WiFi dominates California public housing broadband grant proposals

18 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Good enough for public housing.

Wired networks account for only two of the 52 public housing grant proposals made to the California Public Utilities Commission in the first round of applications. The rest either rely on WiFi – mesh networks, mostly – or, in the case of 24 projects proposed by the San Bernardino County housing authority, don’t specify a technology type.

Promised service speeds are consistent with both the technology proposed and the CPUC’s disappointing low minimum of 1.5 Mbps down and nothing particular for uploads, significantly less than the 6 Mbps down/1.5 Mbps minimum it thinks is acceptable for Californians who don’t live in public housing, and nowhere near the FCC’s new standard of 25 Mbps down/3 Mbps up.… More

FCC won't bulldoze state bans on muni broadband, yet

17 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Parked.

Hopes and fears that the FCC will sweep away state restrictions on municipal broadband at its upcoming meeting this month appear overblown. That’s not to say it won’t be an important decision – assuming, as is all but certain, at least three commissioners vote yes – but it will involve particular issues in two cities in two states. That’s what FCC chair Tom Wheeler told a tech group in Colorado last week…

To be clear, my proposed ruling on these two petitions for pre-emption is an adjudicatory matter.

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Smartphone sales grow as Chinese brands bag bigger global share

16 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Chinese smartphones loom larger.

Trying to track shipment figures for any global consumer electronics product can be a tricky business – piecing together the puzzle requires access to many sources with many agendas – but that said, market research company TrendForce has spotted a significant trend: collectively, Chinese smartphone manufacturers grabbed a huge share of the worldwide market in 2014.

According to TrendForce, manufacturers shipped 1.2 billion smartphones last year, with Chinese companies accounting for 450 million, or 39% of the global total.… More

Last call for telegraph companies, says FCC

15 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Does this mean the end of the candygram too?

Just in time to bring broadband service under its regulatory umbrella, the FCC is doing some clean up work on its common carrier rules. It’s proposing to completely delete regulations it either hasn’t officially enforced in many years or are simply outdated, and to begin erasing telegraph from its vocabulary.

The first step, it seems, is to find out if telegraph service exists anymore…

We seek comment on whether there are any providers offering telegraph service today at all, and if so, whether such service offerings warrant retaining the term “telegraph” in the rules…Would there be any practical impact if the Commission were to delete “telegraph” from these rules?

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Central coast leaders dig into broadband

14 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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There’s one big similarity between water and broadband access on California’s central coast: there’s a lot of it close at hand but high cost and low quality make it nearly unusable. That’s how I set up a discussion about broadband at the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership (MBEP) conference in Seaside a couple weeks ago.

The Central Coast Broadband Consortium has mapped hundreds of miles of fiber optic lines throughout the region. But most of it, like water in the Pacific Ocean, is too expensive for everyday use.… More

Will common carrier-lite Internet rules kill local loop competition?

13 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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The days of plain old telephone service aren’t behind us yet, but the time will come — sooner rather than later — when all telecoms services, including voice, run over Internet protocol systems. The switch from copper to end-to-end fiber is a bit further down the road, but it’s near enough that practical questions about it have to be dealt with now.

Yesterday, the California Public Utilities Commission offered its suggestions on how to do that to the FCC, unanimously approving comments for the feds to consider.… More

Santa Cruz County supervisors look at fiber plan, consider options to move ahead

12 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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On Tuesday, Santa Cruz County supervisors took a look at the broadband development plan that I previewed a couple of days ago. It sketched out a possible core fiber network in five key unincorporated areas of the county that have been identified as economic development priorities, as well as providing additional support for the broadband infrastructure policy initiatives that are already underway.

“Infrastructure is already inadequate and it’s being pulled back”, Peggy Dolgenos, CEO of Cruzio, a local independent ISP, told supervisors after the presentation.… More

Public posturing is a lousy way to evaluate new Internet rules, but it's all the FCC allows

11 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Vague outlines are little help, just give us the full picture.

If you assume for the moment that both (democrat-appointed) FCC chair Tom Wheeler and (republican-appointed) commissioner Ajit Pai are speaking the literally truth when they characterise what the current plan to bring the Internet under common carrier utility rules actually says, then the shape of what’s in the still-secret document starts to emerge.

Wheeler gave a speech to a tech group in Colorado on Monday.… More

Fiber network proposed for five Santa Cruz County communities

10 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Click for the full report.

Build an open access fiber backbone network through areas Santa Cruz County that are high priorities for economic development: that’s the recommendation county supervisors will hear later this morning when they consider a draft broadband master plan.

The study, prepared for the county by Design Nine, includes a number of useful recommendations about broadband policy and planning, but the center piece is an independently operated fiber system that focuses on five key areas of Santa Cruz County.… More

There are devils lurking in the details of new broadband rules, warns FCC commissioner

9 February 2015 by Steve Blum
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Minority report.

The latest plan to regulate broadband under common carrier rules is “a monumental shift toward government control of the Internet”, according to FCC commissioner Ajit Pai. On Friday, he released his rebuttal to chairman Tom Wheeler’s rosy summary of a thick – and still secret – proposal to impose stricter rules on how Internet service providers operate.

As a commissioner, Pai gets to see it now, before it’s voted on and released publicly at the end of the month.… More