October 2007 Archives
Just as ISPs are learning to protect customers from bots, spyware, phishing attacks, and worse, the rapidly mutating PDF trojan known as Gozi arrives.
Karl Bode of BroadbandReports writes, "I was hit hard by the floods in the Northeast last year. . . .Amid the hassle of salvaging possessions and dealing with organizations like FEMA, I was pleasantly surprised to find that neither Time Warner Cable nor DirecTV charged me for destroyed modems and/or DVRs. In fact, both were kind enough to reconnect my service high on a hill free of charge."
But it's a good thing he wasn't an AT&T customer.
This one's from the ISPCON blogroll, but we'd never have read it had it not been posted to the ISP-Lists, which are a great source of information.
Would it be bad if the FCC regulated applications that run over the internet?
It has not done well with VoIP.
Dave Schaeffer is a guy I've interviewed regularly over the years. In today's ISPCON keynote, he covered many of the themes he has covered in the past, but nevertheless did so with his usual combination of intense, concise language and relentless delivery.
He's dressed like the CEO he is, but he's talking a revolution in the network. You'll see a full writeup later this week.
Other items of interest:
Just a quick note to say I've arrived in San Jose. The show starts tomorrow morning, with a packed schedule as usual. I'll be attending the banker session to start with, led by Tom Millitzer, but show chief Jon Price makes sure these choices are not easy, running several valuable sessions in each slot.
ISPs are fascinated by the potential of Clearwire to shake up the U.S. market. The company plans to be the nation's largest WiMAX provider, offering service in every major market.
So how's it doing?
ISPs looking for this kind of information should consider BroadbandReports to be a valuable resource. Although the site is designed to help residential subscribers find a broadband provider, it has detailed information from customers about their experience. That's valuable competitive intelligance.
And today's story is about Clearwire. BBR has collected comments into a product spotlight.
Ever-entertaining Sprint alumnus Martin Geddes, now in Edinburgh, writes on his blog about why the company failed. He is as always entertaining, succinct, and very clear.
He gives 10 reasons but my favorite is number 4:
4. The pipe. Can you hear me now? Nope.
BTW, even the name of the blog is brilliant: Telepocalypse.
You can tell it's a monopoly when the company no longer needs to provide customer service to retain its customers. That's what Comcast has been doing to the people of Manassas, Va., and recently one of them, a 75 year old grandmother, visited the customer service center with a hammer.
The problem is that while young people can live without phone service for weeks, the elderly are subject to medical emergencies, and by not bothering to connect her phone, Comcast was endangering her life.
In order to create change, lobbyists first have to instill fear in Congressional Representatives. DSL Reports today notes that broadcast industry lobbyists are saying that if Congress allows open use of white spaces, baseball will be hurt.
Apple pie too, we presume.
The truth of the matter is that lobbyists have no sense of decency. Decades of success in getting handouts for big business, as described in important new research (see How They Got $480 Billion in Spectrum Giveaways), have made them overconfident. They think that they can ask for anything and get it.