Why everyone hates the telcos and cable companies: they deserve it.

Let's stop hating Google for a moment to hate some companies that really deserve it.

The telcos and cable companies, otherwise known as Evil Incarnate and The Devil Himself.

It's not their fault, really. They're victims of their childhoods. Any company raised as a monopoly just can't stop robbing the people who who paid for its nurturing through public assistance programs.

Now that the telcos are rebuilding monopolies, they figure they can gouge us a little more. The cable companies have hated their customers all along.

They already killed off most of the independent ISPs, by bundling that service with their phone and cable  services, which were really monopolies in their geographic markets. You get a discount only if you subscribe to all their services, like the only hotel in the county charging you a higher room rate if you don't pay its fee for the exercise room and eat all your meals in its restaurant.

When Microsoft tried to bundle services with its monopoly product, governments the world over tried to do a little monopoly-busting head-butting with Bill Gates, who has more wealth and power than most nations.

Now the telcos figure they can screw us a little deeper. They want to start making us sign contracts and charge penalties for early withdrawal. It showed up in a Consumers Union survey of practices among broadband suppliers.

I guess they have bigger butts than even Bill Gates, because no governments are trying to stop them.

They're already trying to sue VoIP companies out of existence by claiming patents on the technology. Never mind that they were last to the market.

No matter, here's what's going to happen: Companies like Google and Metro-fi will increasingly wire cities for free wi-fi, despite the resistance of city governments who either don't know their ISPs from a manhhole cover or are beholden to the local telcos. The existing ISPs will find their business models collapsing under their feet like Wile E. Coyote standing on an overhanging bluff.

Then companies like Google and Apple will create direct-to-internet cell phones as wi-fi spreads, and drop a boulder on the phone companies's heads with free or exorbitantly cheap international calling.

And companies like Google, Apple, AOL, Blinkx, etc., will put folks in touch with free video, no matter how much Hollywood tries to stop it. There goes that boulder on the cable coyotes' heads.

Ten years, max, the telcos and cable monopolies will be dying or desperately seeking other ways to make money. We'll have free telephony, free internet access, and free video and music on demand. And there won't be any early cancellation fees.

It's inevitable. It's the internet, dammit.

del.icio.us        Digg this

 

Comments

[ColdCore]

Excellent observation!

As an active paralellism, watch how major oil companies start to buy/sue/steal technologies involving hydrogen generation, battery power, and fuel cells.

[Richard Brandt]

I think they're already doing that! But I may be paranoid. However, Silicon Valley is starting to invest in alternative energy technologies because of Gov. Schwarzenegger's promise to cut greenhouse emissions in California. Let's hope the VCs don't sell out too soon.