June 2014 – Page 3 – Steve Blum's Blog

Broadband astroturf grows thicker

10 June 2014 by Steve Blum
astroturf, att, broadband, comcast, fcc, ncta, public policy, utopia

The astroturfing season is officially open. According to a story in Vice, big incumbent ISPs are trying to make their opposition to new FCC network neutrality rules or, worse, reclassification of broadband as a regulated, common carrier service look like it’s coming from the common people. A group calling itself Broadband for America – who could be against that? – is cranking up an artificial grassroots – astroturf – campaign against net neutrality. But the group’s leadership is not exactly made up of consumer advocates…

Last month, Broadband for America wrote a letter to the FCC bluntly demanding that the agency ‘categorically reject’ any effort toward designating broadband as a public utility.

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AT&T's rural broadband solution makes satellite look cheap

9 June 2014 by Steve Blum
att, cpuc, public policy, rural broadband, viasat

Something for everyone off the turnip truck.

As it shuts off new rural DSL connections, AT&T is talking up the wonders of its wireless service. It’s only going to get better if regulators allow it to take over DirecTv, at least according a statement the company filed with the SEC…

Today, many Americans in rural areas lack access to a high speed broadband service or have access to only one provider. With the cost synergies and increased revenue from this transaction, AT&T will expand its high speed broadband build to offer a competitive bundle of high speed fixed wireless broadband and satellite video service.

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Is Google looking at an orbital backbone?

8 June 2014 by Steve Blum
broadband, geek stuff, google, leo, worldvu

It was a good look then.

Google is making another sexy move with satellites, or so the rumor goes. It’s supposedly via an investment in WorldVu Satellites, which has picked up the spectrum originally assigned to SkyBridge, one of the failed low earth orbit (LEO) ventures of the 1990s. Iridium and GlobalStar actually launched, primarily as voice telephone services, but both had to go through the wringer of bankruptcy before there was even a hope of sustainability.… More

U.S. supreme court sticks to the strict meaning of patent infringement

7 June 2014 by Steve Blum
akamai, geek stuff, innovation, limelight, patent infringement, patent troll, public policy, scotus

There’s good news in the U.S. supreme court’s unanimous decision this week to toss out a patent infringement lawsuit brought by Akamai against a competing content delivery network, Limelight.

The court declined to open a vast new frontier for patent troll claims. Akamai, of course, isn’t a troll – it uses its patented technology to good effect – but it was trying to make the case that a partial (and thus, under law, allowable) duplication of a method it developed was actually an infringement because Limelight told customers how to complete the missing steps themselves.… More

On the whole, it's broadband market failure

6 June 2014 by Steve Blum
att, broadband, charter, comcast, DirecTv, mobile, public policy, sprint, t-mobile, time-warner

What’s a snowball’s chance in Washington?

Telecoms mega-deals (or have we upgraded to giga-deals?) are snowballing: four in four months. First Comcast and Time-Warner, then Comcast and Charter, AT&T and DirecTv and now Sprint and T-Mobile. Each new merger – of companies or markets – looks to the previous ones for justification. If Comcast is bulking up, AT&T needs to as well. A bigger AT&T, in turn, requires that Sprint and T-Mobile combine forces, or so they say.… More

AT&T Gigapower tease is just a Gigaweasel

5 June 2014 by Steve Blum
att, broadband, DirecTv, ftth, public policy

AT&T is promising more fiber (and, by the way, higher rural wireless broadband speeds) if it’s allowed to buy DirecTv. That’s one way of reading a disclosure statement it just submitted to the SEC, but it’s not the way to bet.

What the filing actually says is…

The economics of this transaction will allow the combined company to upgrade 2 million additional locations to high speed broadband with Gigapower FTTP (fiber to the premise) and expand our high speed broadband footprint to an additional 13 million locations where AT&T will be able to offer a pay TV and high speed broadband bundle.

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Rumored FCC upload standard not designed for transparency

4 June 2014 by Steve Blum
broadband, connect america fund, cpuc, fcc, national broadband map, public policy

Might be substandard, but impossible to tell for sure. Click for bigger version.

The FCC’s definition of adequate broadband service as 4 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up has long been outdated. The California Public Utilities Commission has been working with a minimum of 6 Mbps down and 1.5 Mbps up since 2012, when it adopted it as the threshold for determining which areas would and would not be eligible for broadband construction money from the California Advanced Services Fund.… More

Nimby laws will keep Google Fiber out of its own backyard

3 June 2014 by Steve Blum
broadband, ceqa, ftth, google, google fiber, palo alto, public policy

All Google has accomplished so far by including 5 Silicon Valley cities on its list of 34 candidates for fiber build-outs is to prove that California is a land of opportunity for obstructionists and not for broadband. To build on its home turf, Google Fiber has to accept that state and local laws allow anyone with an objection – no matter how trivial – to snarl and delay construction for months or even years.

The clearest warning comes in Palo Alto’s response to the Google Fiber City Checklist.… More

Mono County homes line up for gigabit service

2 June 2014 by Steve Blum
broadband, casf, cpuc, escrbc, ftth, gigabit, public policy, race telecommunications, suddenlink

Not well served. Yet.

Four small communities in southern Mono County could be getting gigabit class fiber to the home service by the end of 2015. The California Public Utilities Commission is scheduled to consider a resolution to spend $4.7 million on an FTTH project for the Aspen Springs, Chalfant, Crowley Lake and Sunny Slopes areas at its 26 June 2014 meeting.
The project was proposed last year by Race Telecommunications, one of five the company submitted in the current round of applications to the California Advanced Services Fund.… More

Broadband as vital as water to Santa Cruz County economy

1 June 2014 by Steve Blum
broadband, public policy, santa cruz

Upgraded broadband infrastructure is at the center of Santa Cruz County’s proposed economic development plan, and the public is being asked to comment on it. Santa Cruz County supervisors voted unanimously to start a formal 45-day review process for the draft Economic Vitality Plan that sets out 7 steps for improving the local economy.

Broadband facilities would be as important as any other type of public infrastructure, such as roads and water. The document is laced with references to broadband development goals.… More