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Or control the infrastructure on which it relies. Here in the UK we have a wholesale company (BT OpenReach) which is strictly regulated that provides all telep
by cones688 13y ago
Or control the infrastructure on which it relies.
Here in the UK we have a wholesale company (BT OpenReach) which is strictly regulated that provides all telephone lines, providers can then "rent" off those cables. This allows for a massive variety of competition and broadband packages from £5 a month.
This also allows a funnel for the govt to invest if required, say laying fibre to remote communities rather than having to rely commercial interests to, who never would.
- Nux 13y agoA massive variety of crap, mostly. The only thing that gets close to well connected countries in Europe is BT's Infinity. The rest are just pathetic ADSL offers or throttled-to-hell cable offers (Virgin, now UPC).
- dasmoth 13y agoOther ISPs have access to BTs FTTC (and, in the few areas it's deployed, FTTP) systems. Not every ISP offers this, but there are plenty of alternatives to BT Infinity.
- orf 13y agoI have a non-bt fiber package and my speeds beat most of my European friends top speeds. In fact it sometimes beats my Hetzner (German) based servers.
- Nux 13y agoWhich isp?
- cones688 13y agoto repeat what Dasmoth calls out - BT Infinity is just fibre laid by Openreach it is available to any operator (Sky etc), BT have just a great job of branding it like you can't get fibre on other providers - except you can. http://www.sky.com/shop/broadband-talk/fibre-optic/ http://www.sky.com/shop/broadband-talk/fibre-optic/ https://sales.talktalk.co.uk/product/fibre https://sales.talktalk.co.uk/product/fibre http://www.plus.net/home-broadband/package-guides/fibre-optic-broadband/ http://www.plus.net/home-broadband/package-guides/fibre-opti...
- Nux 13y agoMea culpa for not reading properly and thanks for explaining it. It's a shame more ISPs aren't doing it, I for one have not heard of anyone else but BT.
- vertex-four 13y agoThe relevant press release from Ofcom (the telecoms regulator, for those outside the UK): http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/2010/10/supporting-the-uk%E2%80%99s-super-fast-broadband-future/ http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/2010/10/supporting-the-uk%E2%8... BT Retail has just been really good at advertising it, the rest of the ISPs don't seem to have branding budgets to compete.
- breischl 13y agoI know at one point the US had a somewhat similar arrangement for telephone lines. All the offspring of AT&T (ILECs in industry slang, Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers IIRC) were required to lease their lines to competitors. So someone could offer DSL internet and use the phone company's infrastructure to do it. I don't know if that's still the case, I would guess so. But I don't think it ever applied to cable.
- maxerickson 13y agoI ran into a situation where for roughly the same price (the new via SBC) AT&T offered unlimited local calling and the lessee companies did not.
- jmj42 13y agoIt is still the case. It's called Local Loop Unbundling (LLU). LLU accompanied common carrier deregulation in the late nineties. The rules have changed a bit over the years (favoring ILECs) and at's a little more difficult for a CLEC (Competitive Local Exchange Carrier) to get up and running today than it was in, say, 2000, but the rules are still in place. LLU has been somewhat successful in increasing competition in larger metro areas, though not so much in smaller rural areas There's still significant start-up cost associated with starting a CLEC, and LLU only gives CLECs access to the CO and local loop infrastructure. As an example, a few years back, I was living in San Jose and my internet/telephone was provided by a CLEC at about 1/2 the cost of the ILEC (verizon) who owned the lines. I've long thought that LLU applied to cable could provide the same sort of benefit. Since the "local loop" in most cases was subsidized (much like the ILEC situation), then the loss associated with LLU is minimal. It allows for increased competition, without forcing it, and gives the opportunity for increased consumer pressure to (because of additional competition) increase speeds/lower costs.