On Sat, 2006-11-18 at 16:31 -0600, Sean Walberg wrote:
On 11/18/06, Trevor Cordes trevor@tecnopolis.ca wrote:
Two problems: 1) control; 2) cost. No matter how inexpensive, you're still looking at adding $15-$25/month. When unfettered access to all ports (within bandwidth usage limits) should be free, why spend $250 more per year? And if you migrate off your email/web/etc services to aThat level of control isn't worth $250/yr? If not, you should question your need for those extra features.
I don't in principle mind someone charging what the market will bear, rather than just a shade above marginal cost, but I don't much like it in a situation where my choice is limited. And of course, that's invariably where such pricing behaviour crops up. I think the level of competition that exists in network connectivity is qualitatively different from that which exists in other types of markets, say, retail coffee. Unregulated private network infrastructure results in either massive duplication or inadequate competition, and the cost excesses of both problems get passed along to consumers.
Another difference between coffee and networks is that moving from one brand of coffee to another is relatively easy. The substitutability upon which real market competition depends is much more difficult to achieve for wired networks than other types of "products", I suspect.
I sympathize with Trevor's complaint entirely.
Regards, Syd