Papers 4th Forum
‘IP Networks and the Future of Convergence –
Regulation as issue’
The simplest thing to do with IP resources when it grows convergence will be to enjoy its benefits but the key to enjoying such benefits and paradoxically the greatest challenge is proper regulation. Thank God we did not start early.
Fortunately delays sometimes are not costly. Had we embarked on this early, we would have made so many mistakes that even starting would have been almost impossible especially given our remarkable impatience.
But either by design or default, we had the good fortune of delaying our start no thanks to the military who kept it on lock down for the entirety of its rule.
This is pertinent when one looks at the huge losses incurred by AT & T in America because the networks it built lags behind the technology its vendors created.
Look at it like this:
You built a network, complete with fibre and you projected into the long future of say 20 years and then seal up all entrance to the fibre to protect it but six years down the road, you find your capacity is so low due to the pace of technological advancement and you now have to re-visit your fibre provision to accommodate the expansion purposes. But for a deep wallet, AT&T, I am told, might have gone stressed.
The moral of this debacle is that in the provision of infrastructure, thechallenge really would not be for those who build the networks nor those who use the services, but for those who make the laws regarding what we do and what we do not.
If there ever was a case for robust regulation, there it is IP resources, the future of Regulation.
The trends that we can forecast:
All of us will want space on the web so we can have a voice, blogs, news, etc
IPTV will make heavy demand on ubiquitous broadband presence
Newspapers will change irrevocably. They will never die but will be a diminished force in the dissemination of information and therefore re-managed for profit.
Here
What we have done about regulation has been to open up our market (2000 – 2010)
We better start regulating, lest……
See what happened to ISPs in our early days:
The regulator merely hissed, and everybody buried their heads in the sand and it remains there even up today. In those days, ISPs spent too much time being affronted rather than reappraising their procedures and practices. With the advent of the internet, ISP faced a stark choice, ‘Change or Die’. Those who changed survived and those that did not died.
Another dawn has broken, brighter and better than yesterday’s. We counsel that ISPs take the bull by the horn. They need to know how others elsewhere survived during the days of shifting tectonic plates and ensure they remain updated and relevant. We have offered to help in this regard but we are waiting for them to unite and speak with a strong voice and in unison.
See how VoIP threatened even telephone operators. I called it the radicalism of technology at the time.
We should expect more anomalies of emerging technologies. There will be the temptation to regard it as threats but in reality they are opportunities. It is regulation that will contain them. Remember what happened when big Telco’s started calling on the regulator to stop the smaller ones from driving into their largely major voice calls business. It was not that the regulator did not want to react but was slow in so doing which saw the saga escalate and everybody forgot. I remember I lead industry study group which fortunately included diametrically opposing views even among study group members and the regulator probably merely played for time while time sorted things out. The regulator came up with intervention but it was too little too as late and did nothing as the problem had moved on.
We may not have that luxury again as intervention must be faster.
And wait a minute it is not intervention but proactive regulation that methinks will be the name of the game in the future that we are certain of.
Challenge of Regulation
Spectrum management skills top the list
Determining when to legislate comes next
Convincing the legislature if and when necessary is another
The realization that new technologies dictate modern business which cannot run as usual
Lessons and Opportunities
We are lucky in these parts because we have the failures of the advance economies to learn from so we avoid the same pitfalls.
Imagine if the call in 2002 for Telephone Subscriber Registration, TSR, had been heeded when at that time we had South Africa to learn from and from where we took the lesson.To imagine that we are now fighting to implement SIM card registration which is infinitely inferior to Telephone Subscriber Registration and for which we are likely to end up in some halfway house between what we had and what we need.
A change of business models is suggested if businesses will remain and thrive and regulation may be a major factor.