>Some telephone companies and Internet service providers have argued
>that a few cable companies will control the future of the Internet if the
>FCC does not step in and require them to give rivals access to their
>high-speed pipelines. The agency has, for now, agreed to not force cable
>companies to open their broadband networks to Internet competitors.
Having followed cable tv issues for 20 years, I look at this issue differently.
I've been saying for years that there is nothing happening on the Internet
that was not demonstrated by the cable companies back in the 60's and the
70's. Two way technology exists on every cable system that uses set top
boxes. (The vision of the future back then was that you could talk back to
your tv set by hooking up your own camera. Wasting this capability on a set
top box is like hooking up the Internet to your toaster). But the cable
industry never could figure out how to make any money on interactive.
They're too greedy. And their record of promise vs. performance is as
legendary as it is pathetic -- only a fool would believe what the cable
company says or rely on it for mission critical service or applications.
Can you imagine switching from the phone company to the cable company for
local phone service?
But before we paint the cable company as the only villian here, let us
pause to consider that the ISPs -- and to be realistic about it, the only
ISP that matters is AOL due to its size -- are not the innocent victims
they would have us believe.
All ISPs are going the way of AOL (the ISP we love to hate). The way of AOL
is the way of hypocrisy. Consider that AOL wants to get from the cable
company what it will not offer to its own customers and the rest of the
Internet -- common carrier services. The same AOL that is crying about
access to cable companies is the same AOL that routinely blocks access to
its subscribers from third parties. I'm talking about bulk email here. How
is blocking of email by AOL any different from a cable company blocking
access to AOL? It isn't. AOL blocks because it says it is a private online
country club wherein it says its users are free to connect out to the
Internet but Internet users are not necessarily free to connect to its users.
But if that position is valid, the cable company can make an even better
case since, unlike AOL it owns its own physical network -- the wire. So AOL
-- and other ISPs who block -- want to play strictly by their own set of
rules -- and expect the government to force the cable industry and the rest
of us to play along. I say not so fast. Let's truly level the playing field
for all the players -- including the end user and Internet marketers -- and
AOL. In other words, if cable is a common carrier that must provide access
to others, so must be AOL and other ISPs.
Bob Schmidt
www.provider.com
Author of The Geek's Guide to Internet Business Success
Published by John Wiley & Sons ISBN 0471288381
The First Book to Address the Business Side of the Web Design Business
http://www.provider.com/geeksguide
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