ISP Madasafish have conducted research that has shown there are one million unused Broadband Routers in the UK, reports the BCS.
The issue revolves around the fact that ISP’s lock down Routers to work with their services only, then when a user moves on to another Broadband provider, they are given another router locked to that service, and so on… All those Routers that could be re-used, aren’t, and so new Routers are built and old Routers are land-filled. The environmental aspect of this cycle is obvious.
A neighbour of mine experienced this first hand recently. They were moving their Broadband from BT to TalkTalk. Their ADSL account was moved across rapidly, but the “new” hardware didn’t arrive quickly from TalkTalk. Trying to get their existing BT branded ADSL Router to work with TalkTalk’s service was futile, as it had been coded to BT only (despite no technical different in the service between BT and TalkTalk’s offerings). So they went without ADSL for days until a new Router from TalkTalk arrived. The type of Router? You guessed it – exactly the same as the BT model, but this time branded for and locked down to work only with TalkTalk.
In a world where we are being encouraged to recycle, this is obviously a ridiculous situation. But if you want a lesson in ridiculousness, try telephoning your ISP with a view to returning your old networking equipment so it can be re-deployed! They’ll simple see it as a hassle, not an opportunity, and sadly… you wont get very far!
The issue revolves around the fact that ISP’s lock down Routers to work with their services only, then when a user moves on to another Broadband provider, they are given another router locked to that service, and so on… All those Routers that could be re-used, aren’t, and so new Routers are built and old Routers are land-filled. The environmental aspect of this cycle is obvious.
A neighbour of mine experienced this first hand recently. They were moving their Broadband from BT to TalkTalk. Their ADSL account was moved across rapidly, but the “new” hardware didn’t arrive quickly from TalkTalk. Trying to get their existing BT branded ADSL Router to work with TalkTalk’s service was futile, as it had been coded to BT only (despite no technical different in the service between BT and TalkTalk’s offerings). So they went without ADSL for days until a new Router from TalkTalk arrived. The type of Router? You guessed it – exactly the same as the BT model, but this time branded for and locked down to work only with TalkTalk.
In a world where we are being encouraged to recycle, this is obviously a ridiculous situation. But if you want a lesson in ridiculousness, try telephoning your ISP with a view to returning your old networking equipment so it can be re-deployed! They’ll simple see it as a hassle, not an opportunity, and sadly… you wont get very far!
RICHARD TUBB
Richard Tubb is one of the best-known experts within the global IT Managed Service Provider (MSP) community. He launched and sold his own MSP business before creating a leading MSP media and consultancy practice. Richard helps IT business owner’s take back control by freeing up their time and building a business that can run without them. He’s the author of the book “The IT Business Owner’s Survival Guide” and writer of the award-winning blog www.tubblog.co.uk
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