Clearwire and the future of WiMAX

This article over at Forbes is interesting:

In a note to clients, Stifel Nicolaus analyst Christopher King said the latest round of financing will probably not cover all of Clearwire's cash needs over the next few years. He expects the company to lose several billion more dollars.

But he added that "Clearwire needs to build out its nationwide network as quickly as possible, as both Verizon and AT&T will begin to quickly catch up with what we believe will likely be a superior 4G network."

Clearwire's second-quarter loss, though narrower than a year earlier, came to $73.4 million. The company reports third-quarter results after the closing bell Tuesday.

So, Sprint and Comcast are investing an additional US$1.5 billion. Google decided against upping their ante in the WiMAX provider. So, is this a near term play? Will Clearwire switch to LTE when they can or will they focus on fixed wireless broadband?

Cable TV standardization

Some months ago, I had written this article regarding cable, set top boxes, and standards. So, when Forbes posted this item. According to the article:

Facing pressure from regulators, the cable TV industry plans to make good on a promise to standardize its technology and open the door to televisions and other gadgets that don't need cable boxes to receive video-on-demand programs and other interactive services.

An industry initiative, to be renamed "tru2way" after a decade in the works, is expected to allow electronics manufacturers to make TVs and other gear that will work regardless of cable provider. By making devices compatible, the standard also could encourage the development of new services and features that rely on two-way communication over the cable network.

Note that Engadget and CED are framing this as merely a rebranding of "OpenCable". Comcast CEO Brian Roberts is claiming that there is more to it (from the Forbes article):

Our business model has changed completely, from a closed, proprietary model to an open architecture that will work across cable companies - not just across Comcast. That was a Herculean job to accomplish.

Suppose we took Roberts' view at face value. Is it reasonable to imagine the industry model evolving from a vertically integrated "customer experience" to a "platform-based" one? That is, is it reasonable to imagine that the initial innovation in an industry would require a high degree of control, so that specific investments in physical infrastructure could be coupled with specific investments in "software"?

In fact, we have seen this initially in telephony:

• The introduction of automatic switching had to be closely coupled with end user devices.
• The transitition to a "common battery" for handsets (from locally powered devices) also had to be closely coordinated. It is interesting that we seem to be gradually transititioning back to the locally powered paradigm, but that's another story.

Are we seeing this in wireless as well, with Verizon announcing the opening of their wireless network?

Comcast

In an earlier post, I pointed to the report of Comcast "managing" BitTorrent traffic. Well, things have gotten a bit more interesting since then. As this article in BusinessWeek reports, Comcast is now the object of complaints filed at the FCC as well as a lawsuit that is seeking class action status. You might also find this item useful to add a bit of dimension to your thinking.

Should the FCC set guidelines for acceptable "network management" practices, as Vuze is requesting in its petition?

Update (2007-11-29): There have been a few new developments and insights for your consideration:

1. The Electronic Frontier Foundation released a report documenting the AP's findings in more detail. They also are offering tools for users to test their ISP, though the test method seems focussed on more technically astute people. To that end, the NNSquad has been discussing how one might build tools to test ISP behavior.
   
2. For additional background on ISP motivations (yes, there are some that make sense), you might visit this site, which includes a pointer to a report from Sandvine.
   

Comcast and BitTorrent

Articles like this one are showing up on the net ... I chose to refer to this one from Ars Technica because it is the most technical that I have seen thus far. Quoting the article:

Comcast has been "caught" blocking BitTorrent traffic in some areas, according to tests performed by the Associated Press. The news organization claims to have confirmed that Comcast is blocking—or at least seriously slowing down—BitTorrent transfers, regardless of whether the content is legal or not. If true, Comcast's actions have serious implications for sharing information online, and by proxy, Net Neutrality.

The AP was tipped off to the possible P2P blockage by a reader who had noticed serious slowdowns on his Comcast connection. The organization then proceeded to perform a number of tests—three, to be exact—on two computers in cities on both the east and west coasts. AP chose to download a copy of the King James Bible through BitTorrent (because it is an uncopyrighted work) and went to work. In two out of its three tests, the downloads were blocked altogether, while in the remaining test, the download started after a 10-minute delay.

Assuming this report is correct, do you believe that Comcast has the right to "manage" traffic on their network in this way? Could you imagine AT&T or Verizon offering a "BitTorrent-friendly" package to compete with Comcast?