In fact, banking on "future sales" is exactly what EVERY new company does. Virtually no new venture has assets. Berry Gordy started Motown Records with $500 and no assets. C. W. Post was broke when he started Post cereals.
What happened? The telecom markets STOPPED growing. But why? There was no demand for faster, and better, information. There certainly is no glut here, where I can't even get past a 56k Modem. No, what happened is that you have a "knot in the hose." You have flowers that need the water at one end (new companies) and you have plenty of water at the other (new technologies in rapid data transmission, computerized video, MP3 technology) but there is a blockage in delivering the info. This is---and there are different explanations, I'll admit---because the Baby Bells have the technology, but not the authority, to open their wire to digital info; and the local telecoms have the authority, but not the wire.
There is also a massive shortage of VENTURE capital, which the author seems to confuse with the "money supply." WE DO have a deflation in the money supply, but even before this there was a drying up of telecom venture capital---likley due to the factors I mentioned above.