Backtalk

Hurricane Relief Fund The South Florida Chapter of the SCTE has established a relief fund to assist members who are struggling with the costs of everyday living and rebuilding. "I am aware of young people in cable, installers and technicians at Adelphia, Brighthouse and Comcast, that have been hit hard," Stephen Brazil, chapter president, says. For more information, visit the chapter’s Web site: www.scte.org/chapters/southfl. Career Moves Letter to the Editor Editor’s Note: Communications Technology’s sister publication CT’s Pipeline received the following letter regarding the question of "Who’s the Bigger Threat: RBOCs or DBS?" Advantage RBOCs Dear Editor, Great question! I think there is little doubt that five years from now, the broadband landscape will have a new look. The cable industry has done an admirable job of holding the first-place title, but can we keep it? Although we can expect DBS technology to reach a new state of the art in five years, its fundamental design limits bandwidth and the number of simultaneous users. For this reason, I see the bigger threat from the RBOCs. This threat will come not only in the form of passive optical networks to the home, but advanced wireless technologies using cellular architectures to overcome some of the shortcomings of DBS. I do believe, however, that bandwidth will reach saturation where there is enough to go around for every conceivable need. At this point, other factors will drive marketplace dominance. Excellence in customer service will be paramount to the acquisition and retention of customers. In this regard, the cable industry has moved leaps and bounds beyond the telephony interests who have lost focus of this all-too-important facet of business. Leonard T. Muscato, System Engineer,
Cox Communications, Northern Virginia