Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Michael D. Thomas" <mdthomas AT mindspring.com>]

> At 01:02 AM 3/22/2002 -0500, you wrote:
> >* When I signed up for RoadRunner, they brought me the cable modem
for
> >free -- why couldn't TimeWarner bring me a low priced, network
> >appliance with web, email and a small hard drive?
>
> You mean like an X-box?

Toss it in the same bucket as WebTV for now... I don't believe in it
b/c of poor resolution of standard television. True, HDTV fixes that
problem, but then you are back in to a higher price point and you are
also waiting for technology convergence that is a ways off.

What really makes/breaks the whole network appliance idea is a cheap
relatively high resolution screen (600x800 would be fine) so that you
can actually read text on the screen, which is what so much of the
web/email experience is about.

There's still one other point, though -- MS doesn't bring the wire in
to people's houses. I signed up for RoadRunner and there was a guy who
showed up in my driveway in a logo-emblazoned truck, came in to my
house and talked to me. I've used MS products for years and years but
I don't think I've ever talked to anyone from MS except on a
professional (not a consumer) basis. I wouldn't expect that to change
if I bought an X-Box.

That kind of feet-on-the-street service means real marketing power.

Also, the job of setting up a Network Appliance is actually easier --
a lot of what the road runner guy did was to figure out how to get the
cable modem to work with my particular computer, OS, and network card.