California legislature tweaks telecoms policy instead of killing it

16 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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Despite AT&T’s quest for de facto deregulation of telecommunications infrastructure and service, no major telecoms policy changes emerged from the California legislature this year. A few small ball telecoms-related bills did emerge by the end of the 2019 session early Saturday morning, though, and were sent on to governor Gavin Newsom.

Assembly bill 1366 is dead, at least for this year. There was no last minute conniving to pull it out of the committee deep freeze it landed in earlier in the week.… More

Five years and two FCCs later, FTC settles data throttling case against AT&T

13 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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The slow motion network neutrality enforcement ping pong match between the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission resulted in a data throttling settlement with AT&T, according to a story by Bevin Fletcher in FierceWireless. The details haven’t been released yet, but if approved by FTC commissioners it would end a dispute over how AT&T manages – throttles – the bandwidth consumed by millions of customers with grandfathered unlimited data plans.

AT&T’s mobile data throttling isn’t limited to legacy all-you-can-eat customers, at least according to research published last year, but the FTC’s enforcement action is limited to legacy data plans that are no longer offered.… More

California sits out Google anti-trust investigation

12 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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Attorneys general from forty-eight states, plus the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, launched a joint anti-trust investigation against Google on Monday, looking specifically at how the company handles online advertising. The group isn’t accusing Google of anything in particular yet, but they have their suspicions and if those prove out, an anti-trust lawsuit is sure to follow.

Only two states opted out of the investigation: Alabama and California. The absence of California attorney general Xavier Becerra from the group is puzzling to many, and he isn’t offering any hints.… More

AT&T’s backdoor telecoms deregulation bill runs out of room in the California senate

11 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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“AB 1366 was pulled by the author, so it will not be considered today”, said senator Ben Hueso (D – San Diego) as he called the senate’s energy, utilities and communications committee to order yesterday. Assembly bill 1366 would extend a ban on regulation of voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) and other “Internet protocol enabled” services in California.

Conventional wisdom says the bill is dead for this year. It wasn’t amended before last night’s constitutional deadline, so there’ll be no more wrangling over the bill’s language.… More

California telecoms backdoor deregulation bill, AB 1366, stalls

10 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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Assembly bill 1366 was “pulled by the author” ahead of a committee hearing this afternoon. The California senate’s energy, utilities and communications committee was supposed to review amendments made last Friday, but that didn’t happen. No reason was given. The bill might be dead, or it might be going through a final rewrite, ahead of tonight’s hard, constitutional deadline for amending it. Or something else – anything is possible today. Tomorrow, well, that’ll be a different story.… More

“Rate neutral framework”, whatever that is, promised as PG&E offers plan to pay wildfire costs and get out of bankruptcy

10 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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PG&E filed its plan for coming out of bankruptcy with the federal judge handling the case yesterday. The company proposes to give $8.4 billion to those harmed by wildfires over the past four years, both individual and public agencies, another $8.5 billion to insurance companies that have already paid out claims resulting from those fires, as well as a previously agreed $1 billion to a group of northern California public agencies.

In a press release, PG&E’s CEO, Bill Johnson, was quoted as saying the reorganisation plan is a “rate neutral framework”, but didn’t elaborate.… More

AT&T snakes perks into California deregulation bill, while its author ducks for cover

9 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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AT&T slipped more special privileges into a bill that would, in effect, deregulate broadband and modern voice service in California. At the same time, the bill was disowned, sorta, by its godmother, assembly member Lorena Gonzalez (D – San Diego).

Assembly bill 1366, which would extend an existing ban on regulation of voice over Internet protocol service (VoIP), was amended ahead of Friday’s soft deadline for changing bill language in the California legislature (Tuesday is the hard, constitutional cutoff for amendments).… More

FCC is a mouthpiece for telecoms industry’s “self-interested assertions”, local governments tell federal court

6 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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Riverside pole mount

The rounds of written arguments and counter arguments in the appeals of last year’s FCC decisions preempting state and local governments’ control of public right of ways and ownership of property, such as street light poles and traffic signals, they install there is drawing to a close. Several groups filed rebuttals to the FCC’s defence of its preemption. The primary opposition came from a reply brief filed by a long list of cities and counties in the federal appeals court based in San Francisco, which is hearing the combined challenges to two sweeping rulings made by the FCC last year.… More

FCC’s bromance with mobile lobbyists shines through in briefs. Court briefs, that is

5 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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The FCC’s subservience to the telecommunications companies it’s supposed to regulating – or at least the grovelling of its republican majority – is highlighted by the industry’s defence of sweeping preemptions issued by the commission last year. In a brief filed with the San Francisco-based ninth circuit federal appeals court, carriers and their lobbyists effectively admit they were gaming the judicial system when they tried to steer the case to a friendlier court, with the collusion of the FCC.… More

AT&T’s executive shuffle puts WarnerMedia chief in charge of broadband service

4 September 2019 by Steve Blum
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AT&T made two key executive promotions yesterday, naming erstwhile technology chief Jeff McElfresh to head up its broadband and telephone (landline and mobile) businesses, as well as DirecTv, and promoting WarnerMedia head John Stankey to president and chief operating officer, making him the clear second in command to chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson.

Stankey’s new job, according to an AT&T press release is “bringing together the distinct and complimentary capabilities of AT&T Communications, WarnerMedia and [advertising subsidiary] Xandr to deliver…the benefits of a modern media company”.… More