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Net Neutrality 10-12-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Cable Ties Itself Up in Net Neutrality Knots [via freepress]

The five companies, Advance, Charter, Cablevision, Cox and Insight, told the [Federal Trade] Commission in a Sept. 27 filing their Voice over IP services are at risk because of what the telephone companies might do to thwart competition. The filing noted: “In the head-to-head competition with cable, the ILECs (incumbent local exchange carriers, aka telephone companies), have a powerful weapon – their ability to discriminate against cable’s voice service by imposing unreasonable, costly interconnection requirements. This is clearly the case with AT&T.”

This merger, the cable companies said, “will increase AT&T’s incentives and ability to wield its market power over interconnection against its cable competitions. AT&T has the incentive and ability to discriminate against cable’s voice service to retain its own customers.” The companies want the Commission to impose detailed conditions on the merger which govern interconnection, traffic flow and the like.

[ . . . ]

The sympathy meter drops a few more notches when the cable industry further declines to realize that the “incentive and ability to discriminate” principle they oppose on the part of the telephone companies is the same principle at the heart of Net Neutrality.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 10-09-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Here’s the FCC’s Playbook for Burying Net Neutrality By Art Brodsky [via freepress]

It’s not. Beneath the surface, the reality is that FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s planned Notice of Inquiry on Net Neutrality is an audacious triple play with the goals of greasing the largest telecom merger in history, relieving pressure on a key piece of legislation, and burying the Net Neutrality concept for good.

[. . .]

So here’s the setup. The FCC is currently considering AT&T’s $67 billion purchase of BellSouth, the largest merger in history. In similar past mergers, such as SBC’s purchase of AT&T, or Verizon’s purchase of MCI, the Commission has imposed some relatively neutered Net Neutrality conditions for a limited period of time.

[. . .]

Martin’s gambit to make the merger as painless as possible for the companies is to try to take the Net Neutrality issue off the table. The way he will try to do that is with a Notice of Inquiry.

In the arcane world of FCC process, there are basically three levels of action the Commission can take. Most of the time, the Commission employs only two out of three. First, there is a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM). The construct of the NPRM is that the Commission has found a problem that needs a Commission ruling and proposes some solutions. After a public comment proceeding, the Commission then issues the rule. The construct the rule is that the Commission has picked a course of action to follow. Most of the time the Commission adopts its proposed rule, rather than something others might suggest, but you have to go through the drill anyway.

A preliminary step to the NPRM is called the Notice of Inquiry. The construct here is that the Commission is asking whether there is a problem that needs FCC attention. Notices of Inquiry rarely go any farther in the process. They are a device for burying a problem. But this one is tricky, for the political and analytical hazards it poses for Net Neutrality advocates, including FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein.

When the FCC votes on an action, Commissioners can vote for it, vote against it, or concur in part or dissent in part. Because the window dressing on a Notice of Inquiry is that it’s simply asking a question, it’s hard for a Commissioner to vote against issuing one without appearing unreasonable.In this case, it would be hard for Copps or Adelstein to vote against issuing the Inquiry . . . critics will say, the Commission is only “asking questions” and no one can object to that . . .

. . . The telephone companies and cable companies will tell the FCC there’s no problem with Net Neutrality. Those of us who favor reinstating the non-discrimination law will argue that there might not be a current problem because discrimination was until recently illegal, because the telephone and cable companies are on their best behavior while trying to obtain easier entry to the cable business from Congress and because the FCC’s current non-enforceable Net Neutrality principles don’t protect consumers from the telephone and cable companies giving priority to the services in which they have a financial interest . . .

None of our arguments will matter. The FCC, if it says anything, will say there’s no need for a proposed rulemaking because no one has shown a problem exists.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 9-16-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Guess the State and Win a Subsidy: Senate Plays Geography Games in Telecom Bill

Are you good at geography? If so, you may enjoy the small geography quiz buried deep inside of the telecommunications bill now pending in the U.S. Senate. Hidden on page 121 is a paragraph directing the FCC to expand universal service payments to “insular areas, including any insular area that is a State comprised entirely of islands…”

[. . . ]

As it turns out, the list of states covered by this provision is quite short:

1.Hawaii.

And, by total coincidence, a senator from that state — Daniel Inouye — is the co-chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee — which wrote the bill.

[. . . ]

The provision illustrates how far the bill has strayed from a hoped-for focus on eliminating unneeded regulation. At its core, there still is substantial positive reform: streamlining of the video franchising process. But that important change is surrounded by a luau of special interest provisions. . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 9-14-2006

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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

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 9-12-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Amazon exec: net neutrality necessary because of “little choice” for consumers

In an interview [with ECT News] Amazon VP of Global Public Policy Paul Misener reinforces one of the reasons why we need net neutrality: our (lack of) choice when it comes to broadband. . . .

[ . . .]

By the FCC’s reckoning, that means I have broadband choice here on the northwest side of Chicago. Well, sort of. For cable, my sole choice is Comcast-and that’s what I use, with few service complaints. On the other hand, DSL is not an option for me because of the lousy infrastructure in my over 80-year-old neighborhood and my distance from the DSLAM. Broadband over power lines? Not yet. Citywide WiFi network? A gleam in Mayor Daley’s eye. WiMAX? Some day, maybe. Broadband choice? Not in any coherent sense of the word.

In Misener’s opinion, the lack of choice means net neutrality is a must because if an ISP decides to begin prioritizing certain traffic, consumers don’t have a meaningful alternative.

“[U]ltimately what can they do besides complain? Consumers have little choice when it comes to high speed Internet. If they had more choices of providers, this wouldn’t be such a dangerous situation.”

There are a number of other arguments for net neutrality, including the possibility of ISPs clamping down on traffic that they find objectionable. Misener outlines one such scenario involving a striking union and points out that while such scenarios may seem far fetched, there are no laws in place to prevent it from happening.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 8-31-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Net Neutrality Heads Toward Showdown In Senate; May Get Sidelined

. . . Is Internet neutrality a solution without a problem? The hardware companies think so. They haven’t invoked the hoopla around the Y2K debacle, but that’s about the position that they’re taking. “We won’t direct traffic away from the content/service providers”

On the other hand, Internet neutrality groups cite as a battle cry the words spoken last November by AT&T Chairman Edward Whitacre Jr., who said content providers were “nuts” if they thought they could use “my pipes” without paying extra, referring to AT&T’s broadband and telephone DSL services.

The United States Supreme Court opened the battlefield for Congress to step in last year in its Brand X decision, which affirmed the FCC’s decision classifying cable broadband Internet access an information service and not telephone service. The consequence of the decision was not lost on Congress: According to the Supreme Court, cable is not a common-carrier and therefore does not require equal access to its “pipes.”

So, Congress has stepped in with the Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006 to solve what some Senators see as the problem. The act seeks to allow phone companies to negotiate national cable franchise agreements instead of the way cable companies must do now: negotiating city-by-city franchise rights. . . . Wags predict it the bill may get sidelined until next year

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE