HAS ISDN'S TIME COME AND GONE? from Edupage

["W. Curtiss Priest" <BMSLIB@MITVMA.MIT.EDU>]

  HAS ISDN'S TIME COME AND GONE?
  "ISDN was a sort of a `Field of Dreams' technology," says the chief
  technologist for Citicorp.  "The thought was, `Build it, and they will
  come.'"  But it's been slow going, and with cable modems and ADSL
  (asynchronous digital subscriber lines) technology on the horizon, some are
  predicting ISDN's time is already past.  "If they were serious about
  marketing ISDN, I would expect to see billboards and placards on buses,"
  says a Forrester Research analyst.  "They'd offer free installation,
  discount coupons in hardware packages, and bundled Internet access service."
  Instead, ISDN installation is expensive, and its speed still unimpressive
  for activities such as Web browsing, where cable modems' and ADSL's much
  greater downstream capacity is a big advantage.  (Information Week 22 Apr 96
  p65)
  
              W. Curtiss Priest, Director, CITS
        Center for Information, Technology & Society
           466 Pleasant St., Melrose, MA  02176
         Voice: 617-662-4044  BMSLIB@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
   Fax: 617-662-6882 WWW: http://www.eff.org/pub/Groups/CITS