As the Copper Disappears

To remove copper, the LEC's have to post notice to the FCC. These notices can be found on the FCC website or in the daily email from the FCC. the look like this:

Report No: NCD-1578 Released: 06/27/2008. WIRELINE COMPETITION BUREAU NETWORK CHANGE NOTIFICATION FILED BY AT&T SOUTHEAST. WCB. Contact: Carmell Weathers at (202) 418-2325, email: Carmell.Weathers@fcc.gov, TTY: (202) 418-0484 ... DOC-283291A1

or this:

Report No: NCD-1579 Released: 06/27/2008. WIRELINE COMPETITION BUREAU NETWORK CHANGE NOTIFICATION FILED BY AT&T SOUTHEAST. WCB. Contact: Carmell Weathers at (202) 418-2325, email: Carmell.Weathers@fcc.gov, TTY: (202) 418-0484 ... DOC-283292A1

Watch for them.

The story of XO: What does Icahn want?

Here's the low down on XO's financials. Icahn cut back on capex (capital expenditures), which means less build out to light buildings (read: gain customers). Right now, since XO owns an IRU of 18 strands on the original Level3 network, XO competes with L3 in many on-net deals. XO has to build laterals to add customers. The article explains Icahn's influence in this situation. (BTW, NOL = net operating loss)

ISPhone revised

Back in 2005 or so, I spoke with ISPhone owner Victor von Schlegell. ISPhone provides wholesale VOIP termination. ISP-Planet revisited ISPhone in May:

When a press release came over the ISP Planet transom recently announcing a new ISPhone product that allows service providers to integrate their Asterisk switching systems with RADIUS-based authentication and billing, we were intrigued.

Host.net buys WV Fiber

Boca Raton, FL-based Host.net is buying Nashville-based WV Fiber.

Financial terms were not disclosed at this time.

"The infrastructure and operations of the WV Fiber network that we are acquiring provide a major inflection point for our company," said Jeffrey Davis, Host.net's Co-Founder & CEO. "The acquisition of the WV Fiber network will provide Host.net with an immediate and significant base of recurring and growing contract revenues in the carrier and wholesale markets. [tmcnet]

Some facts about Host.net:

1. Host.net runs a data center in Boca.
2. Host.net offers hosting, Hosted VOIP and managed services while utilizing the fiber of BellSouth and others to connect to its customers.
3. Host.net also bought the assets of Expedient Florida/WebUnited in March of 2008.
4. Lenny Chesal, CMO since 2004, is a great guy!

UPDATE: Host.net signed a deal for fiber with FiberLight.

Commercial: Looking for Fiber? Call our office at 813-963-5884

Being an MSP

Jason Hunt spoke about being a CLEC, but really the model is about using the copper to own the customer by offering Managed Services. The MSP Alliance has been an exhibitor at ISPCON in the past. Now they are having their own events:

1. Managed Services Summit - Chicago on September 25-26, 2008
2. Managed Services Summit - Las Vegas on November 5-6, 2008

Did you know that there is MSP Liability Insurance?

There is an MSP University and an MSP Alliance. (I think Jason was pointing out another book at the seminar, but here's an MSP Guide from MSPU.

All the big money is in services. And most MSP's have accounts billing at $500+ monthly. Sure beats that $5 margin on resold DSL, huh?

What the heck is AVOICS?

Ma Bell was pitching Wholesale VOIP at the FISPA meeting. From the feedback, no one had much of an idea what it was. From the ATT SP Newsletter:

"In this issue, we would like to introduce you to AT&T’s Voice Over IP Connect Service (AVOICS), our flagship voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) offer for U.S. service providers that require IP-based connectivity to AT&T’s global IP network for long distance call termination. AVOICS, along with the breadth of VoIP services that we offer, enables you to cost-effectively broaden your footprint and enhance your bandwidth through our robust MPLS-based network with the proven reliability and security you expect from a global networking leader..... AT&T Voice Over IP Connect Service (AVOICS) provides IP-based connectivity to AT&T's network for domestic and international VoIP call termination. AVOICS provides unbranded and unbundled transport and termination of your VoIP traffic.....also offering your end users access to unbranded Directory Assistance for the domestic U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico – a great value-added service available with AVOICS.....AVOICS may also provide long distance termination of “non-native” IP traffic, defined as traffic that originates as TDM, undergoes a protocol conversion to IP by the service provider, and is then transported as IP from the service provider to AT&T, albeit at a different rate then for “native” traffic."

If you are looking for SIP Termination, in many cases without a medium sized commit, you are better off getting Dedicated LD on a T1. It is TDM quality and it costs about 2 cpm. The quality is the real reason. The T1 can be expensive depending how far you are from the tandem, but so will the transport from either ATT or VZB. (For those of you looking at 2 cpm and scoffing, your 20,000 minutes isn't going to have a huge cost differential from 1.5 to 2.0. If that delta will sink your ship, you should already be looking for a bucket to bail water.

WISPA on ISP-Planet

In case you don't read ISP-Planet weekly (and why don't you?), there are articles from 3 WISPA members on the front page. A two-part article on WISP Mistakes from ISPCON by Dustin Jurman of Rapid Systems in Tampa and Jack Unger, Cisco Press author. And there's an article written by Marlon Schafer titled Self-Inflicted Interference is the Worst Kind.

Atlanta - Day 1

So it's time to start Day 2 of the FISPA meeting in Atlanta, but first let me relate to you the highlights from Day 1:

1) Apparently, FISPA ISP's on the BellSouth DSL Program have seen a 20%+ drop in lines in the last year. AT&T would like those DSL numbers to be Organically Grown by the ISP's. However, there will not be any changes to the current program to aid that goal. It looks like this program has MAYBE 18 months left.

2) In the CLEC session, Kris Twomey, Jason Hunt and I moderated a standing room only crowd filled with questions about VoIP, Collocation, EEL's, G.SHDSL (and every other flavor of DSL) and more. The main 4 topics and one key point:

• T.38 - fax with VoIP
• POTS or Hosted PBX
• How to Roll Your Own DSL
• VOIP: DIY or Wholesale
• Key: What is Your Focus?

Today, Twomey will be presenting CPNI and then another CLEC hour is planned.

Business Plans

Business Planning is one way to examine your business from top to bottom. As you can see from this outline, it is a comprehensive document, one that you will need if you are looking for a loan, capital, investors or equity partners.

A Business Plan can take up to 80 hours to write, depending on how much documentation you have. The Small Business Administration has some very good resources for helping you through the process. And of course SCORE has templates for a business plan in addition to a collection of other important business documents like Balance Sheet, analysis and forecasting models.

There are professionals that will write your Business Plan for you, but be prepared to pay about $100 per hour - so anywhere from $2500 to $9000.

Guy Kawasaki thinks that you need a mini business plan to decide if your idea even has merit. The plan can be a PowerPoint with 10 slides (see here). "The outline Guy recommends is:"

1. Problem
2. Your solution
3. Business model
4. Underlying magic/technology
5. Marketing and sales
6. Competition
7. Team
8. Projections and milestones
9. Status and timeline
10. Summary and call to action

Guy explains why you should have a Plan here. If you were opening a new line of business, like moving into being a Wireless Broadband Provider or becoming a CLEC, a mini-plan might help clarify your vision and sales proposition.

LinkLine vs PacBell in Anti-Trust

Supreme Court [finally] To Investigate If AT&T Is Violating Antitrust Laws With Wholesale DSL Pricing

TechDirt writes about the Supreme Court deciding to accept the Appeal of PacWest (now called AT&T) in its anti-trust battle with an ISP named LinkLine.

"A series of lawsuits followed, including an appeals court ruling that found that AT&T was abusing monopoly rights to offer prices that were simply out of line with market pricing -- making it effectively impossible for any other provider to compete. AT&T has appealed and now the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case. This could be very important, as it could force a company like AT&T, which relies on these government granted rights of way, to offer up access to their network to potential competitors who could offer more reasonably priced services. This also could have a major impact on both the overall competitiveness of broadband in the US as well as network neutrality -- since having more competition would make it harder for AT&T and others to violate net neutrality.

The crux of the matter is that "The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled against AT&T, saying the telecom company was setting its wholesale prices so high that the Internet service provider could not compete with the low prices AT&T charged in the retail market. The appeals court said that federal courts have recognized such price squeeze allegations for six decades. [Yahoo]

We have been here before, circa 2005. FISPA, WBIA, and others rallying to fight forbearance at the FCC on DSL and the Supreme Court ruling of Brand-X vs. Cable over access to cable modems. Spin ahead and the ISP groups lost both battles. Now 2008 the Anti-Trust lawsuit winds its way to the Supremes and Cable is welcoming ISP's on its networks.

Seth's Sales Lesson

No such thing as price pressure

Your sales force and your customers may scream that you need to lower your price.

It's not true.

You need to increase your value. If people don't want to pay, it's because you're not delivering enough value for the money you're charging.

You're not selling a commodity unless you want to.

posted by Seth Godin on June 20, 2008

Rebate or Bribe?

XO has a promotion running until Sept. 28, 2008. Customers of XO Business Partners can receive a lump sum cash rebate with new orders of selected speeds of the following products: IP Flex; IP Flex with VPN; SIP Service; and MPLS IP-VPN.

Rebate Amounts

Bandwidth	Customer Rebate
	3 Year Term	5 Year Term
3.0 Mbps	$2,000	$4,000
4.5 Mbps	$4,000	$7,000
10 Mbps	$6,000	$9,000

This looks like a good way to buy some business -- and, hey, I am all about acquiring revenue. If interested or need the fine print, give me a call at 813-963-5884.

Exit Strategy

Are you looking for an exit strategy? You know. Do you want to sell your business?

At least one company is looking to buy your VOIP, ISP, Telecom or Hosting business. Revenues need to be at least $1M.

There has been a lot of M&A lately with Hostopia, HostMySite and others. People are always buying & selling.

(At the present time, I do not have a buyer for WISP's, but you can use the WISPA list or email me and I will gladly post a note here for you).

This Week in the News

Lots of stuff going on, but I will just highlight it here:

Telcos ARE getting immunity for wiretapping for the NSA [isen]

In its battle with Cable, VZ violated CPNI rules big time. FCC may agree today. [usatoday]

MetroFi shuts off Portland and others [yahoo]

NebuAd just keeps getting into trouble. They need to re-think if all this negative publicity is worth it. In the eyes of the consumer, they are Evil. It's how the media has painted them - that and the fact that they invade everyone's privacy. [wired]

FCC approves Sirius-XM merger [forbes]

FCC Chair K-Mart under House Committee Investigation.... Finally! Someone slap that Harry Potter look-alike! [nationaljournal]

Satellite Broadband

For rural ISP's, satellite can be a good complement of services to sell. KYISPA has a deal with Wild Blue and at least 2 ISP's are happy with their experience. (My own experience with Wild Blue and its distributor system was less than stellar. I have 2 clients singing that same tune).

If you are selling Wireless Internet to the residential space, then satellite may be a good filler, so that you do not have to tell people you can not serve them. At least 2 WISP's I know install Wild Blue, DirecTV and DISH along with their own wireless service, so that the customer cuts the cord -- and he keeps his installers busy.

HughesNet is pushing their channel partnership. (Disclosure: I am a sub-agent able to sell Hughes). Phone+ has an article about Satellite Internet. There is a business model of selling Satellite Internet, TV and cell phone - a retail business, but it can be a living. The article starts out about SkyPort Global Communications, who is holding a webinar: Satellite Broadband Services: Better Margins - More Commission.

This is just an FYI to those of you in rural America.

$1B in Sales - Big Deal

PAETEC, XO and others talk about the Billion club. Big Deal. $1 Billion in sales. In the case of XO, it cost over $8B and a BK or 2 to get there and they still have a flawed business plan. Great balance sheet for Icahn and others though.

There were other CLEC's that hit the $1B mark long before XO and PAETEC. Caruso writes about Genuity doing it in 2000. And then ICI (Intermedia) hit $1B in revenue, but $3B in debt - most of it short term. ICI had to sell to MCI in 2001. MCI kept Digex and sold the rest to Allegiance, which became XO.

A billion dollars does not mean success. Profit means success. Happy employees. Low churn - both customer and employee.

UPDATE

In the post, I write about how ICI had a huge, short-term debt load that it collapsed under and how Genuity hit $1B but had to sell anyway. (Carusa's post had the details of Genuity's financial problems).

It isn't about once you hit $1B, you can now compete against the RBOCs on an even field or that you have leverage at that size. Can you say Naive? Even at $1B, the ILEC's hold all the cards. Unless that $1B in revenue was in one ILEC region, THEN, yes, you would have leverage. And then the CLEC could build its own network to rely less on the ILEC. And with its own network, the CLEC would have more control over customer issues as well as the ability to be more creative in its service offerings. But do they do that? No.

Not Features, Benefits

While at a client going over some sales and marketing stuff, we were working on the USP (unique sales proposition, the Compelling Offer, the Differentiator). the service offering has great features, no doubt, but they were Features. Clients need Benefits, like cost or time savings. The Compelling Offer has to be able to crack the ice.

All too often in telecom, the marketing folks think that the Features are All. The features are the ammunition used by sales folks to put band-aids on client pain. That's what sales is after all: Uncovering the Pain. Once you uncover the pain, you can prescribe the medicine: your service.

Features are also used to handle Objections.

All of this, precluded your sales folks getting an appointment or getting an audience with a prospective decision maker. Getting by the Gatekeeper. That's the tough part. (Many books have been written about it by Tom Hopkins, Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy, Keith Rosen, etc. In fact, this 90 second video on YouTube by Hopkins sums up sales). Then you have to have pre-prepared questions to ask the decision maker so that he can tell you his pain. (You should be doing twice as much listening as talking, that's why sales people have 2 ears and one mouth! Sales is not puking your brochure or marketing spiel or sales pitch at the guy. It's asking open ended questions, like How vital is Internet access to your business? Do you take orders by email, or efax or over the web? What would down time cost you? Have you experienced any down time with your current provider?

Now, sales is about waiting for him to answer then telling him everything about your company or service. At this point, the best you can do is say, You know, another client had similar concerns.... Tell a story. (Make sure it is real and authentic, not some BS you make up or your credibility is out the window along with the sale and the prospect).

So that's selling in a nutshell. The problem in our Industry is the lack of sales. Most folks are ORDER TAKERS. If you sell on PRICE, you are NOT selling, you are taking orders (like the guy at the Post Office or the kid at McD's). Here's Ike Elliot on telecom becoming a Commodity:

"The problem for most companies in the telecom industry is the second hurdle, the "Y axis" of Guy Kawasaki's chart. The first time a Harvard MBA asked me "What makes your product unique?", I wanted to hit him, because he had caught me being complacent about our business prospects..... I eventually admitted that our business plan might be a little bit flawed in that one little teensy-weensy area. The hard truth here is that if your product or service is not different from what everybody else is selling, then you are selling a commodity and you will eventually have to use price as a primary differentiator.
Now, I know what you are thinking. "Ike, it's not really that simple...I can think of all kinds of ways my service is different from my competitor's." The key thing, though, is that these differentiators need to matter to your customer. For example, if you are a national network operator and you are competing with a bunch of regional network operators, it might matter to some customers that they can do one-stop shopping with you versus buying from multiple regional guys. But be honest with yourself...how many of your potential customers would skip the big price savings for the convenience of dealing with one carrier? And, for the ones who are willing to buy services piecemeal, you are right back to competeting on price.
Lots of carriers are scared out of their minds of the "C" word. They can't stomach being a commodity, and for good reason. To thrive in a commodity business, you have to have to be really big and really efficient and embrace those values above all others.

How the Telecom/IT Space is Changing

I'm certain that I will bring this up at the CLEC Workshop next week in ATL. In Gary Kim's article in IP Business, he discusses a survey Level3 did about the telecom agent channel. Now before you switch off, it concerns YOUR business direction or focus, too!

There are about 8000 telecom agents, but about 200K VARs (value added resellers loosely defined as System Integrators, IT resellers, and IT consultants).

The line between IT and Telecom is getting blurry.

"Solutions simply are more entangled with data services these days. "Customers are wanting VAR partners to recommend the connectivity piece and provide a complete solution," Schlagbaum says. ... The solutions business customers now require—and which require carrier services—include security (81 percent), WAN migration (66 percent), storage (64 percent), as well as data center and disaster recovery, he notes." [ipbusiness]

Traditional telecom agents sell dial-tone, long distance, broadband (DSL), and T1. They are like a lot of ISP's -- the tool box has just one tool. That won't work much longer. Technology is out-pacing people. Businesses will need to hire / out-source specialized skills, like web design, SEO, blogging, software, etc. And you don't have to do this all in-house. You can partner or out-source too. But you need to start making your brand about technology, not just internet access.

Think about it this way: In the days of BBS, you were selling server access. In dial-up, you were selling email access. In broadband, you are selling information access. Next, comes Apps and IT access. Email is still the killer app, it is still the same way it was in 1994, just about. (Or at least most people sell it that way!)

As IT and Telecom merge, the key will be Maintenance and Security.

Bundling is everywhere. The main reasons: (A) One throat to choke, one bill; (B) the more services, the more you own the account. Your ARPU goes up and churn goes down (in theory).

Just like your website (untouched since 2001), it is time to survey your market and re-vamp your business. (While you are at it, re-vamp your website. Go to guru.com or elance.com and find someone to do it for you).

The XO Saga Continues

On isp-bw list, there has been a "debate" (I'm being polite) about XO, Nextlink, and the Icahn debt. I mentioned some of this here and briefly mentioned other stuff here. But the buzz id big - even with stock at $0.75 and the executive options at $5.

Over at Seeking Alpha, someone really likes XO's chances. Me? I think that it is just Icahn's loss machine. The company is convoluted. "The Company operates its business in two segments through two primary operating subsidiaries: XO Communications, LLC (XOC), which operates its wireline business under the trade name XO Communications, and Nextlink Wireless, Inc. (Nextlink), which operates the Company's wireless business." Both owned by XO Holdings. I forget which owns the debt. R2 sued about the corporate restructuring when it occurred. They are set to sue Icahn again for neglect of fudicuiary duties.

Telephony mag reports that "tensions are also mounting between Icahn and shareholders of XO Holdings, who fear his treatment of that company’s debt could drive it to bankruptcy." The Open Letter to ICAHN: http://tinyurl.com/6b2sq3

"Icahn, who is both XO’s Chairman and its majority shareholder, also controls nearly all of its $461 million in debt, which begins to mature next year. As the company mulls options for refinancing and paying down that debt in a turbulent credit market, some shareholders have criticized Icahn for not allowing XO to refinance that debt earlier, when the credit market was much healthier."

"However, the big question is whether Carl Icahn – the billionaire investor and XO's Chairman, who also owns 59% of the stock and 90+% of its debts is willing to sell the company at any thing under $2 billion. Considering XO's $1.43 billion revenue and the $108 million EBITDA (improving), plus a minimum $100-300 million recurring saving from business/operation synergy by both companies under this specific merge, the price is not far away from the unconfirmed rumor that LVLT offered $3 billion for XO without success after LVLT paid $1.4 billion in early 2007 for Broadwing – a carrier with about $900 million revenue and near zero EBITDA. This wild guess neither includes XO's $3.3 billion accumulated NOLs (net operating losses), which alone may save the acquirer more than $1 billion in tax payment, nor its wireless business unit - NextLink, which owns the largest LMDS portfolio in the nation. LMDS is a hot commodity currently because it offers a viable vehicle for backhauling of the upcoming 4G mobile communication." [seeking alpha]

Is XO worth $2B? I guess in strictly financial terms. But you end up with assets and a balance sheet, not much more. XO is a company without a direction. They have tried so many things that have not panned out, mainly due to poor execution. XO can't decide if it wants to be a wholesaler or a retailer. You certainly can't be both to the same marketplace. It is a company with 4 Presidents:

1. Carl J. Grivner > President, Chief Executive Officer, Director
2. Ernest Ortega > President - Carrier Sales
3. Tom Cady > President - Business Services
4. Craig Collins > President - Hosting and Small Business

This typically means 4 separate silos that don't know what the other is doing and trampling all over itself in the process. (EarthLink suffers from this - much less now with only 25% of the staff left). Having sold XO, I can tell you that any changes to an order totally mess up the company. Many customers have been burned, never to return. And why would they? There isn't any market that XO doesn't have a number of competitors. And it has not had a clear marketing message to the marketplace in years. (Their sales people run willy nilly. Train some of them, will you? Geez. XO's biggest competitor is ITSELF. See rant on silos).

Most of the Board works for Icahn, which means he has little oversight. Never a good thing.

XO was "Started by Craig McCaw with $8 billion investment sunk in for the past 8 years, XO's $3.2 billion tax loss carryover credit is a strong incentive to profitable telecom companies to take over it for essentially free." And who would buy it? Talk has been of L3, GX, Qwest and Akamai, a CDN without a network.

Revenue alone and a balance sheet do not mean anything. Doesn't anyone remember ICI? You need a solid business plan, execution, and focus.

LDMS is only metro areas selling at about $1000 for transport. In those same metros you can get Fixed Wireless for much cheaper (licensed and 3650 MHZ) and you can buy fiber for LESS! XO is now "banking" on cellular backhaul as its marketplace. DUH! Twenty people are chasing that market with you. Again no focus. No direction. No plan. And Alpha writes that many execs have been there a long time. Too bad none of them have a clue either. Harsh, I know, but how do you spend over $8B and still can't get it right?

Who's Going to...?

Who is going to:

• HostingCon in Chicago July 28-30 at the Navy Pier
• Channel Partners on August 18-20, 2008 in Boston
• TMC Internet Telephony Expo 2008 West at the LA Convention Center on Sept. 16-18
• COMPTEL in Orlando on October 5 - 8
• ISPCON in San Jose on Nov. 11-13
• FISPA CLEC + DSL Meeting in ATL next week?

Drop me a not at peter at 4isps dot com or call me at 813-963-5884.

Secret Treaty

One last post before I call it a night: Secret ACTA treaty may include ISP filtering Ciao!

How Muni Fiber Should Work

In a profile about LUS, the Lafayette muni fiber project that Bell and cable fought long and hard, Telephony mag writes about the way it is working:

in Lafayette, La., [the plan] involves a municipal fiber network, a wholesale services provider and a computing platform company offering a service dubbed "IT on demand". ... The service provider is Abacus Data Exchange, which is a wholesale provider buying bandwidth on the Lafayette Utilities System fiber network. The computing platform company is Liquid Computing, which offers a modular converged computing and communications resource that can be turned up or turned down as needed to provide what is essentially a very scalable data center environment with a very small footprint. [telephony]

Can this work with the fiber plant in your area? Maybe. It's about offering the client what he needs without his having to worry about it or any of the parts.

In related news, ISP's have had to be tech support for more than the broadband for a while. ISP's and to some extent HDTV providers have to add a Geek Squad to insure that the install goes smoothly and the client stays happy. Acquisition costs are huge, but so is tech support and customer care. No one can avoid Acquisition costs, but as cited by so many consumers, VZ seems to avoid the support costs. What's your cutomer report card look like?

Conferencing Tools

I used to hold a lot of audio conferences using FreeConference.com. It kind of died down. I am looking at Web Conferencing tools to start up a webinar series on B2B Marketing, as well as Collaboration tools for a couple of committees that I participate on. (I have clients looking for Trouble Ticket systems and telecom Billing systems, so email if you have them)

Here's what I have looked at so far:

1. SightSpeed - p2p video conf, like video chat or video phone.
2. Tokbox - video calling
3. vRoom by Elluminate (3 for free conf) (found it from this post)
4. Vyew - desktop sharing

I'm interested in hearing about what you have seen or what you use.

UPDATE:

I received a comment from a Conferencing sales guy. I rejected it because it was an unpaid ad. I usually don't reject comments. I emailed him that it was spam and he replied: "Sorry for the commercial aspect of the comment, but there is so much going on with conferencing lately, that I post a lot of them and hard to personalize them when doing so many." Now that's a company you want to deal with - we are too busy to be personal.

IP-based TRS Regs

FCC Adopts Telephone Numbering System and E-911 requirements for Providers of Internet-based Telecommunications Relay Services. Telecommunications Relay Service (TRS), and newer, Internet-based forms of TRS, including Video Relay Service (VRS) and Internet Protocol (IP) Relay, allow persons with hearing and speech disabilities to communicate with hearing users of voice services. Until today, there was no uniform, consistent way for voice telephone users to call Internet-based TRS users. FCC WC Docket No. 05-196

Also, the FCC seeks comment on changes in the SPEECH-TO-SPEECH TRS REGULATIONS; Tentatively concludes that IP SPEECH-TO-SPEECH is COMPENSABLE from the inter-State TRS fund.

Metering Inevitable

ATT says that Metering is Inevitable. Funny. I don't see metering in much of the rest of the world. Take Africa for instance. It costs HUGE bucks to get a T1 there, according to the ISP's I have met at ISPCON. But they don't meter.

You know why we meter in the US? Greed and Weak Government. The cablecos will meter because they can't afford to lose the TV revenue. $100B in combined debt for the DOCSIS 2.0 upgrade needs to be paid off before CableCo can upgarde to DOCSIS 3.0. At a time, when there is heavy competition for the consumer space from RBOC and DBS and the Internet. Triple-play bundling and promotions mean that overall revenue is down. Profits as well. Cable stock is at a new low.

Telcos will meter because, hey, it's how we do things at Telco World. In Telco World (similar to Bizarro World), Unlimited is limited. Regulation is Deregulation. Competition is Monopoly. The FCC is your friend. Once we all just swallow this Kool-Aid, we'll all feel better.

Also, DSL is flattening for RBOCs. (see here and there). With Naked DSL rising and Unlimited Cell plans, revenues are down and will likely stay down for a while. But RBOCs have to pay for fiber build plus cellco 4G build while also paying off the massive debt that telcos have.

In the meantime, independent ISP's have chance to steal market share, if they actually run a marketing campaign - and if they can manage the network to give what they sell.

the XO debt mess

XO has $461 Million in debt that matures in 2009. It is owed to the Chairman of the Board at XO, Mr. Carl Icahn. R2, a minority shareholder, says it will sue Icahn if XO files bankruptcy.

XO’s stock was holding steady at 75 cents on Friday. The company trades on the Over The Counter Bulletin Board and its shares have dipped to 47 cents over the past 52 weeks. Company executives said they don't comment on shareholder disputes. [phone+]

Tee Shirt Marketing

Everyone wears tee shirts. People even like Unique ones; ones that represent a select crowd. People also like free tees. There are a couple of places online to have your own tee-shirt factory (CafePress, Reactee, threadless). You can have a contest locally for designs. Why not? It's free advertising!

Here are some slogans that I have been thinking about:

Lit Buildings

In all the blogosphere discussions about Cogent and the VZ Forbearance petitions, the number of lit buildings is getting some discussion. Gary Kim has details here. And Ramblings has 2 articles where he breaks it down. There's about 25,000 buildings lit. And if you consider that at least some of those buildings are lit by more than one carrier especially the telco hotels / collocation centers / metro downtown buildings, well, CLEC's don't have a lot of space covered. In most cases less than 100 buildings.

I often say it is about SELLING DEEP, but not many people listen. The first digital watch costs $1M, according to Seth, so Casio better sell one million of them. Putting fiber in costs anywhere from $7K to $250K depending on where and how far the run is. But the second customer in that building is basically free. And the third is gravy. Get the point?

It works with Wireless as well. I see WISP's put up towers willy-nilly to say they have X number of towers and span Y square miles. Big deal! It's about ROI on each tower; maxing out the number of subs per radio.

On a similar note, many carriers have NO IDEA where their fiber assets are. None. Case in point, this blog post about 1 Summer St in Boston. I run across this every week. Level3 lost an MPLS deal because although every knew there was L3 customers in the CyberCentre, my sales engineer couldn't find it on the list (and has since been given the boot). Keep good maps!

What Happens with Metering

Netflix, iTunes, AppleTV, and other VOD companies were betting on unmetered bandwidth. But now "Bend Broadband, Comcast, Time Warner Cable — they’re all considering or going the route of the tiered (aka metered) broadband. Now add AT&T to that list, according to a report in CED magazine." [GigaOm] This plan is a response to propping up the TV revenues for years to come. However, metered bandwidth throws a monkey wrench into a ton of other things, like Web 2.0 apps, online banking, online shopping, video conferencing, and VOIP.

Yep. I said it. This will drive down Internet usage. As gas prices went up, Internet usage was important. Tele-working now can get real expensive. (AFAIK business broadband is not metered yet, just residential broadband).

Spam will become a bigger issue as it will now cost real dollars to the consumer. Just when companies were seeing some positive effect from email marketing, it will get more difficult, because now people really will have to choose to read your email / newsletter / message --- and better be good! Every moved to an e-bill, now might want to move back -- every bit counts! VOIP is now more than the $25 per month or $200 per year.

I have a real problem with this, because one day's email including the ton o'spam I get is over 40MB with attachments (efax, videos, documents, power-freaking-points, etc).

What gets me is that (A) it will hurt the economy and innovation (argue all you want but it will) and (B) cell companies have stopped metering, so have residential LD plans, so WTF?

My big problem is that I don't have digital cable or FiOS, I have DISH. I pay about $60 for the plain vanilla RoadRunner. And I am a heavy user. But for $60, I should be able to use it unmetered. That's a 6MB pipe from Cogent! But because I do not buy digital cable, I am not a desirable customer. The MSO's have approximately $100B in debt from DOCSIS 2.0 and need to upgrade to DOCSIS 3.0 or fiber to keep up with FiOS and U-Verse, but that will cost about another $80B. (No one has any idea how much VZ and AT&T have paid to upgrade FTTx and the cellular networks through 2G, 2.5G, 3G and now coming up 4G. Probably more than $100B.) Everyone has to recoup that money and can't do it with triple-play at $100.

VoIP Ready?

Many of the problems experienced with VoIP usage can be blamed on the LAN. The things you need to look at are the following:

• Inside wiring - cat3 wiring won't work any more. It maxes at 10MB in good condition. And most is not in good condition.
• Are you using 100MB switches on full duplex or hubs or 10/100 switches set to half-duplex?
• Do you have enough Internet bandwidth? And how many hops are you from the VOIP Gateway?
• Does your router perform QOS or do you need an Edgewater?

Did I miss anything?

CloudPrint

A few years ago, I suggested that if you have a store, then I would allow folks to print to the printers at the store from your network users. Kind of like what Kinko's does with its upload service. The idea was that you could add value to your service; get more traffic in your store; interface with your customers more; and Cliff @ CSSLA could sell a Xerox or three.

Of course, many people told me why it wouldn't work with out even trying it. (Oooh, it's change. I don't like that!) People asked what to do about people that did not pick stuff up? (Mail it to them. you know what IP address it came from). Wasted paper. (People are printing anyway, why not make $$).

I have stayed at hotels that offer this kind of printing. And there is even a Web 2.0 app called CloudPrint that allows people to print to any internet-enabled printer.

I'll go one better for the Green Machine: let people "print" their documents to your Document Management system to be converted to a PDF and sent back to them. It's like efax only without the faxing, although you could accept it faxes as well. But it is like having a full copy of Acrobat and using the PDFWriter. Just an idea. Comments welcome.

Fax doc mgmt

The Technical Widget

In this video, Loral Langemeier mentions the 4 skills you need to be successful: Sales, marketing, Finance, and Leadership. She says that you can learn the technical widget later, but most of you already know the technical widget, now you just have to master the other 4 skills.

Wi-Fi Computer Law

From the CyberTelecom blog, "If Joe Freeloader Checks His Email over an Open Wifi Connection, Is He a Felon? A Survey of State Computer Crime Law"

Cogent Drops to $7

According to reports, Cogent has decided to drop their pants pricing to $7 per MB to better compete with Level3 and Global Crossing. L3 and GX have been selling for sub $20 per MB for a while. I guess, it finally started to affect Cogent growth and revenue.

"Cogent this morning is announcing new discounts for customers who commit to three-year contracts and for higher volume service provider customers. The new three-year price for Ethernet service is a flat $7 a megabit, a dollar less than the previous rate for contracts of two years or more. For service providers who buy Ethernet services at volumes between 100 megabits per second and a Gigabit, rates are as low as $6 per megabit for a three-year contract. Service providers who buy between one Gigabit and 10 gigabits will enjoy a three-year contract rate of $5 a meg, and those that consume a full 10 gigabit port can pay as little as $4 a meg on a three-year contract." [telephony]

"Competitively, Schaeffer said Cogent today competes mostly with Level 3 and Global Crossing and less and less with AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and other backbone network providers."

Cogent says (wholesale) Internet growth has slowed. (Ike wins his bet with Dan). But since Cogent CEO Schaeffer thinks the Internet revolves around him, it could just be that Cogent's growth is slowing. I see demand for bandwidth outside the top 25 MSA's. Unfortunately, most Internet players are not there. So while companies like KDL, Zayo and 360 Networks will be growing, maybe Cogent won't. (The same holds true for GX). Many fiber projects like LUS and MBC-VA are filling fiber strands, but does that equate into growth for L3, GX or Cogent? Maybe, as these regional networks (including Zayo) have to buy from somewhere and it is more likely it would be from AboveNet or Level3 or even GX than it would be VZB/MCI or Ma Bell. In most conversations, Qwest and Sprint don't even come up. (Most of the noise is coming from SAVVIS and InterNAP from what I am seeing). makes me wonder what Verio/NTT and HE.net will do.

Full disclosure: I am a sales rep for most of these carriers.

Where is the ISP Trending?

This week I hit on why I think reselling DSL is a dead-end. In fact, a few ISP's agreed with me. One has canceled his service and is moving those customers he can to his own DSLAM's. Another is on RBAN and watching his clients choose to leave him. Then I spent some time talking strategy - about your culture, your employees, Attitude and Focus. It's not the first time I ever mentioned Focus. In fact, many VoIP companies have closed up due to a lack of focus. Sprint is in its situation because it lost focus on customers and network - a lesson that it could have learned from EarthLink.

So what does this have to do with you? Good question. In Consulting magazine this month, Deloitte has been seeing 18% growth. It will be slowing down, but its growth came from continually changing its service focus. Now the growth is in the area of Performance Improvement.

I know, you are still going: "Yeah, Yeah, but What's In it for ME?"

When was the last time you changed your product offerings? Many of you still sell Dial-Up, DSL, and dabble in Hosting. Oh, and you hate email -- the Number 1 Killer App on the web.

"But we still make money on this stuff, Peter. Why should I change?"

Because it is as Stale as your website! (Seriously, many of you have not updated your website -- your online presence, your online brochure -- in years! Here's some thoughts:

1. The iPhone has driven people to SmartPhones, which means IMAP instead of POP3 email. Companies like everyone.net , groupSPARK, Intermedia.net and others can offer you white label Exchange and IMAP. Or you can run Zimba or Open-Xchange.
2. Are you selling Blogs? Or fighting with GoDaddy over a $5 shared hosting account?
3. There are companies like CleanMachine that you can resell for PC support.

I can go on and on. (Or you can read my book ;) for the rest of the list of ideas. There's money out there, even in Video Email.

Focus on Success

Here's some advice for you business owners out there:

“Several things going on at one time is a distraction to cash,” Loral Langemeier, wealth coach, author and millionaire. FOCUS!

I coached with Loral for a year (before she wrote her best sellers). If you want to achieve Success, there are things you can do to improve. Here are a few:

1. Find a mentor. Someone who has achieved what you want.
2. Don't take advice from people who do not have what you want. (Taking stock tips from the folks at the water cooler who have a net worth of a condo in Vegas is probably not going to help you. Choose who you take advice from carefully. Also, make sure your Financial Advisor has more money than you do.)
3. You must be able to Market & Sell Effectively. That's the only way to gain revenue.
4. Your business is not a Hobby, so don't treat it like one.
5. Have a Plan and then Execute on that Plan.

The Total Buy In

Companies want to have big revenues. (Some without a worry about profit). Dan Caruso of Zayo Networks writes in his blog about Organizational Change. He is specifically talking about the culture at Envysion (a managed video SAAS company) that has to change for the company to get to the next level. It's probably the same with your company.

If you have been doing the same thing, year in, year out, you will get similar results. To get to the next level, you have to make changes. What kinds of changes?

Cultural. For companies with 50 and less employees, every employee is integral. One poisoned pill could does have a ripple effect. It lowers morale. It causes customer relationship issues (potentially sales). Carusa asks some specific questions which I am paraphrasing here:

The questions each team member needs to reflect on are:

1. Are you passionate about your Company? If not, please move on.
2. Do you understand why Your Company's approach is unique? If not, ask for a tutorial.
3. Do you appreciate why our solution helps our customers improve their profitability? If not, talk to me.
4. Do you buy-into the notion that this is a team effort? That increased revenues are needed in order to increase salaries?
5. Do you realize that every time you touch the customer, it is a chance to enhance or destroy the relationship with that customer?

Does your whole team get this? If not, it's time for a Come To Jesus Meeting. (I'd be happy to run it for you).

MagicJack

I think the magic in MagicJack is that they think they can stay afloat on $20 per year VoIP. FierceVoIP has an article about MagicJack, a VoIP USB appliance that costs $40 for year 1 and $20 for year 2. They are now selling 7K devices per day! And this week was news week for MJ. It seemed everyone was writing about them including telephony and channel 16.

It will probably be a hit with the Skype folks and the Vonage-SunRocket target crowd, but at $20 per year, it probably won't be around long.

Ike Elliot has the financial view on MJ.

I think MJ will hasten the demise of Vonage actually. We'll see.

Is Skype a VoIP Choice for you?

Phone+ has an article about Skype: Selling Skype: Can Partners Profit from Selling Peer-to-Peer VoIP to Businesses?

There are opportunities to sell IP-PBX (or partner for it) and put in a bridge to Skype. (You can also sell a Premium pipe for this or managemnet). Read it and let me know what you think.

Internet Pricing is all over the map

You have TWC trying metered bandwidth for consumers. Meanwhile, wholesale Internet backbone is down to $7 per MB at the 1GB port size in the major 8 cities (Dallas, VA, LA, San Jose, NYC, ATL, MIA, CHI). Speakeasy just announced $1297 for Business Ethernet DIA including router and free install. T1's are still at the $400 - $550 rate for 1.5 MB. Remember that much of these rates goes towards the last mile loop.

At the same time that Ma Bell is thinking about metering, it is offering free wi-fi at Starbucks and other locations. That's kind of schizo.

Businesses have always paid more for telecom - phone lines and Internet - because businesses have higher usage. It is more like a dedicated connection. But when you sell UNLIMITED and say it again and again, then don't be surprised when your users decide to use it Unlimited. In the days of dial-up, it was easy to see who was eating up a port all day and converting them to a dedicated line. It could be done with broadband as well. Cable and telco are trying to figure out how. But businesses still pay more. Home Offices, SOHO, and entrepreneurs working at home get to take advantage of the cheaper residential rates now, but if it went metered, a business account might make more sense.

P2P and video downloads affect the consumer ISP POP, but it also affects the wholesale ISP side just as much, because even with a bottleneck somewhere in the neighborhood, as bandwidth usage increases, all ISP's have to buy more backbone (wholesale).

The truth is that the Duopoly spends far too much time "protecting" its revenue streams and not enough thinking on Customers. ILECs have DSL, FTTx, 3G and LTE. All sold as Unlimited - but not really. Where's the FCC and FTC on this stuff? Taxpayers and ratepayers have paid over $2000 a head for a T3 to our house. Where is it?

Do you think the Duopoly will meter business broadband users? Probably not. The whole thing is about protecting the TV revenue stream. Period. We need real competition.

Will Telcos Go Metered?

Gary Kim writes that Ma Bell is looking at usage based Internet. I think all eyes are on TWC's pilot in Texas. Ma Bell's CTO says 20% of traffic is P2P.

Alex Saunders thinks that Tiered Internet is bad idea.

Nielson says that "the average U.S. Internet user spent nearly 68 hours online during the month of April. That's a bit more than two hours a day. .... visited 104 separate domains."

Are You Still Reselling DSL?

There's an ISP association meeting coming up where they will discuss all matters pertaining to Southeast wholesale DSL. What a misnomer! Wholesale DSL. Wholesale means that you buy in bulk and get a discount off the retail rate. It means that you buy the parts and put them together yourself to offer a product. The parts are usually cheaper than the whole due to the labor, support, etc. This is not the case with DSL in most of the US. since the 1985 2005 FCC forbearance proclamation, Qwest, VZ, Embarq and all divisions of Ma Bell, have sold DSL for Resale to ISP's under a commercial contract. In all most all cases, the wholesale rate is at or within $10 of the going Retail rate. This does not include the ATM aggregation circuit, the Internet bandwidth, or the modem , all of which the ISP must supply.

Figuring out what the "retail pricing" is at the telcos is difficult, because since deregulation has been a chalkboard exercise. The prices change faster than the DOW!

In all likelihood, these carriers have little idea if they are making money off DSL or not. Any way that a normal person does math, based on their wholesale rates, they are losing their shirts. Add in DPI and spam controls, tech support, and the way they will do anything for extra money (like Bare fruit, Front Porch, NebuAd, etc.) and you have to wonder why they don't help the ISP's sell their circuits.

Regardless, if your business relies on reselling ILEC DSL for a majority of its business, you will forever be at the mercy of the ILEC. Has it been a pleasant road so far? Based on all the complaints, I would say it has not. Well, stock up on Tums and sleep aids, because 2009 means it will get worse.

Predictions are that more Resi users will drop their landline in hard economic times. (Read that to mean: right now). You can't sell Naked DSL. Your vendor does - and even bundles it with cell phones, which you also can't sell. So the 2 areas of growth for the ILEC - broadband and cellular - and you don't control either. Interesting.

Technology continues to outpace the average user. Current laptops are 100x more powerful than the IBM 3033 that I worked on at RPI in 1983. iPods, twitter, blogs, and everything that you StumbleUpon. They need help. Give them the help and move to a manage services model. That is where the future lies.

A final suggestion I have is to market the fact that you offer: Pure Unadulterated Internet for a premium.

• Buy mine now!
• We don't look at your traffic patterns.
• We don't inject ads.
• We don't snoop.
• We just sell you a dumb pipe to the whole Internet!

If you are attending the ISP meeting in Hotlanta, let me know. I might be up there doing 45 minutes on How to market Against the Big Guys. Leave me a message at (786) 228-7039.

TW Cable Metering

TimeWarner Cable is started a metering trial in Texas. (I wrote about it here) It has sparked a huge debate. Mark Cuban thinks that its great, because he needs his bandwidth and the hogs don't need P2P. (I think he wrote it to cause a commotion). Om thinks wrote: Why Tiered Broadband Is the Enemy of Innovation. In the US, we have paid the telcos about $2000 per person for broadband we do not have yet. But that doesn't mean anything to cable. (I was shocked at how many people only have one choice - cable - for broadband per comments pouring in on both blogs. And many folks think buying from a telco is a Good Thing. (Huh? Are they high?) I think that someone had to test the waters and TWC offered to, since Comcast has enough issues to deal with (DPI, bittorrent blocking, NebuAd+Congress).

Since many people only have on choice for broadband, the FCC was proposing to give away some spectrum to be used for free wireless broadband, but CTIA and lobbyists killed that idea.

VoIP Summer Update

A couple of highlights for VoIP Providers today:

VoIP Most Expensive IT Service, OnForce Data Reveals

VoIP-related IT services cost on average 50 percent per hour more than other IT services, making it the most expensive IT service, according to a new quarterly benchmarking report from OnForce, the online marketplace for IT services professionals..... The average IT service work order value for VoIP is $449, compared with $282 for wiring and cabling and $210 for network and $197 for server work.

Fear of the Unknown is what blocks many business owners from moving to VoIP. [ask steve @ phone+]

Survey: Weak economy will bury landlines as mobile phones become ubiquitous

As the economy tightens further and smaller businesses (especially SOHO and sales offices) opt for cell phones only, what's a VoIP Provider to do? Well, find-me/follow-me is one thing and soft-phones that work on cell phones are another way. (Other ways here).

VoIP is all about productivity and efficiency -- or it should at least be sold that way.

Have You Filed CPNI?

This all started with the people selling phone records. The ILECs have always had CPNI rules to follow. Typically, agents had to follow them, but internal folks could browse away in BOCRIS (not CABS). Then the FCC decided to revamp the CPNI rules, when all they really had to do was ENFORCE them. So now more paperwork, more headaches.

Recently, VZ broke the CPNI rules. When customers were porting numbers to cablecos, VZ decided to slow the LNP process, while contacting the customer with a Winback promotion. The MSO complained to the FCC. The FCC has so far done NADDA. VZ's response was that the MSO's do it for TV. Not the same thing at all.

ISP-Planet has the letter Attorney Kris Twomey sent out to VoIP Providers and CLEC's last night. Have you filed a CPNI compliance statement?

ISP-Planet writes: "Fines so far: CBeyond was fined $255,000, AT&T was fined $355,000, and even small carriers are facing fines of $100,000."

File your CPNI Compliance letter today with the FCC.

VZW to buy Alltel

After going private less than a year ago, Alltel sells itself to VZW.

The timing of the transaction also isn’t surprising. Several analysts agree that Verizon is trying to beat the clock — that is, push the deal through before the Bush administration leaves office. The FCC, led by Chairman Kevin Martin, practically has rubber-stamped every major telco takeover since 2005. Verizon stands to get “more favorable regulatory treatment under the current FCC than a theoretical Democratic FCC under a theoretical President Obama, so now's the time to do this deal,” said Dawson. [phone+]

The VC's gain $1.3B in just 7 months.

The $28.1 billion sale of Alltel Corp. just seven months after two private equity firms bought the wireless carrier isn't a typical 'quick flip', more an opportunistic deal amid a tough credit market. .... TPG Capital TPG.UL and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners bought the phone company in November in a $27.5 billion leveraged buyout ... Under the deal announced on Thursday, Verizon is paying $5.9 billion for the equity part of Alltel, making a $1.3 billion profit for the buyout firms... [reuters]

This will make VZW larger than ATT. And as it turns out, Alltel has more ARPU than both: "In comparison with AT&T ($51.10) and Verizon ($52.40), Alltel has an ARPU of $53.64 a month." [GigaOm]

More from GigaOm:

1. Analysts believe that Verizon can afford the deal, despite having to spend a lot of money on buying the 700 MHz spectrum. Vodafone’s two-line statement doesn’t indicate if Vodafone, which owns 45 percent of Verizon Wireless, will kick in something.
2. The deal is part of a wave of consolidation being brought on by a slowing wireless market. UBS Research estimates that wireless subscriber growth in the U.S. decelerated to 8.6 percent in the first quarter of 2008 from 9.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007. Wireless penetration is over 84 percent. Wireless has been a big driver of earnings for the likes of Verizon and AT&T.
3. Verizon would have to divest about 20 percent to 30 percent of Alltel’s points of presence in order to get the regulatory go-ahead. UBS Research thinks AT&T and T-Mobile might be interested.
4. This deal doubles Verizon’s debt to about $42 billion.

Managed Router

You know how I harp about "Managed Services"? Let's ignore the fact that IBM, HP, and UPS make billions on services. Let's focus on two other facts: the service provider market and the consumer.

The Consumer still has a blinking 12:00 on his VCR. DVR, DVD, Blu-Ray, Wireless, Cellular, LAN, digital pictures, etc. --- have far outpaced what the average consumer can handle.

How about what his kids are doing on MySpace and IM?

Then there is the business owner who can't figure out what VPN is or why he would need it. Back-up? Why? Twitter, blogs, social media, YouTube -- all of these things and trying to figure out Unified messaging, virii, malware, spam, while retaining customers, profitability and employees. Hooboy!

Then we see that Ma bell is moving into the ASP market. That Ma also has a services division AND a Professional Services division. Manage the router, the firewall, the installation, yadda yadda. VZB also does this. Now Paetec has launched a Managed Router Service that ranges from $25 to $125 per month.

At its highest tier, PAETEC configures CPE routers, keeps their software up-to-date, polls routers every 90 seconds and generates automatic alerts in the event of an outage, generates incident reports and trouble tickets for detected outages, and adds proactive trouble notification from a network engineer in PAETEC's Technical Assistance Center.

Help the customer by taking the technology and skills out of the way. Be Customer Centric. All they want is email, web surfing, and dial-tone. Without th eheadaches and pain. Your job is to take away the pain.

5 Ways VoIP can offer Mobility

GigaOm lists 7 Ways to add VoIP to the cell phone handset. Well, a CLEC or ITSP could easily license and incorporate these mobile VoIP apps to add value to its current static offering. Just a hint.

DPI, NebuAd and the law

DSLReports has an article about a New York State bill about behavioral ads. This is the result of a lot of buzz around DPI (deep packet inspection) that carriers are doing (or looking to do). Add NebuAd to the platform and you start scaring consumers and lawmakers in an election year. No one (except the NSA and the White House) wants all their data collected. Granted we live in an era where Privacy is just a word --- folks, there is NO privacy. Privacy policies change quarterly. Companies are going to start mining all the data they have on use. Most cablecos and telcos now give out static dynamic IP's. In other words, your dynamic IP address is really static. It doesn't change. It makes tracking your activity for LEA easier. As CALEA gets expanded by the DOJ and the FBI, ISP's will have to start storing more info - for up to 2 years. That is TeraBytes of data for the smallest ISP.

I see stories about Charter selling browsing history. There's TechDirt's post about NebuAd and Phorm's activities being illegal. (And another post at BB Reports about the same thing). Why? Common Carrier Law says that you can't use DPI. Common Carrier means you are a dumb pipe (for lack of a more gracious term). In addition, using these types of services or DPI means that you may not be protected by the DMCA. Once you inspect packets, you have to start policing the network.

NebuAd has said that they have signed up many ISP's, but BBR says that it is being used by Charter, Knology, Embarq, Broadstripe and Centurytel and Wide Open West. Any ISP using these services needs to include that info in its Privacy Policy along with an opt-out. (Really it should be opt-in, despite what NebuAd says).

It isn't much of a tweak to make behavioral tracking much more than that. And Phorm should know -- it went from being a spyware company to a company selling activity tracking to ISP's.

Yes, ISP's need more revenue, but not at the expense of the consumer's privacy. I would invent a Premium Privacy service that would allow my customers to have no tracking. It would be one way to explain why your service costs more than the ILEC.

Fiber from NOLA to CHI to DEN

FiberLink, LLC owns about 2000 route miles of fiber. New Orleans to Jackson, MS to Memphis to Chicago to Omaha to Denver. FiberLink is offering strands of dark fiber and blank conduits along their routes. RAD-INFO, Inc. can help you acquire fiber.

AboveNet also offers lit fiber, dark fiber, and conduits. AboveNet will allow you to choose the fiber route for diversity. Call me at 800-779-0864, if you are looking for AboveNet or fiber in general.

Sky Cashing Out

It looks like Sky Dayton is cashing out of EarthLink. According to a Market Report, Sky is able to sell 1M shares of ELNK between June 30 2008 and 2009. There must be no hope to sell ELN or he wouldn't be cashing out -- unless he has another company he wants to fund now.

Here's an interview with Sky.

VoIP by MLM

A website lists all of the companies that offer telecom services by MLM - multi-level marketing like Amway. TeamEscape does a comparison of how much you can make here. If you sign up 29,000+ customers at $49.99 per month, you can make $8K per month ($96K gross with no benefits and pay expenses out of that... oh, and buy yourself new friends cuz your old ones will tire of you :) The funny thing about the comparison is that TeamEscape resells Packet8 at $19.99. " As of March 31, 2008, 11,011 companies subscribed to Packet8 business services", according to the 10Q. 8x8 has been selling VoIP since Nov., 2002, so it took them 5+ years to reach half the number of customers that would almost provide $100K in revenue. Easy.

Why bring this up? Well, Excel and LightYear sell via MLM. And I picked up a copy of Success at Home magazine and the entire issue was devoted to 5Linx, an MLM company that offers VoIP, VideoPhone, DBS, Cellular and Broadband. They resell DISH, DirecTV, Nexte, T-Mobile, and others. The broadband companies are not listed. But there isn't a residual to be made selling DBS -- oh, wait, $1 per month per account.

5Linx used to resell Trinsic (Z-Tel). Now they use Globalinx, which they claim is their network that they built and run. The Globalinx offer looks a lot like the SunRocket deal - only Globalinx gives you lots more International included in the $30 Unlimited Plan. (Can you say money loser?)

So where does 5Linx make its money? From its "distributors" - those folks that buy into a dream of passive residual income. It costs $499 to sign-up and get the start up kit. You have to buy their $30 service and there's a $99 annual renewal fee (all here). When you do some research you find that 5Linx is a huge scam. (Here)

ACN was probably the first to resell telecom via MLM. There are dozens of people who have a problem with them as well. (I have a problem with $499 to become a rep.) The reason: How do you pay your reps commission upline and down level when you charge $24 for Unlimited VoIP??? There isn't sufficient profit on resale of VoIP. (I think the 911 is hinky too on some of tehse guys).

Talk Fusion is another MLM company that is selling Video email. I know people in MLM -- and I was in Amway once long ago -- they sell that dream to folks. Prey on the hope. At the end of the day, they don't tell you that you have to run a business - selling, recruiting, working it. The Diamonds and Platinum SVP's have traded in a W-2 to tour the country constantly speaking, recruiting and selling. 98% of people drop out of MLM programs mainly because of the, well, deceit is an ugly word, it's more like disinformation and stuff that is left out. In Amway (and other similar programs) money is made from the system - seminars, tapes, collateral, lessons, books, DVD's - all stuff to motivate you and help you sell. Money isn't made from actually selling the product. (At Packet8 at $20, 10% is $2 -- you are sharing $2 with the MLM company, your upstream and your downstream. Good luck! This is kind of off topic but I can't believe how many charlatans are in the VOIP space.