James, Another interesting point about technology sales is that DAB (like Freeview) is actually sold at retail price, whereas almost everything else is sold at a subsidized discount and then you pay for the price of the handset (ie, mobile phone - iPhone in particular), set-top box (BSkyB) by siging up to a long term direct-debit scheme.
This allows these items to be sold at a very low price, or provided for "free". There is a good side and a bad side to this. The good side is that a large order of a new technology drives down the unit costs, so that the new technology is actually priced say 12 months ahead of the curve (with Moore's Law normally halving the cost in 18 months). The bad side, of course, is that it allows the gatekeeper to force those who use this technology at the 'apparent original cost price'. Shame Rapture didn't make a good case of it, seems the courts like a monopoly these days: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/mar/31/digitaltv.bskyb IMHO, Digital One never really put any effort into getting decent services onto their multiplex and simply used automatic play stations to fill the space and expected the BBC to do the job for them, hoping that once Auntie had got listeners hooked they could pull their space-fillers and replace them with paying customers. On 08/04/2008, James Cridland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > On Thu, Apr 3, 2008 at 11:58 AM, Christopher Woods < > [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > What concerns me is the pronounced slowdown in > > consumer investment in digital radio technology. > > > Well, there's maths for you. > > 1 set sold in 1994. > 2 sets sold in 1995. > 200% increase in DAB sets sold!!! Woot!!! > > 5.5 million sets sold by end 2006 > > 6.5 million sets sold by end 2007 > Oh dear, that's not a 200% increase, DAB must be stillborn. Alert! Call > the police! > > Incidentally, I've bought (another) DAB set today - the Pure Siesta, a > clock radio alarm. £49, and even DAB+ upgradeable. Neat little device. Also > available, but I didn't buy it, a clock radio from Tesco own-brand Tecknicka > or something similar, for £15.00. And yes, it included DAB. > > -- > http://james.cridland.net/ | http://www.mediauk.com/ > > Media UK is a Not At All Bad Ltd production. > http://notatallbad.ltd.uk/legal_info/ -- Please email me back if you need any more help. Brian Butterworth http://www.ukfree.tv
