FR: Bouygues offers FTTH for €25,99 a month

Impetus

The French PJ Hegarty + eircom equivalent" (Bouygues Telecom) announced triple play FTTH in all the main French cities for €25,99 a month. Internet, phone and TV. And of course Bouygues also own one of France's mobile networks. This service will be available from the end of the month. France has made a total mess of the move to fiber. If you live in Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Nice, Bordeaux, or Toulouse chances are you can get real fibre to your home (not to be confused with eircom and UPC's fake fibre) from several suppliers each laying their own fiber. Which is a total waste.

It would be far more intelligent to lay a single national fibre network to every building, shared by all phone companies, ISPs, cable TV operators, VoD operators, security monitoring companies, etc etc.

Back in the day, France did things strategically correctly. They were the first country to install digital telephone exchanges (eg Alcatel 10-B) (which is also used in Ireland in some areas - eg 027, 023, 029, 071, to mention but a few).

They invented Minitel, which initially was a self service phonebook, which quickly grew to other information services - like the WWW is now. Tim Berners Lee was living in Geneva at the time (a city that was in France, before it became Swiss) and I suspect he could see how Minitel was taking over, and "borrowed" the idea for the internet. Minitel was dial-up. Internet is IP based. Both focus on presentation of information and communications.

France have the best motorway system in Europe, the TGV is the best fast train service, Airbus make the best aircraft in the world in Toulouse (with some German engineering help), they have the best shops in the world - be it a massive Carrefour or better still Casino with 100 checkouts or a Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Chanel, and a zillion other boutique chains.

Unfortunately they have made a mess of fibre deployment, and they could have set a standard for the world because the country is big into large scale strategic plans.

Mais, c'est la vie....

http://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2014/06/27/bouygues-telecom-lance-une-offre-a-prix-casse-dans-la-fibre-optique_4446633_3234.html

murphaph

Best motorways in Europe? Aren't you forgetting something?

Impetus

murphaph wrote: »

Best motorways in Europe? Aren't you forgetting something?

While Germany's autobahnen are probably the best signposted in the world, the capacity (4 lanes often) is not enough, hence "Stau". Or "bouchon" in French. No equivalent single word in English. I have driven over hundreds of km of German autobahn and while some new concrete surface roads are silky smooth, one often gets stuck in worn out concrete autobahn that has been in place probably since Hitler's time. The German concrete surfaces are far superior to tar, which melts in the heat and becomes lumpy as a result.

However it is hard to beat a six lane autoroute in France, in pristine state, with rest areas every 10 minutes and interesting feature parks and cafes every 20 or 30 km.

No tolls for cars in Germany. Tolls in France. The Swiss have got it right, as usual. Every car using the motorway must display a vignette which costs about €33 equivalent for unlimited use of the motorway system for a year. The Swiss have some of the best motorway service areas on the planet.

Ireland has the worst motorway service area non-system on the planet. Most force motorists to drive down bog roads for several km off the motorway. And none of them are open at 03h00 in the morning, except for fuel. The Mayfield service area on the E20 is grossly under-scaled for the volume of business. The toilet facilities are tiny for the thousands of users every few hours. And it is off motorway. Is this the best that Ireland can deliver? Tiny Luxembourg with 300,000 people has far better motorway service areas. Irish motorway service areas smell of poor planning, urine, cluelessness of civil servants and lack of attention to detail , and perhaps even political corruption? Every motorway tool booth on the mainland takes credit / debit payment cards. I came to one toll booth in Ireland, and presented a Visa debit card and the agent advised me that there would be a 30c surcharge for debit card use. No surcharge if I paid for the toll on credit. There was no card slot at the toll booth as one finds everywhere on the continent - one had to give it to someone to process. A waste of time and it increases the risk of fraud (eg via skimming cards). It would be difficult to design a more grossly incompetent non-system that which exists in Ireland.

gctest50

Impetus wrote: »

France have the best motorway system in Europe, the TGV is the best fast train service, Airbus make the best aircraft in the world in Toulouse

France have the best motorway system in Europe mmmmmmmmmmmmm Germany n Switzerland ?

the TGV is the best fast train service mmmmmmmmmmm Japan ?

Airbus make the best aircraft in the world in Toulouse

Impetus wrote: »

Unfortunately they have made a mess of fibre deployment..........

probably be dog slow anyway

necessary faster :

http://www.so-net.ne.jp .............. 2gig download / 1 gig upload 33/month


So so far behind

Japan offers one gigabit per second broadband
For £30 a month
By Nick Farrell
Mon Sep 29 2008

.

Impetus

gctest50 wrote: »

France have the best motorway system in Europe mmmmmmmmmmmmm Germany n Switzerland ?

the TGV is the best fast train service mmmmmmmmmmm Japan ?

Airbus make the best aircraft in the world in Toulouse

Please see above which probably crossed "in the post".

Most Shinkansen travel at 240 to 300 km/h. The TGV in service travels at 300 to 350 km/h and have achieved far higher speeds when taken for a run. The Asian staff provide wonderful service. But there is no space for a suitcase on the Shinkasen. Hand baggage only. I love Japan and the Japanese. Their island is bumper to bumper with road traffic and their train system has no space for anything except to sit down and put a 40 x 55 x 20cm wide Rimowa brief case in the overhead shelf. Not very practical. There is no room for a fatter case like a Piquadro.


https://www.piquadro.com/it/
https://www.worldshop.eu/product/RIMOWA-Lufthansa-Private-Jet-Collection-cabin-Trolley/1731218?3

gctest50

KTX if you take up a lot of space - like a tgv without the sense of impending doom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHuqUi9124I

Mr. G

Who would manage the network though if the same thing was implemented here? Not Eircom surely. I'd leave it to the ESB tbh.

The problem with broadband in this country is cost. Our line rental is excessively expensive and prohibitive. €25 a month for a phone line, when really it should be €14.

In fairness to Pat Rabbitte he has improved the state of broadband infrastructure since he became minister but we still have a bit to go.

The market is becoming more competitive with UPC and Eircom going head to head, especially because UPC triple play for less then just the line rental with Eircom. Since Sky came im, Eircom's customer numbers have fallen and the pricing in the fixed broadband sector won't change unless Eircom Wholesale change the line rental rates.

Impetus

gctest50 wrote: »

KTX if you take up a lot of space - like a tgv without the sense of impending doom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHuqUi9124I

Obviously this is not a TGV. On a TGV, it is so silent at 300 km/h you can hear the 90 year old guy snoring 20 rows back. Smooth. You don't feel the kms passing. Silence and smooth - the key to a restful journey. TGV has double or triple glazed windows and normally operates on state of the art tracks that are perfectly laid and maintained. Something Irish Rail could invest in. If they have any intention of competing with the alternatives...

Impetus

Mr. G wrote: »

Who would manage the network though if the same thing was implemented here? Not Eircom surely. I'd leave it to the ESB tbh.

The problem with broadband in this country is cost. Our line rental is excessively expensive and prohibitive. €25 a month for a phoene line, when really it should be €14.

In fairness to Pat Rabbitte he has improved the state of broadband infrastructure since he became minister but we still have a bit to go.

The market is becoming more competitive with UPC and Eircom going head to head, especially because UPC triple play for less then just the line rental with Eircom. Since Sky came im, Eircom's customer numbers have fallen and the pricing in the fixed broadband sector won't change unless Eircom Wholesale change the line rental rates.

An FTTH network needs to be built by a new co, to tender. Legacy companies that have assets - eg fibre can put these into the pot and get credit. eircom, upc, and everyone else should be able to buy capacity on the FTTP plant, as needed. Andorra has gone totally FTTP, and even if you want an analog PSTN phone and nothing else, you get FTTH and a box and you plug your phone into it. Not in EU - no competition, state designed system. But the monthly fee for a phone line is only 5€ or so. The fibre goes up the mountains to remote houses 20km from the nearest village, some 2,000 m above sea level. No distance/speed issues with fiber. Weather is a non issue with fiber - eg electrical storms and rain.

It is basically taking the same approach as we have with roads and electricity networks to bits over fibre to the premises. On a road you can drive a truck or car or ride a bike and pay for the use accordingly. There is only one road network.

Could you imagine if you drove out of your home and there was a choice of roads - an eircom road, a vodafone road, and a upc road. The needless duplication would completely mess up a country requiring needless tunnels and overpasses and interchanges between networks. Not to mention admin cost and billing for use. It is high time that internet delivery matured to the same extent as the road or similar networks.

degsie

Comparing Ireland to France is like comparing lemons and grapes. They're both fruit but they have little to do with one another.

Impetus

degsie wrote: »

Comparing Ireland to France is like comparing lemons and grapes. They're both fruit but they have little to do with one another.

I can not see the relevance of your statement in this context. Every country needs broadband, and with most things moving to IP based delivery - eg Netflix and other VoD services, "broadcast TV", phone / video etc there is an increasing load on the networks in terms of bits to be carried to every household, business premises etc.

You also need competition between carriers - otherwise we will end up like America where many homes have to have cable TV just to have internet. In the US this can cost USD 150+ a month to the local monopoly provider. Also many rural homes in the US have no broadband or very slow service (eg 20 homes sharing a T1 - the American equivalent of an E1 (2 Mbits sec) only slower.

A single, nationwide, shared fibre network would remove duplication of plant for delivery and the cost could be shared between low cost rural and higher cost to install urban areas.

Nonoperational

It's lovely the way you just make things up to suit your point of view. The best trains, aircraft and shops? Righteo.

ED E

ITT: More fanboyism

murphaph

He's certainly right that there should be a single FTTB network with open access to providers. It's insane to be digging up the same road to lay competing fibre optic cables to a premises. To be honest such a network should be state owned like the roads. Same could be said for mobile infrastructure really. It doesn't have to be run by public servants day to day. The running can be contracted out in a similar manner to how Luas or the NCT is.

Impetus

Nonoperational wrote: »

It's lovely the way you just make things up to suit your point of view. The best trains, aircraft and shops? Righteo.

I was simply pointing out that historically the French seem to get "grand plans" right - but they haven't done so this time with multiple competing fibre networks serving the same buildings.

AlanS181824

Very interesting topic OP.

I agree there should be 1 single FTTH network throughout the country that everyone, regardless of provider can use.

Impetus

At the expense of digressing I came across this Swiss autobahn photos website - notice the quality of signage, road markings, road surface etc. The entire system is toll free once you have paid a few Euros for a vignette on the windscreen, which lasts for the entire year. Back in the day in direct democracy Switzerland, there was a tax of a few cents a litre on fuel to pay for the building of the network. After the country was covered with autobahns they had another referendum - should we continue to pay this tax on fuel to pay for motorways? The vote was a yes - because they created a brilliant system (eg Geneva <> Zurich has two different motorways) and while it is not perfect (eg bouchons in Canton Geneva at peak periods due to the booming economy and zillions of people from France commuting into Geneva to work because the French/EU government has totally screwed up the economy) it is a ***** network in terms of quality of service.

http://www.autobahnen.ch/index.php?lg=001&page=001