fcc

Telecoms companies don't manage information, they just transmit data

3 August 2016 by Steve Blum
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Honest, dude. You’re a dumb pipe.

There’s one big question at the center of the wrangling over whether Internet access can be regulated under common carrier rules: is it a telecommunications service or an information service? Federal law says telecommunications is a common carrier service and information is not.

When telecom laws were last overhauled 20 years ago, Internet access looked a lot like an information service. Nearly everyone dialled up an online service – America Online or Earthlink, for example – that, at a minimum, handled your email and provided a portal to proprietary data, public but non-Internet protocol content such as Usenet groups, and FTP and other servers, as well as the world wide web.… More

Your freedom of speech belongs to you, not your ISP

1 August 2016 by Steve Blum
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Freedom means what?

The most dangerous argument against treating Internet access as a common carrier service was made by a Texas wireless Internet service provider last Friday. In a petition asking a federal appeals court to reconsider its decision to uphold the Federal Communications Commission’s common carrier rules for broadband, Alamo Broadband made the outrageous claim that its First Amendment rights were violated because its right to freedom of speech includes the right to decide what its subscribers can and can’t see on the Internet.… More

Whose network is the network now?

31 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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No network to see here. Move along.

One of the six requests for another appellate court review of the Federal Communications Commission decision to regulate broadband as a common carrier service came from the mobile industry’s lobbying front, CTIA. It objects to being under the same regulatory umbrella as plain old telephone service, as do some of the other appellants.

CTIA’s argument hinges on what the definition of public switched network really is – under federal law, mobile broadband can only be regulated as a common carrier service when connected to it.… More

Industry asks appeals court to reconsider broadband common carrier rules

30 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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Politics? Moi?

The next round of legal challenges to the newly upheld decision to treat broadband as a common carrier service have been filed. Alamo Broadband, AT&T, the Cellular Telephone Industries Association (CTIA), the National Cable Television Association (NCTA), TechFreedom and the U.S. Telecom Association (USTA) are asking the federal appeals court in Washington, DC to reconsider its earlier ruling and have all eleven of its active judges re-hear the case, instead of just the three that heard it earlier.… More

Mobile data lifeline can't hold its own weight

25 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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You need a thick line, not a slim thread.

Verizon is kicking heavy bandwidth users off of its unlimited mobile data plans. That begs the question of what exactly unlimited means, but that’s for another time. The justification Verizon offers, though, shows why the Federal Communications Commission’s plan to include grossly inferior mobile service in its broadband lifeline program is nonsense. As reported by Fierce Wireless, Verizon said it can’t handle the load…

“Because our network is a shared resource and we need to ensure all customers have a great mobile experience with Verizon, we are notifying a very small group of customers on unlimited plans who use an extraordinary amount of data that they must move to one of the new Verizon Plans by August 31, 2016.

… More

AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Comcast, DISH in, Sprint, Charter out of spectrum auction

16 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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Sixty-two companies made down payments and qualified for participation in the first buy round of bidding for up to 100 MHz of UHF spectrum currently held by television stations. The Federal Communications Commission released the list yesterday, along with instructions and a schedule for practice rounds of bidding and the auction itself, which will begin on 16 August 2016. The goal is to clear a total of 126 MHz of spectrum, with 100 MHz going to mobile broadband assignments and the remainder used for unlicensed service and guard bands.… More

Mobile lifeline fraud will only get worse

7 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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No carrier left behind.

An FCC commissioner wants Californian regulators, along with their counterparts in Oregon, Vermont and Texas, to answer questions about how eligibility for lifeline telephone service subsidies is managed. All four states have their own process for determining whether a subsidised lifeline customer meets income eligibility standards and verifying that any given household only receives one subsidy.

Republican commissioner Ajit Pai sent largely identical letters to the heads of the four public utilities commissions, including California Public Utilities Commission president Michael Picker, asking, among other things how they “determine whether the one-per-household rule is being enforced?”… More

If carmakers haven't figured out wireless in 20 years, they never will

3 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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More unlicensed spectrum for WiFi and other uses will add value to the U.S. economy. That’s the argument FCC commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel is making to congress as a matter of general policy and to colleagues as opportunities to reallocate frequency assignments are evaluated.

One immediate thing the Federal Communications Commission can do – and democrat Rosenworcel as well as republicans Michael O’Rielly and Ajit Pai want to do – is to shift 75 MHz of spectrum around 5.9 GHz (5.850 GHz to 5.925 GHz, to be exact) from an unlicensed but otherwise restricted short range, transportation-related allocation to general use.… More

High, perhaps unrealistically high, price asked for TV spectrum

1 July 2016 by Steve Blum
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Golden.

It’ll cost $86 billion to free up 100 MHz of broadcast television spectrum for licensed mobile broadband use and another 26 MHz for guard bands and unlicensed users. That’s the result from the reverse auction run by the Federal Communications Commission for television station owners, who were supposed to progressively bid down the price they were willing to accept in exchange for giving up their assigned channels.

That figure is more than twice as much as originally expected.… More

The FCC didn't forbear from broadband rate regulation

19 June 2016 by Steve Blum
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Not everybody gets through at the same time.

Republicans in the U.S. house of representatives want to write a ban on FCC broadband rate regulations into law. But that simple step would have far reaching implications for the net neutrality restrictions the FCC placed on ISPs. As the dissenting judge in the latest appellate court case wrote, it’s not just about how much an ISP can charge subscribers…

The [FCC] (at least for the moment) allows ISPs to provide consumers differing levels of service at differing prices.

… More