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Will parental control features and social media monitoring software that can prevent tragedies be necessary integrations for ISPs to compete in the future? Brad Moline, the CEO of ALLO Fiber, and Matt Collins, the Chief Commercial Operations Officer for Calix, certainly think so.
By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities
With a customer base that is primarily made up of small, regional service providers, Calix has incorporated Bark, a social-media monitoring software, into their platform as part of an effort to add value to the service packages offered by small ISPs.
“It’s an application that parents can use to monitor social media as it’s used by their children on phones or in the home,” said Matt Collins, the Chief Commercial Operations Officer at Calix. “And it uses AI to detect things that could cause harm.”
The software, which has been integrated into ALLO Fiber’s service offerings, can identify language that indicates cyber bullying and suicidal ideation.
“They’ve even had situations where they’ve detected first shooter situations,” Collins said.
Brad Moline, the CEO of ALLO Fiber, said his company integrated Bark to provide protections to children. He said he realizes the internet can be a positive thing but said sometimes it can be a negative influence as well.
“Ninety-seven percent of the internet’s wonderful,” he said, while acknowledging that the interest also has nefarious bad actors.
Moline said Bark can help prevent bad trends from starting with children on the internet, allowing parents the opportunity to intervene.
“In this way, families can remain families,” he said.
Collins said Calix has been very pleased with the results of Bark thus far, and suggested the momentum behind it is just starting.
He said successful ISPs in the future will follow the path of ALLO Fiber when it comes to implementing applications like Bark.
“Will there still be some that are just providing broadband as a basic service? Sure,” he said. “But they’re going to increasingly become marginalized.”
According to Collins, businesses and consumers alike are going to look at the value that programs like Bark offer and gravitate towards them.
“This will be the service provider of the future in our mind,” he said.
To hear the full interview with Moline and Collins on Spotify, click here.
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