The shift from scarcity to plenty is often the harbinger of new value propositions.

Rise of the Stupid Network

This is the Paradox of the Best Network.

The Paradox of the Best Network

This three month issue explains why the prospects are dim for a full fledged recovery for telecom as long as the best effort paradigm remains as the only way of doing business.

Some choice items include:

Why the Hierarchical Peering Model Is Broken

Telecom Bandwidth Provisioning Trapped in a Deflationary Spiral?

The Network Is Not the Issue

Korea and a Gigabit to the Doorstep

Why Adding Bandwidth at One Link Just Shoves Congestion Elsewhere

The COOK Report On Internet | June-August 2004

"We foresee a future with less choice for consumers."

AT&T to Stop [Competing]

The Bush administration is abandoning the landmark 1996 Telecommunications Act, which spawned a new era of competition in telephone service. That is the net effect of its refusal to appeal to the Supreme Court a federal court decision striking down rules that gave local phone companies access to the Baby Bells' networks. Even more disturbing, the administration pressured the Federal Communications Commission, ostensibly an independent agency, to abstain from filing its own appeal in defense of its own rules.

I find it very interesting, and also puzzling, that NYT takes such a strongly protectionist position on telecom ...

The White House Hangs Up

For eight years the Bells and their rivals have battled over control of the old circuit-switched network, and even though the Bells appear to have won that war, it is becoming irrelevant.

It's not especially creative, but it is destructive, and that's what we like to see.

Rate fight masks larger phone issue

MCI: "If wholesale rates go up, we will have to look at raising rates or pulling out of markets, or possibly both."

Bah. Anything to hasten the inevitable telecom death spiral gets my vote.

High Court Allows FCC To Throw Out Phone Rules

I'm glad to see NYT interested in telecom, but ...

Local phone rates across the nation may soon soar if the Bush administration fails to come to the defense of FCC rules aimed at promoting competition.

What? Local telcos would be crazy to raise rates, as long as they have a desire to stay afloat. Higher prices would only hasten the departure of their already shrinking customer base.

Of course, if the government continues to allow failed telcos to "reorganize" under Chapter 11, they have every incentive to collapse under their own weight and emerge, debt-free, to continue beating each other senseless in the marketplace. The Savvis purchase of C&W assets, and the MCI restructuring, among others, are reigniting the telecom death spiral. If the NYT is looking for a telecom hobbyhorse, this should be it.

Some 20 million American households no longer rely on the local phone company for local service. The Baby Bells now argue, prematurely, that the current regulatory arrangement is no longer needed because new technologies like wireless and cable telephony offer plenty of competition. They also argue that lease rates set by some state regulators are so low they are being asked to subsidize competitors, a claim belied by their strong financial performance.

Strong financial performance? Citations, please! Any evidence suggesting "strength" should receive the most stringent scrutiny. And it's not meaningful to look at wireline voice in isolation. The dwindling profits in this sector are the only support beam propping up an entire industry at risk of collapse.

Defending Phone Competition

Participants in the discussions said that the talks have left both sides far apart, with the exception of Qwest and MCI.

Qwest and MCI Break Impasse on Network Leasing Rates

"The thing is, this is a lousy business."

Trying to Revive Struggling AT&T