[CQ-Contest] BPL -

[Jim Talens]

In my local exchange area in McLean, VA, Verizon is installing fiber to the
curb with expected commencement of "bandwidth on demand" service at the end
of the calendar year.  I am not sure how the pricing works on this, but it
likely would be competitive with in-place Cox Cable broadband service.  I
now have 28.8 kbps dial-up so am a likely candidate for Verizon's service
given I don't subscribe to cable.  So BPL is a non-starter here, certainly.
The guy from our power company who stops by every few weeks (as recently as
yesterday!) to check on my QRN level from power lines says Dominion Power is
not hot on BPL, and he personally thinks it's a non-starter.  However, he is
not the decisionmaker at his company.

Several guys who have sent emails to UTC (parent industry association of the
BPL advocacy group known as UPLC - see www.uplc.org and www.utc.org) have
received highly non-responsive propagandist emails in return.  I am one of
those.  In reaction, I have also sent follow-up messages to the CEO and
General Counsel of UTC suggesting that they are not helping their own
advocacy by dispatching ill-considered and inflammatory factually erroneous
public releases.  They have not responded.  But certainly Mary Patterson,
the public relations person whose name appears on UPLC releases, is not
writing this stuff alone.  Of course, anyone making decisions in government
or elsewhere presumably is knowledgeable enough to see past some of this
garbage.  On the other hand, we need only look at other areas of political
gullibility to see we cannot rely on that assumption.  Letting these BPL
garbage-heads (a sophisticated legal term) know they can't get away without
negative feedback seems worthwhile.

Jim, N3JT

> -----Original Message-----
> From: pvrc-bounces at mailman.qth.net
> [mailto:pvrc-bounces at mailman.qth.net]On Behalf Of Jim Jordan K4QPL
> Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 2:43 AM
> To: K3FT; CQ-CONTEST REFL; PVRC LIST
> Subject: Re: [PVRC] Small victory for anti-BPL fans
>
>
> I'm even more pleased to see the market is also destroying the
> need for BPL.
> In addition to the cable and DSL options for consumers, Nextel
> has launched
> a wireless broadband service with good coverage and reasonable cost in the
> Raleigh-Durham area. Don't know how good it is, but hopefully it is the
> picture of things to come. I see no reason why this method won't
> eventually
> achieve the coverage of cell phones and relegate the spectrum-polluting,
> clunky, and totally unnecessary BPL to the scrap heap. I can only say how
> thankful I am that BPL has come so late to a crowded market up against
> broadband providers who are still innovating practical technologies.
>
> 73,
>
> Jim, K4QPL
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "K3FT" <k3ft at starpower.net>
> To: "CQ-CONTEST REFL" <cq-contest at contesting.com>; "PVRC LIST"
> <pvrc at mailman.qth.net>
> Sent: Monday, June 28, 2004 7:00 PM
> Subject: [PVRC] Small victory for anti-BPL fans
>
>
> See ARRL website link
> http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2004/06/28/2/?nc=1
>
> This tells story of Cedar Rapids, IA BPL test bed where supplier (Alliant)
> is pulling the plug. Read the story, read between the lines.
> Draw your own conclusions.  My take? Alliant ran headlong into the
> TECHNICAL REALITY and found it didn't match the PUBLIC RELATIONS ILLUSIONS
> they have been propounding.
>
> One small victory for HF.. one giant leap for Reality!
>
> 73
> K3FT
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