State lawmakers should exorcise muni broadband evil, federal advisors say

19 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Stomp on cities. Boiled down, that’s the conclusion of a group advising the Federal Communications Commission on what states ought to be doing to promote broadband deployment. The FCC formed the Broadband Development Advisory Committee earlier this year, which is top heavy with lobbyists and others from big and mid-sized telecoms companies, very weak on local or state government representation and devoid of any municipal broadband experience. The committee spun off five working groups, including one tasked with writing model laws for states to adopt or, potentially, for the FCC to impose through its assumed preemption powers.… More

Common carrier death watch begins in Washington, D.C.

18 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

As the Federal Communications Commission wrapped up its November weed whacking on Thursday, attention turned to the expected release of a draft decision that will overturn the Obama-era decision that classified broadband as a common carrier service. According to a Reuters story, it’s coming soon…

The head of the Federal Communications Commission is set to unveil plans next week for a final vote to reverse a landmark 2015 net neutrality order barring the blocking or slowing of web content, two people briefed on the plans said.

… More

MBEP conference follows local path to ubiquitious regional broadband

17 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Bringing ubiquitous high speed broadband to the Monterey Bay region requires goals set and pursued at the grass roots level, but benchmarked against a regional plan and standards. That was the top line consensus from a roundtable brainstorming session at the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership’s third annual State of the Region conference, held last week in Monterey.

The region takes in San Benito, Santa Cruz and Monterey counties. It quickly became apparent that one size would never fit all in an area that bundles high tech Santa Cruz and uber-rich Pebble Beach with Salinas Valley farming towns, the Paicines cattle country and the isolated peaks of the Santa Lucia and Gabilan mountains.… More

FCC bases big decisions on small facts spooned out by big telecoms companies

16 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

The Federal Communications Commission jumped in on the side of Charter Communications in a dispute with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission. The case was bumped to a federal appeals court – the MPUC lost the first round – and now the FCC has moved in to protect its turf.

The question is whether Minnesota can regulate voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) phone service the same way it does old style analog service. There’s a great article by Jon Brodkin in ArsTechnica that goes through the details of the case, so I won’t repeat it here.… More

Incumbents get first grab at California broadband subsidies and subs in January

15 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

Yesterday, California’s broadband infrastructure subsidy fund began its transition from a bottom-up program focused on independent, locally developed projects, to a top down one that’s gamed for the benefit of incumbents. The first post-assembly bill 1665 rules for the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) were put on the table by the California Public Utilities Commission.

The draft lays out the process for facilities-based incumbents – broadband service providers that own and operate their own equipment, wired or wireless – to exercise their right of first refusal for unserved areas.… More

FCC broadband committee offers letter to Santa deployment advice

14 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

There was a mix of good and awful policy on the table last Thursday as the Federal Communication Commission’s broadband deployment advisory committee (BDAC) heard from its five working groups. The BDAC was created by Ajit Pai shortly after he got the nod to be Donald Trump’s FCC chairman. Its job is to offer advice on how to speed up broadband deployment by breaking down legal, regulatory and bureaucratic barriers. Although there are nuggets of sound policy to be found, what it came up with mostly reads like wish lists written by telecoms lobbyists.… More

We're not selling lit service to Verizon, says SCE

13 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

In an apparent attempt to dial down the heat on regulatory review of its dark fiber leasing deal with Verizon, Southern California Edison wants to remove any reference to electronics from the paperwork it filed with the California Public Utilities Commission.

SCE has been in the dark fiber business for a couple of decades, and is certified by the CPUC as a competitive telephone company – it holds a certificate of public convenience and necessity (CPCN) that allows it to lease dark fiber and sell other telecommunications services, including lit data transport, on its 5,000 mile fiber network.… More

Google Fiber picks MDU cherries in Orange County

12 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, ,

Google Fiber is figuring out how to play small ball and still get thousands of fiber to the home subscribers. In its latest blog post, Google tells how it’s expanding its fiber footprint – actually, making lots of tiny paw prints – in the southern California multi-dwelling unit market…

The Village is the latest apartment community in Orange County with access to our super fast Internet + TV. Additionally, we announced on Thursday that sign ups are now open for residents of The Park at Irvine Spectrum.

… More

Quickest way to defeat cyber security is to not engage it

11 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, ,

Newsflash! Bad software development practices cause bad results. That’s the gist of a press release issued by Appthority, an IT security company specialising in the mobile enterprise sector.

What Appthority found isn’t a particular revelation. Developers will often hard code their own login credentials into apps while writing and debugging early versions, just to keep things simple. If they forget to remove that data before moving into beta testing and launch phases, it’s there for the taking.… More

Comcast asks FCC for privilege without responsibility

10 November 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

Comcast has joined Verizon in pushing the Federal Communications Commission to override state and local laws that might affect their business. In a required notice filed after a private meeting with FCC chair Ajit Pai’s top staffers, a lawyer for Comcast said they urged the FCC to overturn its 2015 decision to regulate broadband as a common carrier service, and to make sure that state and local governments didn’t try to pick up the slack…

At the meeting, we reiterated Comcast’s support for restoring its prior classification of broadband Internet access service (“BIAS”) as an interstate information service and reversing the 2015 decision to classify BIAS as a [common carrier] telecommunications service…

We also emphasized that the Commission’s order in this proceeding should include a clear, affirmative ruling that expressly confirms the primacy of federal law with respect to BIAS as an interstate information service, and that preempts state and local efforts to regulate BIAS either directly or indirectly.

… More