Virgin Finally Does The Deed With NTL

from the can't-avoid-the-puns dept

Tue, Apr 4th 2006 2:38am — Mike Masnick

Some folks weren't so thrilled with the easy and obvious puns served up during the all-too-long and all-too-public saga of NTL and Virgin Mobile in the UK trying to merge, but now that it's finally happening, four months after initially rumored, it's still a bit difficult to avoid them. In the meantime, though, while plenty of folks in the press prattle on about how this creates a "quadruple play" (or whatever they want to call it) solution in the UK, remember that there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical. The true future opportunity of connecting all these various services comes from doing it all over a single pipe -- with wireless being the true holy grail in this race. That's a problem, because the combined NTL/Virgin Mobile is actually missing the most interesting and most compelling part of the equation, since Virgin's wireless network isn't actually its own.

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5 Comments

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AnarChaos, 4 Apr 2006 @ 5:29am

wireless network...
Is anyone really surprised?? Lots of wireless companies lease or piggyback signal from/over another network.
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discojohnson, 4 Apr 2006 @ 5:46am

Re: wireless network...
this could be problematic later. now what someone over there needs to do is do the same thing--with a catch: the new provider is a provider for virgin mobile...and virgin doesn't get a contract renewal.
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Dan, 4 Apr 2006 @ 9:55am

heh
nice headline!
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Aldoliel, 4 Apr 2006 @ 10:14am

Wireless
While many companies in the US may lease or piggyback on another network, this practice isn't nearly as common in the UK (though it has increased in recent years). There are probably only 7 or 8 so called "virtual" providers compared to the 4 real providers (only two of which actually lease network to other "virtual" providers)
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Sprint Employee, 4 Apr 2006 @ 11:51am

HA HA HA HA HA
WE ARE TAKING OVER THE WORLD!!!!!! HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!
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