 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Mixed results for green IT goalsA majority of tech workers in the public sector do not know about the emission reduction targets they face, says a survey.
Read More >>
Fri, 03 Jul 2009 07:54:03 GMT
Billions stolen in online robbery
Details emerge of why billions in virtual cash disappeared from a virtual bank in Eve Online.
Read More >>
Fri, 03 Jul 2009 11:22:39 GMT
Facebook criticised over privacy
The social networking site comes under fire for planned changes to privacy settings.
Read More >>
Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:48:54 GMT
Regulators eye Google book deal
US anti-trust regulators are to examine Google's $125m deal with book publishers to settle copyright issues, reports say.
Read More >>
Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:00:46 GMT
MySpace 'suicide bully cleared'
A woman accused of "cyber-bullying" a 13-year-old girl who later committed suicide sees her conviction provisionally thrown out.
Read More >>
Fri, 03 Jul 2009 09:32:24 GMT
High Tech Consortium Blog
Broadband capacity, access, and usage
Posted: Tue Jun 2, 2009 03:13:09 PM by: Melissa
There are a variety of views on how to address the country’s broadband shortage – or even if there is one. The below blog entry takes one side of the issue while others argue for a national initiative to dramatically expand capacity rather than allocate what we have. Perhaps this is a good topic for the HTC Blog - go to www.htcnm.com and comment! Gary FOX News Blogs » FOX Forum » Forum Contributor June 2nd, 2009 1:30 AM Eastern LAWRENCE SPIWAK: Is YOUR Broadband Access About to Go Bye Bye? By Lawrence Spiwak President, The Phoenix Center for Advanced Legal and Economic Public Policy Studies In the classic Barry Levinson movie “Tin Men,” a car salesman asks Richard Dreyfuss’s character exactly how much he would like to pay for a new vehicle: “Nothing” he replies, “I want to pay nothing.” Unfortunately, the same attitude seems to apply when it comes to broadband, particularly if you are a bandwidth hog. For the last several years, broadband providers have taken a rather egalitarian approach to broadband pricing with generic “all you can eat” broadband plans. While such plans were helpful to promote adoption when broadband was in its infancy, there is no longer a homogenous broadband consumer: some use a little, some use a lot. ———— Here’s the common sense approach: Let carriers develop plans that allow consumers to pick and chose the approach that best suits their needs and, just as important, let consumers be responsible for their choices. ———— As such, common sense would dictate that consumers should have a range of broadband pricing tier choices to fit their personal needs. Of course, you could be wrong. To wit, several liberal consumer advocacy groups have recently asked Congress to investigate these new tiered pricing plans, claiming that these usage-based tiers are priced “well above the marginal cost of providing Internet service” and, as a result, “these price gouging schemes will discourage consumers from using high-bandwidth Internet applications.” Oh, please. Like it or not, constructing broadband networks (wireline and wireless) is extremely expensive and AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, Qwest, Comcast, Charter, CableVision collectively invested tens of billions into their networks in 2008 alone. However, the broadband business isn’t just about building the networks; you also have to manage an ever increasing amount of traffic over those networks. Internet congestion is becoming a particularly acute problem because, as the Supreme Court recently recognized, the developers of “peer to peer” or “P2P” applications such as BitTorrent and Skype, which consume large amounts of Internet capacity, have absolutely “no incentive to minimize storage or bandwidth consumption, the costs of which are borne by every user of the network.” As a result, the needs of the few are now often outweighing the needs of the many. Economics dictate that when there is a congestion problem, there is actually a pricing problem. However, because these consumer groups view broadband networks not as a business but as some sort of public good, they believe that the congestion problem is not one of pricing, but of altruism. As such, these groups have actually argued before the Federal Communications Commission the naïve notion that that carriers should “simply ask their consumers to moderate their usage during certain hours, and provide information on which times and uses should be modified. Internet users often follow norms and could act as good citizens.” This is the analytical equivalent of telling the fat guy not to take too much the shrimp at the “all you can eat” raw bar —you hope he refrains on his own accord, but you know it just ain’t gonna happen. So what to do? I suppose we could move to a model where carriers charge “by the byte” for Internet service, but that would crush broadband demand instantly. Indeed, if the old long distance and dial-up Internet models are any indication, a strict “pay by the byte” pricing scheme would scare many low income and low volume users to overcompensate and change their usage habits, or even to drop their service all together. Similarly, telling carriers to just “invest their way out” of the congestion problem is also a naïve solution. The network is a shared resource, and this approach would cause the price for all users of the network to rise. And, as the price for everyone rises, some households won’t be able to afford broadband at all. Publicly available studies show that these costs could potentially reach several hundred dollars per month, which would certainly put broadband out of the reach of many Americans. The best—and most economically efficient—option is to let carriers develop plans that allow consumers to pick and chose the approach that best suits their needs and, just as important, let consumers be responsible for their choices. As the old saying goes, an educated consumer is the best customer. In the end, these consumer groups’ efforts to prevent carriers from experimenting with different pricing plans for multi-product offerings is nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to tax the many to subsidize the few who spend their lives online. However, in this case, the “few” are not the poor and disenfranchised who work hard to just to pay for their own broadband, but the Internet glutton next door. Lawrence J. Spiwak is president of the Phoenix Center for Advanced Legal and Economic Public Policy Studies, a non‑profit research institute based in Washington, D.C. The views expressed in this article do not represent the views of the Phoenix Center, its Adjunct Fellows or any if its individual Editorial Advisory Board Members.
Post a Comment >>
View (2) Comments >>
Posted: Tue Jun 2, 2009 03:20:43 PM by: gary
There are a variety of views on how to address the country’s broadband shortage – or even if there is one. Some argue that the country needs to build and deploy an infrastructure that will provide virtually unlimited capacity at an affordable price. Others contend that sufficient capacity exists (most places), but that "bandwidth hogs" are threatening the networks' capacity and economics and need to be constrained. There are difficult questions about who should pay for this critical infrastructure, who should contro access to it and how the proper mix of technology and economies of scale are reached. What is your view?
HTC Press Releases
HTC is High Tech in Southern New Mexico
Interim NMSU Dean of Engieering named
Upcoming Meeting Agenda
April 10 Membership Meeting Agenda
March 13, 2009 Membership Meeting
February 27 Membership Meeting
HTC Meeting Minutes