Re: Level 3 Communications Issues Statement Concerning Comcast's Actions

[Jeff Young <young () jsyoung net>]

Well,

I don't work for the NBN, but I do live here and follow the politics with interest.
So far the 'experiment' is on track.  The political parties who support the NBN
are the majority by a slim margin (2 or 3 seats) and the project seems to be 
going forward.  Most recently legislation passed that creates the NBN as a 
corporation among other things.

If you're truly interested:

http://australianpolitics.com/downloads/10-11-24_nbn-co-business-case-summary.pdf

jy

On 01/12/2010, at 12:56 AM, William Allen Simpson wrote:

> I've read through the entire thread thus far, and there are several very
> interesting points.  I'd like to know more about the Australian experiment?
>
> But there were a couple of disparate comments that seem highly related, so
> I'll reply to them jointly here:
>
>
> On 11/30/10 2:59 AM, JC Dill wrote:
> > What is happening now between L3 and Comcast also reminds me of the dial-tone settlement deals in the 1990s. The big 
> > telcos thought they could push small telcos out by making it more expensive to place calls (paying a fee to the 
> > telco that "terminates" the
> > call) and less expensive to receive calls (receiving the termination fee). They mistakenly thought the startup 
> > telcos would go after consumers (who typically place more calls than they receive) and they didn't think about 
> > startup telcos going after ISP
> > dial-up services (which receive more calls than they place) and then being forced to pay those startups settlement 
> > fees for all the calls their consumer customers made into the startup telco's ISP customer's modem banks.
> But I remember what happened next.  BellSouth refused to pay their settlements.
> The CLECs sued and went bankrupt.  BellSouth had deeper pockets and more lawyers.
>
> > We don't have an interstate telephone settlement system or PUC to "decide" what the rules will be for settlements 
> > between content providers and eyeball providers. I believe that in the end it will come down to market forces and 
> > which group can better
> > marshal customer angst to their side when packets don't flow freely between these two types of networks.
> Maybe.  But I'm hoping the consumer angst gives us a better FCC.  The "market"
> hasn't worked before, and isn't working in this case.  So, maybe there isn't a
> "market" after all....
>
>
> On 11/30/10 2:47 AM, Kevin Blackham wrote:
> > I'm not convinced. Either I'm calculating something wrong, or greed is at work.
>
> Greed.
>
> Reminder: Comcast drastically raised their rates a few years back, saying to
> local cable commissions that they needed to "invest" in digital infrastructure.
> Instead, they took the massive profits and invested in NBC/Universal.
>
> When a cable "node" is an entire neighborhood of 500+ homes, because Comcast
> never bothered to split the nodes down to a reasonable networking size (as
> opposed to CATV-sized), then it's a Comcast greed problem....
>
> A half year ago or so, talking with a Google manager about a certain fiber
> project, we ended up arguing about the size of cable nodes.  He seemed to
> think everywhere was like Mountain View.  I was trying not to embarrass him;
> just let it stand at -- as you drive, you don't look overhead at the cable
> infrastructure much, do you?  (He admitted he doesn't.)
>
>
> On 11/29/10 11:27 PM, Jared Mauch wrote:
> > The issue here is cost of infrastructure.  The last mile generally is more valuable than the long-distance part.  
> > Everyone can build a nationwide network for a nominal amount of money.  All the carriers can provide circuits at 
> > the same IXPs where you can public/private peer.  The question does become, who is in those smaller and 
> > mid-markets.  Not everyone is going to build fiber in Akron, Eugene, nor Madison.  It gets even more interesting if 
> > you look at what happened with Fairpoint in the northeast IMHO.  Verizon realized they would not make money there 
> > and sold it off.  The promises and costs consumed them and forced bankruptcy.
> >
> > I'm not saying that will happen to Comcast, but it may cause them to divest the unprofitable parts as well, leaving 
> > some parts of the country worse-off than we would be today.
> Or in this case, invest in something else more profitable, NBC/Universal; and
> then try to leverage their customer base to gouge their CDN competitors.
>
> I'd like to see Level 3 pull a Disney/ABC or a Murdock/Fox, and publicly
> announce that they expect Comcast to share *their* revenue.  And be willing to
> pull the plug!
>
> (Admittedly, I thought Disney/ABC and Murdock/Fox are evil, too.  That model
> was only reasonable as the CATV channels had no advertising.  All we have
> left now is Turner Classic Movies.  A pox on *all* their houses!)
>
> It's really time for some anti-trust legislation/regulation.  The last mile
> market has failed.

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