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Originally Posted by nidave
Should NTL be forced to open thier networks - would it be a good or bad thing?
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Competition is nearly always a good thing. It reduces complacancy, makes companies work harder to keep customers and makes them develop better products. Compare this to ntl's telephone service: the costs of perifery items such as caller display, itemised billing and connection charges have skyrocketed on a percentage increase scale. This is becuase ntl are complacent that few customers will go through the hassle of switching to a completely different line in their house, or in my case having to have a new line installed by BT.
I don't know how it would work in the case of television, but I guess that a company like Homechoice would love to have access to TV customers with huge video on demand-capable pipes running right into their houses.
With internet, this is the jewel in ntl's crown. They have developed a product that works pretty well most of the time - but as with their TV and phone products, they have not developed the service - instead relying on huge speed increases that the majority of day to day users will never need.
This should be opened up in the same way as BT have been forced to open their networks up.
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Originally Posted by nidave
Should a company who spent all that money creating thier own network be forced to let others use it?
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Although BT's network was originally funded by tax £'s, it would be reasonable to argue now that the complete network would have been largely replaced or refreshed since it was privatised. Certainly this is the case with BT's broadband product, where the equipement in every exchange in the country was paid for with their own money, not public money. So, IMHO, it is no different to expect ntl to open up their internet product to competition too.
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Originally Posted by nidave
Even in BT's Case companies like bulldog have to crete thier own netowrk (ie add thier own equipment to the exchanges) whould any of these potential customers have to supply any of thier own equipment? Does AOL have any of thier own equpment or do they just pay for bandwith and connection?
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I think it would be fair to ntl to plan for this in the same way that BT had to gradually give away it's stranglehold on the monopoly. Initially ISPs rented the connection to the customer - now (where it is prudent to do so) some ISPs are starting to place their own equipment in exchanges. A similarly phased plan for ntl would be a good idea.
Saying all of this is fine - but of course we need to remember that OFCOM's chairman is non other than Stephen Carter, ex-CEO of ntl - and already some of OFCOMs decisions have been seen to be quite favourable to ntl and Telewest whilst penalising competitors - so I hold very little hope in OFCOM producing a fair and balanced report and taking into account anything to do with customer choice.
Instead, I predict their report will favour maintaining the monopoly for all three products of the new CableCo. Mark my words!