CPUC approves Digital 299 fiber project, Webpass transfer, pole access enquiry

23 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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In a 4 to 1 vote, the California Public Utilities Commission voted to spend $47 million on the Digital 299 middle mile fiber project this morning. It’s a 300 mile network connecting Trinity and Humboldt counties to long haul routes in Shasta County. The no vote came from president Michael Picker.

The CPUC also unanimously approved Google’s purchase of Webpass, a mostly wireless broadband provider that is also licensed as a wireline telephone company – hence the need for commission review – and granted a request to begin consideration of new access rules that would allow licensed telephone companies to hang wireless equipment on utility poles.

FCC chair needs to upgrade his competitive thinking

23 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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For a smart guy, Federal Communications Commission chairman Ajit Pai can be awfully obtuse at times. Particularly where telecommunications competition is concerned.
On the one hand he extolls its virtues, saying to a Pittsburgh audience last week that “a competitive free market is crucial to unleashing private-sector ingenuity”. Just so. But in that same speech, he endorsed giving government subsidies to incumbent telephone companies, called for less regulation of those monopolies and ripped the idea that spending money on building competitive infrastructure or supporting new competitors has any value.… More

All or nothing for Digital 299 tomorrow

22 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Update, 23 March 2017: the CPUC voted 4 to 1 to approve the Digital 299 grant this morning.

The Digital 299 middle mile fiber system will either get all of the $47 million that its backers are requesting from the California Advanced Services Fund, or it won’t be subsidised at all. The California Public Utilities Commission will make that choice tomorrow, assuming the current schedule holds, when it considers whether or not to fund a 300-mile fiber route that would begin near Redding, where it would connect to existing fiber lines along the I-5 corridor, and run through Trinity County and terminate on the Humboldt County coast, at Eureka and Trinidad.… More

Google says we're so sorry Kansas City and yanks fiber

21 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Grab the Google rabbit by the tail and face the situation.

Google’s vague pledge to complete fiber networks it was already building is worthless, it turns out. According to a story by KHSB-TV, residents of some Kansas City neighborhoods who signed up for service but never received it are getting cancellation notices from Google…

Hello,

Thanks for signing up for Google Fiber. Although we’ve been working hard to bring you service, we’re unable to build our network to connect your home or business at this time.

… More

Broadband subsidies should be spent on California's future

20 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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There’s more than $100 million left for broadband infrastructure subsidies in the California Advanced Services Fund and the California Public Utilities Commission is considering whether to set its own, statewide priorities for spending it. The first draft of a staff white paper that looks at objective methods of determining those priorities is open for comment, and I submitted three recommendations on behalf of the Central Coast Broadband Consortium on Friday…

  1. Be forward looking in assessing broadband development needs.

… More

CPUC considers pole access, Google and fiber

19 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Update, 23 March 2017: the CPUC voted 4 to 1 to approve the Digital 299 grant this morning, and unanimously approved Google’s purchase of Webpass and the enquiry into expanded utility pole access.

Three important decisions are in front of the California Public Utilities Commission this week: a $41 million (or perhaps $47 million) grant for a northern California middle mile fiber project, formally considering whether telephone companies can attach wireless gear to utility poles and what the aesthetic impacts might be, and allowing Google to buy Webpass, a mostly wireless Internet provider that’s also licensed to offer wireline service.… More

G.fast field trial shows both speed and limits

18 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Strictly for short tracks.

British Telecom – aka BT – is offering real world verification of the speed claims made regarding the G.fast standard, which is technology that’s designed to get fast, fiber-like broadband speeds out of copper wires. The results are encouraging and live up to reasonable expectations, if not all the marketing hype surrounding G.fast.

According to a story by Sean Buckley in FierceTelecom, BT has found that G.fast’s field test results reasonably match laboratory predictions…

The provider is seeing great interest from customers and favorable technical results from its G.fast

… More

Verizon threatens to end NYC FiOS service over lawsuit

17 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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New York City is suing Verizon for failing to build out fiber to the home service to all residences as promised and Verizon might retaliate by yanking out television service citywide. And stroppy landlords are making it a three-cornered fight.

Like any legal dispute that’s measured in billions of dollars, it’s a complicated affair. But one of the central issues is Verizon’s problems with getting access to apartment buildings and condos – multi-dwelling units (MDUs).… More

Give me the money, then I'll give it to AT&T says Pai

16 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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In his “first major policy address” as chair of the Federal Communications Commission, Ajit Pai urged congress to channel broadband infrastructure spending through him. Pai spoke at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh yesterday, and focused almost entirely on broadband, with particular emphasis on the mobile variety.

Broadband infrastructure is at the top of his policy agenda. If congress decides to fund it, Pai thinks that the FCC should run the program and channel the money through its existing, incumbent-centric subsidy programs…

Any direct funding for broadband infrastructure appropriated by Congress as part of a larger infrastructure package should be administered through the FCC’s Universal Service Fund (USF) and targeted to areas that lack high-speed Internet access…

…our track record is frankly better than that of other agencies.

… More

CenturyLink gets extortionate pricing bonus from Level 3 deal

15 March 2017 by Steve Blum
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Level 3 is engaging in “extortionate pricing” for the middle mile fiber connections it leases to broadband companies, and the problem will only get worse if CenturyLink is allowed to buy it. That’s the claim made by Windstream, a relatively small incumbent telephone company, based in Arkansas, that also offers data networking and other telecommunications services to businesses outside of its primary coverage area.

Windstream filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission, as it decides whether CenturyLink’s proposed purchase of Level 3 will go forward.… More