I've wondered if the recent advent of cable modems could change our entire Internet/telecommunications strategy. Provided that the cable network becomes widely available, more internet users would shift from using telephone lines for access to cable lines. Couple that with the use of the internet phone, and the phone line would only be necessary for communicating with non-internauts. I can see a number of ramifications for this - companies making money from long distance usage would be rather upset - and backbone providers would have to upgrade existing circuits to handle the increase in traffic. Anyone have thoughts/comments in regard to this as well? Tony Torzillo ---------------------------------------------------------------- Network Specialist, UW Network Operations Center, 543-5128 EMAIL: ndc-noc@cac.washington.edu, torzillo@cac.washington.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------- On Fri, 31 Jan 1997, David Schwartz wrote: More than anything, the problem is due to a flat-rate monthly pricing plan for calls which are increasing in both number and length. David Schwartz On Fri, 31 Jan 1997, Tony Torzillo wrote:

My question is: Have other people heard of similar attempts by the telephone companies to have "metered Internet access"? It seems they would need a hardware level signal analyzer on their switching equipment to differentiate between voice/data. Does anyone know by what means such a technology could be implemented? What would be the legal ramifications?

Also do people agree with the claims that our local lack of available phone lines is due to Internet usage or just to lack of foresight in growth management decisions?