y would match rate requirements for (one-way) video broadcast and information retrieval over data networks over much greater distances than symmetric means could. They termed this new technology Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL). ADSL downstream speeds have increased to nearly one Gbps (at the price of distance) and upstream speeds have increased similarly. Major suppliers now mass-produce ADSL chip sets, and the footprint and power consumption of ADSL transceivers has significantly decreased. China has become the clear leader in DSL with almost 14 million lines by April 2004. With about 66% of the world's mass-market broadband subscribers, DSL is the leading broadband technology. Bellcore conceived ADSL primarily for video at 1.5 Mbps, and early ADSL trials focused on Video on Demand (VOD) applications. However, the primary market is now Internet based interactive multimedia. Cable TV companies and telephone companies are furiously racing to develop infrastructure or to grow by acquisition SO that they can win over users who desire high-speed Internet access from residences and remote offices. Data communications, to the Internet or to corporate LANs, is driving demand for ADSL and cable modem based network access. ADSL is only a method of moving bits from one end of copper wires to another; it depends upon access networks to perform network management, protocol conversion, data Circuit-switched Networks concentration, routing, multiplexing, and signaling between servers and personal computers. Sensing an imminent market boom, manufacturers started producing transceivers (modems) in summer 1996 that increased ADSL's downstream and upstream capabilities to as much as 9 Mbps and 640 Kbps, respectively. ADSL customers would connect exponentially faster (downstream) than they were connecting at the time with conventional V.34 modems. Perhaps more importantly, ADSL provided those customers with always-on network access. Since ADSL leverages existing POTS infrastructure, providers could implement it while inte