A free broadband service from The Carphone Warehouse, the UK's leading mobile phone retailer, will be announced this week according to the BBC and mobiletoday.co.uk. And, in a report published today, The Independent reckons that the service will be 1MB and free only for three months, after which it will cost a knock-down £4.99 per month.
The Carphone Warehouse's broadband service is thought likely to be available only to those who subscribe to Talk Talk - the landline phone service set up after the company's recent take over of Onetel.
Talk Talk currently offers unlimited 2MB broadband for £17.99 per month and its landline phone deals (£10.49; £14.48; and £19.48 per month) undercut BT and allow life-long free calls to other Talk Talk landline users.
Signing up for the landline service also gives access to a Talk Talk pay-as-you-go mobile service providing free calls to all other Talk Talk users - mobile and landline - and charging 15p per minute for other UK calls, whether landline or mobile.
Although the idea of providing free broadband to Talk Talk subscribers might seem far fetched, the story over at mobiletoday.co.uk highlights the expectation that The Carphone Warehouse will spend £60m over the next three years putting its own gear into BT exchanges ("unbundling the local loop" in technobabble). Although a massive outlay this will, presumably, ensure that running costs for providing phone and broadband services are hugely reduced.
Also adding weight to the whole idea - and suggesting that the announcement will come tomorrow (April 11), Talk Talk's web site is today (April 10) showing this holding image:
Satellite TV broadcaster BSkyB - owner of the Easynet internet service provider - is also expected to launch a Sky-branded broadband service, though not until later this year.
BSkyB's own-brand ADSL will use the infrastructure already in place at Easynet and is expected to offer online access to Sky programmes. This, presumably, will be above and beyond the range of programming already offered by the company's peer-to-peer video-download service Sky by broadband.
All sound interesting? Let us hear your take over in the HEXUS.community.
HEXUS.links
Free broadband from The Carphone Warehouse - BBC
Free broadband from The Carphone Warehouse - mobiletoday.co.uk
BSkyB to offer broadband - BBC
Talk Talk home page (under reconstruction on April 10)
Onetel takeover - Onetel
Sky by broadband - HEXUS.lifestyle - world's first combined review/tutorial
