Robert Cringley looks at the effects of the FCC ruling on DSL that I mentioned in my previous post. Like me, he is doubtful that this is anything but a giveaway to the phone companies.
I believe larger companies are in general too conservative in rolling out new products. This has been especially true with phone companies. Telephone companies missed the broadband boat by 5 years at least. Cable companies aren’t much better. Countries like Korea and Japan are eclipsing us.
In the software industry, the startup comapnies lead the way with inovation (sorry, Bill G.). They do this because they have to, because brains are their biggest weapon against entrenched old-school companies. How many startup phone companes (outside of pure VoIP ones) can you name?
Giving the keys to these larger players will, in my opinion, further accelerate our slide into becoming a broadband backwater.
I agree with your assessment of broadband rollout and the failure to embrace it initially. While countries like Korea and Japan are eclipsing us in this regard, it is not without reason, and surely no reason to forfeit US citizenship for the greener techno pastures of east Asia.
First of all, Japan and korea combine to have barely half of the US Population (japan has 127.5 million people, south korea has just over 48 million). The US, by comparison has just over 300 million people…not counting the assumed 14 million illegals that is more like 22 million…but, for argument’s sake…we’ll call is 300 million.
Second, Japan is roughly the size of California (slightly smaller at 374,000 sq km). Korea (the entire peninsula) is 221,000 sq km (Iowa, Nebraska, North and south dakota)…south korea is only about 98,000 sq km. about the size of indiana plus Rhode Island.
Third, read this http://www.wowessays.com/dbase/ag3/kzo269.shtml
Fourth, both Japan and Korea not only service far fewer people in a much smaller geography, the markets are dominated largely by a single carrier. In Japan it is NTT DoCoMo and in Korea i believe it is government run…fewer players means that decisions are response driven rather than market driven, plus it is easier for one entity to make the decision to move forward versus 5 carriers deciding through continuous market pressure and consumer demand evolution to respond and change. All these things equal cheaper implementation.
fifth, these markets are largely comprised of people with like heritage and like background and socioeconomic status making their demands more uniform and specific versus the “Melting pot” mentality in the US where everyone has a different view f everything. (i’m not racist, i just think that people with common bonds think more alike than ones who do not)
sixth, both the korean and japanese infrastructures are comparatively newer. Their public telepone networks were virtually destroyed during the 40 years of war and Japanesse imperialism in the region from 1910 to 1945. Most of the infrastructure has been rebuilt with more modern infrastructure as a result. I think Hiroshima and Nagasaki are now back online.
Seventh, unlimited, wireless applications are far more effective in a society with the high density populations like japan and korea…lets face it…one transmitter on top of mount Fuji can reach 80 million japanese. Nothing like that in the US.
Eighth, wireless licensing in Japan (i don’t know about korea) are much cheaper than in the us. the FCC determines the range and cost of a license to broadcast signal within a spectrum for each US market. Japan does not have this. They have national wireless licensing rights that do not cost billions of dollars…even if they did cost billions, as they do in the US, there are still far fewer markets in japan and korea.
ninth, japanese and korean broadband users pay more, on average than in the US…as a result of the market pressure. Japanese demand it because they pay through the nose for it. In the US, price is ALWAYS declining from the date of release, in japan and korea it does not drop as far as fast so the carriers can actually MAKE money off of this. In the US, as soon as a technology comes out, there are a dozen copycats and the price almost instantly drops.
tenth, in Japan people are willing to sleep in shoeboxes as hotel rooms and they live in the equivalent of about one third as much space as a typical american (which is why they are willing to pay through the nose for it). Who wants to go home? This makes them want to stay out which makes them more mobile as a society. We watch TV for hours in our homes. Japanes watch TV on mobile phones (called Cellevision-CV).
They demand these apps. We do not. but, I would rather live in the good ol’ US of A any day of the week. Even if it means giving up on quirky, albeit really cool, technology apps.
Bottom line is that US companies will not invest in the implementation of these types of things until our consumers demand it IN NUMBERS. classic free market capitalism. Sometimes it comes at the expense of being #1…but how many times have you seen bleeding edge companies/countries die out because they guessed wrong?
See Pola-Vision (from polaroid), Sony BetaMax, the catastrophic Unsolicited New Coke formula and Schlitz Beer’s secret formula switch in 1975.
I have been drinking, i could be mistaken.