VoIP and ENUM

Last Friday I pointed to plans in Vienna to put FTTH in all households. This seems to be an excellent idea, at least one can "earn" a lot of money with FTTH. But as usual, Europe is lagging behind the US, which is leading the way in "how to make business".

David S. Isenberg is pointing on his blog to a book of his friend Bruce Kushnick, a "man on a mission". In The $200 Billion Broadband Scandal, Bruce writes:

. . . in the early 1990's . . . every Bell company . . . made commitments to rewire America, state by state. Fiber optic wires would replace the 100-year old copper wiring. The push caused techno-frenzy of major proportions. By 2006, 86 million households should have had a service capable of 45 Mbps in both directions . . . In order to pay for these upgrades, in state after state, the public service commissions and state legislatures acquiesced to the Bells' promises by removing the constraints on the Bells' profits as well as gave other financial perks . . . The phone companies collected over $200 billion in higher phone rates and tax perks, about $2000 per household.

Remark: in German we call this "über den Tisch ziehen", in Vienna "a Legerl".

The manipulations, deceptions and broken promises are documented in detail in New Jersey, Texas, Pennsylvania, California and Massachusetts. A synopsis of the book can be found here.

Buy the book (ebook only) here, $20.00 cheap.

A special blog has been set-up on this issue: 200 Billion Broadband scandal