I'm little late to the party but the U.S. court Brand X decision allowing cablecos to not share their networks could be a major blow to independent VOIP service providers such as Vonage and Lingo. It is not inconceivable to think cablecos offering their own flavor of VOIP will block the traffic of rivals. Frankly, this scenario - if it materializes - stinks because totally goes against the grain of the power of Web. Instead of offering a highway to deliver services and information to the masses, the Web could devolve into a series of private networks with "walled garden" applications/services. Sure, the carriers and cablecos have made huge investments to develop high-speed networks but they have the advantage of customer relationships and a steady revenue stream from subscribers paying for high-speed service. If the U.S. cablecos go down this path, perhaps the carriers can counter-attack by providing Vonage, et al with more love in deals that benefit both sides (co-marketing, revenue sharing, joint ventures, white-label branding, etc.). In Canada, the CRTC has extracted a promise from Bell and Telus to not block third-party traffic.

The folks in Redmond must be happy and relieved after BT decided to enter into a commercial agreement to use Microsoft's IP-TV Edition software. The deal comes on the heels of Telstra deciding not to proceed with an IP-TV trial using Microsoft's software, while Swisscom and SBC have delayed the launch of their commercial services. BT said it will conduct IP-TV trials early next year before launching a full-blown commercial offer in the summer. It is hard not to get the idea the buzz surrounding IP-TV is running ahead of the technology. While Microsoft is working on a key part of the IP-TV equation, it is just one piece of the puzzle that also includes software, hardware, network upgrades, programming and back-office billing and provisioning systems. Until all the pieces come together and carriers can provide a fully-baked service to 100s of thousands of customers, IP-TV will not be ready for prime-time. The problem is the longer carriers wait to get into the TV business, the bigger advantage the cablecos enjoy.
Addendum: It was rightly pointed out to me that many carriers are already offering "Telco TV", including Manitoba Telecom Services, Aliant and Sasktel. None of these carriers use Microsoft software.

The big question in the Canadian VOIP market these days is when Rogers will launch its cable telephony service. CEO Ted Rogers has talked about July 1, which is the 20th anniversary of Rogers Wireless, but Rogers' PR folks are sticking a "mid-summer" timeframe. UBS Securities met with Rogers COO Nadir Mohamed yesterday, who heads up the company's cable and wireless divisions. UBS believes Rogers will roll out telephony in a few weeks, and push digital cable and phone service as a way to maximize each truck roll. UBS also expects Rogers will price its telephone service at an "attractive discount" between (Shaw $55 a month and Videotron ($15.95 to $30 a month). I've got Rogers high-speed and cable so it will be interesting to see what kind of deal Ted's going to offer me. Something in the $30 a month range with Web-based features (voice-mail to e-mail, easy ways to configure services such as call-answer and call-forwarding) and a healthy amount of LD would probably lure me away from Sprint.