Google, Microsoft 'should pay for Ireland's broadband roll-out': Eircom exec

bealtine

http://www.yourtechstuff.com/techwire/2010/05/google-microsoft-should-pay-for-irelands-broadband-rollout-eircom-exec.html

Last Friday evening, a senior Eircom executive (John McKeon, director of Eircom Wholesale) made an audacious pitch. Speaking at the annual Ibec telecoms ball, he told the crowd of telecoms bosses that it was time to look again at how Ireland's broadband roll-out was funded.

His proposal: that Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook and other large web content providers should co-pay for infrastructure costs.

The pitch is not a new one. For many years, the US telecoms and cable giants have been calling for some form of "contribution" from content-providers toward their costs. The most oft-used rationale is that Google and Yahoo are getting a "free ride" off their infrastructure.

But this new thinking is likely to be provocative to firms such as Google and Microsoft, multinationals we're supposed to be courting. It might also prove a little unpalatable to film, television and music producers (including RTE), who might have mixed views on their downloadable products being cited as the reason they get a bill for network fees.
The Minister for Communications, Eamon Ryan, got up to speak after McKeon. He acknowledged the point without commenting on it.

CelticTigress

And what roll-out would that be, exactly? :mad:

rob808

bealtine wrote: »

http://www.yourtechstuff.com/techwire/2010/05/google-microsoft-should-pay-for-irelands-broadband-rollout-eircom-exec.html

Last Friday evening, a senior Eircom executive (John McKeon, director of Eircom Wholesale) made an audacious pitch. Speaking at the annual Ibec telecoms ball, he told the crowd of telecoms bosses that it was time to look again at how Ireland's broadband roll-out was funded.

His proposal: that Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook and other large web content providers should co-pay for infrastructure costs.

The pitch is not a new one. For many years, the US telecoms and cable giants have been calling for some form of "contribution" from content-providers toward their costs. The most oft-used rationale is that Google and Yahoo are getting a "free ride" off their infrastructure.

But this new thinking is likely to be provocative to firms such as Google and Microsoft, multinationals we're supposed to be courting. It might also prove a little unpalatable to film, television and music producers (including RTE), who might have mixed views on their downloadable products being cited as the reason they get a bill for network fees.
The Minister for Communications, Eamon Ryan, got up to speak after McKeon. He acknowledged the point without commenting on it.

That Eamon Ryan is such a waste of space he done notting as minister of communications. The green party are annoying with there green economy crap and smart economy bull crap . The sad thing is most of ireland will be stuck on slow broadband for a long time and the government not smart enough to give Ireland what it needs to complete with the rest of the world with a outdate network.

amacachi

Aye, right.
They already funnel UK profits in here giving us a nice windfall every year, never mind the operations here providing jobs and taxes.

watty

This is a rollout

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10111724.stm
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/05/13/bt_fibre_expansion/

Big companies pay big money in Ireland to peer or connect to fibre and they pay big money for transit.

Only large companies using p2p such as Kontiki (background TV program download officially from Sky, BBC, C4 etc) are to an element freeloading. Even there, the USER is paying for Broadband.

No-one is freeloading.

(Except maybe Users of Mobile Phone companies mis-selling Mobile Internet as Mobile Broadband, as these package are 100 to 200 times cheaper than the same volume of voice call data.)

Xennon

I agree completely with Eircoms proposal!.

And we could get Ford, GM and Toyota to pay for our roads along with Shell, BP and Texaco. Ive always said that those foreign countries should be paying for our airports aswell with the amount of money they make from us.

Hmmm I wonder how fast MS would jump outta Ireland if we hit them with a bill to build a real network in this country?

:rolleyes:

trekkypj

Eircom is doomed, folks.

They can't afford to build the fibre network themselves, seemingly, what with all that legacy debt. They're losing swathes of market share to UPC and other providers where they have a presence.

They're just too damn expensive for what they provide.

Idiot statements like that just show that Eircom's management mindset is unchanged. Why should anyone give Eircom money? If they can't turn a profit, invest in fibre or hold onto their customers with the market share they have, why on earth are they bothering? (Apart from paying nice salaries to the directors, of course).

Eircom, without billions in investment and the paying off of corporate paper holders, will ultimately fail to be profitable.

I foresee a collapse. I hope I'm wrong, if only because of the disruption it would cause to people and businesses in the country.

Xennon

Government bailout since they seem to be on a roll at the moment with our money????

evolutionqy7

i remember America had fibre cable broadband around in 2004 maybe even earlier...were only getting it recently...****ing disappoints me!

evolutionqy7

trekkypj wrote: »

Eircom is doomed, folks.

especially with Eircom anti piracy limitations alot of people would tend to go to UPC for high end fast broadband they need to pull off something good to get back in the game i remember eircom agent came to my house offering 8 MB broadband...i asked him for a package that has no limit ( 5 of us in the house using internet) he failed to give me one and tried proving that 80 GB is more than enough

Sponge Bob

Xennon wrote: »

Government bailout since they seem to be on a roll at the moment with our money????

1 in 4 lines is already paid for by the government , 300,000 out of 1.2m residential eircom lines are paid for each month by the social welfare. Why would we provide more subsidies ??????

trekkypj

Sponge Bob wrote: »

1 in 4 lines is already paid for by the government , 300,000 out of 1.2m residential eircom lines are paid for each month by the social welfare. Why would we provide more subsidies ??????

I honestly did not know that. You learn something every day I suppose.

Even less reason to bail them out, so.

clohamon

There's a bit more delusional stuff from Tommy McCabe here. He describes big content companies who would volunteer cash to the networks as "trailblazers". The smaller companies, seeing what a good idea this was, would then follow suit.

The crucial point is his view on the investment horizon. 12 years is beyond consideration apparently.

watty

Why would anyone volunteer cash for what Telcos and governments are doing *ANYWAY* in virtually every other European country?

Tom Young

Those remarks and the consolidation of same in the paper yesterday are an outright disgrace in a recession.

This is a time when our Ireland Inc. marketing should deserve better PR than this nonsense. I've heard of people making location decisions based on such rhetoric.

IBEC you should know better!

Sponge Bob

Tom Young wrote: »

IBEC you should know better!

The McCabe Levy, what! :cool:

Tom Young

Sponge Bob wrote: »

The McCabe Levy, what! :cool:

Rent, tax, FINE? .... ;0)

Sponge Bob

Tom Young wrote: »

Rent, tax, FINE? .... ;0)

The McCabe Levy is noteworthy in that it is the first new tax on business activity ever proposed by IBEC.

clohamon

Sponge Bob wrote: »

The McCabe Levy is noteworthy in that it is the first new tax on business activity ever proposed by IBEC.

Very funny but they can't really be that thick. Who'd be the first donkey to send out an invoice?

So what's it all about?

Consiracy theory # 1 (Highly unlikely and completely bonkers)

Telcos are considering concerted action on charging but are worried about looking like a cartel; IBEC thinking out loud gives them a bit of cover.

Conspiracy theory # 2 (Less unlikely and still won't work)

Telcos fly kite to get the content providers to put pressure on the government for public infrastructure investment.

Tom Young

Suggested Edit to last: 'Telcos' - eircom.