Net Neutrality 9-17-2006

Filed Under Business Life, Community, SOB Business, Successful Blog, Trends | 8 Comments

Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Major U.S. Trade Group Makes Case for Neutrality

The American Electronics Association (AeA) released a report yesterday strongly supporting Net Neutrality and urging Congress: “Don’t stifle competition and innovation by allowing network operators to change and distort what is currently a highly competitive system.”

“The principles of Net Neutrality have created the Internet as we know it — the most dynamic network for communication and commerce in human history,” states The Case for Preserving Net Neutrality, a report by AeA, which represents 2,500 companies from every corner of the high-tech industry.

[ . . . ]

According to the report, the only way to ["safeguard the competitive nature of the Internet] is for Congress to prevent companies like AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from abusing their market power by imposing discriminatory new surcharges that favor the content from companies and Web sites that pay them the most.

Allowing the nation’s largest phone and cable companies to tilt the market in favor of larger and better funded content providers would “undermine the fundamental principles of open and free exchange of information across the network,” according to the AeA report.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 9-14-2006

Filed Under Business Life, Comments, SOB Business, Successful Blog, Trends | 4 Comments

Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

New Report Skewers Telco Spin on Competition

Why has the United States fallen behind the rest of the world in accessible and affordable broadband service?

The answer, according to a report [PDF] released by Free Press, the Consumer Federation of America and Consumers Union, is marketplace failures wrought by phone and cable companies’ near monopoly control of last-mile broadband markets.

The 44-page report, Broadband Reality Check II, exposes the truth behind America’s digital decline: A marketplace controlled by the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Comcast has left Americans with higher prices, slower speeds and no meaningful competition for high-speed Internet service.

It exposes the lie behind phone companies’ repeated claims that the U.S. has a diverse marketplace, with myriad broadband choices for the consumer.

It decisively skewers the notion — put forth by telco executives and their high-paid shills — that “fierce competition” precludes Net Neutrality protections.

[ . . . ]

Broadband Reality Check II also finds:

The 14 other OECD [Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development] nations saw higher overall net growth in broadband adoption than the United States from 2001 to 2005.

Consumers in other countries enjoy broadband connections that are far faster and cheaper than what is available here. U.S. consumers pay nearly twice as much as the Japanese for connections that are 20 times as slow.

U.S. broadband prices aren’t dropping: Cable modem prices are holding constant or rising, and DSL customers on average are getting less bandwidth per dollar than just a year ago.

The market share of “third platform” alternatives like satellite, wireless and broadband over powerline technologies has actually decreased over the past five years.

The report contradicts the rosy picture painted by the Federal Communications Commission, by exposing the agency’s failure to rein in broadband monopolies . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 9-01-2006

Filed Under Business Life, Comments, SOB Business, Successful Blog, Trends | 6 Comments

Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Note To Telcos: Please Get Better Shills

. . . Now, we have Sonia Arrison, who works for a think tank that is funded by telcos. Last month she was claiming that if net neutrality legislation came to be it would be the end of the internet, while then trotting out a freebie about how muni-WiFi would also destroy the internet (ignoring, of course, that almost every muni-WiFi effort nowadays is structured in an almost identical manner to the deals her telco funders got for copper and fiber rights of way — and, in fact, that telcos have now started bidding on muni-WiFi contracts themselves). This time, however, she’s flipped the argument we’ve made here around, saying that dishonesty from the likes of Google proves that net neutrality legislation isn’t needed. There’s just one problem: it’s her side which seems to be acting much more dishonest. She calls it a “scare tactic” by Google to suggest that there would be a two-tiered internet where people might not be able to get to Google. She might want to go talk with the heads of the telcos that fund her think tank, because they’ve all made it clear that they would love to force Google to pay extra to reach their subscribers. . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 8-28-2006

Filed Under Business Life, Community, SOB Business, Successful Blog, Trends | Leave a Comment

Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Telcos, Net Neutrality and fair business practices

This morning, I received an email from Verizon, concerning my DSL service.
The email alerted me to the fact that the federal tax known as FUSF (Federal Universal Service Fund) was no longer to be collected. Depending upon your level of service, this was a fee of $1.25 or $2.83 per month. This was part of a decision last year by the FCC to stop regulating DSL, therefore eliminating the need for the FUSF fee to be collected. Based upon this, consumers should have expected to see a modest reduction in their monthly bills, due to the elimination of the FUSF.

However, in reading my Verizon DSL email, it appears that they couldn’t bear to pass that reduction on to their customers. Instead, they indicate that . . . In essence, they’ve taken the amount of the tax (which they had to remit to the government) and shifted it into a new line item as a fee.

If people can’t understand why we need Net Neutrality, this is just another example of how the telcos operate and why we can’t let them change the playing field.

Update: Apparently the FCC is not too thrilled with Verizon and BellSouth efforts to mask price increases as fees. Also see comments from TechDirt on the matter.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 7-24-2006

Filed Under Business Life, Community, SOB Business, Successful Blog, Trends | Leave a Comment

Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Telco Wars and Net Neutrality

Let me start of by saying reading this post by James Enck may cause your heart to skip a few beats if you work at Level3 or are a customer who relies on them, or has built budgets and pro-formas based on how Level3 charges you.

But it goes much deeper and you MUST read through the various links that other bloggers have gathered to get the whole picture. . . .

The line from Gordon Cook sums up a lot:

Net Neutrality is a skillful diversion to draw our attention there while Qwest, ATT, Verizon and BellSouth still the knife in at the court and PUC level and kill off the remaining services they don’t control.

. . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

« go back — keep looking »