Telepocalypse

Legal high

It's always a relief to get your presentation over and done with, and this time is no exception. You're always left with a nice high when it goes well. I managed to restrain myself to one diagram, and speak from notes; the feedback (from those who understood a word of what I said) seems positive.

Things I've learned so far:

• Lawyers like good food. Lots of it.

• European lawyers use Skype, but not as much as US lawyers, based on the show of hands I asked for.

• Lawyers do lousy Powerpoint. Bullets are bad, folks. Some of these pitches are drier than the bar at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.

• The legal profession is rather lost in the weeds of fine-grained definitions of market power, and isn't seeing the big picture. They just don't see that the ownership structure for access networks is broken. The content/service cross-subsidies aren't sustainable.

• The separation of transport from connectivity wasn't mentioned once before my presentation.

• It took 197 minutes from the conference opening to get a first mention of Skype or BitTorrent -- and it wasn't me! I was the first to mention presence. (Do I get bonus marks?)

• The word "convergence" seems to have taken on a dynamic of its own, desipte being completely information-free.

• The layered model of regulation hasn't been mentioned explicitly once.

I'm glad I've upset some people because they keep saying "unlike the previous speaker said, convergence/VoIP/triple play does exist". I wish James Enck was here to fire some stats about their business model meltdown in return.

I wouldn't say that Europe is particularly ahead or behind the US in its regulatory debate. There seem to be somewhat more nuanced proposals, particularly around copyright and regulation. The interface between the national and EU regulation seems to be just as chaotic as between US states and the Federal government. There's more technocratic discussion here. Some of the regulation seems excessive. Why on earth are we worried about competition reviews of sporting rights for 3G phones? It's just not an important public issue.

Delusions of voice service revenue and triple play persist. But the only content -- as the presenter admits -- that makes it compelling is exclusive sports rights. But that just makes footballers rich, not network owners.

The chief attorney of Verizon gave the lunch keynote, and pleaded for a competition law framework that instead of saying what is verboten instead focuses on what is always to be allowed. His proposal: freedom to lower prices, bundle, "innovate", etc. Actually, I'm largely in agreement, and that Verizon should be allowed to charge monopoly rents. Price signals are important, and it would take a lot of telecom out of the political economy.

Overall, there's a sense of unreality here. They just don't see that the world just moved on. Maybe their kids will tell them. The idea of content being king lingers on in Eurotelcoland.

I'm tired; up late preparing my presentation. Time for a nap.

Posted by Martin Geddes at 2:29 PM

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