The need for speed

The parallels between the U.S. interstate highway system and the “information superhighway” have become cliché. But when it comes to content, those parallels don't apply. The government didn't give consumers Pontiacs to drive on the interstates, but early broadband ISPs like Road Runner and @Home made content as appealing as the latest luxury ride in getting people on their networks.

That model is changing as consumers become accustomed to high-speed networks and content providers build applications that go beyond narrowband on steroids. Meanwhile, ISPs are directing subscribers to broadband-optimized Web sites but not providing content directly.

“There's no question that in its earlier iteration Road Runner while it didn't fundamentally emphasize its own content certainly did feature that as one of the consumer benefits,” said a Road Runner spokesman, who added Road Runner now has “moved away from a more content-driven approach to one that emphasizes speed.”

Fellow cable ISP @Home went even further by merging with Internet portal Excite. Never a subscriber favorite, Excite has become a burden as the Internet advertising market flounders.

“My guess is that @Home would already have been at cash-flow break-even had they not merged with Excite,” said Dan O'Brien, president and CEO of High Speed Access.

While @Home may eventually jettison Excite and stick to the network business, the content portal served its purpose, said Milo Medin, chief technical officer for Excite@Home.

“Things go in phases,” Medin said. “Had the ad market not collapsed, we wouldn't be having this discussion.”

Medin said broadband networks accomplished their original purpose by driving subscribers into a new way of using the Internet.

“We talk about the Internet today just like we talked about the Internet six years ago, but the Internet I used a few years ago is very different than the one we use today,” he said. “We're in the middle of a change… where people are moving out of the pure content model.”

Excite@Home's high-speed offering has attracted more than 3 million subscribers worldwide, including 474,000 who joined in the last quarter. It's also a magnet for ISPs such as EarthLink that want to break free of narrowband's constrictions.

EarthLink won't develop content for the newly accessed broadband networks, but it will provide “the toolset that allows the customer to take advantage of what they can get with this broadband connection,” said Jon Irwin, executive vice president of member experience for EarthLink. “We provide [customers] access to content that may be richer without forcing it on them,” he said.

On the other end of the spectrum is America Online, which is expected to enlist broadband subscribers through its Time Warner cable group. In a recent news release, AOL said integrated music programming would “help fuel the growing adoption of broadband” by combining digital music technology with high-speed access services.

In other words, “They create a closed environment of, ‘This is the content we want you to see,’” Irwin said. “What we're trying to do is provide a tool so the customer can go out and look at that.”

The crunch to differentiate in an open access environment will inevitably lead to some content and ISP partnering, said High Speed Access' O'Brien.

In a way, that's what @Home has been trying to do all along. “Consumers are going to want to consume either content or services that are possible on broadband,” Medin said. “Otherwise, they'll just stick with their dial-up connection.”