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Bandwidth Crunch Looms for Cable Companies
coax4life writes "While Verizon and AT&T lay fiber, cable companies are looking at a huge bandwidth crunch according to a new report. Increased demand for high-def programming on the TV side and faster download speeds on the ISP side of the business will leave cable companies in a rough spot — after spending over $100 billion in the last decade on infrastructure improvements. Jumping on the fiber bandwagon may help. 'Upgrading to a fiber infrastructure is a much more expensive proposition, and one more likely to occur in areas where the cable companies are facing more competition. It can happen, though — several years ago, Comcast's predecessor on the northwest side of Chicago laid fiber on top of its existing coaxial installation. The payoff is good for both cable companies and users, as it can result in more programming choices and faster Internet access.' Moving to switched digital video solutions will also help."
"Really, I swear on this stack of $100 bills, Senator!"
MOST up to date cable systems already use fiber in a "HFC" setup. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_fibre-coaxial
If they need more bandwidth they just split bigger nodes in to smaller nodes. HFC has no problem growing with the needs of more digital bandwidth.
The only issue with this is when some cable co's try to cut cost by over crowding a node.
I have to return some videotapes...
Do business before someone else does!
e rnment don't find a way to prevent the little guys from making a success of something they are unwilling to do themselves.
I think it's a well-established observation that the larger US companies do everything in their power to avoid changing their business model and practices... this includes immoral and illegal acts as history has shown time and time again.
But someone will see opportunity and find a way to make it happen, and when they do, it will spell an even MORE difficult life for the ones that didn't move fast enough to own the infrastructure that customers demand... that is if the big-bad-existing-companies-with-pull-over-the-gov
One thing that bothers me is how obvious this trend of avoiding "risky behavior" is simply the wrong thing to do in a world of constantly changing and evolving technologies? They can work to slow things down -- this has been shown. But they can't really stop things. But in the end, the more they fight change, the weaker the position they find themselves in when change becomes inevitable.
Don't get me wrong: I think cable TV is a horrible ripoff. (Which is just one of several reasons I don't subscribe.) But the cable companies aren't the bad guys here. That's the media monopolies who've become obsessed with sequestering content and squeezing every penny they can out of it. And when you subscribe to cable, you're feeding that pathology, no matter how much you bitch and moan about it.
It still works just fine. My directv only goes out during the worst of thunderstorms.
Gone!
Just make them invest back some percentage of the immense profits they have made by overselling the bandwidth on the lines that were constructed by public funding, something which they should ALREADY had done in the first place.
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