It would be impossible to put a man on the moon today in the current U.S. due to lack of willpower. Example number 1 for your review (the article at Techdirt has some worthwhile links in it).
From Techdirt, Muni WiFi Takes A Beating
from the weak-signal-strength dept
Municipal WiFi's been having a rough time lately, as the ridiculous levels of hype that built up around it comes back to bite it in the backside. Things have taken a turn for the worse over the past week: EarthLink's deal with San Francisco (which garnered tons of hype) now looks like it's dead, while its deal in Houston looks like it's dying as the company pulls back from muni WiFi altogether. Meanwhile, city officials in Chicago have dropped their plans to get a vendor to build a citywide network there, after balking at demands that the city become the network's anchor tenant, and guarantee certain payments to the vendors. Elsewhere in Illinois, AT&T has decided not to move forward with plans to build a muni network in Springfield.
All in all, it's not been a good week for muni WiFi and its backers. But does all this bad news spell doom for muni WiFi as a whole? Perhaps -- but the idea of municipal wireless in general still could hold some value. Muni WiFi is bound to fail when it's being judged by unrealistic expectations -- as so many muni networks are. Vendors and politicians have whipped up a frenzy around the networks, while a willing media lapped up the stories and fed them to an easily excitable public. The fact remains that there are plenty of useful applications of municipal wireless; delivering widespread public internet access, and making money from it, may simply not be one of them. Also, as we've stated before, WiFi -- a local networking technology -- may not be the best technology to use for covering large areas. WiMAX could hold some promise in this regard, while in terms of muni broadband in general, fiber is probably even better. And, as Rick Martin points out, many smaller communities are seeing more success with their muni WiFi efforts, an indication that smaller-scale installations are much more workable than huge citywide installations in places like Chicago and San Francisco. He also passes along the quote that muni WiFi is "the monorail of the decade" -- meaning it's the boondoggle du jour for local politicians. But as Martin also notes, that while the monorail has never really lived up to its hype as the solution to cities' public transport ills, the concept and some of the technology has lived on in the form of light rail and other transport projects. In the same way, while muni WiFi might be looking pretty poorly, the idea of municipal wireless, or municipal broadband, should live on.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
How to build a mob (Lesson No. 4)
From the cyberland of Epinions, comes this mix of opinions from HughesNet and WildBlue users about their experiences with their chosen satellite internet products.
Hughes/Direcway
" . . . . As a Direcway/Hughes Net customer for over a year I can say the product is not any better. In fact, all the posts on Wildblue have answered my question about going to that company. It sounds exactly like Hughes Net.
I have recently reinstalled my dialup modem and cannot believe how much faster it is at 44kbps than my Hughes net (which is suppose to have a download of 1Mbps!).
I am in the middle of a dispute with Hughes over their new DW7000 modem that is suppose to be the fast 1Mbps download...It is slower than my previous DW6000 modem. So, in other words, I am more of an idiot because I actually spent more money with the company thinking it might improve things. Their speed tester must be bogus...
Long story short, the new modem is so much worse than the old one that we cannot even have two people surfing the web at the same time. It takes soooo long for the web sites to pop up...I might as well wait my turn on the phone line!
Hughes will not let me send back the new modem and go back to my old one. They wont fix the problem..they wont even acknowledge there is a problem.
At this point, I dont want to deal with them at all. They make sure it is very difficult for you to get anywhere past thier Tech Support location in India. You have no way to speak to anyone in the company that has any clout to take care of the situation.
Anyway....just wanted to give my 2 cents worth in hopes of discouraging any of those who think that jumping from WildBlue to Hughes is better. I know that this website answered my question about jumping from Hughes to Wildblue...NOT! . . . ."
And from DirecWay Uncensored comes this....
" . . . . The biggest complaints seem to be coming from small business owners, who use their HughesNet system for office work. One can only imagine the hassel of having your business internet connection severely reduced for 24Hrs. That could well span from one business day through the next. . . . "
Much love and Namaste to HughesNet.
More to come later!
Hughes/Direcway
" . . . . As a Direcway/Hughes Net customer for over a year I can say the product is not any better. In fact, all the posts on Wildblue have answered my question about going to that company. It sounds exactly like Hughes Net.
I have recently reinstalled my dialup modem and cannot believe how much faster it is at 44kbps than my Hughes net (which is suppose to have a download of 1Mbps!).
I am in the middle of a dispute with Hughes over their new DW7000 modem that is suppose to be the fast 1Mbps download...It is slower than my previous DW6000 modem. So, in other words, I am more of an idiot because I actually spent more money with the company thinking it might improve things. Their speed tester must be bogus...
Long story short, the new modem is so much worse than the old one that we cannot even have two people surfing the web at the same time. It takes soooo long for the web sites to pop up...I might as well wait my turn on the phone line!
Hughes will not let me send back the new modem and go back to my old one. They wont fix the problem..they wont even acknowledge there is a problem.
At this point, I dont want to deal with them at all. They make sure it is very difficult for you to get anywhere past thier Tech Support location in India. You have no way to speak to anyone in the company that has any clout to take care of the situation.
Anyway....just wanted to give my 2 cents worth in hopes of discouraging any of those who think that jumping from WildBlue to Hughes is better. I know that this website answered my question about jumping from Hughes to Wildblue...NOT! . . . ."
And from DirecWay Uncensored comes this....
" . . . . The biggest complaints seem to be coming from small business owners, who use their HughesNet system for office work. One can only imagine the hassel of having your business internet connection severely reduced for 24Hrs. That could well span from one business day through the next. . . . "
Much love and Namaste to HughesNet.
More to come later!
Another gem from Techdirt . . . .
More links within the article to reference.
* * * * * * * *
Comparing Unauthorized Downloads To Speed Limits
from the problem-starts-at-home dept
Given the entertainment industry's obsession with claiming (often in a misleading way) that unauthorized use of copyrighted content hurts all the "everyday" people in the industry rather than the big stars, you would hope that people in the entertainment industry capital of the world, Los Angeles, would be concerned about the problem -- but it appears that many are not. A new study suggests that one in four Los Angelinos bought, copied or downloaded an unauthorized product. Now, that includes things like counterfeit handbags as well as downloading music. However, it's a self-reported study, so it wouldn't be crazy to suggest that these results are much lower than reality, as many people probably wouldn't admit to downloading when asked point-blank. No matter what the number is, Justin Levine uses this study to kick off an interesting discussion comparing such actions to breaking the speed limit. His point is that most people have a general sense of fairness. If they're breaking the speed limit, it's often because they actually think the speed limit is too slow. If speed limits were raised, some people would still speed, but it would be a smaller amount. Alternatively, if the speed limits were lowered, more people would likely break the speed limit. If you swap that analogy back to downloading, Levine notes that it seems like this study is only going to be used by officials as a reason to "crack down," or effectively "lower the speed limit." In other words, trying to crack down on the problem is only likely to make it worse -- which is pretty much exactly what we've seen over the past decade.
* * * * * * * *
Comparing Unauthorized Downloads To Speed Limits
from the problem-starts-at-home dept
Given the entertainment industry's obsession with claiming (often in a misleading way) that unauthorized use of copyrighted content hurts all the "everyday" people in the industry rather than the big stars, you would hope that people in the entertainment industry capital of the world, Los Angeles, would be concerned about the problem -- but it appears that many are not. A new study suggests that one in four Los Angelinos bought, copied or downloaded an unauthorized product. Now, that includes things like counterfeit handbags as well as downloading music. However, it's a self-reported study, so it wouldn't be crazy to suggest that these results are much lower than reality, as many people probably wouldn't admit to downloading when asked point-blank. No matter what the number is, Justin Levine uses this study to kick off an interesting discussion comparing such actions to breaking the speed limit. His point is that most people have a general sense of fairness. If they're breaking the speed limit, it's often because they actually think the speed limit is too slow. If speed limits were raised, some people would still speed, but it would be a smaller amount. Alternatively, if the speed limits were lowered, more people would likely break the speed limit. If you swap that analogy back to downloading, Levine notes that it seems like this study is only going to be used by officials as a reason to "crack down," or effectively "lower the speed limit." In other words, trying to crack down on the problem is only likely to make it worse -- which is pretty much exactly what we've seen over the past decade.
In Your Dreams U.S.
TechDirt has a piece that AGAIN displays what we've pretty much all known for awhile.
Typical of Americans to invent something and then let it get away from them.
* * * * * * * *
Washington Post Notices That Japanese Broadband Is Pretty Damn Fast (And Competitive)
from the in-case-you-hadn't-been-paying-attention dept
While there isn't that much new there if you've been paying attention, the Washington Post has an article about how Japan reached the point where it has a highly competitive broadband market that is cheaper and many times faster than US broadband offerings. The Washington Post version does a pretty good job highlighting how opening up access to the core lines was a big part of it (as was newer infrastructure and the much smaller geographic footprint in Japan). It's a pretty balanced piece, and good background if you weren't familiar with the situation in Japan. There is one very interesting point, however, that doesn't get very much attention in this debate and deserves to be highlighted.
Whenever the debate comes up in the US about unbundling broadband networks and requiring network providers to offer their wholesale pricing to competitive providers, people say that it will kill those network providers and take away all of the incentive to invest in new network technologies. In Japan, it seems the exact opposite happened. When the gov't required DSL wholesaling to competitors, it certainly increased competition and lowered prices for consumers -- but it also opened up new uses for the network that increased demand for bandwidth. That became an opportunity for former monopoly provider NTT who was pushed (thanks to the competition which drove the increased usage) to invest heavily in a new fiber optic network that provided even better speeds and services. And what's happened? NTT is doing great: "NTT is becoming dominant again in the fiber broadband kingdom," according to a Japanese professor of telecom economics. This is a point we've tried to make repeatedly, but sometimes doesn't get through clearly: while many people fear that competition hurts innovation by making it tougher to profit, the opposite is usually true. Competition drives innovation as the competitors look for some edge that differentiates them and allows them to profit. That edge pushes the innovation train faster and faster, opening up new opportunities to earn even greater profits. The new things that people can do on fiber networks are going to help NTT (and others) make a lot more money than if it had remained offering pokey DSL without any competition.
* * * * * * * *
Japan's Warp-Speed Ride to Internet Future
By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Foreign Service
TOKYO -- Americans invented the Internet, but the Japanese are running away with it.
Broadband service here is eight to 30 times as fast as in the United States -- and considerably cheaper. Japan has the world's fastest Internet connections, delivering more data at a lower cost than anywhere else, recent studies show.
Accelerating broadband speed in this country -- as well as in South Korea and much of Europe -- is pushing open doors to Internet innovation that are likely to remain closed for years to come in much of the United States.
The speed advantage allows the Japanese to watch broadcast-quality, full-screen television over the Internet, an experience that mocks the grainy, wallet-size images Americans endure.
Ultra-high-speed applications are being rolled out for low-cost, high-definition teleconferencing, for telemedicine -- which allows urban doctors to diagnose diseases from a distance -- and for advanced telecommuting to help Japan meet its goal of doubling the number of people who work from home by 2010.
"For now and for at least the short term, these applications will be cheaper and probably better in Japan," said Robert Pepper, senior managing director of global technology policy at Cisco Systems, the networking giant.
Japan has surged ahead of the United States on the wings of better wire and more aggressive government regulation, industry analysts say.
The copper wire used to hook up Japanese homes is newer and runs in shorter loops to telephone exchanges than in the United States. This is partly a matter of geography and demographics: Japan is relatively small, highly urbanized and densely populated. But better wire is also a legacy of American bombs, which razed much of urban Japan during World War II and led to a wholesale rewiring of the country.
In 2000, the Japanese government seized its advantage in wire. In sharp contrast to the Bush administration over the same time period, regulators here compelled big phone companies to open up wires to upstart Internet providers.
In short order, broadband exploded. At first, it used the same DSL technology that exists in the United States. But because of the better, shorter wire in Japan, DSL service here is much faster. Ten to 20 times as fast, according to Pepper, one of the world's leading experts on broadband infrastructure.
Indeed, DSL in Japan is often five to 10 times as fast as what is widely offered by U.S. cable providers, generally viewed as the fastest American carriers. (Cable has not been much of a player in Japan.)
Perhaps more important, competition in Japan gave a kick in the pants to Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT), once a government-controlled enterprise and still Japan's largest phone company. With the help of government subsidies and tax breaks, NTT launched a nationwide build-out of fiber-optic lines to homes, making the lower-capacity copper wires obsolete.
"Obviously, without the competition, we would not have done all this at this pace," said Hideki Ohmichi, NTT's senior manager for public relations.
His company now offers speeds on fiber of up to 100 megabits per second -- 17 times as fast as the top speed generally available from U.S. cable. About 8.8 million Japanese homes have fiber lines -- roughly nine times the number in the United States.
The burgeoning optical fiber system is hurtling Japan into an Internet future that experts say Americans are unlikely to experience for at least several years.
Shoji Matsuya, director of diagnostic pathology at Kanto Medical Center in Tokyo, has tested an NTT telepathology system scheduled for nationwide use next spring.
It allows pathologists -- using high-definition video and remote-controlled microscopes -- to examine tissue samples from patients living in areas without access to major hospitals. Those patients need only find a clinic with the right microscope and an NTT fiber connection.
"Before, we did not have the richness of image detail," Matsuya said, noting that Japan has a severe shortage of pathologists. "With this equipment, I think it is possible to make a definitive remote diagnosis of cancer."
Japan's leap forward, as the United States has lost ground among major industrialized countries in providing high-speed broadband connections, has frustrated many American high-tech innovators.
"The experience of the last seven years shows that sometimes you need a strong federal regulatory framework to ensure that competition happens in a way that is constructive," said Vinton G. Cerf, a vice president at Google.
Japan's lead in speed is worrisome because it will shift Internet innovation away from the United States, warns Cerf, who is widely credited with helping to invent some of the Internet's basic architecture. "Once you have very high speeds, I guarantee that people will figure out things to do with it that they haven't done before," he said.
As a champion of Japanese-style competition through regulation, Cerf supports "net neutrality" legislation now pending in Congress. It would mandate that phone and cable companies treat all online traffic equally, without imposing higher tolls for certain content.
The proposed laws would probably save billions for companies such as Google and Yahoo, but consumer advocates say they would also save money for most home Internet users.
U.S. phone and cable companies, which control about 98 percent of the country's broadband market, strongly oppose the proposed laws, saying they would discourage the huge investments needed to upgrade broadband speed.
Yet the story of how Japan outclassed the United States in the provision of better, cheaper Internet service suggests that forceful government regulation can pay substantial dividends.
The opening of Japan's copper phone lines to DSL competition launched a "virtuous cycle" of ever-increasing speed, said Cisco's Pepper. The cycle began shortly after Japanese politicians -- fretting about an Internet system that in 2000 was slower and more expensive than what existed in the United States -- decided to "unbundle" copper lines.
For just $2 a month, upstart broadband companies were allowed to rent bandwidth on an NTT copper wire connected to a Japanese home. Low rent allowed them to charge low prices to consumers -- as little as $22 a month for a DSL connection faster than almost all U.S. broadband services.
In the United States, a similar kind of competitive access to phone company lines was strongly endorsed by Congress in a 1996 telecommunications law. But the federal push fizzled in 2003 and 2004, when the Federal Communications Commission and a federal court ruled that major companies do not have to share phone or fiber lines with competitors. The Bush administration did not appeal the court ruling.
"The Bush administration largely turned its back on the Internet, so we have just drifted downwards," said Thomas Bleha, a former U.S. diplomat who served in Japan and is writing a history of how that country trumped the United States in broadband.
As the United States drifted, a prominent venture capitalist in Japan pounced on his government's decision to open up the country's copper wire.
Masayoshi Son, head of a company called Softbank, offered broadband that was much cheaper and more than six times as fast as NTT's. He added marketing razzmatazz to the mix, dispatching young people to street corners to give away modems that would connect users to a service called Yahoo BB. (The U.S.-based Yahoo owns about a third of it.) The company's share of DSL business in Japan has exploded in the past five years, from zero to 37 percent. As competition grew, the monthly cost of broadband across Japan fell by about half, as broadband speed jumped 33-fold, according to a recent study.
"Once a customer enjoyed the high speed of DSL, then he or she preferred more speed," said Harumasa Sato, a professor of telecommunication economics at Konan University in Kobe.
The growing addiction to speed, ironically, is returning near-monopoly power in fiber to NTT, which owns and controls most new fiber lines to homes. Growth of new fiber connections exceeded DSL growth two years ago. Fiber is how all of Japan will soon be connected -- for phones, television and nearly all other services.
"NTT is becoming dominant again in the fiber broadband kingdom," Sato said.
That infuriates its competitors. Yahoo BB and others are demanding that the government once again compel NTT to unlock the lines.
In Japan, the regulatory wars over broadband are far from over.
Special correspondent Akiko Yamamoto contributed to this report.
* * * * * * * *
More to come later!
Typical of Americans to invent something and then let it get away from them.
* * * * * * * *
Washington Post Notices That Japanese Broadband Is Pretty Damn Fast (And Competitive)
from the in-case-you-hadn't-been-paying-attention dept
While there isn't that much new there if you've been paying attention, the Washington Post has an article about how Japan reached the point where it has a highly competitive broadband market that is cheaper and many times faster than US broadband offerings. The Washington Post version does a pretty good job highlighting how opening up access to the core lines was a big part of it (as was newer infrastructure and the much smaller geographic footprint in Japan). It's a pretty balanced piece, and good background if you weren't familiar with the situation in Japan. There is one very interesting point, however, that doesn't get very much attention in this debate and deserves to be highlighted.
Whenever the debate comes up in the US about unbundling broadband networks and requiring network providers to offer their wholesale pricing to competitive providers, people say that it will kill those network providers and take away all of the incentive to invest in new network technologies. In Japan, it seems the exact opposite happened. When the gov't required DSL wholesaling to competitors, it certainly increased competition and lowered prices for consumers -- but it also opened up new uses for the network that increased demand for bandwidth. That became an opportunity for former monopoly provider NTT who was pushed (thanks to the competition which drove the increased usage) to invest heavily in a new fiber optic network that provided even better speeds and services. And what's happened? NTT is doing great: "NTT is becoming dominant again in the fiber broadband kingdom," according to a Japanese professor of telecom economics. This is a point we've tried to make repeatedly, but sometimes doesn't get through clearly: while many people fear that competition hurts innovation by making it tougher to profit, the opposite is usually true. Competition drives innovation as the competitors look for some edge that differentiates them and allows them to profit. That edge pushes the innovation train faster and faster, opening up new opportunities to earn even greater profits. The new things that people can do on fiber networks are going to help NTT (and others) make a lot more money than if it had remained offering pokey DSL without any competition.
* * * * * * * *
Japan's Warp-Speed Ride to Internet Future
By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Foreign Service
TOKYO -- Americans invented the Internet, but the Japanese are running away with it.
Broadband service here is eight to 30 times as fast as in the United States -- and considerably cheaper. Japan has the world's fastest Internet connections, delivering more data at a lower cost than anywhere else, recent studies show.
Accelerating broadband speed in this country -- as well as in South Korea and much of Europe -- is pushing open doors to Internet innovation that are likely to remain closed for years to come in much of the United States.
The speed advantage allows the Japanese to watch broadcast-quality, full-screen television over the Internet, an experience that mocks the grainy, wallet-size images Americans endure.
Ultra-high-speed applications are being rolled out for low-cost, high-definition teleconferencing, for telemedicine -- which allows urban doctors to diagnose diseases from a distance -- and for advanced telecommuting to help Japan meet its goal of doubling the number of people who work from home by 2010.
"For now and for at least the short term, these applications will be cheaper and probably better in Japan," said Robert Pepper, senior managing director of global technology policy at Cisco Systems, the networking giant.
Japan has surged ahead of the United States on the wings of better wire and more aggressive government regulation, industry analysts say.
The copper wire used to hook up Japanese homes is newer and runs in shorter loops to telephone exchanges than in the United States. This is partly a matter of geography and demographics: Japan is relatively small, highly urbanized and densely populated. But better wire is also a legacy of American bombs, which razed much of urban Japan during World War II and led to a wholesale rewiring of the country.
In 2000, the Japanese government seized its advantage in wire. In sharp contrast to the Bush administration over the same time period, regulators here compelled big phone companies to open up wires to upstart Internet providers.
In short order, broadband exploded. At first, it used the same DSL technology that exists in the United States. But because of the better, shorter wire in Japan, DSL service here is much faster. Ten to 20 times as fast, according to Pepper, one of the world's leading experts on broadband infrastructure.
Indeed, DSL in Japan is often five to 10 times as fast as what is widely offered by U.S. cable providers, generally viewed as the fastest American carriers. (Cable has not been much of a player in Japan.)
Perhaps more important, competition in Japan gave a kick in the pants to Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT), once a government-controlled enterprise and still Japan's largest phone company. With the help of government subsidies and tax breaks, NTT launched a nationwide build-out of fiber-optic lines to homes, making the lower-capacity copper wires obsolete.
"Obviously, without the competition, we would not have done all this at this pace," said Hideki Ohmichi, NTT's senior manager for public relations.
His company now offers speeds on fiber of up to 100 megabits per second -- 17 times as fast as the top speed generally available from U.S. cable. About 8.8 million Japanese homes have fiber lines -- roughly nine times the number in the United States.
The burgeoning optical fiber system is hurtling Japan into an Internet future that experts say Americans are unlikely to experience for at least several years.
Shoji Matsuya, director of diagnostic pathology at Kanto Medical Center in Tokyo, has tested an NTT telepathology system scheduled for nationwide use next spring.
It allows pathologists -- using high-definition video and remote-controlled microscopes -- to examine tissue samples from patients living in areas without access to major hospitals. Those patients need only find a clinic with the right microscope and an NTT fiber connection.
"Before, we did not have the richness of image detail," Matsuya said, noting that Japan has a severe shortage of pathologists. "With this equipment, I think it is possible to make a definitive remote diagnosis of cancer."
Japan's leap forward, as the United States has lost ground among major industrialized countries in providing high-speed broadband connections, has frustrated many American high-tech innovators.
"The experience of the last seven years shows that sometimes you need a strong federal regulatory framework to ensure that competition happens in a way that is constructive," said Vinton G. Cerf, a vice president at Google.
Japan's lead in speed is worrisome because it will shift Internet innovation away from the United States, warns Cerf, who is widely credited with helping to invent some of the Internet's basic architecture. "Once you have very high speeds, I guarantee that people will figure out things to do with it that they haven't done before," he said.
As a champion of Japanese-style competition through regulation, Cerf supports "net neutrality" legislation now pending in Congress. It would mandate that phone and cable companies treat all online traffic equally, without imposing higher tolls for certain content.
The proposed laws would probably save billions for companies such as Google and Yahoo, but consumer advocates say they would also save money for most home Internet users.
U.S. phone and cable companies, which control about 98 percent of the country's broadband market, strongly oppose the proposed laws, saying they would discourage the huge investments needed to upgrade broadband speed.
Yet the story of how Japan outclassed the United States in the provision of better, cheaper Internet service suggests that forceful government regulation can pay substantial dividends.
The opening of Japan's copper phone lines to DSL competition launched a "virtuous cycle" of ever-increasing speed, said Cisco's Pepper. The cycle began shortly after Japanese politicians -- fretting about an Internet system that in 2000 was slower and more expensive than what existed in the United States -- decided to "unbundle" copper lines.
For just $2 a month, upstart broadband companies were allowed to rent bandwidth on an NTT copper wire connected to a Japanese home. Low rent allowed them to charge low prices to consumers -- as little as $22 a month for a DSL connection faster than almost all U.S. broadband services.
In the United States, a similar kind of competitive access to phone company lines was strongly endorsed by Congress in a 1996 telecommunications law. But the federal push fizzled in 2003 and 2004, when the Federal Communications Commission and a federal court ruled that major companies do not have to share phone or fiber lines with competitors. The Bush administration did not appeal the court ruling.
"The Bush administration largely turned its back on the Internet, so we have just drifted downwards," said Thomas Bleha, a former U.S. diplomat who served in Japan and is writing a history of how that country trumped the United States in broadband.
As the United States drifted, a prominent venture capitalist in Japan pounced on his government's decision to open up the country's copper wire.
Masayoshi Son, head of a company called Softbank, offered broadband that was much cheaper and more than six times as fast as NTT's. He added marketing razzmatazz to the mix, dispatching young people to street corners to give away modems that would connect users to a service called Yahoo BB. (The U.S.-based Yahoo owns about a third of it.) The company's share of DSL business in Japan has exploded in the past five years, from zero to 37 percent. As competition grew, the monthly cost of broadband across Japan fell by about half, as broadband speed jumped 33-fold, according to a recent study.
"Once a customer enjoyed the high speed of DSL, then he or she preferred more speed," said Harumasa Sato, a professor of telecommunication economics at Konan University in Kobe.
The growing addiction to speed, ironically, is returning near-monopoly power in fiber to NTT, which owns and controls most new fiber lines to homes. Growth of new fiber connections exceeded DSL growth two years ago. Fiber is how all of Japan will soon be connected -- for phones, television and nearly all other services.
"NTT is becoming dominant again in the fiber broadband kingdom," Sato said.
That infuriates its competitors. Yahoo BB and others are demanding that the government once again compel NTT to unlock the lines.
In Japan, the regulatory wars over broadband are far from over.
Special correspondent Akiko Yamamoto contributed to this report.
* * * * * * * *
More to come later!
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Something you'll probably never see in the U.S. in your lifetime . . . .
Swede shows off 40 Gig broadband connection
Think you've got fast broadband? Think again.
Over the last couple of years - thanks to a bit of market pressure and greater consumer awareness - high speed internet access has become the norm around the UK. But we still argue about what constitutes "high speed". Get a bunch of geeks around the table in a pub and somebody is bound to mention how fast: it's the webby equivalent of "My Dad's bigger than your Dad".
Whatever your download speed, though, it surely pales in comparison to that owned by Swedish pensioner Sigbritt Löthberg... who boasts a 40 gig internet connection.
Yes, that's right - 40 Gigabits per second. According to the Local:
Sigbritt will now be able to enjoy 1,500 high definition HDTV channels simultaneously. Or, if there is nothing worth watching there, she will be able to download a full high definition DVD in just two seconds.
The extraordinary speeds are no coincidence - Sigbritt's son is "Swedish internet legend" Peter Löthberg, who advises companies like Cisco on what they should be doing.
Me? I'm still smarting as a result of downgrading from a 10+ Meg connection to a maximum of 2 Megs when I moved out of London. The idea of 40GB is enough to make me faint.
And some of the comments are interesting . . . .
"You guys are lucky I'm still trying to get above 2kb per sec here in America and I have "high speed" internet almost makes me want to move to get that kind of speed."
---
"I live less than 100 miles from the USA Capitol Washington D.C, also living less than 50 miles outside the state capitol, Richmond. The average user here is still on dial-up speeds, around 33k.
DSL is not possible in rural areas.
Cable which has a defacto monopoly in the state of virginia, per county, - they wired the high profit, densely populated areas, leaving the rest of the counties with no options because no one will wire the remaining areas for the limited profit available, hence you have one provider, meaning you play by their rules, and take what they are willing to give you. - A defacto monopoly.
Virginia is a GOP-Big business owned state where the golden rule applies: them whats got de gold makes de rules.
Cable stopped 2 miles from us fourteen years ago, and has not expanded since, and has no plans to expand. They admit they can make a profit by wiring this area, just not as big a profit as they desire - see us when you have 30 customers per mile is their motto."
---
There are others too that say much about the state of North America's broadband infrastructure.
More to come later!
Think you've got fast broadband? Think again.
Over the last couple of years - thanks to a bit of market pressure and greater consumer awareness - high speed internet access has become the norm around the UK. But we still argue about what constitutes "high speed". Get a bunch of geeks around the table in a pub and somebody is bound to mention how fast: it's the webby equivalent of "My Dad's bigger than your Dad".
Whatever your download speed, though, it surely pales in comparison to that owned by Swedish pensioner Sigbritt Löthberg... who boasts a 40 gig internet connection.
Yes, that's right - 40 Gigabits per second. According to the Local:
Sigbritt will now be able to enjoy 1,500 high definition HDTV channels simultaneously. Or, if there is nothing worth watching there, she will be able to download a full high definition DVD in just two seconds.
The extraordinary speeds are no coincidence - Sigbritt's son is "Swedish internet legend" Peter Löthberg, who advises companies like Cisco on what they should be doing.
Me? I'm still smarting as a result of downgrading from a 10+ Meg connection to a maximum of 2 Megs when I moved out of London. The idea of 40GB is enough to make me faint.
And some of the comments are interesting . . . .
"You guys are lucky I'm still trying to get above 2kb per sec here in America and I have "high speed" internet almost makes me want to move to get that kind of speed."
---
"I live less than 100 miles from the USA Capitol Washington D.C, also living less than 50 miles outside the state capitol, Richmond. The average user here is still on dial-up speeds, around 33k.
DSL is not possible in rural areas.
Cable which has a defacto monopoly in the state of virginia, per county, - they wired the high profit, densely populated areas, leaving the rest of the counties with no options because no one will wire the remaining areas for the limited profit available, hence you have one provider, meaning you play by their rules, and take what they are willing to give you. - A defacto monopoly.
Virginia is a GOP-Big business owned state where the golden rule applies: them whats got de gold makes de rules.
Cable stopped 2 miles from us fourteen years ago, and has not expanded since, and has no plans to expand. They admit they can make a profit by wiring this area, just not as big a profit as they desire - see us when you have 30 customers per mile is their motto."
---
There are others too that say much about the state of North America's broadband infrastructure.
More to come later!
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Broadband Hits Maturity: Implications of a Slower-Growing Market
IP Media Monitor has performed a detailed analysis that looks at broadband trends in the US. It looks at land-based telco internets.
Broadband Hits Maturity: Implications of a Slower-Growing Market
2007 Could Be the First Year of U.S. Broadband Growth Slow-Down, According to Analysis by Emerging Media Dynamics.
Top Broadband Providers Experienced 22% Seasonally Adjusted Drop in Broadband Customer Gains During Q2 07, Potentially Signaling Long-Anticipated Era of Decelerating Broadband Growth, Research Firm Says
U.S. broadband growth declined on a seasonally adjusted quarterly basis during Q2 07, the first such true growth deceleration since broadband Internet service emerged from its tentative test-bed status in 1997. According to our just-completed analysis of the broadband marketplace, the top four telco and top nine cable broadband service providers experienced combined net high-speed Internet customer additions of 1.56 million during Q2 07, a rate of growth that was 22% lower than the 1.994 million net additions the same group of companies gained during Q2 06.
Our exclusive analysis of this critical turning point in the broadband world is spelled out in our report, Broadband Hits Maturity: Implications of a Slower-Growing Market. Everyone has long understood that fundamental mathematics would result in a slow-down of broadband growth sooner or later. But, as Broadband Hits Maturity notes, the U.S. experienced accelerating quarterly and annual gains in the high-speed Internet business for almost ten years, and the Q2 07 downshift in growth is nonetheless as surprising as it was predictable.
This data-rich report offers detailed charts, tables and analysis that interpret this development and deliver cogent assessments of the competitive performance of the major cable and telco service providers in the U.S. Among the companies examined in the report are:
Brighthouse Networks
Cable One
Cablevision
Charter
Comcast
Cox
Insight
Mediacom
Time Warner
Qwest
AT&T
Verizon
Embarq
More importantly, Broadband Hits Maturity offers reasoned and reasonable industry-wide projections on just how quickly -- or how slowly -- the U.S. broadband market will grow over the next ten years. According to our analysis, by year-end 2017, at least 100 million homes will subscribe to some form of broadband service, which represents still-healthy growth in this business. At the same time, however, could grow and should grow at a far slower pace than they have over the past ten years.
The year 2006 may very well have been the high-water mark in residential broadband growth, with all providers adding an incremental 10.6 million units during the year. For 2007, however, the net growth in residential broadband subscriptions could slip to 8.8 million, declining each thereafter until hitting 1.5 million for the year 2017. The upshot of this cool-down could be greater price competition across the range of triple-play (and even quadruple-play) services in selected markets, plus intensified efforts by broadband providers to differentiate their services in terms of speeds, reliability and even content-related add-ons.
The detailed report is for sale via the link at the top of the article.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
My take on this is that this may be the trend if viewed a certain way at today's environment. As I've said before, people are using more bandwidth-intensive applications such as music, YouTube-type apps, VOIP, and others. And chances are that the number of users will increase rather than decrease. Needless to say, the rest of the world's broadband usage will increase significantly, and as I said before, the implications of this report are specific to the US due to the telco industry's monopoly control which erases competition in the marketplace.
Again, the telcos, internet providers, and their business models are the problem.
Broadband Hits Maturity: Implications of a Slower-Growing Market
2007 Could Be the First Year of U.S. Broadband Growth Slow-Down, According to Analysis by Emerging Media Dynamics.
Top Broadband Providers Experienced 22% Seasonally Adjusted Drop in Broadband Customer Gains During Q2 07, Potentially Signaling Long-Anticipated Era of Decelerating Broadband Growth, Research Firm Says
U.S. broadband growth declined on a seasonally adjusted quarterly basis during Q2 07, the first such true growth deceleration since broadband Internet service emerged from its tentative test-bed status in 1997. According to our just-completed analysis of the broadband marketplace, the top four telco and top nine cable broadband service providers experienced combined net high-speed Internet customer additions of 1.56 million during Q2 07, a rate of growth that was 22% lower than the 1.994 million net additions the same group of companies gained during Q2 06.
Our exclusive analysis of this critical turning point in the broadband world is spelled out in our report, Broadband Hits Maturity: Implications of a Slower-Growing Market. Everyone has long understood that fundamental mathematics would result in a slow-down of broadband growth sooner or later. But, as Broadband Hits Maturity notes, the U.S. experienced accelerating quarterly and annual gains in the high-speed Internet business for almost ten years, and the Q2 07 downshift in growth is nonetheless as surprising as it was predictable.
This data-rich report offers detailed charts, tables and analysis that interpret this development and deliver cogent assessments of the competitive performance of the major cable and telco service providers in the U.S. Among the companies examined in the report are:
Brighthouse Networks
Cable One
Cablevision
Charter
Comcast
Cox
Insight
Mediacom
Time Warner
Qwest
AT&T
Verizon
Embarq
More importantly, Broadband Hits Maturity offers reasoned and reasonable industry-wide projections on just how quickly -- or how slowly -- the U.S. broadband market will grow over the next ten years. According to our analysis, by year-end 2017, at least 100 million homes will subscribe to some form of broadband service, which represents still-healthy growth in this business. At the same time, however, could grow and should grow at a far slower pace than they have over the past ten years.
The year 2006 may very well have been the high-water mark in residential broadband growth, with all providers adding an incremental 10.6 million units during the year. For 2007, however, the net growth in residential broadband subscriptions could slip to 8.8 million, declining each thereafter until hitting 1.5 million for the year 2017. The upshot of this cool-down could be greater price competition across the range of triple-play (and even quadruple-play) services in selected markets, plus intensified efforts by broadband providers to differentiate their services in terms of speeds, reliability and even content-related add-ons.
The detailed report is for sale via the link at the top of the article.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
My take on this is that this may be the trend if viewed a certain way at today's environment. As I've said before, people are using more bandwidth-intensive applications such as music, YouTube-type apps, VOIP, and others. And chances are that the number of users will increase rather than decrease. Needless to say, the rest of the world's broadband usage will increase significantly, and as I said before, the implications of this report are specific to the US due to the telco industry's monopoly control which erases competition in the marketplace.
Again, the telcos, internet providers, and their business models are the problem.
Is Restricting Bandwidth the Future of the Internet?
Leave it to US-based corporations to ruin a great idea such as the internet because they want it to be about "CONTROL" so they can charge the maximum while providing the minimum.
Now, not only are satellite internet companies implementing traffic limits via their FAP policies, now it looks like the regular land-based telcos like Comcast are imposing caps too.
Comcast and the amazing invisible bandwidth barrier.
" . . . . But this is another example of how the uncompetitive cable/telecom duopoly in this country enables such arbitrary business decisions. Overall broadband growth is on the decline in America, and much like credit card companies, the incumbent providers will unlock the higher speeds and offer more bells and whistles to retain customers or fight for restless subscribers to other services, rather than actually offer better terms of service or expand to underserved areas. . . . "
The article links are pretty informative too. For instance.....
Comcast Cuts Off Heavy Internet Users
". . . . The company, which a few years ago advertised the service as “unlimited” has an “acceptable use policy” which enforces the invisible download limit.
The 23-part policy, states that it is a breach of contract to generate “levels of traffic sufficient to impede others' ability to send or retrieve information.” But nowhere does it detail what levels of traffic will impede others. . . . "
Putting a lid on broadband use
" . . . . Hard caps and fuzzy ones
Different ISPs are taking widely different approaches to this issue, although caps seem for now to be limited to the cable companies.
Cox Communications started phasing in hard usage limits in February, and now a majority of that company's subscribers are limited to downloading 2 gigabytes a day--the equivalent of about two compressed feature-length movies or about 400 MP3 songs. AOL Time Warner's Road Runner cable modem service recently instituted download caps of 40 gigabytes per month.
Comcast's policy has proven most controversial. The company's terms of service say only that users cannot "represent (in the sole judgment of Comcast) an unusually large burden on the network." According to a spokeswoman, the company began sending notes about two months ago to the top 1 percent of the heaviest users--people who collectively use about 28 percent of the company's bandwidth--telling them they were violating their terms of service. . . . "
Comcast imposing invisible caps again
" . . . . Its been 2 years since I have seen this, but needless to say If you are a high downloader, you will be getting a call or letter soon.
I got a call from some not so intelligent Comcast employee today. Regarding network abuse. Now I have the Pro Account $95/mo for 6MB/768K I believe the speeds are. Anyways, I dealt with this little issue about 2 years ago. I had gotten a call from the same $5.75/hr person. Saying the samething, too much usage, can't tell ya how much nor can I tell what is a reasonable limit.
Now 2 years ago when I called my local office (best advice, i will be doing this Monday) Locals advised me that I needed the Pro Account, so I signed up for it and maintained my usage. My usage hasn't changed much, yet Today, I got the call. . . . "
The Battle For Better Broadband
" . . . . Is government regulation of the Net necessary? In this case, I would say “Yes.” Look, it’s a reality that U.S. broadband development and penetration is abysmal. Major telecoms like AT&T and Verizon would rather use the Universal Service Fund–which was ostensibly designed to spur investment in rural broadband–as a slush fund to subsidize their cost overruns and whatever big project they have going. (In fact, you may recall that both telecoms petitioned for regulatory relief from paying the USF–and then promptly charged customers a brand-new fee with no explanation that went right into their pockets, until a consumer outcry forced them to give it up.) . . . . "
Verizon Admits that their Unlimited Data Plan is Limited to 5GB Per Month
" . . . . So all the service is really good for is viewing websites and sending emails since you cannot download or upload anything. They say that sending emails is okay, but what about if you constantly have large attachments in your email which results in high bandwidth usage? Does that fall under the download/upload restriction that can terminate your account, or is that considered acceptable use since it is an email? . . . . "
Broadband Growth is Decelerating
" . . . . Over at Emerging Media Dynamics (my consulting firm), we’ve just completed an analysis of broadband growth trends and have confirmed what many folks have lately suspected. Broadband growth is, in fact, slowing down, at least in the U.S., a logical development that had to happen sooner or later. It makes sense that it would happen now given that penetration of high-speed Internet service has top the 50% household milestone. . . . "
NOTE to US telcos and satellite internet providers:
This is why the US is falling behind the rest of the world in many areas including technology. You're negatively affecting CREATIVITY & PRODUCTIVITY with your business models.
Now, not only are satellite internet companies implementing traffic limits via their FAP policies, now it looks like the regular land-based telcos like Comcast are imposing caps too.
Comcast and the amazing invisible bandwidth barrier.
" . . . . But this is another example of how the uncompetitive cable/telecom duopoly in this country enables such arbitrary business decisions. Overall broadband growth is on the decline in America, and much like credit card companies, the incumbent providers will unlock the higher speeds and offer more bells and whistles to retain customers or fight for restless subscribers to other services, rather than actually offer better terms of service or expand to underserved areas. . . . "
The article links are pretty informative too. For instance.....
Comcast Cuts Off Heavy Internet Users
". . . . The company, which a few years ago advertised the service as “unlimited” has an “acceptable use policy” which enforces the invisible download limit.
The 23-part policy, states that it is a breach of contract to generate “levels of traffic sufficient to impede others' ability to send or retrieve information.” But nowhere does it detail what levels of traffic will impede others. . . . "
Putting a lid on broadband use
" . . . . Hard caps and fuzzy ones
Different ISPs are taking widely different approaches to this issue, although caps seem for now to be limited to the cable companies.
Cox Communications started phasing in hard usage limits in February, and now a majority of that company's subscribers are limited to downloading 2 gigabytes a day--the equivalent of about two compressed feature-length movies or about 400 MP3 songs. AOL Time Warner's Road Runner cable modem service recently instituted download caps of 40 gigabytes per month.
Comcast's policy has proven most controversial. The company's terms of service say only that users cannot "represent (in the sole judgment of Comcast) an unusually large burden on the network." According to a spokeswoman, the company began sending notes about two months ago to the top 1 percent of the heaviest users--people who collectively use about 28 percent of the company's bandwidth--telling them they were violating their terms of service. . . . "
Comcast imposing invisible caps again
" . . . . Its been 2 years since I have seen this, but needless to say If you are a high downloader, you will be getting a call or letter soon.
I got a call from some not so intelligent Comcast employee today. Regarding network abuse. Now I have the Pro Account $95/mo for 6MB/768K I believe the speeds are. Anyways, I dealt with this little issue about 2 years ago. I had gotten a call from the same $5.75/hr person. Saying the samething, too much usage, can't tell ya how much nor can I tell what is a reasonable limit.
Now 2 years ago when I called my local office (best advice, i will be doing this Monday) Locals advised me that I needed the Pro Account, so I signed up for it and maintained my usage. My usage hasn't changed much, yet Today, I got the call. . . . "
The Battle For Better Broadband
" . . . . Is government regulation of the Net necessary? In this case, I would say “Yes.” Look, it’s a reality that U.S. broadband development and penetration is abysmal. Major telecoms like AT&T and Verizon would rather use the Universal Service Fund–which was ostensibly designed to spur investment in rural broadband–as a slush fund to subsidize their cost overruns and whatever big project they have going. (In fact, you may recall that both telecoms petitioned for regulatory relief from paying the USF–and then promptly charged customers a brand-new fee with no explanation that went right into their pockets, until a consumer outcry forced them to give it up.) . . . . "
Verizon Admits that their Unlimited Data Plan is Limited to 5GB Per Month
" . . . . So all the service is really good for is viewing websites and sending emails since you cannot download or upload anything. They say that sending emails is okay, but what about if you constantly have large attachments in your email which results in high bandwidth usage? Does that fall under the download/upload restriction that can terminate your account, or is that considered acceptable use since it is an email? . . . . "
Broadband Growth is Decelerating
" . . . . Over at Emerging Media Dynamics (my consulting firm), we’ve just completed an analysis of broadband growth trends and have confirmed what many folks have lately suspected. Broadband growth is, in fact, slowing down, at least in the U.S., a logical development that had to happen sooner or later. It makes sense that it would happen now given that penetration of high-speed Internet service has top the 50% household milestone. . . . "
NOTE to US telcos and satellite internet providers:
This is why the US is falling behind the rest of the world in many areas including technology. You're negatively affecting CREATIVITY & PRODUCTIVITY with your business models.
Monday, August 27, 2007
The World According to ...
MARK CUBAN.
Much like Friedrich Nietzsche, who scandalized 19th-century Europe by declaring that "God is dead," Mark Cuban has some bad news for all the true believers who are investing billions in the Web.
The internet is "dead and boring," Cuban says in an interview with Portfolio.com. "We have reached the point of diminishing returns with today's internet. The speed of broadband to your home won't increase much more in the next five years than it has in the last five years. That is not enough to work as a platform for new levels of applications that will require much, much higher levels of bandwidth."
Of course, the 49-year-old Cuban made his $2.3 billion fortune as an internet entrepreneur. In 1999, he and business partner Todd Wagner sold their Web TV company, Broadcast.com, to Yahoo for $5.7 billion in Yahoo stock, then cashed out before the tech market imploded -- leaving Cuban with plenty of money to buy a basketball team, the Dallas Mavericks; launch a high-definition television network, HDNet; hire Dan Rather; and start a vertically integrated entertainment company, 2929 Entertainment, that makes and distributes movies and owns a chain of theaters.
. . . .
Answering questions by email from the Cayman Islands, where he was vacationing with his family and recovering from hip-replacement surgery, Cuban also shared his views on Rupert Murdoch's acquisition of the Wall Street Journal, Yahoo versus Google, day-trading, his personal investment strategy, and why he won't pull the plug on his much-criticized business journalism operation, Sharesleuth.com, in which he shorts companies that the site plans to trash-hoping to turn a tidy profit on his pre-publication insider knowledge.
Lloyd Grove: As recently as May 2007, you told the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet that government policy could encourage internet providers to make the necessary investment in fiber optics to significantly increase bandwidth to home users, in line with industrialized nations such as Japan, Germany, and South Korea, and that the economic benefits would eventually outweigh the costs. But last month, you declared: “The internet is dead. It’s over.” You said it’s “for old people” and it’s a “stagnant consumer platform.” Did you change your mind between May and July? Who or what killed the internet? And aren’t you biting the hand that fed you?
Mark Cuban: The internet of today versus what I suggested to the committee would happen if internet speeds to the home increased to 1 gigabyte per second, is like comparing the plane Orville and Wilbur Wright built in 1903 to a brand-new Boeing.
We have reached a point of diminishing returns with today’s internet. The speed of broadband to your home won’t increase much more in the next five years than it has in the last five years. That is not enough to work as a platform for new levels of applications that will require much, much higher levels of bandwidth.
Broadband to the home isn’t fast enough for downloads of movies at DVD quality to be ubiquitous. That means it’s no longer a platform for technological innovation.
Think of it this way. Way back when, electricity changed the world. It was the platform for everything electronic that we do today. Do you get excited about electricity or is it just a utility? Maybe old people who remember the advent of electricity still get excited about it. No one else does.
The internet is in the same position today. It’s no longer an exciting platform for societal and business change. It’s a utility. It’s something that is exciting to people who remember the old days of the internet.
The only way to change that is to upgrade the platform for bandwidth transport across the country to a minimum of 1 gigabyte per second throughout to every home. At that point kids will come up with new and unique applications that we can’t imagine today. That’s when it becomes exciting. Until then, it’s dead and boring.
Read the complete interview here.
* * * * * * * * * *
See, there are some forward-thinking people who have a pretty good idea about where the internet is today and where it's going (unlike some satellite installers, ummm sorry, Satellite Internet News Analysts, who get their monthly newsletters from the mothership).
And he's talking about broadband internet cabled into the home, not the dialup-over-the-satellite kind of internet.
Houston, HughesNet may have a problem.
Much like Friedrich Nietzsche, who scandalized 19th-century Europe by declaring that "God is dead," Mark Cuban has some bad news for all the true believers who are investing billions in the Web.
The internet is "dead and boring," Cuban says in an interview with Portfolio.com. "We have reached the point of diminishing returns with today's internet. The speed of broadband to your home won't increase much more in the next five years than it has in the last five years. That is not enough to work as a platform for new levels of applications that will require much, much higher levels of bandwidth."
Of course, the 49-year-old Cuban made his $2.3 billion fortune as an internet entrepreneur. In 1999, he and business partner Todd Wagner sold their Web TV company, Broadcast.com, to Yahoo for $5.7 billion in Yahoo stock, then cashed out before the tech market imploded -- leaving Cuban with plenty of money to buy a basketball team, the Dallas Mavericks; launch a high-definition television network, HDNet; hire Dan Rather; and start a vertically integrated entertainment company, 2929 Entertainment, that makes and distributes movies and owns a chain of theaters.
. . . .
Answering questions by email from the Cayman Islands, where he was vacationing with his family and recovering from hip-replacement surgery, Cuban also shared his views on Rupert Murdoch's acquisition of the Wall Street Journal, Yahoo versus Google, day-trading, his personal investment strategy, and why he won't pull the plug on his much-criticized business journalism operation, Sharesleuth.com, in which he shorts companies that the site plans to trash-hoping to turn a tidy profit on his pre-publication insider knowledge.
Lloyd Grove: As recently as May 2007, you told the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet that government policy could encourage internet providers to make the necessary investment in fiber optics to significantly increase bandwidth to home users, in line with industrialized nations such as Japan, Germany, and South Korea, and that the economic benefits would eventually outweigh the costs. But last month, you declared: “The internet is dead. It’s over.” You said it’s “for old people” and it’s a “stagnant consumer platform.” Did you change your mind between May and July? Who or what killed the internet? And aren’t you biting the hand that fed you?
Mark Cuban: The internet of today versus what I suggested to the committee would happen if internet speeds to the home increased to 1 gigabyte per second, is like comparing the plane Orville and Wilbur Wright built in 1903 to a brand-new Boeing.
We have reached a point of diminishing returns with today’s internet. The speed of broadband to your home won’t increase much more in the next five years than it has in the last five years. That is not enough to work as a platform for new levels of applications that will require much, much higher levels of bandwidth.
Broadband to the home isn’t fast enough for downloads of movies at DVD quality to be ubiquitous. That means it’s no longer a platform for technological innovation.
Think of it this way. Way back when, electricity changed the world. It was the platform for everything electronic that we do today. Do you get excited about electricity or is it just a utility? Maybe old people who remember the advent of electricity still get excited about it. No one else does.
The internet is in the same position today. It’s no longer an exciting platform for societal and business change. It’s a utility. It’s something that is exciting to people who remember the old days of the internet.
The only way to change that is to upgrade the platform for bandwidth transport across the country to a minimum of 1 gigabyte per second throughout to every home. At that point kids will come up with new and unique applications that we can’t imagine today. That’s when it becomes exciting. Until then, it’s dead and boring.
Read the complete interview here.
* * * * * * * * * *
See, there are some forward-thinking people who have a pretty good idea about where the internet is today and where it's going (unlike some satellite installers, ummm sorry, Satellite Internet News Analysts, who get their monthly newsletters from the mothership).
And he's talking about broadband internet cabled into the home, not the dialup-over-the-satellite kind of internet.
Houston, HughesNet may have a problem.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
So I was crawling around cyberia...
And I came upon some guy's blog (I may include the link later).
He claims to be a "Satellite Internet Service Provider & Satellite Internet News Analyst". In other words, he's an installer. After he gets the call from HughesNet, he drives his truck to the customer's residence, climbs the ladder, and sets up the dish, and gets the modem ready to go.
He has three blogs linked to his profile; two about satellite internet and another about his life in general since he moved to Colorado, politics, and whatever strikes his fancy at the moment (it seems he doesn't like free speech either). Oh, and he updates his blogs only once in awhile too.
So anyway, on one of his blogs back in 2005, he's kind of pointing out that WildBlue was having problems and pooh poohing them wondering how they were going to make it without an huge influx of cash (maybe valid, maybe not, but it's well into 2007 and they're still operating).
So, here's what he says about the HughesNet FAP when it was enacted this year:
* * * * * *
2007 - The Year of the FAP Flap!
I wondered when Satellite Internet Service Providers would finally pull off the rose colored glasses and get a grip on the realities of bandwidth cost.......Have they finally learned that you have to earn a profit if you want to stay in business? Most VSAT Service Providers have found out that allowing all of your customers to download or upload whatever, whenever and however they want on a "Shared Network," is a recipe for massive network slowdowns, customer complaints and ultimately, loss of revenue.
Until late 2005, the only major satellite internet provider with any type of bandwidth limitation for users was HughesNet (formerly DirecWay). They prevented bandwidth "gluttons" from bringing an already overbooked network to a screeching halt by implementing a Fair Access Policy (FAP). This policy slows down aggressive users for several hours to permit others on the network a fair "shot" at the available bandwidth. On a typical HughesNet transponder there are about 7-8,000 customers. If everyone assigned to that transponder were active at the same time they theoretically would be surfing at about 2-5 kbps, or around 1/10th of dial-up speed! Fortunately not everyone is competing simultaneously.
HughesNet did a pretty good job in the past of "balancing the load" - spacing out the time zones of users, moving users from one transponder to another, etc. But things have changed a great deal in the surfing world over the last 2-3 years. Content that people want to download has more graphics in it......so the formulas for network loading used successfully in the past by HNS and copied by others are not working as well today and a lot of customers are unhappy with the speeds they get, especially during the "prime time" hours of 5 PM to 11 PM. Since 2005 almost every satellite internet provider has implemented some type of FAP or traffic management scheme for all shared bandwidth (which is what nearly all users are on).
Update: April 29th, 2007: HughesNet has announced a new Fair Access Policy! The new policy is still actually being "implemented" and is subject to some continued modification, but essentially works the same way as the previous policy allowing you to refill an imaginary bucket as you use the service; however, the new "rules", if you will, put you in a near zero upload/download penalty mode if you actually hit FAP levels. Sound confusing?....it's supposed to!
Update: June 1, 2007: As a possible response to the criticism from many long time HughesNet customers, HughesNet "opened up" a period of FAP Free usage each day in the middle of the night. Basically from 3-6 AM Eastern Time Zone, you can download as much as you are able.
In 2006 the buzzword in the satellite internet world was "traffic shaping"....a fancy term for blocking undesired activity or managing the data packet delivery by a internet provider. An internet provider can prevent certain high volume activity like streaming video, gaming, voip phone calls and point to point downloading by blocking the typical ports used by those activities at the gateway or Network Operations Center, where the network is managed. Alternatively, they can prioritize the handling of data packets so that your latency skyrockets, but the overall speed (once you are "slotted") remains good. All of this is a form of curtailing usage outside of the FAP policies and is considered a "black hat" policy by many critics.
Many users have raised a good deal of fuss........saying basically, "I paid for X amount of bandwidth and expect to be able to use it any way I want to." Internet providers have either refused to admit they were actually traffic shaping, or told customers to re-read their Terms Of Service agreements, which are very one-sided in favor of the provider, stating that almost anything could be considered undesirable download activity and could be restricted if the network operator wished! These tactics have just galvanized the distrust many satellite internet users already have for Internet providers. The outcry from users hit with this so called traffic shaping, has been so overwhelming that many providers (especially iDirect uplink carriers) have been scrambling to put together a stated FAP policy in lieu of the perceived back-door tactics used in most traffic shaping schemes.
We are entering a era in which the desires and needs of internet users are on a collision course with satellite owners and resellers of satellite bandwidth (terrestrial bandwidth as well). People are using the internet more and the available content is more graphical, meaning big increases in demand ....unfortunately the cost of satellites, the cost of launch and the ongoing costs to deliver it to customers has stayed the same or increased.
I predict that by the end of 2007 the most ethical satellite internet providers will have a simple to understand Fair Access Policy and virtually all of this behind the curtain traffic shaping activity will fall by the wayside. Providers who aren't making very good returns on investments won't continue to do business the way they have in the past.......investors won't stand for it any more. It all adds up to increased costs for those wanting to do all the "cool stuff" that is coming our way like IPTV, more video streaming, games, movies and so forth.
* * * * * *
So, here's my take on it:
He's saying that HughesNet enacted their FAP / traffic limits after there was a massive signup and that was causing them some problems. And then he adds that investors were looking for a better return. But, the strange part of this sudden FAP implementation is this: things were ok up until this year.
But, he completely ignores a few really important points.
First, he completely ignores the FUTURE. As I mentioned previously, the trend (one that won't be turned around) is that people will be using MORE bandwidth because of applications like streaming music, YouTube, videos, VOIP, and the like. You know, 21st century stuff; NOT LESS bandwidth. Here, he says HughesNet is charging more and providing less via their FAP policy...good enough for viewing STATIC WEB PAGES (sooo 20th century).
Second, a company that promises the moon & the stars, and then delivers something signifcantly less is in for a rude wakeup call. That's not how it works in the marketplace. People won't pay for a service that promises but doesn't deliver results. In the end, it will lose them existing customers, new customers, and potential customers (via word-of-mouth over the internet). People will view these shenanigans as deceptive and misleading tactics. And this opens them up to a potential lawsuit. OUCH!!!
Third, Hughes / HughesNet owns their own satellites; they don't rent them. Yes, they're THAT Hughes Corp. And once you get past all the nonsense of "cost centers" of same-company and wholly-owned subsidiary fog, it's just internal transfers on the books. Yes, I'm quite aware of all this from my corporate days.
Fourth, ONLY in the US is this a problem. It's strange that other countries, notably the fourteen industrialized countries ahead of the US in the broadband rankings, seem to have better infrastructure for delivery and lower prices. In other words, kickass internet. Except the US, where the norm is high prices, disappointment, and headaches. A case of squeezing the last dollar out of the customer for something that is a COMMODITY.
Last, if HughesNet does as poorly planning for increased business and excels at being customer-antagonistic, then they deserve to go out of business. I've run companies better than this.
FYI - In case you missed it, he mentions the 3-hour window for FAP-free downloading (3am - 6am Eastern time). Yeah, I know I'm always working in the middle of the night. Very conducive.
More to come later!
He claims to be a "Satellite Internet Service Provider & Satellite Internet News Analyst". In other words, he's an installer. After he gets the call from HughesNet, he drives his truck to the customer's residence, climbs the ladder, and sets up the dish, and gets the modem ready to go.
He has three blogs linked to his profile; two about satellite internet and another about his life in general since he moved to Colorado, politics, and whatever strikes his fancy at the moment (it seems he doesn't like free speech either). Oh, and he updates his blogs only once in awhile too.
So anyway, on one of his blogs back in 2005, he's kind of pointing out that WildBlue was having problems and pooh poohing them wondering how they were going to make it without an huge influx of cash (maybe valid, maybe not, but it's well into 2007 and they're still operating).
So, here's what he says about the HughesNet FAP when it was enacted this year:
* * * * * *
2007 - The Year of the FAP Flap!
I wondered when Satellite Internet Service Providers would finally pull off the rose colored glasses and get a grip on the realities of bandwidth cost.......Have they finally learned that you have to earn a profit if you want to stay in business? Most VSAT Service Providers have found out that allowing all of your customers to download or upload whatever, whenever and however they want on a "Shared Network," is a recipe for massive network slowdowns, customer complaints and ultimately, loss of revenue.
Until late 2005, the only major satellite internet provider with any type of bandwidth limitation for users was HughesNet (formerly DirecWay). They prevented bandwidth "gluttons" from bringing an already overbooked network to a screeching halt by implementing a Fair Access Policy (FAP). This policy slows down aggressive users for several hours to permit others on the network a fair "shot" at the available bandwidth. On a typical HughesNet transponder there are about 7-8,000 customers. If everyone assigned to that transponder were active at the same time they theoretically would be surfing at about 2-5 kbps, or around 1/10th of dial-up speed! Fortunately not everyone is competing simultaneously.
HughesNet did a pretty good job in the past of "balancing the load" - spacing out the time zones of users, moving users from one transponder to another, etc. But things have changed a great deal in the surfing world over the last 2-3 years. Content that people want to download has more graphics in it......so the formulas for network loading used successfully in the past by HNS and copied by others are not working as well today and a lot of customers are unhappy with the speeds they get, especially during the "prime time" hours of 5 PM to 11 PM. Since 2005 almost every satellite internet provider has implemented some type of FAP or traffic management scheme for all shared bandwidth (which is what nearly all users are on).
Update: April 29th, 2007: HughesNet has announced a new Fair Access Policy! The new policy is still actually being "implemented" and is subject to some continued modification, but essentially works the same way as the previous policy allowing you to refill an imaginary bucket as you use the service; however, the new "rules", if you will, put you in a near zero upload/download penalty mode if you actually hit FAP levels. Sound confusing?....it's supposed to!
Update: June 1, 2007: As a possible response to the criticism from many long time HughesNet customers, HughesNet "opened up" a period of FAP Free usage each day in the middle of the night. Basically from 3-6 AM Eastern Time Zone, you can download as much as you are able.
In 2006 the buzzword in the satellite internet world was "traffic shaping"....a fancy term for blocking undesired activity or managing the data packet delivery by a internet provider. An internet provider can prevent certain high volume activity like streaming video, gaming, voip phone calls and point to point downloading by blocking the typical ports used by those activities at the gateway or Network Operations Center, where the network is managed. Alternatively, they can prioritize the handling of data packets so that your latency skyrockets, but the overall speed (once you are "slotted") remains good. All of this is a form of curtailing usage outside of the FAP policies and is considered a "black hat" policy by many critics.
Many users have raised a good deal of fuss........saying basically, "I paid for X amount of bandwidth and expect to be able to use it any way I want to." Internet providers have either refused to admit they were actually traffic shaping, or told customers to re-read their Terms Of Service agreements, which are very one-sided in favor of the provider, stating that almost anything could be considered undesirable download activity and could be restricted if the network operator wished! These tactics have just galvanized the distrust many satellite internet users already have for Internet providers. The outcry from users hit with this so called traffic shaping, has been so overwhelming that many providers (especially iDirect uplink carriers) have been scrambling to put together a stated FAP policy in lieu of the perceived back-door tactics used in most traffic shaping schemes.
We are entering a era in which the desires and needs of internet users are on a collision course with satellite owners and resellers of satellite bandwidth (terrestrial bandwidth as well). People are using the internet more and the available content is more graphical, meaning big increases in demand ....unfortunately the cost of satellites, the cost of launch and the ongoing costs to deliver it to customers has stayed the same or increased.
I predict that by the end of 2007 the most ethical satellite internet providers will have a simple to understand Fair Access Policy and virtually all of this behind the curtain traffic shaping activity will fall by the wayside. Providers who aren't making very good returns on investments won't continue to do business the way they have in the past.......investors won't stand for it any more. It all adds up to increased costs for those wanting to do all the "cool stuff" that is coming our way like IPTV, more video streaming, games, movies and so forth.
* * * * * *
So, here's my take on it:
He's saying that HughesNet enacted their FAP / traffic limits after there was a massive signup and that was causing them some problems. And then he adds that investors were looking for a better return. But, the strange part of this sudden FAP implementation is this: things were ok up until this year.
But, he completely ignores a few really important points.
First, he completely ignores the FUTURE. As I mentioned previously, the trend (one that won't be turned around) is that people will be using MORE bandwidth because of applications like streaming music, YouTube, videos, VOIP, and the like. You know, 21st century stuff; NOT LESS bandwidth. Here, he says HughesNet is charging more and providing less via their FAP policy...good enough for viewing STATIC WEB PAGES (sooo 20th century).
Second, a company that promises the moon & the stars, and then delivers something signifcantly less is in for a rude wakeup call. That's not how it works in the marketplace. People won't pay for a service that promises but doesn't deliver results. In the end, it will lose them existing customers, new customers, and potential customers (via word-of-mouth over the internet). People will view these shenanigans as deceptive and misleading tactics. And this opens them up to a potential lawsuit. OUCH!!!
Third, Hughes / HughesNet owns their own satellites; they don't rent them. Yes, they're THAT Hughes Corp. And once you get past all the nonsense of "cost centers" of same-company and wholly-owned subsidiary fog, it's just internal transfers on the books. Yes, I'm quite aware of all this from my corporate days.
Fourth, ONLY in the US is this a problem. It's strange that other countries, notably the fourteen industrialized countries ahead of the US in the broadband rankings, seem to have better infrastructure for delivery and lower prices. In other words, kickass internet. Except the US, where the norm is high prices, disappointment, and headaches. A case of squeezing the last dollar out of the customer for something that is a COMMODITY.
Last, if HughesNet does as poorly planning for increased business and excels at being customer-antagonistic, then they deserve to go out of business. I've run companies better than this.
FYI - In case you missed it, he mentions the 3-hour window for FAP-free downloading (3am - 6am Eastern time). Yeah, I know I'm always working in the middle of the night. Very conducive.
More to come later!
How to build a mob (Lesson No. 3)
Feel the love.
We'll Downgrade Your Bandwidth 82% And You'll Like It.
" . . . . After 3:01AM April 18th, their so-called "Fair Access Policy" changed to say that now the subscribers can download 375MB but in a TWENTY FOUR HOUR period! What's worse is, if you download more than 375MB in your 24 hour period (which by the way is a rolling period of time -- therefore you never get reset to zero unless you unplug your modem for 24 hours!), then you will be rated limited to sub-dialup speeds for TWENTY FOUR HOURS! The rate limit punishment time used to be 12 hours before this new policy came into effect! . . . . "
And of course, the comments are fun reading! In fact, the comments are more telling because they are people who are sharing their experiences.
Let's put it this way, the future of satellite internet is not looking so bright if your name is HughesNet. Unhappy customers is not a way to stay in business.
We'll be reading about this as a case study in business school one of these days. Especially if HughesNet tries to tell users that they'll get dialup speeds at 3x-4x the price of dialup and they'll have to severely limit their internet usage. Especially, as the rest of the world reduces their internet prices and the US increases their internet prices.
More to come later!
We'll Downgrade Your Bandwidth 82% And You'll Like It.
" . . . . After 3:01AM April 18th, their so-called "Fair Access Policy" changed to say that now the subscribers can download 375MB but in a TWENTY FOUR HOUR period! What's worse is, if you download more than 375MB in your 24 hour period (which by the way is a rolling period of time -- therefore you never get reset to zero unless you unplug your modem for 24 hours!), then you will be rated limited to sub-dialup speeds for TWENTY FOUR HOURS! The rate limit punishment time used to be 12 hours before this new policy came into effect! . . . . "
And of course, the comments are fun reading! In fact, the comments are more telling because they are people who are sharing their experiences.
Let's put it this way, the future of satellite internet is not looking so bright if your name is HughesNet. Unhappy customers is not a way to stay in business.
We'll be reading about this as a case study in business school one of these days. Especially if HughesNet tries to tell users that they'll get dialup speeds at 3x-4x the price of dialup and they'll have to severely limit their internet usage. Especially, as the rest of the world reduces their internet prices and the US increases their internet prices.
More to come later!
How to build a mob (Lesson No. 2)
A few more people who have experienced HughesNet (be sure to read ALL the comments on the links):
The World According to Bob
" . . . . I subscribed to HughesNet satellite direct Internet. It was DirecWay Internet. I've had it for about a month now and it's the biggest piece of crap I've ever had since I've been on-line. Bob has been on line since the days of Commodore computers and 300 baud bulletin boards. Bob has seen the good and the bad, and Hughes satellite direct Internet service is expensive crapola. About 1 day out of 2 it goes off-line and stays off line for hours. Their "technical support" phone number gives you an endless recording recommending their on-line support web site, which you can't access since their crap Internet service is down . . . .
Priceless (and the numerous comments are even more fun to read).
The Squeaky Wheel has some complaints (listed in alphabetical order, so scroll down the page until you see either Direcway or HughesNet, since it's listed under both names). Here's a couple of them.
Squeaky Wheel - intermittant and slow connection.
". . . . So, we call the 800 # and the wait is so long that by the time we get them on the phone the connection and speed has improved. What do they expect we are calling India to solve a problem in Virginia! We are almost to the point of signing back up with dial up, it is more reliable and consistant. For 59.99 per month the service is a rip off! . . . .
Squeaky Wheel - Overall Service
" . . . . Overall service from HUGHESNET can be described as dismal at best . . . ."
Broadband Reports
" . . . . Now with the new FAP, the $60 account is about worthless. You need to consider a bigger account and if you can afford it, get the 1.2M dish and a business account.
Hughes is now so bad, it should be considered the worst ISP in the United States.
This is not only because of the new FAP, but when they changed it, they didn't inform one single user to be careful because after a 1/3 of your allotment you will be penalized with lower refill rates, nor did they tell people they were going to get 24 hours without internet until it happened to them . . . . "
More to come later!
The World According to Bob
" . . . . I subscribed to HughesNet satellite direct Internet. It was DirecWay Internet. I've had it for about a month now and it's the biggest piece of crap I've ever had since I've been on-line. Bob has been on line since the days of Commodore computers and 300 baud bulletin boards. Bob has seen the good and the bad, and Hughes satellite direct Internet service is expensive crapola. About 1 day out of 2 it goes off-line and stays off line for hours. Their "technical support" phone number gives you an endless recording recommending their on-line support web site, which you can't access since their crap Internet service is down . . . .
Priceless (and the numerous comments are even more fun to read).
The Squeaky Wheel has some complaints (listed in alphabetical order, so scroll down the page until you see either Direcway or HughesNet, since it's listed under both names). Here's a couple of them.
Squeaky Wheel - intermittant and slow connection.
". . . . So, we call the 800 # and the wait is so long that by the time we get them on the phone the connection and speed has improved. What do they expect we are calling India to solve a problem in Virginia! We are almost to the point of signing back up with dial up, it is more reliable and consistant. For 59.99 per month the service is a rip off! . . . .
Squeaky Wheel - Overall Service
" . . . . Overall service from HUGHESNET can be described as dismal at best . . . ."
Broadband Reports
" . . . . Now with the new FAP, the $60 account is about worthless. You need to consider a bigger account and if you can afford it, get the 1.2M dish and a business account.
Hughes is now so bad, it should be considered the worst ISP in the United States.
This is not only because of the new FAP, but when they changed it, they didn't inform one single user to be careful because after a 1/3 of your allotment you will be penalized with lower refill rates, nor did they tell people they were going to get 24 hours without internet until it happened to them . . . . "
More to come later!
Friday, August 24, 2007
The Myth of Capitalism
Think you know what "capitalism" is about? Psssst. It's not about "competition". It's about "crushing the competition".
So why am I bringing this up? Well, it occurs to me that as you look around trying to find an ISP or a phone these days, you'll find that they're mostly the same price (or within a few dollars of each other). That's not really competition is it? What about "market price"? Maybe, but they're still all about the same price. With phone companies, they're granted "monopoly" status so they have limited competition in the marketplace (all big names of course, when's the last time you remember seeing a smaller local / regional business competing with them). When you start to see that they're all about the same price, then you have a right to question if the big names are practising "collusion" (aka known as "price fixing").
Another reason I bring this up, is take a look at a comapny like Apple. They focus on designing new products, and then they can charge top-drawer prices in the marketplace to an audience that actually wants to buy their stuff (ummm, like the iPhone for instance). But, they spend a lot of time and money on Research & Development (R&D) to design, build, and bring those products to market.
But when you look at ISPs these days (either telco or satellite), these services have been around a fairly long time and are now fairly mature products / services. Which is why in Asia, it's fairly easy to find a reasonably priced all-you-eat high-speed internet service. Yet, in the US, it's basically the same product / service they were offering ten years ago and they're still charging premium prices (compared to the rest of the world) for an internet service. And these ISPs in the US aren't spending any money on R&D to build something better and faster and more desirable.
Think of it, they have a "commodity" where they're still trying to squeeze out the last dollar without anything new on the horizon. In other words, "same old wine, new bottle" for the customer, and which is why they keep adding all kind of headaches like FAP / traffic limits and degrading their basic service so they can try to keep driving people to their higher-priced packages.
Yeah, that's a grand idea. And they wonder why people don't like them or their service.
It's called being "lazy".
So why am I bringing this up? Well, it occurs to me that as you look around trying to find an ISP or a phone these days, you'll find that they're mostly the same price (or within a few dollars of each other). That's not really competition is it? What about "market price"? Maybe, but they're still all about the same price. With phone companies, they're granted "monopoly" status so they have limited competition in the marketplace (all big names of course, when's the last time you remember seeing a smaller local / regional business competing with them). When you start to see that they're all about the same price, then you have a right to question if the big names are practising "collusion" (aka known as "price fixing").
Another reason I bring this up, is take a look at a comapny like Apple. They focus on designing new products, and then they can charge top-drawer prices in the marketplace to an audience that actually wants to buy their stuff (ummm, like the iPhone for instance). But, they spend a lot of time and money on Research & Development (R&D) to design, build, and bring those products to market.
But when you look at ISPs these days (either telco or satellite), these services have been around a fairly long time and are now fairly mature products / services. Which is why in Asia, it's fairly easy to find a reasonably priced all-you-eat high-speed internet service. Yet, in the US, it's basically the same product / service they were offering ten years ago and they're still charging premium prices (compared to the rest of the world) for an internet service. And these ISPs in the US aren't spending any money on R&D to build something better and faster and more desirable.
Think of it, they have a "commodity" where they're still trying to squeeze out the last dollar without anything new on the horizon. In other words, "same old wine, new bottle" for the customer, and which is why they keep adding all kind of headaches like FAP / traffic limits and degrading their basic service so they can try to keep driving people to their higher-priced packages.
Yeah, that's a grand idea. And they wonder why people don't like them or their service.
It's called being "lazy".
Availability & Page Load Times
Availability.
Clear, blue skies, calm weather. And HughesNet will still go out. It is intermittent, but it's hard to understand why there'll be an interruption in service on clear days with no bad weather. And it is irritating, especially if you're in the middle of something. Maybe a leaf blew by the dish, or the wind kicked up a bit, or who knows maybe the dog down the street barked (yes, I'm being facetious), and the service goes out and who knows why.
Never mind that it's a given that it WILL go out when there is bad weather (ie: thunder, lightning, storms, rain, heavy winds). And it will stay out until the weather clears up.
But then again, that's HughesNet for you. And to be fair, probably satellite internet in general.
Page loading times.
As I said before, since the name changed to Hughesnet, overall the daily service for $60/mth has gotten slower, around the time traffic limits / FAP were put into effect. The time required to load a simple, plain web page is taking longer than it used to; on par with dialup times (same dish & same modem).
This is HughesNet-specific since they have actively taken to "choking" the basic service in an effort to drive people to upgrade to a more expensive package.
Clear, blue skies, calm weather. And HughesNet will still go out. It is intermittent, but it's hard to understand why there'll be an interruption in service on clear days with no bad weather. And it is irritating, especially if you're in the middle of something. Maybe a leaf blew by the dish, or the wind kicked up a bit, or who knows maybe the dog down the street barked (yes, I'm being facetious), and the service goes out and who knows why.
Never mind that it's a given that it WILL go out when there is bad weather (ie: thunder, lightning, storms, rain, heavy winds). And it will stay out until the weather clears up.
But then again, that's HughesNet for you. And to be fair, probably satellite internet in general.
Page loading times.
As I said before, since the name changed to Hughesnet, overall the daily service for $60/mth has gotten slower, around the time traffic limits / FAP were put into effect. The time required to load a simple, plain web page is taking longer than it used to; on par with dialup times (same dish & same modem).
This is HughesNet-specific since they have actively taken to "choking" the basic service in an effort to drive people to upgrade to a more expensive package.
Knowledge = Power
Why do this?
Because no matter how much homework and due diligence someone does in the leadup to making their decision, there's always a lot to consider. And other people's experiences say alot about the company you'll be "wedded to" during your contract with them.
"Word of mouth" is always the best referral in business. And in the case of HughesNet, it's also the best deterrent. It's not like people haven't told them about these problems. They have and they still refuse to change. Not listening to the customer is BAD BUSINESS and certainly no way to run a business.
If and when you do talk to HughesNet about their service, be sure to ask them about the things you've learned during your homework, especially about the FAP (traffic limits). What HughesNet did over the last year is not what some people signed up for; HughesNet changed the terms of their contract and service afterwards.
People can always make their own decisions once they have information. This blog is just to help people understand what they're dealing with based on others' experiences.
My goal is to be off HughesNet by the end of the year, whether it be by physical relocation or by using another ISP.
Because no matter how much homework and due diligence someone does in the leadup to making their decision, there's always a lot to consider. And other people's experiences say alot about the company you'll be "wedded to" during your contract with them.
"Word of mouth" is always the best referral in business. And in the case of HughesNet, it's also the best deterrent. It's not like people haven't told them about these problems. They have and they still refuse to change. Not listening to the customer is BAD BUSINESS and certainly no way to run a business.
If and when you do talk to HughesNet about their service, be sure to ask them about the things you've learned during your homework, especially about the FAP (traffic limits). What HughesNet did over the last year is not what some people signed up for; HughesNet changed the terms of their contract and service afterwards.
People can always make their own decisions once they have information. This blog is just to help people understand what they're dealing with based on others' experiences.
My goal is to be off HughesNet by the end of the year, whether it be by physical relocation or by using another ISP.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
FAP (Fair Access Policy)...not really fair and soooo 20th century
What exactly makes HughesNet suck soooo much?
Well, PRICE for one thing. Let's face it, they're nowhere close to broadband internet speeds. On a good day, they're more like a souped-up dialup service (you can get an all-you-can-eat dialup for $20/mth). It's a COMMODITY. Otherwise HughesNet would like us to believe their dialup-over-the-satellite service is worth $60/mth.
Another thing is that they've reduced what was available when it was DirecWay but left it at the same price. A TAKE AWAY. In other words, paying the same price and getting less.
But the biggest thing is the traffic limits they place on users known as Fair Access Policy (FAP). They changed this in the middle-of-the-night without telling anyone. And then the limits they set for daily usage are also unreasonable in the 21st century. OS updates are pretty large sizes these days. And the trend has been for application sizes to get BIGGER, not SMALLER. And one of the biggest 21st century applications used is streaming music from an internet radio station. And that in itself, is the single biggest complaint across the board with HughesNet users. That and the way they've handled it. People aren't abusing it, they're just living in the 21st century. Is HughesNet still living in the 56K-modem world in 2007?
But they would like users to upgrade to their more expensive service (more revenue for them, BUT they will still cut your service for 24-hours if you exceed their limits)
Well, PRICE for one thing. Let's face it, they're nowhere close to broadband internet speeds. On a good day, they're more like a souped-up dialup service (you can get an all-you-can-eat dialup for $20/mth). It's a COMMODITY. Otherwise HughesNet would like us to believe their dialup-over-the-satellite service is worth $60/mth.
Another thing is that they've reduced what was available when it was DirecWay but left it at the same price. A TAKE AWAY. In other words, paying the same price and getting less.
But the biggest thing is the traffic limits they place on users known as Fair Access Policy (FAP). They changed this in the middle-of-the-night without telling anyone. And then the limits they set for daily usage are also unreasonable in the 21st century. OS updates are pretty large sizes these days. And the trend has been for application sizes to get BIGGER, not SMALLER. And one of the biggest 21st century applications used is streaming music from an internet radio station. And that in itself, is the single biggest complaint across the board with HughesNet users. That and the way they've handled it. People aren't abusing it, they're just living in the 21st century. Is HughesNet still living in the 56K-modem world in 2007?
But they would like users to upgrade to their more expensive service (more revenue for them, BUT they will still cut your service for 24-hours if you exceed their limits)
Did you know?
Unless it's changed recently, HughesNet is a Rupert Murdoch corporation.
So. How do we get that class-action lawsuit started and what would it be based on?
So. How do we get that class-action lawsuit started and what would it be based on?
Alternatives to HughesNet (No. 1)
These are some alternatives courtesy of other people. I haven't used them so I can't endorse them (yet).
I'll be adding alternatives as I find them. Feel free to list some of those you know about.
Wild Blue. Another satellite ISP provider using monthly traffic limits instead of daily traffic limits (as HughesNet uses). Also has their own proprietary hardware and a 12-month contract, BUT based in the United States in Colorado.
Some areas of the US got fed up with the big-name telco players and built their own local high-speed ISPs (they provide faster and cheaper service):
-- Grant County WA
-- Tacoma WA
And did you ever wonder why the US is such a mess compared to other countries (the US ranks 15th in the world of developed nations...and is FALLING)? Wonder no more. Cringely weighs in.
This is also an interesting read: 'Shooting the Messenger' Myth vs. Reality: U.S. Broadband Policy and International Broadband Rankings.
More to come later!
I'll be adding alternatives as I find them. Feel free to list some of those you know about.
Wild Blue. Another satellite ISP provider using monthly traffic limits instead of daily traffic limits (as HughesNet uses). Also has their own proprietary hardware and a 12-month contract, BUT based in the United States in Colorado.
Some areas of the US got fed up with the big-name telco players and built their own local high-speed ISPs (they provide faster and cheaper service):
-- Grant County WA
-- Tacoma WA
And did you ever wonder why the US is such a mess compared to other countries (the US ranks 15th in the world of developed nations...and is FALLING)? Wonder no more. Cringely weighs in.
This is also an interesting read: 'Shooting the Messenger' Myth vs. Reality: U.S. Broadband Policy and International Broadband Rankings.
More to come later!
How to build a mob (Lesson No. 1)
You are not alone!!! HughesNet is gathering quite a few people who HATE their service.
Following are samples of a few choice comments from around cyberia (be sure to scroll down the page to read ALL the comments):
-- Ripoff Report. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I finally got a tech guy (in India) to tell me about this FAP cap that had been implemented. He said, 'Just wait a few hours, your speed will come back'. The Hughes website (I found) says this, too. But, they LIE!
Once I reach my limit, it takes a full day (24 hours) to get my 'high speed' back. Until then, I'm screwed. Just think if they did this with DirecTV. That would mean you could only watch TV for 3 hours per day! I wonder how many people would cancel DirecTV if they did that? . . . .
-- PC Pitstop. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . Hughes net is the biggest scam out there! I have had Hughes net for 18 months(Direct Way at that point) and Just when I finally got use to the, bad service, horrible tech support and FAP(Fair Access Policy) they went and changed it today!
Hughes lies! They have these adds that say, "High speed", "fast downloads", "no waiting to get online" and that they are the only option out there if you can’t get DSL! Well let me tell you how my 18 months has gone. . . . .
-- Complaints Board. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I had my email under Direcway for 4 years until somebody, without my consent and without amending my service contract, switched it to "Hughes.net." Now I cannot relay email, nor can I use another ISP to receive email . . . .
-- XOM Reviews (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I think a class action suit is in order.
What FAP doesn't say is that when the throttle you down they make email and web browsing totally unusable. I have two days to discontinue the service and get my equipment money back. Guess I'll do that . . . .
Some good things come from people that post negative reviews about HughesNet.
First, it provides a public service and warns people considering their service.
Second, some people actually list alternatives to HughesNet, which I'll include in a separate article.
Following are samples of a few choice comments from around cyberia (be sure to scroll down the page to read ALL the comments):
-- Ripoff Report. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I finally got a tech guy (in India) to tell me about this FAP cap that had been implemented. He said, 'Just wait a few hours, your speed will come back'. The Hughes website (I found) says this, too. But, they LIE!
Once I reach my limit, it takes a full day (24 hours) to get my 'high speed' back. Until then, I'm screwed. Just think if they did this with DirecTV. That would mean you could only watch TV for 3 hours per day! I wonder how many people would cancel DirecTV if they did that? . . . .
-- PC Pitstop. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . Hughes net is the biggest scam out there! I have had Hughes net for 18 months(Direct Way at that point) and Just when I finally got use to the, bad service, horrible tech support and FAP(Fair Access Policy) they went and changed it today!
Hughes lies! They have these adds that say, "High speed", "fast downloads", "no waiting to get online" and that they are the only option out there if you can’t get DSL! Well let me tell you how my 18 months has gone. . . . .
-- Complaints Board. (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I had my email under Direcway for 4 years until somebody, without my consent and without amending my service contract, switched it to "Hughes.net." Now I cannot relay email, nor can I use another ISP to receive email . . . .
-- XOM Reviews (link to the whole article and comments)
. . . . I think a class action suit is in order.
What FAP doesn't say is that when the throttle you down they make email and web browsing totally unusable. I have two days to discontinue the service and get my equipment money back. Guess I'll do that . . . .
Some good things come from people that post negative reviews about HughesNet.
First, it provides a public service and warns people considering their service.
Second, some people actually list alternatives to HughesNet, which I'll include in a separate article.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Where to begin...where to begin.
Where to begin? Well, here, today, now.
I want to share my experiences with the HughesNet (supposed) "high-speed" internet service with readers. At best, the service can described as an overpriced and average performing ISP. Sometimes, while I'm waiting for the page to load, it can be best described as dialup-over-the-satellite (yes, it's that s-l-o-w).
And they won't do a thing about it.
I've had it for over 3-1/2 years. It was originally named DirecWay (I don't know if that makes a difference) and last year they switched the name to HughesNet. I live in an area where the only alternative is dialup (all you can eat for $20/month). HughesNet costs $60/mth.
Originally, it came with a fifteen-month contract, which included the price of the satellite dish and the modem you had to buy along with the service. That totaled about $160/mth. After the contract expired, it's been a month-to-month service for $60/mth.
And they have traffic limits too. Today, they're more restrictive than ever; about 190MB/day and continuing to vary, usually downwards. Originally, it was limited to 475MB over a 4-hour period. But sometime this year, that changed without any warning. And if you exceed that limit, they'll shut your service down for 24-hours. Want to hear something laughable? Call HughesNet Customer Service (it's routed to India), and try to get them to tell you what the limits are and what your traffic is. It's a secret. They can't / they won't tell you. Only a "finger-wagging" accusation that you've exceeded their traffic limits. Shame on you!!!
Pretty damned expensive service for what you get.
I'll have other thoughts about my experiences which I'll add soon. But my recommendation based on my experiences, is that if you can avoid HughesNet, do it at all costs. Otherwise, you'll find the same frustration that I and plenty of other users have found it to be.
I want to share my experiences with the HughesNet (supposed) "high-speed" internet service with readers. At best, the service can described as an overpriced and average performing ISP. Sometimes, while I'm waiting for the page to load, it can be best described as dialup-over-the-satellite (yes, it's that s-l-o-w).
And they won't do a thing about it.
I've had it for over 3-1/2 years. It was originally named DirecWay (I don't know if that makes a difference) and last year they switched the name to HughesNet. I live in an area where the only alternative is dialup (all you can eat for $20/month). HughesNet costs $60/mth.
Originally, it came with a fifteen-month contract, which included the price of the satellite dish and the modem you had to buy along with the service. That totaled about $160/mth. After the contract expired, it's been a month-to-month service for $60/mth.
And they have traffic limits too. Today, they're more restrictive than ever; about 190MB/day and continuing to vary, usually downwards. Originally, it was limited to 475MB over a 4-hour period. But sometime this year, that changed without any warning. And if you exceed that limit, they'll shut your service down for 24-hours. Want to hear something laughable? Call HughesNet Customer Service (it's routed to India), and try to get them to tell you what the limits are and what your traffic is. It's a secret. They can't / they won't tell you. Only a "finger-wagging" accusation that you've exceeded their traffic limits. Shame on you!!!
Pretty damned expensive service for what you get.
I'll have other thoughts about my experiences which I'll add soon. But my recommendation based on my experiences, is that if you can avoid HughesNet, do it at all costs. Otherwise, you'll find the same frustration that I and plenty of other users have found it to be.
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