OK, interesting question... a friend of mine lives in upstate NY, where he has Citizens Telecom (or whatever they're calling themselves this week). All the Cits'Tel areas used to be GTE until GTE got kicked out by the PUC for poor customer service. Cits Tel has basically ignored the CO he is served out of -- as well as most of their other NY CO's -- when it comes to hardware upgrades. (not even ISDN is available, nor is it predicted to be available for several years). By comparison, he is only 80 miles north of NYC where Bell Atlantic is beginning DSL rollouts. Other BA areas around him can also get ISDN, although not really at anything considered affordable). Leaving for Bell Atlantic (a 7 mile move) is not an option for various reasons. He has mentioned to me, "what if I formed an CLEC/ISP and started leasing dry copper from CitsTel to provide DSL myself?" at which point he was very much over my head in ability to answer. His sole motivation in this is that he wants to be able to get affordable dedicated access himself. :) (If he could make a decent living at it beating CT to the punch, I'm sure that he wouldn't mind that either). D