Path: utzoo!telecom-request Date: Sat, 27 Apr 91 16:47:03 PDT From: Jack Winslade Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Decreasing Costs of Transmission Reply-to: ivgate!drbbs!jsw@uunet.uu.net Message-ID: Organization: DRBBS Technical BBS, Omaha, Ne. 402-896-3537 Sender: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 309, Message 5 of 12 Lines: 53 In recent articles: > Because these costs are going down so very much they will quickly be > dwarfed (or indeed may already be dwarfed) by other costs such as > local access, accounting of calls, etc. Therefore, for all practical > purposes a LOCAL phone calls costs as much as a LONG DISTANCE phone > call. > Clearly the pricing structures do not reflect these costs (Yet!). My > question is - What is AT&T, MCI, Sprint, etc going to do when they can > no longer reasonably charge more than a local call? Won't this change > the industry substantially? Will North America move to a wide area > extended flat rate billing zone? > How about this - you pay Sprint $10/month to call anywhere in the USA > to talk for as long as you want. I don't think we're gonna see this in God's lifetime . The Phone Companies will do whatever it takes to maximize their profits. That means maximum $$$ transferred from the pockets of consumers (that's you and me, gang) to the pockets of the corporations. If they *COULD* make more by offering flat-rate service, they would, but I think in practicality it would result in some people abusing it (as in the 1800-0700 PCP connections of a few years ago) and keeping lines open continuously. Selling it by the slice instead of all-you-can-scarf is obviously more profitible for all telecom corporations. Local telcos have been trying to push for the end of flat and/or untimed local service in favor of measured service. They **CLAIM** this 'saves money for many customers' but in truth it simply serves to extract more $$$ from customers' pockets. I **CAN**, however, visualize that in the near future the least expensive portion of a phone call will be the long distance transport from one area to another. I can imagine LD calls costing just slightly over local calls of the same duration, but the most expensive part of any call, local, LD, or international, may very well be the local telco's charge for the local loop portion of the call, whether it is to another local subscriber or the terminal point for an interexchange carrier. However (comma) if I am wrong, I would not gripe. ;-) Good Day! JSW [1:285/666@fidonet] DRBBS Technical BBS, Omaha (1:285/666) ..uunet!ivgate!drbbs