Back to the (secret) drawing board for FCC set top box plan

17 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Shhhh. No one else is supposed to know.

FCC chairman Tom Wheeler’s plan to set up an industry licensing board to review apps created by pay TV providers that will allow third-party set top boxes to access their programming is slowing down, if not dead in the water. The senior republican and democrat on the house judiciary committee – Bob Goodlatte (R – Virginia) and John Conyers (D – Michigan) – released a joint statement yesterday blasting the plan, saying “there are many unresolved questions about this proposal, not the least of which is the fundamental question of whether the Federal Communication Commission even has the authority to create such a regime”.… More

Telcos can't trouble, annoy, molest, embarrass, inconvenience, hinder, impede or obstruct Californians, court rules

16 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Don’t bother ugly ducklings, either.

California cities may regulate the aesthetics of cell sites and other wireless telecoms facilities. That was the ruling yesterday from a California appeals court, in a case brought by T-Mobile, Crown Castle and ExteNet against the City and County of San Francisco (h/t to Omar Masry there for the pointer).

The major argument in the case hinged on the definition of use. California law (section 7901 of the public utilities code, if you’re keeping score) says that telephone companies can build infrastructure on “public roads and highways in such manner and at such points as not to incommode the public use”.… More

AT&T copper network replacement presentation video posted

15 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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AT&T’s plan to replace rural copper networks in California with a fixed wireless broadband service running at 10 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload speeds was presented to the Eldorado County board of supervisors two days ago, on 13 September 2016. The conversion will be subsidised by the Federal Communications Commission’s Connect America Fund phase 2 program, which will give AT&T $360 million in California alone, and $2.6 billion nationwide.

The video was streamed live, and I’ve posted a recording to YouTube.… More

For results, trim down Pai's broadband plan to an FCC punch list

15 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Use the home field advantage.

Earlier this week, FCC commissioner Ajit Pai offered a long checklist of actions he’d like to take to improve Internet access and promote economic development, in rural and inner city communities in particular. Those items fall into two categories: things he wants congress to do – good luck with that – and things the Federal Communications Commission can do on its own authority.

Pai is proposing gigabit opportunity zones – low income areas where service providers would get federal tax breaks to improve broadband service and entrepreneurs would likewise benefit if they located there.… More

AT&T confirms plans to replace California copper service with wireless

14 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Copper sunset.

AT&T will spend $360 million earmarked for broadband service improvements in rural California on fixed wireless broadband service and not on upgrading or maintaining existing wireline networks. That was the message from Alice Perez, an AT&T staff lobbyist, to the Eldorado County board of supervisors yesterday (h/t to Fred Pilot at the Eldo Telecom blog for the heads up). Nationwide, AT&T is getting a total of $2.6 billion in federal Connect America Fund (CAF) subsidies over six years to upgrade broadband speeds in predominantly rural areas.… More

Governor Brown contemplates a stack of broadband decisions

13 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Say yes to the trench.

Although it isn’t as high or as deep as originally hope, governor Brown has a significant pile of broadband-related bills that he’ll have to work through by the end of the month.

My favorite is assembly bill 1549 by assemblyman Jim Wood (D – Healdsburg). It started out as an ambitious attempt to bring Caltrans around to the idea that fiber and conduit are transportation infrastructure too. It won a series of unanimous votes as it moved through the legislature, but in the end it was considerably trimmed back to satisfy Brown, who was more accepting of Caltrans’ opposition to the bill.… More

California legislature approves LA fast track wireless reviews, sorta

12 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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The way California law works now, if a permit application for a new cell tower is held up for more than five months because of reviews or challenges resulting from the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), then the permit is deemed approved. Yep, regardless of whatever other issues are involved, once the shot clock expires, permission to build a new cell tower is automatically granted.

Suppose, though, that CEQA didn’t apply to…

  1. Antennas, including microwave dishes and arrays.
… More

Smart policy has to lead smart technology to make a smart city

11 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Nobody knows what a smart city is. Or rather, everybody defines smart city differently, depending on individual goals: it’s a means to an end.

For equipment makers and service providers, a city is smart if it buys their stuff. To a network operator, a smart city is one that hangs that stuff, whatever it might be, on its network. On the private sector side, the smart city vision is marketing driven and has a distinctly vertical focus – there was little or no interest in horizontal integration on display at the smart city panel sessions I sat in on at the CTIA show in Las Vegas last week.… More

Surviving CPUC reform bills sent to governor

10 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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Final versions of two utility regulation reform bills have been sent to governor Brown for his review. Senate bill 62 and SB 512, carried by senator Jerry Hill (D – San Bruno), change the way the California Public Utilities Commission conducts business. Both were passed in the final hours of the legislative session last month, without last minute changes.
SB 512 is the more consequential of the two. It aims to open CPUC proceedings to greater public scrutiny and participation.… More

FCC set top box plan takes app-based approach

9 September 2016 by Steve Blum
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The Federal Communications Commission has backed off from requiring pay-TV companies – cable, telco, satellite – to open up their networks and allow consumers to buy and use a set top boxes made by third party companies. Instead, the FCC is pushing a hybrid plan – given the litigious response from the industry, I wouldn’t call it a compromise – that would have pay TV operators create apps that can run on third-party boxes.

The FCC has only released a summary of the proposed new rules.… More