Cisco blogger dives into digital home issues

Fellow blogger, and fellow IDG News Service alum, Jack McCarthy, teased out my frustration with the ongoing balkanized approach to the home digital network and communications/media access morass.

It seems Pollyanna to assume that Intel (Viiv), Apple (iLife/iHome), Microsoft (nearly everything), Cisco (LinkSys/Scientific Atlanta), Time Warner (most everything), and Verizon (should be everything) would work together to build out simplicity, convenience, and integration for all things IP in and around the home. But what are the alternatives?

Well, pretty much what we have today -- a lot of good stuff from different sources all billed separately, not meaningfully integrated. And yet, on the back end, the consolidation and unification is well under way around the big honking IP switch and services-delivery-platform-cum-datacenter-common-architecture.

Do all the players need their own back end stuff, network, and fiber? No, no more than railroad companies needed their own custom tracks, custom trains, and specific wheels-width some 150 years ago. Will someone give me one inclusive IP service on the front end into my home with one bill soon, please?