Telcos told 'you're no better than the gas board'

Incumbent telecoms providers have been told to start falling into line with utilities companies as bandwidth and connectivity become commodity products, piped into customers' homes like gas and electricity. Consumers are now entitled to pay "utility prices for a utility product", said Morten Singleton, director of telecommunications equity research at West LB. ... Ironically it was the incumbents' provision of broadband bandwidth which has brought about the most rapid period of decline due to convergence and the arrival of free, or very low cost internet telephony (VoIP)