Wednesday, August 16, 2006


EarthLink loses fiber line sharing case: Verizon and AT&T don't want to share those shiny new fiber networks they are installing. It's looking like they won't have to. [...] The FCC's vision of competition looks like cable competing with DSL, hopefully adding fiber, WiMAX, and broadband over power lines into the mix in the next couple of years. As long as consumers have viable choices, that model works. For many, real choice has yet to materialize. (Via Ars Technica.)

Case in point. I had used Covad DSL over my primary Verizon phone line, resold by local ISP DCAnet, since I moved to Philly five years ago. Recently, DCAnet decided to get out of the residential Covad resale business. I decided to switch to Speakeasy, also a Covad reseller, who many people recommended. Because of an information disconnect at DCAnet, it seemed at first that it would take a long downtime (weeks!) to switch my Covad service from DCAnet to Speakeasy, so I decided to order Speakeasy over a second phone line. To cut a long story short, Speakeasy, Covad and I wasted several weeks trying to get a working physical circuit from Verizon to no avail, even though there are no problems with my primary phone line. Eventually, an enterprising manager at Speakeasy found a way to switch my existing Covad service from DCAnet to Speakeasy without service interruption, but the whole process wasted a lot of time and effort for all involved. From where I stand, local loop competition is a joke if it only happens at the mercy of the local access oligopoly.


2:29:42 PM