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[Bowdon]

... I know of one law that still requires a copper phone line to be used for emergency services in case of a power outage.

Which law is that out of interest?  It's been many years since I've seen businesses make that sort of provision, and when I last researched it seems that the UK legal position was more along the lines of "reasonable provision" to make emergency calls.

I did a quick scan over the net and found this article. It seems to be more an Ofcom regulatory requirement. BT asking Ofcom to change it. I'm not sure if they ever did or not. I never noticed a follow-up to it.

Here is the link;

BT: Let us scrap ordinary phone lines. You've all got great internet, right?

BT is asking Ofcom to be freed from its obligation to provide ordinary PSTN/POTS voice telephone connections across the UK. The telecoms giant would prefer to provide only internet services, and let customers use them for voice calls.

If there was a follow-up to this request I'd be interested to know. Like what was the Ofcom reply etc.

[kitz]

Wombat you appear to have made the same mistake as kitz and think sky are alone in wanting the split.

have observed what appears to be a hatred towards, sky e.g. they got singled out for the veto,

I haven't ever said Sky are the only one, nor do I think that.  I may use the term like "Sky etc" because they are the ones shouting the loudest.

Just to reiterate go read my post here I said "Sky & TT" and "Sky et al" here.  I also later said I hadn't forgotten about Vodafone just hadnt decided where they were going or what they were up to in the UK.

Just for the record I said "It was vetoed by Sky & TT"

Its you who is putting false words in my mouth and nit picking small facts.   Please show me where I have ever said Sky are alone in wanting the split.

We seem to be going round in circles again covering the same points.  You seem to be oblivious that the non factual information is coming from the split off Openreach camp.

Sky position themselves as a premium tv provider, their main market has always been tv, but they have had to sell broadband to keep their tv customer base high, this is clear.  Which is why they have so many customers on low priced deals so they can keep their high TV subs.  However you paint a picture that suggests sky does everything on the cheap, yet their investment history suggests otherwise,

Since you bring TV up, some of us recall the early days of satellite TV back in the days when they did have competition.  I used to pay £5.99 for TV for an entertainment package that included sport.  Sky undercut all the competition and very soon there was only sky left from whom you could purchase TV.  The next year the prices went up to £7.99, and very soon after that they started charging a premium for sport and within just a few years our £5.99 package became something like £20.  Then they started wanting more money for premium sports.   I ditched it because I felt they were taking the pee. They could charge what they like now there was absolutely no where else to go.

No Sky didnt have to sell broadband, they didn't have to enter the broadband market at all.  Back in 2005 they were already thriving in the TV and media industries.  They decided to purchase Easynet and enter into a totally different market place.  Back in 2005 streaming TV wasnt available, so you cant even say that was a reason they entered into telecommunications..  which Sky did in 2013 when they bought telefonica in 2013. Thats what Sky do, they purchase other companies rather than innovate.  They cross subsidised from their TV to offer cheap broadband and that is how they became so big.   We've already seen stats to show that of all the telco's its Sky who have increased their telephony charges the most in order to cross subsidise broadband. 

Its not that anyone hates Sky, its just that some of us are well aware of Murdochs proven history in other industries where its never the consumer that benefits at the end of the day.  The Murdoch empire isnt called evil for nothing.  Do your research there's plenty of facts out there. With regards to investment history, anyone who thinks it is for the benefit of the consumer is very niave.  Ive put plenty of people on Sky if I thought it was their best option.

Virgin media isnt really credible competition because its performance levels are pretty horrific due to how high they allow users to burst to vs the size of the shared capacity, until they change that policy they could well have those sort of problems for years to come.

Really?  I shook my head in disbelief when I read that.
All may not be happy in Virgin land, but OFCOM seems pleased with their progress.   You cant single out or disregard players because of capacity. Virgin is investing in DOCIS to bring faster speeds and better capacity.  OFCOM is pushing for cheap - thats what we get.
So how come no one is forcing Virgins hand like they do with BT to separate what is in effect wholesale and retail.   
I think you fail to see that sometimes it is OFCOM who is actually holding back progress and making things more difficult for BT.

so for that reason it is understandable anyone with an affiliation to the BT group might be hostile to sky.

To be perfectly frank I am sick and tired of insinuations that aren't there.   Just because someone does not agree with you does not mean that they have some affiliation with BT.

Let me state here and now for the umpteenth time that I dont have any affiliation with BT.  Im tired of you not understanding and misinterpreting my reasons for saying what I do. 

On one hand you accuse me of not saying much and force my hand to say something so that you can misunderstand that and then seem disappointed at my post because I didnt give you the response you wanted to hear.

You've had a dig at me because I cite my main reason for not wanting the split is because I foresee that a split would cause much complication and legalities that would take years and a large amount of money to sort.

I repeatedly say I feel that BT can improve without the split.  The reason I am against the split is because I know for a FACT that it will be disruptive to BT and costly...  and most importantly I do not think it would benefit the consumer.

Just to repeat so you understand. 
 - I do not think splitting of Openreach would benefit the consumer.
 - It is a fact that it would be costly and hinder progress.
 - The only people to benefit from a split would be accountants and lawyers.
 - I repeatedly say that if there was any splitting to do, then IMHO it would be more logical to split off Retail.

I care about the consumers..  and give the reasons why I dont think it would benefit them.  Pure and simple.   I'm pro consumer.  Not pro Openreach, Not pro BT, Not pro Sky.   I care about future provision of broadband for the UK but Im able to see factual reasons why it cant all be done yesterday. 

[Moderator edited to correct a typographical error, nothing factual.]

[kitz]

In all honesty Chrys I sometimes wonder if you actually read and digest what is written.

I spent hours and hours and hours typing about BTw infrastructure and how it worked.  You failed to believe me when I said that I suspected the Plusnet issues were the MSILs.
I was the first person to point that the blame could be BTw and for that you thought I was shifting the blame away from Plusnet.   You still didnt accept this theory, even though once I had mentioned it in public, then others started to understand that perhaps it could be the case.  Hell I even had a hell of a time making some people believe there was such a product as Dedicated WBMC despite it being there on the main site for about 6 years.
Then several weeks ago look what happened.  Plusnet buy their own MSILs and go dedicated.

Same with g.inp. 
You questioned my information every step of the way.  I was accused of giving out duff info because I would not name my source.   So I go to great lengths to get permission to do this.
   
What you may not know - and what my mods did.  BT were seeing if being open about some of their more technical information to a few select sources, if this information would be well received by the techie/hobbyists who wanted to know more and were interested in how things worked.
So what happened.  The thread got littered with 'BT are crap' one liners.   Yep that helped.  I know for a fact that if just a few people had said "Hey this is great getting proper information from the horses mouth", then they were looking to form a panel of people to share information with that could be relied to share accurately.  All has now gone quiet.

Same with DLM.
Im sick of the accusations of covering up information because I wouldn't pass on BTw documents to you.  You totally fail to understand why I could not share such documentation. Others who scan the BT site are aware that sometimes BT information isnt properly locked down, and sometimes if you are given a link to one piece of information then links can be manipulated to find more.  You do not blurt this info out because everything then gets locked down. You do not betray sources if someone gave you a link or certain info because said person will never tell you anything again.
It took weeks/months to find out and piece everything together.   Rather than whining about things I did what I could to piece everything together in one place.    But then that all gets dissed.  Too late anyhow its all locked down good and proper now.

The whole reason I did it was to put information out there to understand what was going on. 


Right now Im tired, very tired of it all.  It should become apparent that I do have other things going on.   Right now I should be sorting real life stuff but instead Im having to justify myself.
Im sick of the accusations.   I have no affiliation with BT.  Im not paid my BT.  I receive no remuneration what so ever from BT.    The only perks I do have is that from my previous battles with BT is a few contacts from whom I could ask information. The information I ask is then shared to the public.

The following is no idle threat and its not dramatics,  Im so tired of it all I wonder why I bother.   I put hours and hours into things to try and make information available on the main site.    I'm sick of the arguments, I'm sick of the conspiracies.   You have absolutely no idea just how tempting sometimes it damn well is to just walk away for good.
 
My friends and family think I'm nuts putting so much time and effort into a website that costs me.  I'm beginning to think they are right.   Why the hell do I do this when it brings me nothing but grief.   You have absolutely no idea of the crap that goes on in the background nor the upsets it has caused, some of them serious especially when 2 men in black or whoever turn up at your door looking for a member of your forum because of his behaviour elsewhere.   You've no idea how I've worried in the past because I couldn't pay the server fee one month and had to borrow from a friend.    How my friends have gifted money to the site rather than send me a birthday present.  **  Does this really seem like the actions of someone in bed with BT. 

I think what you totally don't get is that sometimes people do have enough and just walk away.
You accuse me of being over protective to BS, he's a big boy and can stand up for himself which is why I'd left your post alone before I even saw your PM.
What you do fail to realise is that despite being a BT employee, what he does on this forum is totally up to him.  He shares what info he can and he is a genuine help to the broadband community. I've met him once very briefly, he's old school BT who cares about doing a good job to the customer.   One of those rare breeds who likes to help if they can just because they can.  So if he gets accused or personal insults, then its no wonder if one day he also thinks stuff it.  I wouldn't blame him.   

Im done Im not wasting any more time engaging in conspiracies. If I know enough about the BT plant to know that any attempt to separate would cause a major issue then I have the right to say so.  Anyone who has half a clue about it will know it will take years to resolve and how difficult it would   How would they deal with the BTw dslams, lock them down and install handover frames to them.  That wouldn't be disruptive in the exchanges would it. What about the RAS, what about DLM and RAMBO.  There's far too much crossover. 

Instead its very easy for trolls to diss what others are saying when it doesnt meet with their own agenda.   It's quite clear that you have lumped the likes of me, Ignition, wombat and a few others as 'affiliated with BT'.   
TBH I dont personally know Ignition but Ive 'known' of him for about 10+ years on TBB.  I haven't spoken to him in years, but I am aware that he knows one hell of a lot about telecoms, dsl and broadband networks from his days at Easynet.  I know for a fact that he is not in employment with BT.  He knows his stuff and he does not make things up.   Im afraid I don't know wombat at all, but from his posts he appears to be a genuine enthusiast and from the amount of time he spends posting (not just BT related!) and helping others I don't get the impression in the slightest that there is any hidden agenda.
They are simply people who do have a lot of knowledge and are willing to share.   Neither of them are in the habit of making posts that are anything but factual. 

I could just as easy turn it round and say you are in bed with Sky to see Openreach flounder so that the later could take over the world. See how easy and ridiculous it is to say someone who has a different point of view to you is part of a conspiracy.


----
**PS
That isn't in anyway a guilt trip for anyone to donate to the site.    I said it because it needs to be said.   When it comes to forum members I value contributions in the way of informative posts.   The regs support this site by just by being here and contributing their time.  I categorically state that I do not want any of the regs making a donation because of what Ive just said.  If they do, then it will be refunded.

[guest]

Virgin media isnt really credible competition because its performance levels are pretty horrific due to how high they allow users to burst to vs the size of the shared capacity, until they change that policy they could well have those sort of problems for years to come.

Really?  I shook my head in disbelief when I read that.

To be fair his experiences of NTL/Virgin in Leicester colour his opinions kitz.

They are bloody awful here - next door is preparing to sell & I told him to do some regular speedtests with various sites & log them so potential buyers can look at them. He of course has done them at peak times and the results are :

Downstream : 0.23Mbps to 71.75Mbps - average 24.42Mbps
Upstream : 0.27Mbps to 4.72Mbps - average 2.23Mbps

That's on a 100/5Mbps service IIRC.

I did him a favour & bumped the "postcode average" up a bit by running speedtests on Sky at peak times (got it up to 62Mbps average between him/me) but he keeps running tests & dragging it down

[kitz]

I meant the fact that they were an alternative as laying down infrastructure.   
I can see what you mean with that though.   As you know for years Ive seen similar issues with a certain LLU MSAN around here and why I eventually had to migrate them away.  You saw the speedtests I provided at the time which were circa 1.2Mbps/2Mbps every night - granted it can only sync at around 8Mbps on adsl2+, but at least since migration they get around 7Mbps despite my fears over the BTw DLM.

[guest]

I meant the fact that they were an alternative as laying down infrastructure.   
I can see what you mean with that though.   As you know for years Ive seen similar issues with a certain LLU MSAN around here and why I eventually had to migrate them away.  You saw the speedtests I provided at the time which were circa 1.2Mbps/2Mbps every night - granted it can only sync at around 8Mbps on adsl2+, but at least since migration they get around 7Mbps despite my fears over the BTw DLM.

Absolutely but take it from me that a lot of the NTL infrastructure in Leicester is mickey mouse standards - much of that in the last 5 years as well.

Add to that the huge student population and choosing Virgin is a lottery with long odds around here

[Chrysalis]

wombat be careful please, telling me to bog off, and just laughing is been a bit ignorant.

You seem more interested in discrediting my comments than actually sensibly contributing to the debate.

Are you also trying to claim sky's openreach statistics are false? if so please provide counter data.

Also I have had enough of people been rude to me, saying I am causing them grief etc.  kitz if you too busy just dont reply.  I see you have also resorted to a personal attack on me, which is just plain childish.  So thats you and black sheep resorting to personal attacks on me, and wombat halfway there.   Is it not allowed to be critical of the BT group on this site?  Because I am starting to think that.

If this is a BT group publicity site please delete my account.

By the way I have not marked anyone as affiliated with BT other than black sheep, I certainly dont think ignition is affiliated with BT.
I already know you have an affiliation due to them sponsoring your site and having them do official interviews for your site (since that interview your posting activity changed).  However I have never slured you in public like you have to me multiple times on this forum (all the others I ignored).

So thats me, alex and asbokid pushed away from this site now.  Asbokid to those who dont know is the one who initially unlocked the hg612 modem and he has perhaps contributed the most to the FTTC uk community.

[renluop]

Much of what passes through this forum is way beyond what I could really grasp, yet Kitz and many contributors too have never made me uncomfortable, have been willing to respond to the simplest questions kindly.

IMO, the spirit of any group is set by its leader, so I'd be highly disappointed were she to pull the plug.

[kitz]

I have not resorted to personal attacks.  I said I sometimes wonder if you actually read and digest what is written because I keep having to repeat myself.  You were constantly insinuating things I hadn't ever said, and asking the same questions which had already been answered. 

Same with the other points I spent a lot of time explaining things to you about about BTw backhaul.

I'm not surprised wombat bit back.  You made blatant insinuations about affiliations with BT.
The accusation that wombat was "discrediting my comments than actually sensibly contributing to the debate" is untrue.  Anyone with half a brain could see frustration mounting because they were answering the same questions, then you'd come back with comments that didn't ring true.   Wombats posts contain an awful lot of factual and technical information, all backed up by public available documentation, yet he too was having to repeat himself. 

You have made lots of false allegations against me and made out that I said things which I had not - which is why I ask if you actually read them properly.   You kept pushing and pushing me to say more. -link and link

1) I have NEVER said "truly believe keeping the status quo with no changes at all is the way forward" as you imply in the other thread.  I have said time and time again that more accountability needs to be given to the EU and there are plenty of areas which need improvement.

2) Nor have I ever said its critical that it doesn't happen.  I just that I don't think it would benefit the EU and it could actually make things worse.  There's in depth reasons why in the other threads.

You also stated I'd just said sky, when I actually said 'Sky et al' and 'Sky and TT', the constant snipes about affiliation where there isnt one.   You either twist my words or make out that Ive said something I haven't.   If I don't say anything, then I get accused of saying not what you wanted to hear. :/

Im sick of accusations because I wouldn't give you information before I made it public. You were told information would go on the main site when it was ready.   I made it very clear that I had information and could not publish until I got the go ahead from BT.  For that I got accused of doing a disservice to the broadband community by not spilling the beans to certain people first.    It didn't matter that I had bust a gut to get the info in the first place and on the provision that it wouldn't be published until Ian gave me the final say so.  When I did publish you were disappointed because most of it just confirmed what we'd been saying on the forum. 

I already know you have an affiliation due to them sponsoring your site and having them do official interviews for your site

You are wrong.   BT do NOT sponsor this site. 
I may show ads for BT, but then again I show ads for Plusnet, EE, TT, Sky and whatever else google throws out.   By your reasoning every other DSL site is also sponsored by BT. It also makes the argument 'anyone with an affiliation to the BT group might be hostile to sky' invalid, as I equally show Sky ads.
 
The reason I got an interview with Ian Lawrence was because I was sick of people saying info I was publishing about g.inp was untrue... so I did what what people asked to get someone to put their name to the information.

So thats me, alex and asbokid pushed away from this site now.

Alex was repeatedly warned for making disruptive one line comments even if they had nothing to do with the topic.  He was given more than enough chances and repeatedly told I had no objections to anyone stating their views, just not in the way he did.  I had various complaints by other forum members about his posts becoming disruptive.  He was warned time and time again.  His ban was for what he said to one of my mods and the language used. 

Re Asbokid - He was not pushed away from this site, you dont even have the slightest clue what went on under various other aliases, nor the fact that he's been banned at plenty other places too.  For the record it was totally unrelated to his hacking of the HG612 and BT before anyone starts that conspiracy.

[WWWombat]

wombat be careful please, telling me to bog off,

Why? You just uncarefully accused all participants of being in BTs pocket.

Am I required to hide my contempt? Am I required to engage in one-sided courtesy?

You seem more interested in discrediting my comments than actually sensibly contributing to the debate.

Right now, the two feel contemporaneous. I make a sensible contribution to the debate (that feels suspiciously like you didn't bother to read much of), which just happens to make sense (which is what i am actually most interested in) but it just happens to discredit what you wrote.

If you think I get some points wrong, please point them out, and prepare for robust debate.

Note that I'm careful to talk about discrediting your comments, or discrediting what you wrote. As opposed to discrediting you personally. Two very different things.

Are you also trying to claim sky's openreach statistics are false? if so please provide counter data.

I am claiming that Sky's statistics are deliberately chosen to obfuscate, but I said that already. If I invented statistics that showed how Openreach failed 100% to install lines within 27 seconds of ordering, I'm sure I'd be right, but would such a statistic add to the debate? Or just be some puff PR? Sky's stats have the same validity.

The Openreach data is open to all, as demanded by Ofcom in those pesky consultations. You've been pointed at it before.
http://www.expect.openreach.co.uk/Our-responsibilities/

Openreach publish data for the first Sky statistic - that an engineer install is an average of 13.6 working days. Way above the "10 calendar days" Sky chose to benchmark against. Sky want you to believe that "10 calendar days" is on-time, and Openreach don't achieve it 90% of the time. But they don't quite say that. Just leave you to believe it.

Yet, at the same time, Openreach manage to install 93% on time.

How can Openreach achieve 93% on time (nearly 95% for LLU), yet have an average elapsed time of nearly 14 working days - 20 calendar days - if Sky believes "on time" is 10 calendar days?

It barely triggers my maths o-level memories to conclude that what Sky wants you to believe is nonsense, let alone the more hardy qualifications useful to quantify just how much nonsense. Believe in better? Hardly.

If you want to undo the discredit that Sky does to themselves, I'll pay attention when you can write more in response than I bothered to spend writing to you. More interesting stuff, that is, than just a whinge.

Can you do that?

  Is it not allowed to be critical of the BT group on this site?

Of course it is.

Of course, it helps if the first criticism stands up to scrutiny.

If that criticism is called into doubt with {lots of words}, it helps if you then read that expression of doubt and respond to the points in turn.

If however, you resort to ignoring 99% of the points, and start flinging accusations around, you've probably just disqualified yourself from the course of reasonable discourse. Things will only go downhill from there.

And the thing is ... while this isn't a BT fanboy site, it is one populated by knowledgeable people. Ones who understand the things that go on in the background. Ones that aren't susceptible to your average scaremongering story.

Such a population is willing to entertain valid criticism of BT. But it is very likely to be able to detect, and correct, misplaced criticism. Each Sky press release just happens to send those detectors haywire. Microsoft would be proud of the levels of FUD.

So, in return, I ask you: is it not allowed to correct misplaced criticism of the BT group? Is it not allowed to hold a torch to the criticism as much as to BT group itself?

The same principle ought to apply to any provider, including VM. But for some reason, BT is the one that seems to get the most misplaced criticism directed at it, and the most opportunity for correction.

The course of action is up to you. Do you respond proactively? Or stay *plonk*ed?

[WWWombat]

Absolutely but take it from me that a lot of the NTL infrastructure in Leicester is mickey mouse standards - much of that in the last 5 years as well.

Add to that the huge student population and choosing Virgin is a lottery with long odds around here

I fully understand ... And until relatively recently, I was firmly in the "VM won't invest, so disregard them" club. Now they seem to have reversed that ... but roll outs take time. You can't spend £3bn overnight.

This begs an obvious question ... Is Ofcom's job to provide competition? Or to quality check the competition?

Is it the market's job to do the quality check instead? Or does that not apply to Openreach?

If it doesn't apply to Openreach, is that everywhere? Or just where is has infrastructure monopoly? Or just where it has a true monopoly?

[gt94sss2]

The Openreach data is open to all, as demanded by Ofcom in those pesky consultations. You've been pointed at it before.
http://www.expect.openreach.co.uk/Our-responsibilities/

I think I was the one who previously pointed Chrysalis to this before in response to his challenge to produce more up to date figures that Sky had selectively chosen (and where several years old). If you click on each graphic in the above you will get some historical data for that KPI.

I should also say that there is an 'Office of the Telecommunications Adjudicator'. OTA2 who are an independent body describe their primary task is to deal with major or strategic issues affecting the rollout and performance of products provided by Openreach

To assist in this, they publish monthly updates/stats/KPIs on how the industry are trying to improve things - as the problems are not solely due to BT/Openreach.

As such, there are lots of more recent stats available to hold Openreach to account if Sky had really wanted to do so.