Three major U.S. local telephone companies have they agreed on a common set of technical standards to improve development of fiber-optic networks and speed the introduction of new services such as photo sharing and interactive gaming.
According to news reports, this collaboration will also lead to the development of higher-speed Internet service.
The carriers involved include Verizon Communications Inc., SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp., the three largest U.S. local telephone companies.
At present, long-distance networks use high-speed fiber, but local telephone networks still use traditional copper telephone wires which lack the bandwidth to handle these newer services.
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