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FCC Rules Telcos Need Not Provide Naked DSL
Devistater writes "Despite at least four states' laws to the contrary, the FCC has ruled that phone companies need not provide naked DSL service to customers, but can require bundling; for example: Voice and DSL.
FCC Commisioners Copps and Adelstein say in dissent 'In this decision, the Commission unwisely flashes the green light for broadband tying arrangements.' 'If it is [ok] to deny consumers DSL if they do not [have] analog voice service, what stops a carrier from denying broadband service to an end-user who has cut the cord and uses only a wireless phone? What prevents a carrier from refusing to provide DSL service to a savvy consumer who wants stand-alone broadband only for VoIP?'"
Free Market arguments don't apply to local phone comapies. They have monopolies in their areas and close to local governments... This is arguably a good thing, but it's not possible for another company to come in and start putting down new phone lines. No chance for competion -> free market reasoning does not apply.
--Jeff
Um,no. Thanks for drinking the free market koolaid. In my town, there is one city granted monopoly cable provider, and one city granted monopoly telephone provider, whom are the ONLY options for broadband. What about "city granted monopoly" is congruent with free market again?
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
While having the ability to choose seems like a good idea, forcing companies to give you a choice inevitably leads to price structures like "$50 for a 50 channel bundle, or any channels of your choice for only $20 per channel". They blame it on something like 'costs of restructuring service' and charge you more for 3 channels than they do for 50. You're back where you started, essentially forced into buying the bundle.
Internet wouldn't be any different. "1Mbit DSL for $90, or 8Mbit for $20 if you subscribe to our $70 call plan". You have the choice not to pay for a voice line, but I bet 99% of people would keep the line and the company would wave those statistics around as proof that people don't want internet alone.
If you bothered to read the ruling and not the opinion piece, you would know that the ruling merely tells the States to butt out and stop trying to enforce rules that conflict with existing FCC unbundling rules. This rules removes the conflict between FCC and State rules.
Under the existing FCC rules, the encumbant Telco is not required to offer DSL even if your lines are capable of providing it (they do it because its profitable). BellSouth had a policy of not offering DSL if the local loop was being used by a competitive telco to provide analog voice service. Probably due to techincal and billing issues. Some states were trying forcing BellSouth to provide DSL anyway. This was illegal.
This ruling does not automatically mean that the telco will refuse to provide DSL unless you buy voice service from them. In reality, what you'll probably see is the telco providing discounts for getting both DSL and voice service from them. Like Verizon offering cost saving bundles for home and wireless.
I did think of that. The local cable company (northern Baja California) requires me to purchase a TV channel package in order to get their broadband internet. So it works out just as expensive as phone+dsl.
Actually, corporations are legal persons and as such have some of the same independent rights that people ('natural persons') have. Corporations are protected against federal regulation that isn't allowed under the Commerce Clause. Corporations also have Due Process protections against Takings (ie. deprivation of certain property rights), and have some Equal Protection protections as well (they are treated equally as any other 'party' in a lawsuit, for example). They also have some First Amendment rights (commercial advertising has speech value that the government cannot arbitrarily regulate).
IINAL, but I am a law student.
btw--the FCC rulemaking authority over this kind of market activity certainly derives at least from Congress' power to regulate Interstate Commerce. Might be a dumb decision, but, I doubt it's illegal. (There might be some antitrust issues if the DSL companies overreach, but since these telcos are usually regulated monopolies anyway, I doubt the antitrust rules apply in the usual way.)
sig my booty, check my website
Ok, I'll bite. The Center for Public Integrity reports that FCC officials had accepted nearly $2.8 million in travel and entertainment expenses over the past eight years, mostly from the telecom and broadcast industries they regulate. This extends to Michael Powell, who seemingly maintained the status quo. Recently however the department has changed its policies and is requesting more federal funds for travel to replace what was once paid for outside of the goverment.
30 characters are fine for a s