incumbent carriers got suckered into arrangements where the incumbent carrier provides the DSL network and the competitors lease the DSL line wholesale. Now these former landline incumbents regret that fateful decision very much --- so now they vow never to repeat that mistake again. So now these landline incumbents are saying that they will not put a single line of fiber into ground unless they get to use it all by themselves --- not having to share it or lease it by government decree. That's why Europe is 4 years behind US in FTTH deployments.
Comments
blame that on the local governments and state public utility commissions that force cable companies to offer analog cable. but it's going away this year. Cablevision is killing analog later this month. Time Warner either killed it or will do so this year.
once analog cable goes away there will be a lot more free bandwidth on the cable companies' networks
I'm not so sure. My cable company, RCN, killed analog some time ago, and their cable modem speed is still bad and they charge substantially more for higher-speed service, which is still limited to an advertised speed of 10Mb and a practical speed of probably 6-7Mb. And I just received notice that they're raising their prices again.
The fact is that for both cable TV and cable modem service (as well as AT&T's offerings), fixed pricing simply doesn't work anymore. It doesn't work because of the users who use incredibly high amounts of bandwidth and it doesn't work for cable TV because the cable stations each want a big piece of revenue, which doesn't work when basic service supplies 90 or more channels. Everything is going to have to move to some variant of ala-carte and/or usage based pricing. Or, the MSOs are going to have to install equipment that tracks what we're watching, so that cable channels can be paid not by the number of subscribers, but by the number of watchers of their particular channel.
Don't be obtuse.
Take a look at this graph.
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/I...speedchart.jpg
Unfortunately, the time we were ahead technologically is gone..nowadays we are way behind.
The only reason ATT can come out and say we are gonna go ahead and wait a couple of years before even starting to think about rolling out 4g, is cause US does not have nearly the competition that Europe does. It's like either you go with Verizon or ATT, everyone else is is too small to even have towers in some places and have to rent them from one of these two players anyways.
Please know the fact Europe phone service is the best out there and as far as broadband speed is concerned the US is way behind.
Take a look at this graph.
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/I...speedchart.jpg
Unfortunately, the time we were ahead technologically is gone..nowadays we are way behind.
Please note that the speed differential is only temporary.
Europe is faster RIGHT NOW because they are jerry-rigging their old DSL infrastructure. But it comes a point where such jerry-rigging will hit the wall.
US is 4 years AHEAD of Europe in FTTH fiber optics deployment.
http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=172028
It is the rabbit vs. the turtle all over again. Europe the rabbit has the bragging rights early on, but it is the US the turtle that will win at the end. It's that simple.
As for wireless network --- you are looking at advertised speed which means nothing. It is also nothing about some nordic country having a 2 city LTE rollout --- we all know that VZW has LTE in Boston and Seattle. Saying that there is no competition in the US is garbage when you look at the iphone plans around the world. The most idiotic comes from Norway (2 national carriers). You want to talk about Sweden --- the Swedish/Finnish government is the largest shareholder of the former landline incumbant/wireless carrier.
Please note that the speed differential is only temporary.
Europe is faster RIGHT NOW because they are jerry-rigging their old DSL infrastructure. But it comes a point where such jerry-rigging will hit the wall.
US is 4 years AHEAD of Europe in FTTH fiber optics deployment.
http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=172028
It is the rabbit vs. the turtle all over again. Europe the rabbit has the bragging rights early on, but it is the US the turtle that will win at the end. It's that simple.
That may be true, but only future will tell. Since the North America has finally adopted the same standards as the rest of the developed world, the barriers for that have lowered considerably. FTTH/B is good for fixed acces. No effect on wireless unless the wireless backhaul is also Fibre (propably is in the same areas yes).
Also bear in mind that in every conceivable field of tech or economics, one area of the world is always in the lead and that lead will change eventually (in Economics, the shift is to Asia after some hundreds of years). The one behind eventually has to make a "rabbit's leap" and then they have a better base to stay ahead for a while before the other makes their leap.
As for wireless network --- you are looking at advertised speed which means nothing. It is also nothing about some nordic country having a 2 city LTE rollout --- we all know that VZW has LTE in Boston and Seattle. Saying that there is no competition in the US is garbage when you look at the iphone plans around the world. The most idiotic comes from Norway (2 national carriers). You want to talk about Sweden --- the Swedish/Finnish government is the largest shareholder of the former landline incumbant/wireless carrier.
Please at least read the lightreading article about HSPA+ and LTE rollouts with thought. The ads at least here in the Nordics talk about realistic maximum bitrates (don't see many adverts for 14.4 or 24Mbps).
Yes, one of the players in Sweden is partly owned by the Swedish and Finnish governments. So? Why is it that the other (private) players in Sweden have deployed latest tech as well? 3 is also deploying LTE in Sweden and Denmark. Finland has allocated LTE frequencies, but none has yet to announce LTE rollout plans. Why the difference between so similar neigbours? Even though TeliaSonera is a player here as well? (I have my thoughts, but it's no use here).
HSPA+ (up to 24Mbps) has already been deployed by over 12 operators across Europe (not to mention networks in Asia) and most deploy during this year. AT&T has just barely deployed standard HSPA (14 Mbps). Why is that? Please no flame war, real reasons for the difference please.
It's not a race as to who has or will get the bragging rights (I couldn't care less). It's all about trying to understand why the situation is as it is and about how and why is it changing and can we do anything to influence it.
About the tiered plans. Tiering on volume doesn't make sense since the average user has a very difficult time comprehending data volume when they are surfing the web and doing email. Tiering on bitrate on the other hand is more understandable and has a similar (maybe even better?) effect on resource usage.
As for the wired iPhone test. Look at the data and apply a bit of statistical analysis and you'll quite quickly see why that test is useful for only a very select networks and countries. Think about the # of data points and penetration of iPhone in said networks at the time of the test and the demographics of those iPhone users at the time of the test.
Regs, Jarkko
It's not a race as to who has or will get the bragging rights (I couldn't care less). It's all about trying to understand why the situation is as it is and about how and why is it changing and can we do anything to influence it.
It has a lot with governments in Japan, South Korea and European countries --- trying to promote their wireless technology companies for export sales, ahead of the well-being of their domestic end-users. A lot of these lessons can't be translated into North American context because Japanese, German and Nordic governments are the largest shareholders of their former landline incumbents.
The odds of finding the next GSM is very slim --- much like how venture capitalists lose money on 99 start-ups and hitting 1 jackpot (and yet still come out filthy rich). Europe's 3G dictatorship turned out to be the other 99 start-up --- that's why all these regulators have embraced technology neutral spectrum auctions. 3-4 years ago, WiMax looked every bit as promising as LTE --- and these regulators decided against betting on a single technology.
As for DSL broadband --- the European lesson is that their former landline incumbent carriers got suckered into arrangements where the incumbent carrier provides the DSL network and the competitors lease the DSL line wholesale. Now these former landline incumbents regret that fateful decision very much --- so now they vow never to repeat that mistake again. So now these landline incumbents are saying that they will not put a single line of fiber into ground unless they get to use it all by themselves --- not having to share it or lease it by government decree. That's why Europe is 4 years behind US in FTTH deployments.