Telepocalypse

Converged to death

Saw the word "convergence" pop up again on the ITU web site. I love that word. So soothing -- "service convergence". Looks perfect in your vendor presentation. We're clearly remedying some unwanted divergence. Friendly. Reassuring. Wrong.

Now, what we need is someone to write a little browser plug-in. Every time you go to a web site with more than the threshold level of telecom jargon, it is triggered. And all it does is replace "convergence" with "displacement". Voila! You can see the truth. Legacy service providers cease to be able to force bundling of service with access. Telecom and IT get "converged" into access and even more IT. The IT folks are doing just fine, thanks.

So next time you see a car wreck on the freeway with blood and oil oozing under the twisted metal, don't panic. Have no worries. Let your fear subside. The car has simply converged with the concrete barrier. Converged with fate. Converged into history.

PS -- Bear in mind that the ITU is a global industry association mostly populated by traditional voice carriers. It's run under the auspices of the UN, hardly the foremost proponents of wrenching capitalist change. Loss of control of the application space weakens their political importance -- viz their fights with ICANN. They don't want to be converged with the unemployment queue, either.