{"id":1117,"date":"2010-07-21T11:37:44","date_gmt":"2010-07-21T18:37:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/?p=1117"},"modified":"2017-01-17T14:15:42","modified_gmt":"2017-01-17T21:15:42","slug":"qwest-xmission-and-dsl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/21\/qwest-xmission-and-dsl","title":{"rendered":"Qwest, XMission, and DSL"},"content":{"rendered":"

Please note: As of January 1, 2017, XMission no longer sells DSL services.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Fiber<\/a>In 1997, XMission first started providing service over Qwest’s DSL. \u00a0We have literally paid millions of dollars of revenue to Qwest for the privilege, all the while relieving them of the difficult task of providing excellent customer support. \u00a0In 2008, Qwest launched their “Fiber-to-the-Node” product which is usually falsely advertised as just plain “fiber”. \u00a0Unlike the UTOPIA system which runs fiber optics all the way to the home, Qwest FTTN runs fiber to a neighborhood, then copper DSL lines to the customer. \u00a0Because of the subsequent shorter distances on copper, they are able to attain download speeds of up to 40Mbit to the customer and 5Mbit from the customer. \u00a0This is normally referred to “download” and “upload” respectively.<\/p>\n

There is one key difference in the FTTN product. \u00a0Qwest is not not allowing 3rd party ISPs like XMission to sell their own service over it, as we traditionally have with their first DSL product. \u00a0In addition, Qwest has been notorious for disinformation and service problems that motivate customers to drop their current ISP and change over to Qwest. \u00a0Technical problems exist, such as radio interference that degrades existing XMission customer DSL speeds, sometimes making their Internet connection unusable. \u00a0The solution offered by Qwest was not to shield the radio interference, but to switch customers off XMission and to their own product. \u00a0We have also had reports and in one case, a recording<\/strong><\/a>, of Qwest sales representatives telling customers that Qwest’s intent is to “eliminate” 3rd party ISPs. \u00a0 Today, I received an email from a customer who was told by Qwest that XMission’s equipment is “too slow” to handle FTTN service. \u00a0Considering that we service customers on fiber and in our data center with up to a gigabit in solid bandwidth, one has to wonder why Qwest feels the need to lie to sell their service. \u00a0There is no technical reason why Qwest could not allow 3rd party ISPs like XMission to provide service over their FTTN network.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

XMission has been \ufeff\ufeff\ufeffhemorrhaging DSL customers for the past year, and I really don’t blame them for looking for bigger Internet connections. \u00a0I personally can only get 3Mbit download and 500Kbit upload to my own home and it is not enough bandwidth for me. \u00a0With Netflix, Hulu, Youtube, and other services demanding more and more bandwidth, homes will need larger and larger connections. \u00a0Unless they’re in a UTOPIA connected city, chances are that they are going to choose from two companies to buy Internet from in the future, neither of them stellar.<\/p>\n

As I have long advocated, the solution for this is not only to build municipal fiber networks like UTOPIA, but to regulate all data, telephone, and television providers that would otherwise run their own lines to your house, into using these systems as well. \u00a0Incumbent telephone and cable companies wouldn’t otherwise spend millions lobbying and suing municipalities that take networking into their own hands if they had no choice but to use these systems as well. \u00a0In addition, problems like “net neutrality<\/a>” become moot when you can dump your limiting ISP for another who gives you more freedom. \u00a0This is not where we are currently headed. \u00a0I have had a chance to listen to and question FCC representatives about the national broadband initiative. \u00a0It continues to be too little, too late. \u00a0If XMission can only provide limited Internet service to residential customers in the future it will continue to survive on its business class services. \u00a0\ufeff\ufeffYet, it will be all of us who lose when local ISPs are run out of business, or can no longer provide service to the home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Please note: As of January 1, 2017, XMission no longer sells DSL services. In 1997, XMission first started providing service over Qwest’s DSL. \u00a0We have literally paid millions of dollars of revenue to Qwest for the privilege, all the while relieving them of the difficult task of providing excellent customer support. \u00a0In 2008, Qwest launched […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[133,452,130,4,6],"tags":[324,346,312,325],"class_list":["post-1117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local","category-netflix","category-tech","category-utopia","category-whats-on-the-horizon","tag-century-link","tag-connectivity-2","tag-protection","tag-qwest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1117"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4740,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1117\/revisions\/4740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xmission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}