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If there's one thing that really hit home during our first six months, it was the depth and diversity of the people, enterprises and events taking place in the broadband sphere. Internet time we already knew about. Broadband time is proving to be something that's as fast and as fascinating.
The speed at which the broadband world is evolving has been amazing, from shakeouts in the digital CLEC business to the emergence of a horde of new wireless-based broadband service providers and the success of Gigabit Ethernet in the metro network.
For us, the ongoing challenge is to continue covering this wide-ranging landscape with the depth that you, the readers, have been asking us for. We'll be answering that call this year in a few different ways.
First and foremost, beginning with this issue we'll be a bi-weekly publication. The initial response to Broadband Week has been so compelling that moving on from our startup mode of monthly publication was a no-brainer. Bi-weekly frequency will give us more of a chance to flex our editorial muscles and dig into the news with a perspective we believe nobody else will match.
You'll be seeing some other new elements to Broadband Week, too. Beginning with our next issue we'll introduce two new special sections, "Building Bandwidth" and "Broadband Focus" that will appear in 14 issues this year. Our Building Bandwidth topics will focus on the nuts and bolts of the networks that provide broadband service, with our leadoff version looking at the new two-way satellite services. Broadband Focus will delve into the myriad issues facing service providers, from raising capital to taming their back office and network tigers.
Beefing our coverage up even further will be new supplements like the ones you saw in our November and December issues. Spearheaded by our editor at large, broadband journalism veteran Matt Stump, the supplements will offer in-depth looks at major elements of our business, including advanced optical networking; next-generation streaming media and broadband venture financing.
We're also developing a monthly Broadband Rollout Update, to help keep you abreast of the geographic spread of broadband services provided by the major platforms: telecom, cable and wireless.
All this comes on top of the things we're already doing to paint the most cohesive picture you'll get about all things broadband. Our regular news report combined with our Web site and daily e-mail news updates form the foundation of this effort. These new features will leverage that foundation to make us even better.
Afterthought:
After the financial beating that competitive DSL providers took in the second half of last year, a logical question to ask might be, "How bad is the DSL business?" Some possible answers? So bad that satellite TV provider Hughes is buying DSL service Telocity to help round out its consumer product portfolio. So bad that Qwest Communications is going to beat fourth quarter earnings estimates and hit its DSL subscriber target. And so bad that BellSouth is bailing out of wireless TV to focus on fiber and DSL as its consumer broadband plays. In other words, maybe not as bad as Wall Street believes...
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