Expanding the Internet Service through the Cable

A new service available to thousands of cable television subscribers promises to change the way business and individuals use the Internet. For a moderate monthly fee, cable subscribers can obtain uninterrupted high-speed Internet access through their cable TV connection, without having to tie up a phone line using a dial-up Internet service.

The monthly fee makes sense for business that currently use unlimited dial-up service, and for individual Web surfers who average an hour or more each day.

Experts say that broadband cable’s closest rival technology is dial-up unlimited service, which allows users to stay online as long as they like.

The biggest disadvantage of the broadband Internet service is that users have to buy a cable modem. The biggest advantage is its speed. The quality of the broadband Internet connection is higher than that offered by a dial-up connection.

At a minimum connection speed of 64 kilobits per second, the broadband service is faster than dial-up services. Home users can opt for even faster 128-kbps access for an extra fee, and business users are offered 256-kbps service.

Broadband cable users can watch television and use their telephones while online. And service’s speed makes it possible to view Webcasts and video, or listen to radio stations on the Internet.

In many Western countries, residential cable subscribers are the biggest market for broadband cable. But in Ukraine, where basic cable service is expensive and average household incomes are low, businesses are the primary target market.

Broadband cable’s entrance isn’t worrying competitors that offer dial-up services, though. The appearance of new technology does not necessarily mean the disappearance of old technologies. The invention of the telephone and television didn’t kill the telegraph, and newspapers still exist despite the Internet. The appearance of new technologies encourages older ones to upgrade, rather than eliminate them.

Whenever a new technology is introduced, a redistribution of the market is inevitable. But these changes are never dramatic.