Broadband Bytes: 2008 Wrap-up Edition

Happy New Year! This Broadband Bytes covers from December 20 through the end of the year. The end of 2008 saw even more retransmission battles (in particular the 11th-hour showdown between Time Warner and Viacom), Qwest trying to unplug a rival that’s suing it for racketeering, and the pending launch of FTTH services in Lafayette, LA. I predict that 2009 will offer up explosive growth in broadband speeds and availability fueled by federal dollars, an increased flight of users from cable to online video streaming and continued greater-than-inflation rises in programming costs.

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3 Responses to Broadband Bytes: 2008 Wrap-up Edition

  1. Jonathan says:

    I like this part from the Lafayette roll out.

    The 100 Mbps intranet has been discussed on these pages for a long time. Suffice it to say that any regular customer will have access to blinding 100 meg speed over the internal community intranet. Want to download the 6 hours of one of those interminable contensious council meeting? In HD? No problem. It will come down in a flash. Video telephony. Shuttling those huge files will become trivially easy—if only inside our net. That will encourage businesses and tech-oriented citizens to locate inside the city…which might do more to encorage “smart growth” than any suggestion I have heard to date.

  2. Tom says:

    Hmm. Anyone get that new Qwest deal? They are still quoting me (on the website) the old pricing. No new pricing here in Springville.

  3. Jesse says:

    I’m with Comcast, so I wouldn’t be able to speak specifically to that. I do know that they have upped my home connection to somewhere in the 12Mbps/2Mbps range without a price increase.

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