Comcast sucker punches business park startups

24 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, ,

Ars Technica enterprised a fascinating story that perfectly illustrates the problem new businesses face when looking for commercial and industrial-grade broadband connectivity. Cable companies – in this case it’s Comcast – advertise blanket availability of their highest service tiers, sign up customers to long term contracts, and then don’t deliver because their plant doesn’t reach the location. Or they dither for a few weeks or months, and then come back with a demand for tens of thousands of dollars in installation fees.… More

AT&T writes its own permission slip to end California wireline service

23 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , , , ,

Cheaper to chop than fix.

AT&T wants to rip out its copper phone networks in California and sell wireless voice and broadband service instead. Its lobbyists in Sacramento wrote a bill – assembly bill 2395 – that would give AT&T blanket permission to shut down regulated plain old telephone service and replace it with whatever kind of unregulated technology it deems most profitable.

For customers lucky enough to live in a high potential area – someplace dense enough with customers and cash to make wireline service sufficiently lucrative – that’ll mean voice over Internet protocol phone service running on one flavor or another of DSL broadband.… More

FCC tongue-tied as appeals court judge blows holes in muni preemption

22 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , ,

The Federal Communications Commission has serious difficulties explaining why it has the power to preempt state laws that restrict municipal broadband service. Matthew Dunne, an FCC lawyer, argued the agency’s case before three federal appeals court judges on Thursday, defending last year’s decision to remove state-imposed restrictions on municipal broadband systems in Chattanooga, Tennessee and Wilson, North Carolina.

The case hinges on whether the FCC is using authority granted (or not) by congress to remove barriers to broadband deployment, or if it’s simply interfering in a state’s traditional – and well litigated – right to manage what its cities and counties can do, and how they can do it.… More

AT&T tries $100 million grab from California taxpayers

21 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

AT&T wants to change California law so that it can take $100 million from taxpayers, for broadband service that’s considered unacceptable under state standards. Assembly bill 2130 was rewritten by AT&T lobbyists and re-introduced last week. It would 1. freeze the current California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) broadband infrastructure subsidy program, 2. authorise the collection of $100 million more from taxpayers, 3. distribute it according to byzantine rules that all but guarantee that the money would go to AT&T to spend as it pleases, while 4.… More

Hints of respectability for Google Fiber's sub count

20 March 2016 by Steve Blum
,

Some tantalising numbers have been published that could be interpreted as bad news for Google Fiber’s subscriber count. Or it might foretell market success. It depends on how you look at it.

MoffetNathanson Research took a bearish look at the latest filings with the U.S. copyright office, which collects pay TV data, and found that Google has 53,000 video subscribers in the three markets where it’s doing business – Kansas City, Provo and Austin – which indicates it grew by only 23,000 subs in 2015.… More

U.S. house bill says bigger ISPs have lower transparency standards

19 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Face it, $100 million is chump change here.

Mid-sized Internet service providers as well as small ones would be exempt from Federal Communications Commission rules that require, among other things, full disclosure of monthly price, fees, data caps and other such terms of service, under a bill approved unanimously (411 to zip) by the U.S. house of representatives. HR 4596 says that transparency rules adopted last year by the FCC, as part of its decision to regulate broadband as a common carrier service, “shall not apply to any small business”, which is defined as “any provider of broadband Internet access service that has not more than 250,000 subscribers”.… More

Charter offers to upgrade Californian systems if CPUC okays deal

18 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Charter Communications is willing to accept a long list of conditions on its purchase of Time Warner and Bright House cable systems in California, albeit not as long a list as the groups that are opposing the deal want.

In a filing with the California Public Utilities Commission, Charter offered to upgrade 70,000 Californian homes from 1980s style analog-only TV service to full digital broadband and video capabilities. That includes systems in the Salinas Valley that it has committed to upgrade, as a result of a negotiated settlement with the City of Gonzales and Monterey County.… More

FCC leaning toward allowing Charter to buy Time Warner

17 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

Word is beginning to leak out of the Federal Communications Commission that Charter Communications’ pending purchase of Time Warner and Bright House cable systems will get a green light from regulators. According to Politico, there are serious discussions going on regarding conditions that would be attached to federal approvals…

The latest development shows the Charter deal is further along the path than Comcast’s failed $45 billion bid for Time Warner Cable, which never reached the point where regulators seriously considered conditions, the sources said.

… More

Five teams compete for cash and honors at Watsonville agtech hackathon

16 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, ,

It’s more complicated than you realise.

An application that farmers can use to manage the hundreds of tasks they have to work through every day was the winner at the third Apps for Ag hackathon, held in Watsonville on Sunday. The two-person Central Coast Coordinate team took top honors with a web application that uses calendar and map technology to schedule individual jobs for specific locations in the fields.

A total of fifteen competitors representing five teams took part in the competition, hosted by Cabrillo College at the Solari Green Technology Center in downtown Watsonville.… More

You're not one of us, California cable tells Google

15 March 2016 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Not welcome.

Google probably thought its problems getting access to utility poles in California were safely astern. After all, the California Public Utilities Commission declared that Google is a cable company and has the same right as any other cable (or telephone) company to use utility poles. Turns out, other cable operators, via their Sacramento lobbying front, are claiming that Google Fiber isn’t a member of their tribe and shouldn’t be allowed on poles that they jointly control with electric and telephone utilities.… More