A Significant Move, Architecturally Speaking

Comcast says it is testing switched digital video. Cablevision already added SDV capability and Time Warner has been saying it would likely be necessary. All of this is important because the historic argument made by the cable industry is that its hybrid fiber coax, hybrid analog and digital delivery network was the right way to approach access networks. The argument has been that telco fiber to the home networks were a needlessly expensive way to provide broadband services, and a particularly expensive way to deliver digital video. The latest move by Cablevision and the testing by Comcast and Time Warner suggest that the telcos might have been right all along.

That's a huge shift in thinking, and should cause at least some skeptics to rethink their positions. To wit, as cable moves to SDV over an HFC network, it becomes essentially the same network at&t says it is building. And there are two ways to look at matters. One can argue that at&t's approach is good enough to compete with cable. One can argue that telco-style SDV was the right approach all along, and cable has had to acknowledge that fact. Or one can argue that a full-bore FTTH network is a better choice, where it can be done, because it is a way to leapfrog the bandwidth limitations of any HFC network, either of the cable or at&t varieties.

Or, put it this way: is an optical Ethernet network, all the way to the customer premises, the best wireline platform for launching all sorts of new IP services, including, but not limited to video. And if that is the case, is there not strategic value for the network operator that builds such a network? And if that is the case, maybe some people should cut Verizon a bit of slack....