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Originally Posted by ackees
Are NTL networks available to 3rd parties?
Can another company offer broadband over the NTL cable?
Can someone confirm this?
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Yes. AOL already do this. If you are talking about "Local Loop Unbundling" though, NTL don't seem to offer this, and TBH, BT are not exactly being co-operative with offering it either.
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You see the most important thing is the control of reasonable base prices, sure you can have the grease lightening top tier service that cost a lot but if the basic service starts costing a lot then not only does it lock out poorer customers (who then cannot have a service) but it forces all the other prices up.
So if dial in goes up to £17.50
Basic broadband will go up to £30 and so on.
Unreasonable price inflation.
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NTL will lose customers to other ISPs. It would not be in their interest to do this.
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Look at it like this:
Will NTL be increasing wages by 25%?
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I doubt it
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Will there be an increase of speed by 25% taking 56kps to 70kbs?
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Impractical. Users would need new modems.
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Yes you can have companies say:
†œCome over to us and we will give you free internet accessÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â€šà ¬Ã‚ÂÂ
and then increase their prices dramatically while saying:
†œItÃƒÂ¢à ¢â€šÂ¬Ã¢â€Š¾Ã‚¢s only reasonable that we increase our prices to match our competitorsââ ¡Ã‚¬Ã‚ÂÂ
If you join a service you need some security that the company will not then increase prices unreasonably once you are on board, to do so at unreasonable rates is disreputable.
What would happen in a few years if the services we depend on were allowed to increase prices year on year at 25% (last year NTL increased the price by 100%).
Market conditions cannot control such abuse because all the companies will raise prices give or take a few pence between them to offer the sham of competition, consumers need protection.
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I do agree with you that in a lot of areas, customers need protection. But, the market will NOT keep absorbing those kinds of price rises. Look at the mobile phone market. That's still expensive, but it's actually quite reasonable compared to prices in the late 80s early 90s. The government have intervened in that market, but I think the major change in mobile phones occured when Mercury Communications leapt into the market with One2One.