Cable Wants to Cut the Cord

skatephat420 writes "Wired News has featured an article on how "the cable industry wants you to chuck your cable -- at least when you're outside the house. The addition of a fourth wireless component to the cable package is now affectionately known as the 'quadruple play.'" With this addition to the standard package of voice, video and data, how long is it going to take DSL to compete?"

Comments

I'd put my money elsewhere

[Monte]

Cable access wherever I go? I think this is actually the wrong direction for them to persue - my strategy would be to first add some sort of uber-addictive MMORPG (which ought to be trivial) along with some other video games (subscription based, of course), and then the hard part: pizza, caffeine and beer delivery on-demand.

Then I would have no reason to leave the house, ever. I don't need to take it with me 'cause I ain't leaving.

Battle of the Elephants: Wireless vs. Telcos.

[Ohmster]

The "quadruple play" is already a well understood investment play on Wall Street over the last few months. The big battle ahead is cable and what used to be the regional telcos. They're both arming themselves with everything they can think of, including faster and faster, two-way broadband, internet telephony, cellular and broadband wireless services, along with hundreds of content channels...and each side is committing to spend billions to do it. What investors are trying to understand is who remains standing with a semblance of a profitable business at the end of it. Each side is desperately trying not to end up being a "dumb pipe", but have a valuable "walled garden" of services to keep customers paying $50, 100 or more per month per household. Someone is going to end up losing these multi-billion dollar bets. More here: http://mp.blogs.com/mp/2005/07/on_wilting_wire.htm l

Wow!

[Anonymous Coward]

Wireless television! Who would've thunk it?

Oh, wait.

SBC already bundles this

[SydShamino]

SBC already offers a bundles package of:
Home phone service
Long distance
DSL internet service
Dish Network satellite TV
Cingular Wireless phone service

It seems that the cable companies are trying to catch up to DSL, not the other way around.

If cable can integrate their content onto the phones as the article suggests, maybe they will pull ahead.

Bypassing the Incumbents

[SolarCanine]

It's obvious that all these large companies with massive infrastructure want to extend the use of said infrastructure as much as possible.

But what I'm really waiting to see is whether or not any new/fringe players will make a move to implement a WiMAX grid that has decent redundancy and large-scale coverage and move away from the "ground-based" bandwidth carriers.

IMHO, that's where the really interesting dynamics come into play. FTTH, increased cable speed/features, expanded DSL offerings, that's all great. But show me a completely tetherless solution for my voice/data/entertainment needs with mass coverage and you've got me hooked for your hundreds a month, with probably less cost to you than to (insert cable co./telco here).

Convergence

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

From TFA:

"They want this phone to do everything that their TV does and everything that their PC does."

So I guess my phone will now gets viruses, worms, spyware, while it's busy playing mindless advertising interrupting my conversation every 5 minutes?

DSL is still ahead in my book.

[DaedalusHKX]

I can run a server on 29.99/mo DSL...

39.99+all sorts of fees = 54.00 / mo cable does NOT allow me to run ANY servers, and block most of the default service ports for unix... (most still allow windows, but I'm not about to buy IIS to run a simple site on that huge clunking POS).

Of course if I manage to get around it by shifting ports around, they threaten to cut off my service if I do not disconnect the server within 5 days of being notified. (if it happens a second time, they DO cut off the service as they have done to me before)

In my book, DSL is still light years ahead of cable for what ***I*** need!

For browsing its a tad slow, but they don't have nearly as many DNS outages as the providers in my area.

Re:DSL is still ahead in my book.

[ScytheBlade1]

Here's the thing. Comcast (shut up about what the ToS says, really) allows you to do that.

When they started to crack down on spam, they didn't just kill off :25. They watched the traffic for huge amounts of e-mail, scanned the e-mails, and then cut off the spammers.

They could have shut off :25 in the blink of an eye, but instead they invested actual money into fixing the problem without pissing off their competent user base. I would know, I'm part of that user base. Additionally, I have some friends working Comcast tech support, and they can likewise vouch for what I've said.

Self Delusion

[Scareduck]

Check this quote:

"The wireless phone is becoming the third screen of [consumers' lives]," said John Garcia, Sprint's senior VP of sales and distribution. "They want this phone to do everything that their TV does and everything that their PC does."

Does this guy even get out and talk to anybody who isn't a marketroid or a self-serving company flack (often the same people)? I have never -- not one time -- met a person who's demanding this. If anything, what I've encountered is people who don't want their phone to be anything other than a phone. This is self-interested wanking from a company praying for yet another captive customer base.

Re:How DSL can compete?

[timeOday]

Everyone needs a landline phone.

I think not.

VOIP is reliable enough for me. Are you really that frightened not being able to dial 911? I don't have a cellphone, so I lose 911 service every time I walk out my front door. So what? It's like saying people shouldn't buy a home over a half mile from the fire department, just in case those extra few seconds end up making the difference between life and death. Humbug! A thousand other mishaps will kill you before a VOIP outage does.

What I want: TV via Internet

[DoorFrame]

Here's what I want. If anyone out there works for a cable company, please feel free to pass this along. Currently when I subscribe to cable, not only do I get access to all the shows they air, but I also get limited access, through Comcast's Digital Cable, to something vaguely PVRish... I can watch a select number of shows at any time for free. I can pause them and rewind them as I see fit. If this service is already available, I don't see any reason why I can't have the following feature:

I would like to be able to go online, log into my cable company's webpage, and download any show that's aired since I began my subscription. These are all shows I theoretically have access to already (I could have taped them), so why not allow me to watch them when I want. Give me a username and a password; go ahead and keep track of when I joined and only give me access to content I'm entitled to. Bittorrent distribution is fine, I don't mind contributing a little bit of bandwidth to this scheme.

In addition, I want to be able to schedule downloads of new shows in a PVR like system. So, anytime I decide I like a show, I can download the whole back catalogue since I started my cable subscription, and download every new episode that airs automatically.

Also, I should be able to access this content anywhere, at any time. This would actually be a big selling point if I were presenting this idea to a cable company because it means you could sell something of a discounted product to people outside of your traditional market. Why do I need to deal with Comcast when I can subscribe over the internet to Time Warner, even though they're not in my area? Suddenly, all the cable companies will be competing against each other to provide the best selection of programming at the best price with the most ease of service... something that isn't really happening today.

I'm sure there's legal issues with this from the point of the content producers. All I know is that I'd be happy to download shows via bittorrent with commercials directly from my cable company if they allowed me to do so. I'd be happy to switch away from my local cable company if someone else on the internet could provide me with a better deal. The cable companies already have the rights to distribute the content to end users... this scheme would require a renogotiation, but it's within their power (unlike some crazy startup).

Anyone else interested in this sort of service?

Vertical Monopoly

[Doc Ruby]

I don't want to rely on the same company for my Internet connection, both wired and wireless, and the voice, data and video coming over it. Especially one so hostile to customer service as my cable company. Each of those services should be delivered by a competing company, not some monolithic monopoly which controls all my access to information. Which can censor info it doesn't like, like "obscene" or "terrorist" websites. Which can eavesdrop on my calls. Which can cross-reference all my info together. Which can cut off my wired (and unwired) life completely as leverage behind an "accidental" SNAFU in billing me for one service.

There's all kinds of integrated billing / customer service systems that already bundle multiple outsourced services into one bill, one "help desk". That's what cable and phone companies already use to bundle the services they market and control into one "customer relationship". These bundled services are like Microsoft controlling the markets of OS, apps, development and content. And cable companies have even less minority competition to "keep them honest". Bundling like this proposal should be prohibited, to protect consumers. And to create opportunities for entrepreneurs, like an independent "customer care" service that wraps up billing and customer care into one contact. Without creating a bottleneck through a cable company that's guaranteed to fail, with devastating results, all the time, all over the country.

Verizon has come out of nowhere

[tkrotchko]

A few years ago, I thought Verizon was cooked. Long distance was dead, and they were not one of the leaders in wireless, and DSL has always been a bit of a joke outside of heavily populated areas.

But in the Washington DC area, we've seen in the past few years:

1) Verizon Wireless has become one of the leaders for voice.
2) Verizon Wireless offers their 1X service which gives 90-110K web service in most areas of the country
3) in metro areas their EVDO service is now offering mid-speed internet access
4) They still offer DSL
5) In the Washington DC area, they're rolling FIOS out to everybody, far beyond their DSL offering, and they're spending money faster than I've seen anybody short of the military spend money on this rollout. Its amazing.
6) In the process of this rollout, they're getting rid of 40 year old copper infrastructure.
7) Using this fiber they'll be offering increasing video services that strike right at the heart of the cable companies.

Seriously, Comcast should be scared. They looked to be in the driver's seat 3 years ago, but Verizon has come on strong and now Comcast has to come up with an answer. Maybe they'll even start offering decent help desk and helpful employees.

Nah. I think they'd rather go out of businss.

Re:Verizon has come out of nowhere

[moosesocks]

Mod parent up!

Verizon has made a tremendous investment into their infrastructure, and is rolling out their fiber network faster than they rolled out their DSL network. I've had FIOS for about 3 weeks now, and I must say that it's anything short of amazing.

Where Verizon has really delivered, though, is on price. Unlike Cable, Verizon actually has competitors. Cable TV loves price-fixing, and it's rare to see a community with more than one cable franchise, allowing the companies to charge exorbitant rates while gouging their customers. The remarkable thing about Verizon's DSL/FiOS offerings is that they're significantly cheaper than anything else out there. I pay $35/month for 5/2mbps fibre, while getting 3/.768 service from my cable co. costs $60/month. The STATEWIDE franchises that the cable companies have been granted are striking fear into the hearts of the cable companies. I fully expect a huge legal battle to come out of this debating the legality of such franchises to begin with -- Cable is and always has been a legal monopoly. Healthy competition (Verizon in this case) drives prices down. Hopefully once FiOS-TV is rolled out, the cable co's will be forced to cut their rates and start expanding their HD offerings -- FiOS-TV is said to have 300 channels, about 75 of which are in HD.

  I suppose Verizon expects a huge return on their investment in the fibre network. It's costing them a mint. A typical fios install takes 3 installers about 6-8 hours per residence just to do the premesis wiring and termination. On the up-side, the new network will cost them a lot less to operate than their old copper network. Reduced power draw, smaller local COs, and increased reliability to name a few, not to mention that they've finally rid themselves of copper wiring.

Hopefully this and satelitte will finally kill off the corrupt cable-tv industry.

Time Warner Roadrunner Music Store!

[argent]

It's the Quintuple Play! It's a wireless cable modem phone MUSIC PLAYER!

And it's edible, with Zero Carbs! Just don't nibble on your phone before your two year service agreement is up...

Re:How DSL can compete?

[argent]

VOIP is reliable enough for me.

That's what Time Warner Roadrunner was trying to tell me when I was on hold for the THIRD TIME THIS WEEK because my cable had gone down from 2PM to 5PM.

"Hello," I said to the customer service representative, after I finally got through their new and exciting phone system that told me two times how to spend 15 minutes resetting the DVR I don't own, "Could you tell your management that having ads for your phone service when people are on hold trying to get their cable service back... on a phone they couldn't use because their cable service was out... is probably NOT going to win many new customers?"

I was in Houston when Alicia hit. A tornado took out the U-Haul storage place across the street. I had no power for 6 hours. But my phone worked, I could even get online (on a BBS, the Internet wasn't around yet) and leave a message for the folks I knew back at college. When the floods hit we lost power for half a day, of course there was no cable. But my phone worked, I could let my family know I was OK. This June a storm (and possibly another tornado) dropped someone else's fence on my roof and took mine in exchange. I had no power and no cable for several hours. But I could call up the power company and report the outage, and the insurance company to make a claim! I'm getting a partial rebate for July, because a bad splitter had packet-loss going to 85% every time the weather got hot, but I could still call the cable company to report it even if it took them two weeks to get someone out at a time I could be home.

Hell with dialling 911. I want a landline phone because I need Time Warner's repair service on speed-dial.