Two Tiered Internet

Wed Dec 14 06:38:54 UTC 2005

Thus spake "Christopher L. Morrow" <christopher.morrow at mci.com>
> On Tue, 13 Dec 2005, Tony Li wrote:
>> > What good is 6Mbit DSL from my ISP (say, SBC for example) if
>> > only a small portion of the net (sites that pay for non-degraded
>> > access) loads at a reasonable speed and everything else sucks?
>>
>> One might argue that in such a situation, the end user is getting
>> less value than they did previously.  End users might then either
>> demand a price break or might vote with their connectivity.
>
> the last 2 times this has come up I think there was the suggestion
> that given other options at reasonably close to the same end cost
> users might switch to alternate access methods. That works as
> long as there are alternate access methods, and as long as the
> telecom's don't 'cabal' and all do the same hideously bad thing...

Congress appears to be working hard to make sure that happens.

> I do think it'd be funny for SBC or BS to do this sort of thing and get
> massive customer loss when their customers defect to cable
> modem networks.

Do you really think the cablecos will be significantly less evil than the 
telcos?  I'm not as optimistic about the result of a legislated duopoly.

S

Stephen Sprunk         "God does not play dice."  --Albert Einstein
CCIE #3723         "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the
K5SSS        dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking 