[m419]

Thats interesting.

NTL thinks that if they rebrand into Virgin, it will improve everything. But clearly its not and understand what you are saying. Rebranding to Virgin is not going upgrade 30% of NTL's cable network by 2008!

NTL has two large franchises once owned by BT and it is in tatters, NTL cannot afford to upgrade these two franchises which are located in Westminster and Milton Keynes, they don't even have a telephone network and customers have to use a BT line! Whats more, there are parts of other NTL franchises and streets which are still not digital and they were aiming to get the whole network upgraded by 2008, 2009 at the latest. Telewest said that it would upgrade its network to digital by 2006, and so they have. However, they also said that they would turn off analogue services by 2006, there are still loads of customers using analogue services, this shows that NTL cannot afford to upgrade its network to digital and means it could be heading for more financial trouble.

And another thing, how comes Cable and Wireless is not regulated by Ofcom as much as BT, BT and Cable and Wireless were both nationalised companies before Margaret Thatcher came on the scene. In fact C&W launched in the 1850's and was a private company until the second world war and was re-nationalised until 1982 and it was privatised again. BT was formed by the goverment sometime around when Cable and Wireless was nationalised and was taken over by the goverment's post office and was then known as 'GPO or post office telephones/telegraphs' until 1982 when it de-merged away from the post office and then privatised in 1984.