Sources say an elderly Vienna man is dead after falling down in a confrontation outside his home with a Verizon FiOS technician.

Police say 79-year-old Bill Cornelious was unhappy with the installation of a new service.

The Verizon employee left the home at about 5 p.m. Wednesday, and the elderly man followed him out and tried to block the technician’s van from leaving the driveway.

Vienna police say the man tried to reach inside the van and grab the steering wheel. It was then that he fell and suffered the injuries that caused his death. WJLA-TV reports on this tragedy which occurred in late June and was brought to our attention today:

[flv width=”320″ height=”240″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WJLA Washington – Elderly Man Dies After Encounter With FiOS Technician 06-18-09.flv[/flv]

It’s unfortunate that disputes over cable/television service can lead to these kinds of confrontations and tragic results.

The quest for fiber-based broadband service from consumers has reached the point where many have decided to accept or decline offers to purchase property in new housing developments based on whether they’ll have access to fiber or not.  Those were the findings in a study from the Fiber to the Home Council, which surveyed more than 600 existing fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) customers and 600 other broadband customers nationwide.

The results clearly show consumers love fiber optic broadband, far more than cable modems or DSL service from the phone company.

For example, 67% of FTTH users were very satisfied with their broadband speed compared to 58% of cable modem users and 46% of DSL users. A total of 70% of FTTH users were very satisfied with their Internet service up time compared to 64% of cable modem users and 55% of DSL users.

Consumers also reported that FTTH service was faster… much faster than competing technologies.  The median tested download speed from FTTH users was 10.4Mbps. FTTH tested download speed was 51% higher than cable modem service and 593% higher than DSL (DSL has abandoned the speed war, having lost that race to competing technologies, and now prevails only on price and where other alternatives are not available).

Upload speeds offered by FTTH users blew away the competition.  The average subscriber had 2.4Mbps of upload speed, which is 380% higher than cable modem users and 500% faster than DSL.

The survey also showed that robust competition, with at least one provider bringing true fiber to the home service to consumers, meant an average of six percent lower broadband bills.

Some cable and telephone industry executives downplay the lust for speed by consumers, claiming that most don’t understand the differences in speed, and don’t utilize services where speed matters most.  But the FTTH survey found entirely different results.  Not only are FTTH customers extremely loyal and happy with their service, they are reluctant to move to places that don’t offer it.

When asked to imagine purchasing a new home and given a list of five real estate development amenities, both current and non FTTH broadband users rated “Very high speed Internet from a direct fiber line” more important than other amenities such as green space/walking trails, 24 hour neighborhood patrol, a community pool, and a fitness center/club house. 69% of non FTTH users and 82% of current FTTH users said “Very high speed Internet” would be an important factor in buying a new home.

Even in this difficult economy, 49% of FTTH users said their broadband service would be the “last thing” they would give up.  Only 11% said it would be among the first things to go.

The demand is there, but the competition is not in many American communities.  Unless consumers reside in an area where an aggressive provider such as Verizon is willing to deploy fiber to the home, the chances of service arriving anytime in the near future is dismally low.  Few telephone companies are interested in deploying widespread fiber networks to consumers, and most cable operators believe their existing hybrid fiber/coaxial cable networks are “good enough” for consumers.  Only when a third player arrives in town, be it a private competitor or a municipally-owned fiber network, do telephone and cable providers get interested in performing their own fiber upgrades.

AT&T believes in its own copper-wire-based U-verse technology.  Smaller independent telephone companies are doing only limited experiments with fiber deployment, primarily to multiple dwelling units like apartment buildings and condos, and other uniform, expansive new housing developments.

Until prevailing attitudes among providers change, consumers hungering for fiber may simply have to pack up and relocate to the lucky communities that already have it, or will soon.

Verizon is concerned about potential risks for data hacking and security breaches associated with mergers and acquisitions in undertakes.  The Verizon Business Risk Team reported that 13% of the breaches studied in 2008 involved companies undergoing transition as part of a merger or acquisition.

Verizon signaled caution to prospective Frontier Communications territories about to be spun away from Verizon:

“Mergers and acquisitions bring together not only the people and products of once separate organizations, but their technology environments as well. Integration rarely happens overnight or without a hitch.”

TheDeal.com writes Verizon has the experience to understand the risks, as both a buyer and seller.

Verizon’s selling of its operations in New England to FairPoint Communications was particularly noted, because of ongoing billing, customer care, and other transition problems, some of which are still unresolved to this day.

Charter Communications is going to have some major competition in the Massachusetts city of Groton over the next year as city officials signed a 15-year franchise agreement with Verizon Communications to bring the fiber-to-the-home service to area residents.

Verizon promised to introduce FiOS service to area residents immediately, with a build out to nearby communities taking place over a four year period.  The deal brings competitive choice to Groton, which until now has relied exclusively on Charter Cable for cable television service.

Verizon agreed to spend $112,500 to outfit four locations with broadcast equipment and provide three public access channels.  Equipment will be installed at the Town Hall for local government coverage, the local public library, the middle school Performing Arts Center and a nearby senior center.  The franchise fee will be 4.2% of local earnings and a 50 cent fee per subscriber per year, all paid to Groton’s local government.

The loudest complaint came from one resident who wanted to know why service might not be immediately available on his street.  He told local officials Charter had the “worst service” on his street and wanted the Verizon alternative immediately.

While residential customers face the threat of Internet Overcharging schemes designed to ration their use of the Internet with excessive pricing combined with usage limits, business customers are finding the opposite:  providers rolling out several new innovative services designed to control costs and increase broadband flexibility.

Verizon Business‘ Ethernet Virtual Private Line Service customers, who enjoy enormously fast speeds over a fiber-based network, will now have the ability to customize their bandwidth on-demand, through an online control panel.

Verizon EVPL Dynamic Bandwidth enables customers to raise or lower their broadband speeds as needed, and pay for their broadband service based on the speed they select.  The service is designed to maximize savings for businesses that have a periodic need for higher bandwidth, but don’t feel justified paying for a higher tier of service that will go unused at other times.  A customer accesses an online control panel, reviews pricing for different levels of speed, and then selects the option that best meets their needs.

Customers can raise or lower both the upload and download speeds once every 24 hours.  The requested capacity is provided within 60 minutes, and the control panel lets customers schedule bandwidth needs in advance.

The Dynamic Bandwidth service supports speeds between 1Mbps all the way up to 1000Mbps, depending on available facilities in your area.

“There is an insatiable hunger for bandwidth as technologies such as video transmission become more widely adopted by enterprises,” said Blair Crump, worldwide president of sales with Verizon Business.  “Our self-service dynamic bandwidth capability allows our EVPL and Private IP customers to make the most of their networks, at their convenience.”

David Hold, senior analyst, network services with Current Analysis, said: “Verizon Business is delivering a unique value proposition to the Ethernet services market with their new dynamic bandwidth capability.  With the proliferation of sophisticated, bandwidth-intensive applications, most organizations are demanding greater network capacity, and this new capability will help customers improve their return on investment in EVPL by only paying for greater speed when needed.”

Speed-based tiered pricing is familiar to consumers, and does not raise the same level of concern that consumption-based billing schemes do.  It is based on the premise that those heavy users of broadband will naturally gravitate towards higher speed, more expensive tiers of service to enjoy faster speeds.  The provider’s premium pricing also guarantees premium profits.

While residential customers bear the brunt of Internet Overcharging experiments based on data consumption, most business-class customers curiously escape such limits and fees.  Indeed, if the rationale for such pricing is based on demands placed on the network infrastructure, business customers, who face pricing commensurate with their anticipated higher usage, should be the natural first candidates for experimentation, not the ones exempted from it.

Verizon Business’ new speed based tiering demonstrates that there is money to be made providing customers with their choice of speed, without alienating them with unwarranted usage limits and the penalties and fees that follow those who exceed them.