public policy

Kill AT&T's California wireline exit bill, don't bother tinkering with it

11 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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AT&T’s ongoing attempt to re-write California law so that it can replace rural wireline broadband and regulated telephone systems with unregulated wireless service is up for a vote in a key assembly committee on Wednesday. It’s opposed by the California Public Utilities Commission, among others. During the CPUC’s debate, commissioner Mike Florio said spike assembly bill 2395, don’t bother rewriting it…

In my legislative work over the years, there was an adage that I learned that you don’t amend a bad bill.

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AT&T's bid to nix wireline obligations opposed by CPUC

8 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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End of the line?

AT&T wants to end wireline service where ever it pleases and that drew fire yesterday from the California Public Utilities Commission. But not the whole commission. By a 3 to 2 vote, the CPUC officially went on record as opposing assembly bill 2395, written by AT&T and carried by Silicon Valley assemblyman Evan Low.

The bill itself is dressed up with talk about improving technology and reducing pollution but, as commissioner Catherine Sandoval explained, it gives AT&T blanket permission to do whatever it wants, however it wants, without subjecting itself to inconvenient regulations or bothersome competitors…

This bill would seem to allow a carrier of last resort to keep all the poles, keep all the conduits, keep all the rights of ways, keep the wires, keep the buildings, keep all the facilities that they want, offer none of the services – no basic services – and have no interconnection obligations.

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CPUC votes 3 to 2 to oppose AT&T bid to end wireline service

7 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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By a split vote, the California Public Utilities Commission has gone on record opposing a bill going through the state legislature – assembly bill 2395 – that would allow AT&T to effectively yank out its wireline network at will, and replace it with wireless service. Three commissioners – Catherine Sandoval, Mike Florio and Carla Peterman – supported a staff recommendation to oppose the bill. President Michael Picker, backed by commissioner Liane Randolph, wanted to take a neutral position on the AT&T sponsored bill, which comes up for a hearing next week.

Online consumer cancellation law threatens broadband monopolies

7 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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That’s not the AT&T logo about to explode, is it?

Sometimes the simplest laws bring the biggest changes. That might be the case for a proposal from California assemblyman Mike Gatto (D – Los Angeles) to make it as easy to cancel broadband or video service as it is to sign up for it. Assembly bill 2867 adds one sentence to California consumer protection law…

If a cable or Internet service provider enables an individual to subscribe to its services through an Internet Web site, it shall also enable all of its customers to cancel their subscriptions through the Internet Web site.

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FCC says 150 GB is all rural residents need

6 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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Urban benchmarks for rural residents. Right.


Telephone companies that get federal subsidies to provide rural broadband service have to offer at least one service package with a monthly data cap of 150 GB and charge no more than $71 for it. That’s the top line from an annual survey run by the Federal Communications Commission to set benchmark rates for subsidised service in high cost – also known as rural – areas.
The survey looks at rates paid by consumers in urban areas, in particular those served by cable and fiber to the home systems, and the amount of data they use every month.… More

FCC tells big ISPs to tell the plain truth

5 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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By definition, competition requires market information. Internet service providers, like pretty much any business, have a natural tendency to want to reduce competition. So they make it very difficult to do comparison shopping. Try going to Comcast’s or AT&T’s website and get a fast and straight answer to a simple question: what’s the monthly price for a service package? It takes tenacity to get it, if it can be had at all. It’s one more way to protect a monopoly business from the perils of competition.… More

If red tape could carry data, California would lead the broadband world

4 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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A Shasta County broadband project is trapped in California’s web of environmental regulations, and it’s going to cost taxpayers $400,000 or more to pull it out. Not to mention that the rural phone company building the project has to stump up a few hundred thousand dollars of its own.

In 2013, the California Public Utilities Commission approved a $3.1 million grant from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) to the Happy Valley Telephone Company to pay for 60% of the cost of upgrading its network in and around the small Shasta County town of Olinda to VDSL2 technology.… More

Stormy FCC okays lifeline subsidies for broadband

1 April 2016 by Steve Blum
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Politics.

The Federal Communications Commission approved a lifeline subsidy for broadband service yesterday with high drama and a party line vote. As is common practice at the FCC, no one knows what the program actually is, except commissioners and staff. And maybe not even them.

According to press reports, yesterday’s meeting was delayed for three hours while democrat Mignon Clyburn tried to negotiate a bipartisan agreement with the two republican commissioners, Ajit Pai and Michael O’Rielly.… More

FCC approval near for Charter's Time Warner takeover

29 March 2016 by Steve Blum
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The clock is just about run out.

All indications are that Charter Communications has cut a deal with the Federal Communications Commission that will allow it to buy out Time Warner’s and Bright House’s cable systems, making it the second biggest U.S. cable company, after Comcast.

Major newspapers and wire services are floating stories that generally all jibe. Which means they’re either banging around in the same speculative echo chamber or the FCC sprung some leaks.… More

AT&T's political troops muscle Tennessee into submission

28 March 2016 by Steve Blum
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Lobbyists, primarily from AT&T, won the day in the Tennessee legislature when they leaned hard enough on a handful of lawmakers and killed a bill that would have allowed municipal broadband utilities to expand beyond city limits. According to a story in the Chattanooga Time Free Press, a “platoon” of AT&T political operatives descended on the Tennessee capitol to convince a bare majority of a key subcommittee to kill a compromise bill that would have allowed one pilot project to move ahead.… More