Deutsche Telekom wants to be like Comcast

This is not directly related to the article but it helps to put the code of conduct of the Deutsche Telekom into perspective:

The Deutsche Telekom inherited the copper infrastructure, when the state-owned Deutsche Post AG was split into private corporations in 1989.

Due to this inheritance they are reluctant to build fiber-optical infrastructure. Because they are obligated to allow access to this infrastructure to competitors, they try different ways to put obstacles in competitors path, e.g. by suddenly embracing vectoring which effectivly denies access to competitors.

So the customer cannot benefit from fiber optical tech, has bought the whole infrastructure for DT and now pays for it again.

The competitors - if not denied access to the DT infrastructure - pay fees to use the infrastructure.

So basically the DT has a copper infrastructure which it never paid for, is unwilling to improve and gets money for from many different parties.

Their much advertised IPO worked... for the DT, while most of the private investors still feel the burn. They paid roughly 63 EUR per share which immediately dropped to round about 15 EUR which equals the current share price. There are still 17.000 investors sueing over the assumption that the DT knowingly falsified the IPO information.

All companies want to be like Comcast. Comcast's model is rather profitable. Most companies, however, don't think they would ever be able to get away with the kind of stuff Comcast does.

How does Deutsche Telekom stack up against Comcast on a per-mile cost basis? I.e., what does it cost, on average, to send a bit over the same distance, with the same latency, on each network?

We have to go by a per-mile (or per-km) statistic here because Germany has a vastly higher population density than the US, which means that it has to put or buy far less cable in the ground to build an equivalent telecommunications network in Germany.

Before anyone pours more hate on Comcast, does anyone actually know the answer to this question?

After recently moving to Berlin from the states I miss Comcast. Not something I ever thought I would say but it's true. Internet plans are expensive, most if not all the reasonably priced ones have data caps and the support is horrible. To get my internet connected not only do you have to wait months but once an appointment is made it is actually impossible to reschedule or cancel it. This is all anecdotal granted but from others I talked to experiences have been similar with DT.

Sensationalised title

Granted, Deutsche Telekom is already responsible for a lot of crap German users have to endure (like long waits to have an internet connection)

But I guess since most of their customers would be satisfied of using a disk dial phone and usage is kept low by fines to torrent users and half of Youtube being censored by GEMA they have little incentive to change.