Cable Vs. Phone Companies: Fair Competition Helps Consumers
This month, Cox Communications surveyed Hampton Roads consumers about their feelings on fair competition. We did so in light of the fact that, across the country, the nations big telephone companies are asserting they need special favors from legislators and regulators to enter the local video business.
Of course, the notion that the regional Bell behemoths need a government handout to compete strains credulity.
Clearly, changing the rules for the phone giants, and no one else, would tilt the market in their favor and penalize the true entrepreneurs that have invested the time and resources to bring the benefits of broadband technology to a vast majority of Americans.
In Hampton Roads, Cox Communications has invested nearly $600 million since the 1996 Telecommunications Act to build a regional fiber-optic-rich broadband network. As a result, Hampton Roads consumers have access to high-speed Internet service; state-of-the art video products such as high-definition television; and competitive telephone-service options, which can be as much as 25 percent lower than Verizons prices.
It was competition largely from direct-broadcast satellite companies that prompted cable operators to invest money in broadband networks and upgrade their service offerings, without asking for any government favors.
Even as cable companies have improved their offerings, the two national satellite companies have added 25 million subscribers, claiming better than one-quarter of all subscribers to multi- channel video services.
Competition for new and existing customers is fierce across all facets of the communications business. This kind of marketplace rivalry is the rising tide that lifts all boats.
These developments are due in large part to a regulatory framework that has fostered increased competition and provided incentives for companies to make private capital investments in technology and networks that are a springboard for new services.
The phone giants have had nearly a full decade to share in this growth, and many of the incentives in the 1996 Telecommunications Act were designed specifically for them. During that period, several of their predecessors entered and then beat a hasty retreat from the cable-television business.
Only after it became clear that their monopoly local telephone service would be challenged by competition did the phone companies begin to seek regulatory shortcuts for entering the television business. And now theyre claiming that a service that is virtually identical to cable television should be given preferential regulatory treatment.
When the FCC recently deregulated parts of the phone companies high-speed Internet-access business to level the playing field with cables high-speed Internet service the cable industry supported the change. Thats because we believe that like services should be treated alike.
The phone giants need to accept this logic. Hampton Roads consumers certainly do. The results of our survey show that Virginians sense of fair play is quite clear: Eighty-nine percent of those surveyed indicated that they think phone companies should play by the rules that are in existence for current cable television companies.
Further, 90 percent said that if rules and regulations are changed to accommodate phone companies, the changes should apply to all cable providers, including existing ones.
The most exciting development in todays telecommunications marketplace is that consumers are only just beginning to realize the promise of broadband technology. Innovation and creativity are flourishing, bringing Virginians and all Americans a diverse and compelling array of content and applications. The result is that consumers will continue to be the true winners.
If state and national policymakers will apply the rules equally to all competitors, the best will be yet to come: greater choice and higher value, along with an increasing ability to personalize services for our homes and lifestyles.
When customers can choose their companies (and not the companies choosing their customers), better, more innovative telecommunications services will be made available to everyone.
Its that simple.
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Frank Bowers is vice president and region manager of Cox Communications Hampton Roads in Chesapeake. other opinions
Source: Virginian - Pilot
http://www.redorbit.com/news/techno...elps_consumers/index.html?source=r_technology
