Jim Higgins wrote:
On Thu, 22 Dec 2005 14:41:03 +0000 (UTC), (Geoffrey
S. Mendelson) wrote:
And the flaw in your analysis is that they'll make up for a losing
proposition with sheer volume.
Not at all. My logic is that they will keep pouring money into it until
it makes a profit or they give up. Like UPS did with a portion of the
220 MHz band in the U.S. they lobbied for it, convinced everyone it would
be in the public good to give it to them and they took it from the hams.
By the time they got it, it was too late, technology passed them by and
they never used it. But it was never given back.
As for making a profit, there are lots of ways to recover cost. Maybe
you will start seeing "ads by google" in the middle of web pages that
did not have them, or a page request will give you an AOL page first
before the page you requested.
Haven't you heard? Google just gave AOL $1bn for the privledge of being
bought out by them. From now on a Google search will show AOL pages first.
The thing is that BPL doesn't scale up all that well. The power line
bandwidth is eaten up far faster than cable bandwidth and they can't
get more by just adding some new transducers using a different
wavelength and keep going.
Sort of. BPL uses carrier frequencies like every other digital communications
method. If they run out of bandwidth in unocuppied carriers (which don't exist
because every HF frequency is in use somewhere), they add more carriers.
If there was a burden upon them to make sure it is not in use, but all
they have to do to check that is to listen with a cheap shortwave
portable. It's not their fault there is no propigation at that moment or
all the hams are asleep. They "checked" and you would have to fight them to
get them off it.
BPL will slow down quickly as subscribers
are added and it won't be as fast as cable even with only one
subscriber. The BPL industry has sold the power companies a bill of
goods and the few who aren't simply abandoning it after initial trials
need to be fought at a level that doesn't require FCC involvement.
So what? Once it's there it's there. Once given it can never be taken away.
I'm sick and tired of seeing the ARRL humping the FCC's leg over BPL
and being ignored. It's time to add another weapon to the arsenal. If
not an approach involving regulating BPL to death thru the state PUCs,
what do you suggest?
I really can't say. I'm not in the U.S. BPL died a quick death here for
two reasons. One it sucked. Two, Israel Electric (a country wide monopoly)
has been quietly running fiber alongside of their wires. Currently they use
it for the monitoring and control functions that BPL is supposed to provide,
but if the Ministry of Communications would let them, they would sell the
bandwith for internet.
As for the ARRL if you are a member, complain. Their attitude is as long as
you don't foul my bands, I don't care. Make them care. Deluge Sumner and
Hare with emails. (one per member please, not a worthless mail bomb).
I don't believe for a second that a call to not use Google will have
any effect on BPL. It will take millions of people cooperating to
make that approach effective and you'll never get that many to
cooperate. Getting the attention of state PUCs takes far fewer people
to accomplish.
Yes, but with 600,000 licensed hams in the U.S., if they and their families
each emailed Google seperately and boycotted Google search engines, Google
maps and "ads by google" they would get the message pretty quick.
The owner of one popular ham site wrote me that he could not give up his
"ads by google" as the money paid for the site. I told him that he was making
a mistake and I would also boycott his site and his advertisers.
It's up to you. If you don't do anything, there will be no HF bands in 5-10
years. Morse code tests or not, you simply won't be able to hear anyhting
except buzz-buzz-buzz. :-(
Geoff.
--
Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel
N3OWJ/4X1GM
IL Voice: (07)-7424-1667 IL Fax: 972-2-648-1443 U.S. Voice: 1-215-821-1838
The trouble with being a futurist is that when people get around to believing
you, it's too late. We lost. Google 2,000,000:Hams 0.