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FCC Considers Deregulation of DSL
Phlatline_ATL writes "In an article on ArsTechnica, they explore the FCC's current consideration to reclassify DSL as an information service and as such would no longer require the telcos to lease out their lines. This seems like it would effectively make the telcos the exclusive DSL broadband providers." From the article: " So after six months to a year it would be goodbye Earthlink and Speakeasy, hello SBC DSL monopoly (in the case of Chicago, where I live). So the telcos would get what they want, which is no competition while the consumers get screwed. But it's perfectly logical under the FCC's definition of broadband competition, where they want cable to compete with DSL--and hopefully IP over power lines and WiMax down the road."
They're not the cheapest, but their staff is the most knowledgable I have seen, and they're definately the most Linux-friendly.
The more people that switch away from SBC the more money the competition has to fight this stuff.
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Clearly SpeakEasy and Earthlink don't know how to properly bribe officials to keep themselves in business. It's their own fault, really.
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This seems like one of those grand opportunities, like the building of the U.S. highway system, where the government could step in and provide universal internet access. Such a move would make it possible for people out in the countryside to get broadband and access to high speed internet services.
The current problem is that the vastness of America means that private companies don't find it cost effective to hook up Ma and Pa Kent out in the sticks. But under a government system, those people would get the service.
A lot of people don't want to pay for that, I'm sure. However, if you consider that the reason you have your broadband is because it just happens that you are lucky enough to live in a densely populated area. People who run farms and are otherwise far away from the crowds of cities simply can't generate enough demand to make it worth the broadband companies' while to hook them up.
This deregulation is the opposite direction that the FCC should be taking. There are certain things that the government ought to provide, or ought to subsidize in large amounts, and one subset of those is basic utilities. The Internet is one of the utilities that will be key in the future of our country. It makes sense that we get a jump on it now and wire (figuratively speaking. Wireless would work as well) the whole country up.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
Isn't that like saying only one company is allowed to make pencils, and another to make pens, and those two companies will compete? They fight with the marker company and the crayon company too?
Is this what competition now is?
I agree. The same rules should apply to phone companies and to cable companies. The notion that the phone company is a "utility" but the cable company provides a "service" is outdated.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
The infrastructure built by the Bells was heavily subsidized by... your tax dollars.
Would another company be allowed to build poles and run lines right next the current lines?
McLeod has Fiber running 150 feet from my house along County Rd 46. I don't have access to those lines and they are likely sharing the "public space".
So why are they being treated differently? If we are going to regulate/deregulate due to public space I want access to that Fiber.
What is wrong is that the ILEC's (SBC, Verizon, etc) have had 100+ years as a protected monopoly to build their networks on the backs of their captive customer base.
CLEC's and other DSL providers have had since the 1996 Telecom Act to try to build a business in the face of the 800 lb gorilla.
It is silly to act like the ILEC's have been successful by building a business just like anyone else does. They haven't. They had the enormous advantage of being the only game in town for a long, long time.
What we need is structural separation.
Break each Babay Bell into two units.
One being a regulated company that owns the outside plant. It would be required to sell access to everyone equally at requlated, cost-based rates.
Take the switching and retail side of the company and put it into another, un-regulated unit. This company would buy loops from the regulated company just like every other CLEC does.
Of course this is pie in the sky.
The Baby Bell's have far too much lobbying power for this to ever happen.
No company is going to be able to install the nationwide infrastructure that the telcos have -- it would be a multi-trillion-dollar investment if it was even possible given the amount of disruption to everyday life (digging up streets, etc.) that would be required. It was built piece by piece during the monopoly era, funded by a combination of tax money and monopoly profits, over a period of 90 years. The only way to participate in the DSL market is through the existing infrastructure.
To anyone who thinks Bell Telephone was a benign monopoly, well, you're wrong. I remember all too well the days when you had one choice of long distance carrier -- AT&T -- and you paid whatever they felt like charging. I remember when a 3-minute call to a town 15 miles away cost $1.63 (my parents made sure I'd remember). I remember when you were legally prohibited from owning a telephone; you had to rent them from the phone company, and since they had a monopoly there, too, they had no reason to offer anything more than desk, wall, and "princess" styles, and a handful of colors (about 5), so they didn't. I remember when long distance calls were something you made on special occasions, birthdays and holidays, not how you chatted with your friends for hours. I remember when they required you to get permission before connecting so much as an answering machine, and argued that allowing people to plug in their own hardware would cause the entire national phone network to collapse. (funny, it's still there) The Bell monopoly was never benevolent.
It is just mind-blowing that the federal government is redefining "competition" as "closing down multiple profitable companies competing in a given market and turning that market over to a single monopoly."
The power company owns the poles (and hates it when people call them telephone poles). Nothing is stopping a company from leasing pole space from the power company to run lines to compete with the phone and cable providers except the extreme cost.
It depends on where you live. Some places the power company owns the poles. In other places the telephone companies own them. Then there are the distribution companies. They just own the poles and right-of-ways and don't make either electricity or dial tone. Regardless of who owns them they are almost always part of a regulated utility monopoly, and therefore come under the controls of the PUC in your state, and they don't want the poles to become overloaded. Either technically or visually. There are regulations on how many cables can be on the poles or burried in the right-of-way. There are regulations on how close they can be. So, when it's all said and done, most places it is almost impossible to get cable for new technologies run, so forget competing technologies. Why in the world do you think municipal wireless initiatives are getting so much push? No cost for wiring IS a factor, but a lot of places they simply CAN'T run the wire.