public policy – Page 179 – Steve Blum's Blog

Longmont voters will decide whether to back FTTH with their electric bills

3 August 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, community networks, ftth, google, longmont, provo, public policy

Putting broadband bonds on the meter.

As Google Fiber takes the reins in Provo, Utah, the city council in Longmont, Colorado is heading to the ballot box to, essentially, ask voters if they want to follow the same path. At least as far as using city electric bills as collateral.

The Longmont council voted in May to move ahead with plans to build a fiber-to-the-home system, leveraging an existing – and successful – municipal dark fiber business.… More

New season, new FCC

2 August 2013 by Steve Blum
fcc, public policy

I’m not saying Mike O’Rielly looks anything like this, but really, Bill O’Reilly does.

The Federal Communications Commission should be up to full strength by September. President Obama rubber stamped the recommendation of U.S. senate republicans and appointed Mike O’Rielly to take the empty GOP seat on the commission. He’s likely to walk hand in hand through the senate confirmation process with another Washington insider, Tom Wheeler, Obama’s pick for FCC chair.

Wheeler is a former cable and mobile phone industry lobbyist who has been involved in venture capital pursuits lately, at least when he’s not busy raising money for presidential campaigns.… More

California lawmakers have a chance to reconsider cable lobby's big lie

1 August 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, casf, ccta, comcast, community networks, cpuc, public policy, sb740

Even Comcast doesn’t believe 1.5 Mbps is enough.

The effort to resurrect a proposal to add $90 million to the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) and allow independent ISPs and cities to apply for grants is gathering steam. The California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) has published a white paper that’s aimed at debunking one of the more outrageous bits of misinformation spread by cable lobbyists as they derailed the bill in an assembly committee last month.… More

Slow broadband a drag on Seattle mayor's re-election campaign

28 July 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, centurylink, comcast, community networks, condointernet, ftth, gigabit squared, public policy, seattle

I’ll have what she’s having.

Seattle mayor Mike McGinn is running for re-election and the editorial page of the Seattle Times, which has never particularly cared for him, is homing in on his failure to build fiber to every home and business in the city…

With a campaign pledge of broadband Internet for all, Mike McGinn promised big, delivered small, and hopes voters won’t notice the difference.

KUOW-FM, Seattle’s University of Washington-owned NPR powerhouse, reached a similar conclusion, although in a better researched and more nuanced way…

When Mike McGinn ran for mayor in 2009, he campaigned on the promise of high-speed internet for all of Seattle.

… More

Lawless governments can break Gilmore's Law

27 July 2013 by Steve Blum
censorship, geek stuff, public policy

“The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it,” said Internet pioneer and activist John Gilmore in 1993. A real world test, though, shows there are limits to that law.

Syrian government stops traffic completely, cable cut only slows Egypt. Source: Akamai.

Buried deep in Akamai’s latest State of the Internet report are some interesting stats showing how world events, including the war in Syria and submarine cable cuts, affect Internet traffic. The former resulted in Internet censorship at a brute force level, the latter involved physical damage to infrastructure.… More

Google Fiber's Provo deal is Internet on the instalment plan

24 July 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, community networks, ftth, google, provo, public policy

A cashless transaction.

Google will be rolling out its fiber to the home offering in Provo, Utah next week. The company signed the deal to buy the city-owned system on Monday. Negotiated and approved by the Provo municipal council in April, the final details were ironed out and Google took possession of the system this week.

Google got the system in exchange for a token payment and a promise to finish building out the FTTH system to everyone in the city, and provide free service for seven years at something like 5 Mbps to any resident that pays a $30 installation fee.… More

Don't blame local government for a lack of California broadband competition

21 July 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, community networks, public policy, techfreedom

Kicking back in California is no kickback.

I admit to being a Californian, so my objections to (what I consider to be) a rant by senior members of TechFreedom, a think tank as they put it, might be specific to my native State. That said, their contention in a Wired editorial that local government is to blame for poor Internet service is not consistent with the facts.

The core of their argument is that local governments control access to utility poles and underground conduit, and they restrict competitors – particularly cable companies – from accessing it in order to extract kickbacks.… More

Trading broadband subsidies for access to California public housing residents

17 July 2013 by Steve Blum
ab1299, broadband, casf, community networks, cpuc, public policy, sb740

A couple of apartments are enough to make cable companies lose their taste for monopoly.

Public housing agencies stand between residents and cable television companies. Like any other landlord in California, a public housing agency has considerable (but not total) control over who can install wiring in a building or complex, and consequently who can sell television, telephone and Internet service to residents.

That control is about to be trimmed back a notch.

Assembly bill 1299 proposes to use $20 million from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) to improve broadband infrastructure in public housing, plus another $5 million to encourage residents to buy service, assuming lawmakers also add more money to the account.… More

Landlords face down Google: who benefits from broadband?

16 July 2013 by Steve Blum
ab1299, broadband, casf, community networks, google, public policy, sb740

Complex issue for Kansas City complexes.

Google Fiber’s offer in Kansas City of at least 5 Mbps Internet service for at least seven years for a one-time $300 installation fee is a rocking good deal if you own a house, or even if you’re a renter who expects to be around for a couple of years. But the economics are different for apartment buildings, where landlords have to pay the fee and tenants get the free service.… More

Big Sur is broadband on the edge

14 July 2013 by Steve Blum
broadband, community networks, public policy

Fill up here. Next broadband sixty miles.

California’s rocky, tide-lashed Big Sur coast has tenuous electronic connections to the outside world. At its northern end, there’s an old navy listening post at Point Sur that now serves as, among other things, a cellular site. Head south, though, and it’s more than sixty miles before you’ll see modern telecoms facilities.

AT&T keeps copper-based phone service working for most of the scattered businesses and homes along this isolated stretch of State Route 1.… More