The Paradox of Commoditization

Thu Apr 10 04:32:28 UTC 2003

Gordon Cook wrote:
> 
> When voice no longer rides on the TDM transport that was especially 
> designed to carry it and is just a packet-encapsulated application on an 
> IP network, the new central office is no longer a building housing five 
> million dollars worth of equipment. It fits on a desktop using SIP, SIP 
> proxy servers, and ENUM databases. It costs well under five thousand 
> dollars and delivers an entire range of services not possible to derive 
> from now obsolete TDM hardware costing a thousand times more.
> 

There are many things that are acceptable to society as a whole. 
However, when it comes to one's life, they suddenly become more 
cautious. Do you propose that technology today is at a state that we can 
replace the old system and still maintain E911? Would you trust your 
life to it? Remember, there are very tight regulations and 
accountability concerning the legacy network and what it is allowed in 
the way of outages. This is because people's lives depend on it. 
Reguardless of loss of electrictiy, gas, and water, you can plug a $5 
phone into a POTS line and call for help. I have yet to see someone 
swear by their own life that the new technologies will meet the uptimes 
of the legacy. The fact is, in the telco world, they don't. Even 
businesses that require time sensitive, guaranteed communications don't 
trust the new technology whole heartedly.

Having said that, outside of the scope of the local CO, I can see your 
point.

-Jack