Innovate Or Get Out Of The Way
While Lee Dryburgh, the heart and soul behind the upcoming eComm conference in Mountain View, CA, thinks that the telecom industry needs to wake up, I would be just as happy if today’s telecoms became nothing more than a dumb, stupid pipe.
As far as I’m concerned, the telecoms have had their chance to innovate and you know what? They’ve failed. If it were possible to give them a grade lower than an F, I would, trust me.
What innovation has the telecom companies given us since I’ve been alive? You can use your own handset on our closed network, mostly thanks to the Carterfone rules. A bunch of useless services that cost way too much and do too little. No interest in interoperating with the likes of anything that might threaten their business to point of actually impeding innovation.
All I want from the telcos is a fat, dumb, and stupid pipe. Don’t try and “help” me by shaping packets or giving me quality of service. Focus on delivering 100% of the traffic and keeping that line active. Don’t try and provide me anything more than IP dialtone either, be it in IPv4 or IPv6 flavors.
Unless, of course, the telcos want to prove me wrong and actually innovate. Otherwise, get the hell out of the way and let the rest of us innovate.
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Tags: dumb pipes, telco Fnord
Comment by spg
i agree completely. all i want is ‘dumb pipe’ with fast quality access tho the internet. eventually this will have to come anyways even if it coexists with models.
spg
Comment by Aswath
I think telcos have stayed out of the way of any innovator, especially after the Carterfone ruling. There have been lot of innovation at the end without requiring any participation from the telcos (but I am not sure whether these are before or after the epoch you identify). For example, data modems and fax machines are important innovations. With out-of-band signalling, we could bring up information related to the caller even before the call is answered. Don’t let Ribbit tell you that it is Caller ID 2.0. Why, PhoneGnome allows one to do lots of innovations even for POTS line, without involving the telcos. If the industry is lacking innovations it is because people are not focusing on the ends, but only the middle just as they denigrate the keepers of the middle – the telcos.
Comment by PhoneBoy
@aswath Your point doesn’t in any way go against what I said. The telecoms can innovate by giving me a fat, dumb, reliable pipe. Leave the innovations to others–at the endpoints.
Comment by Aswath
I thought the post tacitly admits that there is a dearth of innovation (the organizer of the event you refer says it as much) and I interpreted your post to be suggesting that the problem is with the carriers. If I misinterpreted your post, that is my bad.
Comment by PhoneBoy
@aswath There is innovation to be had at the edges. The carriers can do their part by giving us a fat, dumb, reliable pipe and not try and make that pipe “smart.” That’s the only innovation the carriers can–and really should–give us. Their other attempts at innovation have, for the most part, been abject failures.