Big Cable uses critics' own arguments to slam set-top box shake-up Amid a battle to end Big Cable's $20bn annual windfall from rented set-top boxes, the industry has hit on a novel strategy: use its opponents' own arguments against them. In a filing on the last day of public comment to the FCC's plan to open up the market, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) in the US …
Your argument is stupid and backwards. Competition is what creates jobs, not profit. If a company makes a lot of money, they aren't going to hire more people because they can afford it - they are probably going to keep it as profits, use it for acquisitions/mergers neither of which creates any jobs (mergers kill jobs instead of creating them, in fact) If every town had three cable companies to choose from there would be a lot more people employed in the industry, even if they had much lower margins. Obviously this change won't make that happen, and maybe it doesn't make sense to have three companies stringing cable around town, but it would be a great situation for consumers if it happened!
If cable companies can't force people to pay $200/yr to rent their crappy boxes because customers are able to use their own, the only profit they're driving out is on those overpriced cable company boxes. So either people will buy their own (i.e. use what's built into their new TV, or a Roku, or Apple TV, or whatever that is either cheaper or does more or both) or choose to continue renting from the cable company if they don't like change and are happy with what they have now. By enforcing a standard, it will create jobs as a lot of companies will want a piece of this new market that opens up.
If you think the FCC shouldn't set standards, why do we have LTE? Shouldn't AT&T, Verizon et al each be able to create their own cellular standard, so that if you go with AT&T you have to get your phone through them to use their network, and if you switch to Verizon you have to get a different phone? The iPhone would have never been created, because they wouldn't license their proprietary standard to other companies. No one in the US would have anything like a modern iPhone or Android, because the lack of competition would have killed innovation in the industry. You'd be paying $20/month to rent a circa 2000 Nokia brick, because that would be your only option.
[DougS] Your argument is stupid and backwards
Anonymous just made a statement. Let's see your argument.
[DougS] If a company makes a lot of money, they aren't going to hire more people
So, if a company loses money or only makes a little money, they can hire more people?
That does not make much sense. I don't see a lot of poor people hiring others.
[DougS] If every town had three cable companies to choose from there would be a lot more people employed in the industry
Multiple competitors exist through media only, today. Wireless, satellite, cable, copper. In the past, there was only Government Telco. We effectively have what you are talking about - there are jobs in all these markets. All are delivering audio, internet, and video services.
Federal Government regulations discourages cable from competing with one another.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/05/charter-wont-compete-against-cable-firms-because-it-might-buy-them-later/
[DougS] If cable companies can't force people to pay $200/yr to rent their crappy boxes...
Cable companies are not forcing people to pay for the boxes, today. I had a friend who just ordered Cable Internet, about 2 months ago, and he bought his own box. He just does not get the maximum bandwidth that is available. You can buy cable modems at electronic stores or internet.
[DougS] If you think the FCC shouldn't set standards, why do we have LTE?
ISDN was a set standard, DSL ate it alive after de-regulation. Innovation is the reason the government political appointees should not create standards. Political Government Appointees should register standards, not dictate them. Free Government should be a neutral arbitrator, not a dictator. Government control & dictatorship breeds horrible conditions - look at Venezuela, North Korea, Cuba, etc.
Freedom breeds innovation.
[DougS] ... LTE... AT&T, Verizon... switch to a different phone... iPhone would never have been created... wouldn't license proprietary standard to other companies...
The iPhone was released with 2G network capabilities. The first phones were tied to AT&T. A new iPhone was created for Verizon due to frequencies leased by the company and different network standards. Other carriers followed with different iPhones for different frequencies & protocols. The iPhone was created, even through the technologies were different between the carriers - the carriers DID license them because AT&T made so much money eating the other carriers alive with an innovative product. Your argument is not really solid.
Back circa 2000, I had an internet capable phone with a screen. The difference was the decision by Apple to abandon the WAP standard and adopt other standards.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Application_Protocol
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I am not sure where you are trying to go with your reasoning. Vendors come up with a product, partner with the carrier, and produce something to be sold. They have always done this.
I had some friends recently released from a set top box manufacturer. High product costs enable high-salary designers & software engineers. Product costs, at $200 a box, is too low for manufacturing in high cost regions.
With human capital costs in Mexico, Eastern Europe, and Asia at 1/5th U.S. costs - Federal Government should not be encouraging the migration of those jobs any faster than they will occur naturally. $1 for every star in the Milky Way Galaxy was added to U.S. employers recently - U.S. Jobs were the casualties.
http://dailysignal.com/2016/05/23/20642-new-regulations-added-in-the-obama-presidency/
The same problem exists in Europe and Japan. The way all these nations tax their people is obscene. Income tax on businesses and employees outsources jobs to lower cost regions. Every time government increases costs through regulation or laws, more jobs disappear.
Where will the next generation of innovators come from, when all the newly trained workers are elsewhere?
The irony is that people vote for their own joblessness. It is a crying shame.
Anonymous was not too far from the truth.
The new proposal, the NCTA argues, is the same: it has the FCC requiring cable companies to use a specific format and make it available to others to build cable boxes. In effect, setting that format in stone.
Defining and establishing technological standards is part of the FCC's raison d'etre. Why is the NCTA pretending that it doesn't know this? Standards create a level playing field so that everyone* has equal opportunity to succeed or fail.
And I am so tired of multi-billion dollar companies pretending that they can't have slightly lower profits without claiming that this will destroy everything that is right and good in the world and threatening to never invest anything into anything ever again like pouting children.
[*] - For varying definitions of "everyone" natch; obviously I'm not going to go out and start a cable company next week without having won several lotteries in the intervening time.
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