9th Circuit Overturns FCC's Cable Modem Decision

Decaffeinated Jedi writes "According to this Washington Post article, a federal appeals court in California has overturned a Federal Communications Commission decision that many smaller companies claim has kept them locked out of the high-speed cable Internet business. As Chris Murry of Consumers Union (publisher of Consumer Reports) notes, 'Many consumers hate their cable companies' privacy policies and their failure to deal with spam effectively. Giving consumers a choice of Internet service providers would open the door to more competition, and let people choose services with better privacy and less spam.' As noted in News.com coverage of this decision, however, FCC chairman Michael Powell plans to appeal the ruling." Reader rednaxela provides some more insight (and a link to the ruling itself), below.

rednaxela writes "The 9th Circuit today issued a decision overturning the FCC's classification of cable modem service as an 'information service,' stating instead that cable modem service consists of both an 'information service' *and* a 'telecommunications service.' Telecommunications services are classified under Title II of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and are subject to all kinds of regulation. Information Services are classified under Title I, and are largely free from regulation. If upheld, this decision will likely require cable modem providers to open their networks to competing ISPs. Further, this is likely to derail, or at least complicate, the FCC's plans to classify DSL service (which is provided primarily over incumbent telco facilities) as a unified 'information service." Bottom line - the 9th Circuit's decision may well have preserved open access for competing ISPs on all forms of wireline networks.' Here is the 9th Circuit's ruling (PDF).

Comments

I'm in Canada

[B3ryllium]

I hate that Shaw is such a monopoly in my particular region. In cities, they compete with Telus - but frankly, Telus is the greater of the two evils. That's another topic for another day, however.

Out here in Ruralland Canada, Shaw Cable is the only choice for highspeed, and they charge an arm and a leg AND make you sign over your firstborn. It's very annoying. I'd like to see them put in charge of the infrastructure alone, and have mom & pop ISPs handle the cable modems, and the end-user support. They should only have to pay a small per-client licensing fee, and be given free reign to charge what they'd like above that for internet access. They should also have the option of regulating speeds at their own discretion, for various bundle offerings.

Does anyone think this is a good way to break up monopoly power, or is it just silly?

Re:I'm in Canada

[eht]

Canada and monopolies can be a slight problem, the US allows Microsoft to operate, but they won't even let DeBeers in.

Can't have it both ways

[perimorph]

People are complaining about ISPs not doing enough about the spam problem, and yet people also complain about how on-line privacy is being erroded..

Now, someone please explain to me how these two "goals" (less spam and more privacy) can co-exist with each other. I just really don't get it.

Re:Competition=good thing.

[homer_ca]

Yes, competition is good, but does that also mean more taxes for cable modem service if it's classified as a telecommunications service?

BOTH GOOD & BAD

[exhilaration]

This is good for those of us that already have access to high-speed cable Internet. The investment has already been made which pretty much means that it can only get better. (Note the optimism)

This is bad for those that lack access to high-speed cable Internet, perhaps because they don't live in highly metropolitan areas. As it becomes more likely that a cable company will have to share its infrastructure, the cable company becomes more likely to drag its heels. For example, Verizon held back the deveopment of DSL in the northeast because they were forced to share their network.

Any thoughts?

Question?

[TnkMkr]

It was my understanding that the phone companies had to open their lines up because their infrastructure was in part funded by the government. And a lot of the initial capitol to build a reliable phone system was provided by the taxpayers.

I thought the cable companies totally funded the construction (or purchase of pre-existing) system, and had no government assistance financially or otherwise? If this is the case is it fair to force a private company to allow competitors to use the fruits of their labor?

I picture a similar case being United Parcel Services being forced to share it's truck fleet with the competition, just because no one else can afford to buy their own trucks.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

Re:Question?

[pben]

The Phone companies in the USA have mostly been privately funded. The exception was rural telephone companies started during the depression (1930's), they got loans at rates that were backed by the US goverment.

The Bell system was formed about a hundred years ago by merging and buying out of other private phone companies. AT&T agreed to regulation in return for buying out their competition. The US goverment changed their mind in the 1980's and that lead to the mess we have in today's US phone system.

US Cable systems have fought hard to keep out both comptition and all levels of goverment controls.

Re:Competition=good thing.

[twistedcubic]

My cable internet bill has increased with each aquisition (Comcast formerly AT&T formerly Mediaone) and the last time I had to order basic cable in addition to keep the bill under $60/month. Hopefully another company will now step in so I'll stop dreaming of going back to sucky DSL.

Re:No need to worry...

[whatparadox]

The 9th Circuit decisions get overturned more often based on volume, but it is the largest circuit by far. By percentage, The 9th sits average ~75%. I heard this on NPR's All Things Considered; Sept. 17, 2003; "Arguments on Recall Filed with Appeals Court"

What the hell!?

[Negativeions101]

You can't even find a decent ISP anymore. You hear people talking about how this and that company is a monopoly, customer service sucks, they don't deal with spam properly, service inconsistent, etc. Why is that? What the hell is going on!? Why can't there just be a high-speed ISP that does what it's supposed to do? Is it that they just don't give a crap or what? Remember back when Microsoft said that high speed internet was going to take a couple of years longer to come to the mainstream then anticipated? I think there's something fucked up going on. Fuck high-speed internet, fuck technology... fuck computers. The whole industry makes me sick to my bloody stomach.

South Korea has an easier job of it.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

maybe now the most-technologically-advanced United States will catch up with third-world South Korea in broadband!!

South Korea has a much easier time rolling out broadband than the US.

In particular, something like 90% of the population lives in large apartment buildings in dense cities. LARGE apartment buildings. SO large that they each have a small telephone exchange in the basement.

Wiring all those apartments for broadband is a snap. For instance you can put a router in the basement, hook it into the SONET ring, and feed the phone lines with DSL. They're so short that getting 6 Mb to every apartment is a snap. (Or use two pair in the phone cable and send 'em Ethernet.)

In the US, on the other hand, you're dealing with a country that spans a continent from side to side and about a third of the way from top to bottom. Thousands of miles both ways. (It takes a week or so to drive across it.) On the average that takes a LOT of wire/cable/fiber to get everybody hooked up.

You'll notice that, like South Korea, the net (both narrow and broadband) is being rolled out mostly on existing copper: dialup, phone-pair DSL, and cable TV coax. (Exception is wireless, which also doesn't involve stringing something new to each house - just shine an antenna on it.)

But UNlike South Korea maybe half the population lives too far from the CO for even a 1.5 Mb downlink / puny uplink to work over phone pair.

Re:Build competing networks!

[Anonymous Coward]

Your new telephone pole outside the house.

Michael Powell is on the side of the media cos

[andy1307]

Michael Powell supports media consolidation redardless of the side effects(mostly negative for the consumer). In this example, Fox is squeezing Cox(;0) by demanding cox pay a higher rate for Fox Sports. This means higher cable bills for consumers which in turn drive them into the waiting arms of Direct TV, also owned by Fox parent News Corp.

bah. mark my words, this will be bad.

[pb]

You missed the other half; this is obviously an attempt to shut down or regulate the nascent VoIP market. The big phone companies don't want to slash their margins and have to compete with Vonage and the 10-10 numbers on price and value, so they'll do it in the courtroom.