Cable Internet Service Not Common Carrier

l2718 writes "The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed with the Federal Communications Commission that cable Internet service is an 'information service' rather than a 'telecommunication service.' This means that cable companies don't have to make their infrastructure open for competing ISPs to use. This is in distinction to the case of telephone companies and long-distance service, for example. For more information try the Center for Digital Democracy or read the Telecommunications Act."

Comments

Complete Ruling Online; Read for Yourself

[WebHostingGuy]

You can view the complete ruling in pdf here:

http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/27jun20051 200/www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/04pdf/04-277.p df

Major difference between phone and cable

[papasui]

Disclaimer: I'm a network engineer for a major cable company.
Everyone overlooks the major difference between phone and cable when saying cable should be opened up. That is (I'll prefix this with IN GENERAL, since there may be exceptions to this) cable systems were privately funded while phone systems used tax payer money. A second difference, although it will become less of one as cable telephony becomes more common is that phone is an utility service while cable is entertainment.

Re:Major difference between phone and cable

[Anonymous Coward]

Cable companies lease space on the power line utility poles to hang their cables, as typically does the phone company. The recipient is usually the power company, who negotiated a (usually) perpetual lease from the city in order to erect their power distribution network. Of course, there are exceptions - in the town where I live, the power utility is municipally owned. So the companies usually do pay for the privilege - it's not free (but sometimes the cost is just a token fee per year).

In the case of underground distribution, usually the power, telephone and cable companies pay the local municipality for the use of the underground conduit/pathways.

Back in the 1930's, Congress passed legislation called the Rural Electrification Act (REA) that lent money almost interest free, and I believe also contributed matching funds, to electric and telephone companies to build out their networks into rural areas (less population density equals more cost per subscriber). The REA is what most /.'s are really referring to when they talk about government subsidies.

REA money is what enabled your great-grandma to have an 8-party telephone line out in Hooterville, and later added the DTMF decoders at the central office to allow the old analog SxS switch to hear the Touch-Tones that the phone your grandma bought at WalMart to work on her existing service. And REA money is what helped your great-grandma to keep paying party-line rates even though she was converted to single-party service back in 1977...

Re:No more Earthlink over Time Warner?

[jratcliffe]

In your case, you'll be able to continue to have Earthlink. Time Warner is required to allow Earthlink access based on terms agreed to as a condition of the AOL/Time Warner merger.

Ok.

[papasui]

Disclaimer: I'm a network engineer for a major cable company. I know this is /. but we can brings some facts to the table. Monopoly: Cable is not a monopoly, (there may be some notable exceptions) there are areas where cable companies compete with each other. BUT you typically don't see this because it's simply unprofitable for them to do so. I know everybody thinks they should have cheap/free high speed internet service, but ALWAYS remember that a business has one primary purpose, to make money. Building a cable network to support a single city requires MILLIONS of dollars. Building cable plant typically costs $7.00 per foot, this includes price for nodes, amps, cable, fiber, maintence, employees. Then you have your cost for content, headend equipment (upcoverters, CMTS, combiners, forward lasers, multiplexers, etc, etc, etc). You better have a very solid business plan and know what you're doing if you plant compete with an established company and convince a city to open the right of way to you.

Re:The Real Problem Here

[Pentavirate]

If it's so much more profitable for cable companies to lock themselves into the ISP role for their networks, I wonder why Time-Warner allows Earthlink as an ISP on their network here in San Diego along with their own offering of Road Runner? Earthlink is even cheaper.

Common Carrier?

[windex]

Not common carrier, eh?

Well, here's the problem with this. Common carrier laws apply to telecommunications services. If Cable is not a telecommunications service, it's not a common carrier.

I strongly suggest someone sue charter, time warner, etc, for damages over the emotional trama the 'degrading' porn email they receive brings them. After all, that's why common carrier laws exist...

Scalia gets it right

[l2718]

Take care to read Justice Scalia's Dissent. In it, he shows a good understanding of how internet service works and what this means legally.

His point is that the cable companies are prodviding two services:

1. communications from your home to their ISP facility.
2. their ISP facility connects you to the rest of the Internet.

The second is an "information service" under the law. The first is a "telecommunication service". The cable company is bundling them together exactly to get around the regulations by claiming that the joint offering is an "information service", but they shouldn't be allowed to play such shenannigans.

Re:No more Earthlink over Time Warner?

[UnknowingFool]

This ruling means that Time Warner cannot be forced to lease to Earthlink. It does not mean that Time Warner cannot lease to Earthlink. If Earthlink and Time Warner already have an agreement, then you're safe with your service. But if the agreement expires and Time Warner does not want to renew the agreement then, yes, your option vanish.

I'm fine with 555-5767

[FatSean]

7 versus 3 digits...you know...it's not that hard. My phone even has emergency buttons on it! Big red ones that I pre-programmed. I only have to press ONE BUTTON now.

911 is for retards.

Re:The Real Problem Here

[museumpeace]

You haven't been around very long have you?

The US is a pretty right-of-center place in terms of what infrastructure we generally agree the govt should provide: these days its pretty much roads and dams, period. A handful of east coast cities and the Bay area think [though less and less] there should be public transportation. the govt is in the midst of a 2 decade retreat from even regulating, prefering the break-up of monopolies and deregulation to let magic market forces enforce fair and efficient distribution of services in air travel, rail [you think AmTrak is for real?] and telecommunications. So politically speaking you talk about a move THIS COUNTRY is heading away from faster with each passing year and would never make.
Technologically its an even dumber idea. The europeans have been decades getting out from under the legacy of phone infrastructure that was originally govt provided...the problems were manifold:

• response times to get a phone installed were measured in months
• innovation is one thing that competition does promote and Europeans enjoyed very little of that in phone service for the decades that the govt was the phone company
• the govt was the industry to a large extent so standards bodies generally worked with one hand tied behind their back.
• A "phone company" that was typically a subbureaucracy of the post office bureaucracy was a place where motivation to improve service would be stifled.

The underlying technology layers or the mix of technologies that we will use to deliver ever more bandwidth to ever more subscribers is just changing too fast to leave in the hands of bureaucrats and ultimately politicians. That ferment requires enterprises that can reinvent themselves frequently, not bureaucracies that inevitably ossify into selfperpetuating monuments to whatever problem they were originally chartered to do.