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The FCC Is Preparing To Weaken the Definition of Broadband (dslreports.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from DSLReports: Under Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act, the FCC is required to consistently measure whether broadband is being deployed to all Americans uniformly and "in a reasonable and timely fashion." If the FCC finds that broadband isn't being deployed quickly enough to the public, the agency is required by law to "take immediate action to accelerate deployment of such capability by removing barriers to infrastructure investment and by promoting competition in the telecommunications market." Unfortunately whenever the FCC is stocked by revolving door regulators all-too-focused on pleasing the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Comcast -- this dedication to expanding coverage and competition often tends to waver.
What's more, regulators beholden to regional duopolies often take things one-step further -- by trying to manipulate data to suggest that broadband is faster, cheaper, and more evenly deployed than it actually is. We saw this under former FCC boss Michael Powell (now the top lobbyist for the cable industry), and more recently when the industry cried incessantly when the base definition of broadband was bumped to 25 Mbps downstream, 4 Mbps upstream. We're about to see this effort take shape once again as the FCC prepares to vote in February for a new proposal that would dramatically weaken the definition of broadband. How? Under this new proposal, any area able to obtain wireless speeds of at least 10 Mbps down, 1 Mbps would be deemed good enough for American consumers, pre-empting any need to prod industry to speed up or expand broadband coverage.
What's more, regulators beholden to regional duopolies often take things one-step further -- by trying to manipulate data to suggest that broadband is faster, cheaper, and more evenly deployed than it actually is. We saw this under former FCC boss Michael Powell (now the top lobbyist for the cable industry), and more recently when the industry cried incessantly when the base definition of broadband was bumped to 25 Mbps downstream, 4 Mbps upstream. We're about to see this effort take shape once again as the FCC prepares to vote in February for a new proposal that would dramatically weaken the definition of broadband. How? Under this new proposal, any area able to obtain wireless speeds of at least 10 Mbps down, 1 Mbps would be deemed good enough for American consumers, pre-empting any need to prod industry to speed up or expand broadband coverage.
Simply eliminate all local monopolies on internet access and you will see all manner of companies jumping into the fray.
Yes. These monopoly agreements must be declared illegal at the federal level, with an actual law which overrides state law. If we can't even manage that, we literally cannot fix this problem.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
But honestly 10 megabits is perfectly fine. I live in rural Mississippi and have a 10 mbps cable connection that loads everything perfectly fine from emails and websites all the way up to 720p netflix steaming. The 25down/4up definition is only 2 years old, and going to 10down/1up as a modification will still be much better than the pre-2015 definition of only 4down/1up.
So much wrong and stupid with this statement I dont know where to begin..
1. Some of us might like 1080p or 4k video streams
2. Try streaming more than 1 video at a time, your 10 mbps will top out fast. And dont get me started on how horrible a slow upload of 1 mbps is to use.
3. So we should not try to excel, we should do the absolute bare minimum. Making america great again eh?
So you don't have kids or family staying? At Thanksgiving at my sister's house there are 6 kids and 10 adults. One TV and dozens of laptops and tablets. Being able to stream 2-4 streams at a time is normal.
My house only has 50mbs but I can watch things stutter when we have a large party
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
I visited my mother (in rural France) over Christmas, where she gets about 10/1. I'd agree that 10Mb/s down is pretty reasonable as an absolute minimum, but 1Mb/s up is quite painful.
In 2002, I was in a shared house where we decided to pay extra to get the 1Mb/s service from the cable company (their default was 512Kb/s). I stayed on their top tier until it got to 10Mb/s. At that point, I stayed on the 10Mb/s service until it was the cheapest that they offered, then it became 20Mb/s and then 30Mb/s. My most recent move was to a house without cable service, but with FTTH. I'm on their slowest service, which is 54Mb/s down, 9.5Mb/s up. I don't notice much difference between 10 and 54Mb/s downstream, but the difference between 1 and 9.5Mb/s upstream is enormous.
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I'm neither for nor against this redefinition of terms, but there's two different issues here: (1) what speeds do you need to get access to all the bells and whistles, and (2) what speeds are so slow that the government needs to step in and prod things along. Those two speeds don't necessarily need to be the same.
If you can get 10Mbps down, you can do your homework, access job sites, and all of the other reasons cited as justification for the government being involved in the first place. You can also watch a heck of a lot of cat videos, waste time on Facebook, etc. I get 100Mbps down where I live, and I'm super grateful for it, but part of that is cuz I still remember the 300 baud modem days. :)
Anyway, I don't know if the redefining of terms is being done out of bad motives or not, but there is some potential upside to it. For example, TFA talked about how a good chunk of the US doesn't have even 10Mbps yet, so lowering the "good enough" bar to 10Mbps could help keep the focus on those parts of the country that are the most underserved.
Adequate for you, but 'broadband' definitions should only ever escalate. Unless the notion that we're being run by a bunch of regressive bastards is true...
There is no XUL, only WebExtensions...
Around here, municipalities are installing their own fiber last miles. It's carrier neutral. Eventually, independent operators will be on those systems, they will interconnect and the big carriers will be sucking wind trying to suck money out of old outdated infrastructure. Break the rules.
"You might want to look up the term 'natural monopoly'."
Finally something intelligent said about this. I get tired of reading comments by libertarians that don't understand anything about economics, especially macro economics. You can't get real competition in markets that are inherently natural monopolies. Regulation, or outright government takeover are the only alternatives.
The real problem for the US is that universal high speed broadband is starting to be a competitive advantage for other countries that are pushing high speed internet to all of its citizens. We have allowed corporate propaganda to obscure the fact that the US is falling behind in something that we created.
Let us take an example from history. Does anyone know anything about the Rural Electrification Act? It was a push by the US government to get good electricity to every person in the country. Before the act if you lived out side of a major city in a rural area you almost certainly didn't have electricity.
Getting electricity to everyone in the country actually greatly helped the US Economy in the long run, but no company would have done this on its own because it just wasn't profitable in the short run.
Does anyone see a parallel with broadband access? The Rural US has terrible access to broadband, and it is killing small towns. If we started a Rural Fibre Act, we would see revitalization in small towns because businesses could start to look to locate in these areas.