Uncategorized

Cable wins the broadband market fight, telcos lose. Again

14 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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The U.S. cable industry’s broadband subscriber count grew by 1.7% in the last quarter of 2017, while telephone companies continued to lose customers. That’s the top line from a tally by FierceTelecom of 15 of the 16 largest Internet service providers (Wow Cable hasn’t reported yet, although check the link – FierceTelecom will be updating its numbers). It’s a trend that continued throughout 2017.

In total, cable companies added 918,000 Internet subscribers, while the telco loss was a bit more than 7,000 subs – negligible in terms of percentage, but a significantly bad result in a growing market.… More

Trump builds a virtual wall to fence high tech companies in

13 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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© Yann Forget / Wikimedia Commons, via Wikimedia Commons

Broadcom will not buy Qualcomm, and will not become the third largest chipmaker in the world, behind Intel and Samsung. Not because the eye watering price – $117 billion, the largest such high tech transaction ever – is too high. Not because the deal doesn’t make economic sense. It’s because U.S. president Donald Trump says it will harm U.S. national security.
Using his authority to define what national security needs are and squash transactions that threaten them, Trump categorically blocked Broadcom’s Singapore-based corporate parent and its Californian affiliate from buying San Diego-based Qualcomm.… More

FCC will have to defend net neutrality repeal in San Francisco

12 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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The luck of the draw means the future of network neutrality and broadband’s status as a common carrier service will be argued in San Francisco. Credit for that is split between the California Public Utilities Commission and Santa Clara County, who filed separate challenges to the Federal Communications Commission’s decision to eliminate net neutrality rules and scrap common carrier obligations for broadband service with the ninth circuit federal appeals court.

Several other organisations filed their appeals in Washington, D.C.,… More

Unanimous dig once vote puts broadband conduit in federal highway plans

11 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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Broadband infrastructure, and service providers, will have to be included in planning done for federally funded highway projects if, as expected, the U.S. senate goes along with a bill – house resolution 4986, aka the Ray Baum act – passed by the house of representatives last week. State transportation departments wouldn’t be required to include conduit and other telecoms facilities in projects, but they would have to share their construction plans with broadband companies and other state and local agencies, and do a minimal amount of coordination.… More

State lawmakers can do stupid things to the Internet too

10 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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State legislatures and governors are stepping into the void left by the Federal Communications Commission when it rolled back network neutrality last year. Laws reinstating net neutrality requirements of one kind or another passed or are pending in California, Washington, Oregon and elsewhere. In Montana, governor Steve Bullock did it by executive order.

That’s a trend that cheers up net neutrality advocates, but there’s another side to it that’s not so pleasant and offers a solid argument for keeping states out of the business of regulating the Internet.… More

Wyoming's legislature bows to telco, cable lobbyists, but not as deeply as California's

9 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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Following California’s lead, Wyoming lawmakers grabbed their ankles and took what cable and telco lobbyists gave them: a law that subsidises broadband infrastructure, but only to the extent that incumbents want. Even so, Wyoming is not buying into the 1990s service levels that lobbyists for Frontier Communications, AT&T, Comcast and Charter Communications bribed convinced Californian assembly members and senators to accept.

As described by Phillip Dampier in Stop the Cap, what started out as an effort to give communities the option of pursuing their own broadband projects turned into an incumbent right of first refusal, secretly rewritten by lobbyists for Charter and CenturyLink.… More

The State of Washington takes on Washington, DC with its own net neutrality law

8 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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The State of Washington is the first to enact a network neutrality law. Washington governor Jay Inslee, a democrat, signed the bill on Monday. Both republicans and democrats voted in favor, with the bill winning lopsided majorities in the Washington house and senate.

The core language tracks with the former FCC’s three bright line rules, as well as similar legislation introduced in California. Internet service providers would not be allowed to…

(a) Block lawful content, applications, services, or nonharmful devices, subject to reasonable network management;
(b) Impair or degrade lawful internet traffic on the basis of internet content, application, or service, or use of a nonharmful device, subject to reasonable network management; or
(c) Engage in paid prioritization.

… More

FCC considers clearing a path through federal reviews for small cells

7 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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Update: the FCC approved the report and order, click here for it.
Small cell sites and similarly sized wireless facilities will be able to skip federal environmental and historic preservation reviews if, as expected, the Federal Communications Commission okays new rules at its meeting later this month. As drafted, the FCC report and order would exempt “small wireless facilities” from studies and paperwork required by the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.… More

Wrangling over electric company fiber continues at CPUC

6 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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Both Southern California Edison and TURN, a consumer advocacy group, are lobbying the California Public Utilities Commission in the hope of pressing home their respective arguments about how much money generated from telecoms services, such as dark fiber leasing, privately owned electric companies can keep. The narrow issue that’s on the table is a master fiber lease agreement between SCE and Verizon that needs to be approved by the CPUC, but it could have far reaching effects on how, or even if, electric companies pursue telecoms opportunities and ultimately on the availability of independent long haul dark fiber in California.… More

Truth is the first casualty of small cell deployments

5 March 2018 by Steve Blum
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Mobile broadband companies are increasingly getting it when it comes to aesthetics, but pledges made on the front end aren’t always fulfilled by construction and operations staff or backed up by management. Wireless lobbyists and public relations people understand that they need to speak the right words to massage away concerns about how small cell installations will look as they proliferate along urban and suburban streets. But those oh-so-sincere promises, accompanied by beautifully rendered conceptual drawings, don’t always survive the descent into contract language, let alone appear on poles.… More