You know you’re in the topsy-turvy legislative thick of things when Verizon lands a video franchise smack in Cablevision’s territory, and Cablevision gladly promotes that fact. Verizon won a cable franchise for its FiOs TV service today in the town of Hempstead, NY following a unanimous vote by the town board.
Verizon has also landed franchises in the Long Island town of Massapequa Park and the Rockland County Villages of Nyack, South Nyack and Upper Nyack. News of the latest franchise win for Verizon prompted Cablevision to try to score some points on the legislative front.
In a statement, company spokesman Jim Maiella drove home the idea that this latest win is proof that phone companies don’t need video franchising reform.
Although we continue to believe that this franchise will let Verizon pick and choose which residents receive its new services, this approval demonstrates that it is not hard for the phone company to get local franchises if it participates in the process. Verizon should stop trying to change state and federal law and instead work with local governments. We will continue to deliver excellent products to our customers and will vigorously compete with the fourth provider of television service in the Town of Hempstead.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 9:16 PM | Print | Comments (2)
If I were a state legislator, I’d give up on trying to outlaw the sale of violent video games to minors, Senator Clinton’s efforts to fund research justifying these kinds of laws notwithstanding. The latest evidence that the courts are simply going to strike down these laws as violations of the First Amendment comes from a U.S. District Court Judge in Michigan.
Judge George Steeh, who had already issued a preliminary injunction against a Michigan law that barred the sale of violent video games to minors, made that injunction permanent yesterday. In his opinion, Judge Steeh said
Video games contain creative, expressive free speech, inseparable from their interactive functional elements, and are therefore protected by the First Amendment.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 8:11 PM | Print | Comments (0)
As the telecom reform legislative process kicks into overdrive (the Barton bill markup starts today in the House Commerce Committee, a crucial, probably days-long event which I will be able to monitor only sporadically over the next week due to travel), the proposals, counter-proposals, amendments and deal-cutting are coming fast and furiously. On the Senate side, Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND), both members of the Senate Commerce Committee, have circulated a draft net neutrality bill called The Internet Neutrality Act.
The bill establishes a national policy of broadband non-discrimination to preserve the open nature of the Internet. The bill contains a series of requirements for broadband providers, such as the the obligation of network providers to not block or impair users’ Internet access.
Beyond that the bill also has the following network neutrality provisions that require a broadband service provider:
(4) to provide on a reasonable and nondiscriminatory basis the ability to offer, provide or post content, applications, or services into the operator’s network in a manner that is at least equal to the speed and quality of service that the broadband network operator offers to affiliated content, applications, or services, and not to impose a charge on the basis of such content, applications, or services;
(5) to prioritize content, applications, or services within the operator’s networks based only on the type of content, applications, or services and the level of service purchased by the user, without charge for such prioritization;
(6) to make available the same bandwidth the operator uses to provide affiliated content, applications, or services in a way that permits a user to access and enjoy similar content, applications, or services offered by other persons; and
(7) not to install or utilize network features, functions, or capabilities that impede or hinder compliance with this section.
The bill also features a detailed section that directs the FCC to come up with rules implementing the legislation’s directives, specifying that the Commission come up with complaint and enforcement procedures, and directing the FCC to issue decisions on complaints within 90 days. Moreover, after receiving an complaint with prima facie evidence of a violation of the above obligations, the FCC is required to issue a cease and desist order against the offending broadband provider.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 5:10 PM | Print | Comments (1)
(Silver Spring, MD) As the number of municipal broadband initiatives mount, skeptics await what they believe will be the inevitable collapse of these government-backed ventures. Although it’s relatively easy to build communications networks, running them in a financially viable manner is another matter altogether, the doubters say.
But a group of muni-broadband proponents and industry representatives speaking here today at the Freedom-to-Connect (F2C) conference countered that proposition, pointing to a number of factors that make muni-broadband networks a success. “I don’t know what business models will be successful, bit it will probably be some confluence of business models,” said Ron Sege, CEO of wireless broadband tech provider Tropos.
Among the muni-Wi-Fi models out there are ad supported networks, such as that proposed by Google in San Francisco, subscriber-sponsored services, typified by EarthLink’s Wi-Fi efforts, municipally sponsored services and private networks run for the sole benefits of cities, among other models.
Anti-competitive behavior by incumbents don’t help matters, Sege said. Moreover, getting access to poles is a big problem for some Wi-Fi operators, a situation that could be resolved by giving Wi-Fi providers the same kind of federally legislated pole attachment rights that cable operators have. “Just as Congress in the 1980s made it easy for cable operators to attach to telephone poles, they could do the same thing here,” he said.
Muni-broadband attorney Jim Baller said a key factor to the recent surge in muni-broadband activity is growing acceptance by the public. “A key factor to success is that the public is getting it.”
Again, one thing holding back muni-broadband is anti-competitive behavior by the incumbents, Baller contended, with some phone companies undermining laws that permit municipalities to launch broadband services. Antitrust actions against these trouble makers, however, is not an option.
“For all of you who think the antitrust laws are a solution, forget it. They’re [antitrust lawsuits] too expensive, they take too long and there are too many victims along the way,” he said.
Esme Vos of Muniwireless.com said that the rise of big-city Wi-Fi projects point to the economic benefits that can be derived from municipal networks. Cities see Wi-Fi as a way to not only offer consumer broadband services but also as a means of cutting their own communications and personnel costs.
But, not all muni-broadband efforts are based on Wi-Fi. James Salter, CEO of fiber network construction company Atlantic Engineering said “wireless has its place, but it doesn’t solve the real core issue as to why the U.S. is 19th in terms of broadband.” Phone companies (with the exception of Verizon) and cable companies aren’t moving the ball either because they are just trying “to pump that antiquated copper and coax.”
Municipalities, on the other hand, could take the lead by building fiber-to-the-premises networks. “Municipalities may be the broadband savior,” Salter said. Atlantic Engineering has built 53 muni-fiber projects and “the average market share for these guys is between 50% to 60%. People flock to them because the service is so much better.”
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 1:49 PM | Print | Comments (0)
(Silver Spring, MD) A group of Democrats plan to introduce during mark-up an amendment to the Barton bill that bars phone companies from selling to content or application providers preferential or faster broadband transmission speeds unless the telcos also offer that preferential treatment to all comers at no charge. Mark up of that bill begins later today and continues through at least tomorrow (the markup will be carried live on C-SPAN).
Speaking here today at the Freedom-to-Connect (F2C) conference, Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA) said that he, along with Ed Markey (D-MA), Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and Jay Inslee (D-OH), will introduce an amendment “that says that if a telephone company or broadband provider of any kind decides to prioritize any content, then they have to offer that that same fast lane treatment to all content providers without charge.”
Boucher thinks that some Republicans will join the group in supporting the amendment, which is designed to shore-up the draft bill’s current net neutrality provisions. Boucher said that these current provisions, which give the FCC the statutory authority to hear disputes according to Commission “principles,” are a “step forward.”
But, these provisions don’t go far enough because they don’t give the FCC rulemaking authority. “There is not authority for a rulemaking however, so the Commission cannot elaborate on these principles,” Boucher said.
Moreover, the FCC established those principles at a time when the telcos’ two-tiered Internet business model wasn’t well-known. “The big problem here is that at the time that Chairman Powell was at the FCC and up until now we were not aware of a major new business model.”
Boucher said that this new business model, which he contends will be impossible to outlaw once it’s allowed to take effect, poses a threat to innovation. “The major problem I see is that there could be a dramatic adverse effect on innovation. It wasn’t that very long ago that Google was in a garage getting started,” he said. “How is that Google wannabe going to get into that fast lane today?”
Young companies or innovators won’t be able to buy their way into the fast lane. “They’re simply not going to be able to pay this toll. In the slow lane they’re not going to be able to compete. Latency matters in these instances.”
Boucher also said that he plans to introduce an amendent during mark-up that closes the so-called “terrestrial loophole,” referring to the program access rules contained in the 1992 Cable Act. Under these rules, a vertically integrated company (i.e. a company that holds ownership interests in both cable systems and cable networks) must give competitive video providers access to programming that is distributed via satellite.
However, a growing number of networks, particularly regional networks, are distributed via terrestrial means such as fiber networks and thus competitors don’t have access to them. Boucher’s amendment would close this “loophole.”
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 9:50 AM | Print | Comments (0)
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