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On Thu, 10 Jul 2003 13:59:45 +0000, Peter Gutmann wrote:

> They did the same with ISDN: Took them forever to figure out how to
> cripple it badly enough that it wouldn't compete with their (crappy)
> data services. This seems to be a constant: No new technology can be
> deployed until it's been made non-competitive with DDS/X.25/whatever
> they're pushing as their data services at the time.

The ISDN situation had a double prong:

The NEAX 61E and 61M switches the NZ Post Office bought very cheaply off
NEC in exchange for being guinea pigs don't do ISDN, except with _very_
expensive personality changes. They don't do ISDN primaries properly _at
all_.

So not only id they have to worry about DDS/X.25 competition, they also
had to ensure it was priced so that uptake wasn't high enough to cost them
a fortune in switch modifications.

I was surprised when ISDN came down to the point where it was cheaper than
2 business lines.