Rural telcos can bust a move on big incumbents, says CPUC commissioner

Typically, telephone companies do not intrude on each other’s territory, but that’s a matter of custom, not a fundamental law of the universe. Commissioner Catherine Sandoval says that breaking down that barrier could be a way to improve broadband coverage in rural areas, if small rural telephone companies are willing to take on big incumbents, with the encouragement of the California Public Utilities Commission.

She spoke at the Central Sierra Connect Broadband Consortium conference in Tuolumne City last week about going to public meetings in rural areas and hearing from speaker after disgruntled speaker…

It turns out that what they were disgruntled about is they said that ‘my neighbor who’s just down the road has terrific Internet access and I don’t have Internet access and I want better Internet access’.

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Slashing the cost of getting to yes clears the way for broadband upgrades

29 April 2014 by Steve Blum
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If you want fast and cheap Internet service, then your permit process has to be fast and cheap, too. That was the essence of the message that Santa Cruz County supervisor Zach Friend delivered to the Central Sierra Connect Broadband Consortium conference in Tuolumne City last week.

Traditionally, getting county approval to bury fiber or install an equipment box was a complicated process that subjected broadband projects to the same level of scrutiny and one-off analysis that might be applied to a new shopping center.… More

Comcast occupies Crimea, I'm sorry, California

28 April 2014 by Steve Blum
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Comcast will be, by far, the dominant cable company in California, if the proposed acquisition of Time-Warner Cable and today’s announcement of a pie-slicing deal with Charter Communications come to pass.

In order to get the Time-Warner purchase past federal regulators, Comcast wants to trim back what would be its combined customer base to 30 million homes, which is about half the cable TV subscribers in the U.S. So this morning it announced a scheme to spin off some Time-Warner subscribers into a company effectively controlled by Charter Communications (which would become the second biggest cable operator in the U.S.),… More

Is FCC chair Wheeler dumb enough to think we're that dumb?

27 April 2014 by Steve Blum
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We finally know where FCC chairman Tom Wheeler stands on network neutrality rules: squarely in front of Washington’s army of industry lobbyists, leading the way. When rumors began circulating last week that commissioners were looking at draft rules that would allow Internet service providers to charge web-based businesses extra for speeding their packets along to consumers, Wheeler’s response was exactly what you would expect from a man who spent 20 years as a telecoms lobbyist himself…

There has been a great deal of misinformation that has recently surfaced regarding the draft Open Internet Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that we will today circulate to the Commission…The Notice does not change the underlying goals of transparency, no blocking of lawful content, and no unreasonable discrimination among users established by the 2010 Rule.

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Local broadband policy models presented to central Sierra policy makers


Click to download the presentation.

Like it or not, convincing an incumbent provider to invest in improving broadband infrastructure in your community means putting a better deal in front of them than they can get elsewhere. Both Google and AT&T have money to spend on fiber upgrades, but not very much, relatively speaking. So they’re issuing short lists of cities, and then sitting back and waiting to see what those candidates put on the table.

Two things top their wish lists: getting permits quicker and cheaper, and access to public right of ways and real estate.… More

AT&T hypes fiber to the chosen few

25 April 2014 by Steve Blum
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Assume the position.

The digital divide is getting deeper, thanks to diligent digging by incumbents. This week’s big announcement is that AT&T is looking at 100 cities as possible sites for gigabit service. Okay, it’s their GigaPower service which is designed for “up to” a gigabit. That doesn’t mean anyone will actually see it, but, hey, it lets them say giga twice in the same sentence, which makes it a really fast press release.

It doesn’t actually say that fiber-to-the-home builds are on the way, just “a network that includes fiber-optic technology”.… More

Central California fiber network about to go fully operational


Click for a bigger version of the map.

An 850 mile fiber build that threads through 18 counties in central California – largely paid for by the 2009 federal broadband stimulus program – is almost done. The Central Valley Independent Network, which now does business as Vast Networks will finally be complete by the end of May, according to marketing director Mike Stewart, who gave a presentation on the project at today’s Central Sierra Connect Broadband Consortium conference in Tuolumne City.… More

South Africa endorses best practices for broadband development policy

South Africa’s goal is to bring a minimum of 5Mbps Internet access to half its population by 2016 and 90% by 2020, with 100% of school, medical and government sites getting at least 10 Mbps by then. To do it, the government is adopting essentially the same policy playbook as the European Union, Google, and Californian communities such as Santa Cruz, San Leandro and Loma Linda

  • Efficient permit granting: Responsible authorities will provide network operators with a clear, simple, transparent and efficient mechanism for granting permits for civil works.
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Old real estate business models slowing fiber upgrades

22 April 2014 by Steve Blum
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If you live in an apartment or condominium complex or similar – multiple dwelling units or MDUs as they’re called – then there is an additional hurdle between you and faster Internet service: your landlord or home owners’ association. Generally speaking, ISPs have to get permission to upgrade or install broadband facilities on private property. Those who control access can, in many cases, demand some form of compensation for saying yes.

Google has run into this problem in Kansas City.… More

Google offers a better benchmark for Santa Cruz broadband policy


The color scheme is optional.

Santa Cruz County is moving closer to slashing red tape for broadband projects to the level urged by Google Fiber, in its talks with other cities in California and elsewhere in the U.S. That’s not to say that Google has any interest in putting a fiber system anywhere on California’s central coast. Nor that new broadband infrastructure rules are a done deal here. Not by a long shot. But it’s to the point where it’s more useful to compare Santa Cruz County to Google’s fast track than to the normal course of broadband construction in California.… More