Verizon To Pump $18B Into FiOS

larytet writes, "LightReading reports that Verizon will invest $18B into FTTH. The company says its fiber-based service will become profitable after four years, and expects by then to have 7 million customers using FiOS for Internet access." For perspective, have a look at Bruce Kushnick's book $200 Billion Broadband Scandal. His site has a page detailing phone company promises of fiber since 1993. We have been paying for these undelivered promises for years. By now we should have 86 million homes wired with FTTH at 100 Mbits/sec.

Comments

FiOS more real than many of those broken promises

[EVil Lawyer]

For perspective, have a look at Bruce Kushnick's book $200 Billion Broadband Scandal. His site has a page detailing phone company promises of fiber since 1993. We have been paying for these undelivered promises for years. By now we should have 86 million homes wired with FTTH at 100 Mbits/sec.

Fine, there have been plenty of broken promises from phone companies (and, I believe, cable providers, satellite providers, and others) over the years. 7 million homes also might be a little optimistic. But FiOS is really, exists in plenty of homes already, and is much more real than many of those other technologies were at the times the promises were made.

I'm in New York and have FiOS. It's a very nice service. Happily, in New York, the slowest speed tier is 10 down / 2 up, and it's quite affordable compared to cable modem service. I'm looking forward to the FiOS TV service, and the day I'll be completely rid of Time Warner (not that Verizon itself is such a wonderful company).

Of course!

[laughingcoyote]

Well is this unexpected? They were begging for money and consideration at the time, but they were also lobbying. In effect, they say "Oh it'll be fine, you'll see, watch what we'll give you!" Of course, since the promises weren't written into the law as a mandate, with real consequences if they went unfulfilled, what they gave us, predictably, was as little as they could get away with for as much as they could charge.

Now, in addition to tax revenue and right-of-ways, they want us to give up net neutrality. "Oh, but look what we'll give you!" I imagine they'll do just as well as last time.

And this is why subsidies are bad

[MikeRT]

Subsidies are frequently abused and allocated for all of the wrong reasons. They skew the market, create a new base of lobbyists and generally increase the scope of government intrusion. We wouldn't have people like Ted Stevens be the norm in Congress if the American people could bring themselves to follow what's in the Constitution, and subsidizing business isn't one of the enumerated powers of Congress. If it were a dry, boring job that made them more like "law book janitors" than power brokers, most problems would go away within an election cycle.

But no, we just need to change where and how the government gives away money, not whether or not the government should be involved at all.

Actual Dollar Amount $23b

[cdrudge]

According to this article in my local paper, Verizon is planning on spending nearly $23b on FiOS and that's for about 1/2 their network. The $18b figure mentioned in the summary comes from discounting the $5b in projected savings from not having to maintain the aging copper physical plant. The linked to article sort of mentions this, but it's not real clear.

I'll take two.

[oc255]

I've been hitting the submit button on the "Can I get FiOS?" site in Northern Virginia since I heard about it in 2004. So far, all I've gotten is a web redirect to their DSL offerings.

Speaking of DSL, I talked to Speakeasy (my dsl provider) and asked them if they'd ever be able to offer their open hosting policies over FiOS. Speakeasy said no because FiOS is regulated differently than your POTS lines. So this really put a damper on things because I won't get port 80 etc over blazing optics. Unless they strike a deal (unlikely?) or an act of congress happens (lobbying?). I'd love to know exactly why fiber is treated differently.

I'm a little surprised by Verizon

[chaffed]

I'm surprised by Verizon because you don't need a Verizon PC to use FIOS. Imagine that! Those clever engineers figured out a way to make a service profitable without proprietary lock in. Gee they are great!

Okay I do have a chip on my shoulder when it comes to Verizon.

Now imagine if Verizon FIOS was operated like Verizon Wireless.

You would be required to sign a 2 year contract and pay $1000 for a PC that can barely take advantage of the basic features of the service. If you wanted something that could give you the full experience that would be a 2 year contract plus $2000 for equipment.

All the while the PC they sold you would be locked to FIOS and have many features disabled. Some features I can imagine being disabled would be File Transfers via FTP or any standard protocol. You would be required to use their application at a fee for every transfer.

You would be locked out of using other media services like Apple, Yahoo or audiable.

Your information services would be limited to their partners, probably fox news...

Finally they would happily hand over your personal information to those willing to pay or a government with no probable cause or a warrant.

This all sounds very familiar now that I write this all... Net Neutrality anyone? or a lack there of...

Have no fear!

[rlp]

Congress is actively dealing with this right now! You won't get fiber to your house, but you will get a larger series of tubes. And your representative will mail you your very own Internet.

Re:Better late than never?

[kevinl]

You're fortunate that you don't live in a rural area where Verizon is busy trying to sell off their landlines. From today's New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/28/technology/28ver mont.html