The Death of Indie ISP's Groups march, prep for final blow Believing that the FCC's Michael Powell has all but relegated them to extinction, a number of groups representing CLECs and independent ISP's are organizing the "GigaByte March on Washington" tomorrow. Their latest concern is a a 44 page petition filed with the FCC (pdf files part 1, part 2), that they believe could be the final blow to their businesses. In the request, BellSouth asks for forbearance from having to allow ISP's any access to their DSL networks, because there is already "adequate broadband competition" from cable, satellite, wireless and broadband over power lines. The other ILEC's have either filed - or plan to file - similar requests.
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 FlizeshPremium
join:2003-08-16
United State | Michael Powell is an asshat I fig'd I'd just get this post out of the way. | |
|  |  jwsmiths4Part Man, Part MacPremium
join:2003-10-25
Savannah, GA | Re: Michael Powell is an asshat haha indeed so... | |
| | | | | Re: Michael Powell is an asshat Broadband is a tougher sell in the heartland because of all the liberal content flowing from the blue states 
So the telcos wanna do it on the cheap with DSL+ dsl 2 dsl dsl dsl copper til you drop...
Fiber is the future, if you don't build it, someone else will. What these clecs ought to be doing is building their own networks!!! then you'll see bellsouth get off their ass and do something really good... Not one of the other big telcos or cablecos have done what verizon "MAY" do yet... put shareholder value on hold for 2-3 years to reap 5-10 year rewards at the expense of cable companies, namely Cablevision... | |
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|  japPremium
join:2003-08-10
038xx
1 edit | wha's an asshat?
undies? diapers? b-plug? | |
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| | japPremium
join:2003-08-10
038xx | Ahha! Thank you. However, I'll eschew obfuscation & stick with asshole. | |
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|  sbdjaroI DunnoPremium
join:2004-01-29
Grand Junction, CO | great idea | |
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| | Gigabyte March? Is that going to be some kind of DOS attack or something?
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www.spatula-city.com | |
|  DerchPremium
join:2004-10-16
Cross Plains, WI
1 edit | E-mail Powell I can't make it, but I'll send an e-mail to Powell saying that I disapprove of his actions against independent ISP's. Here is his e-mail address if you want to do the same:
Michael.Powell@fcc.gov
I doubt he will listen... | |
| |  roamer1sticking it out at you
join:2001-03-24
Atlanta, GA | Re: E-mail Powell said by Derch:I can't make it, but I'll send an e-mail to Powell saying that I disapprove of his actions against independent ISP's. Don't just do that -- submit a comment (that goes "on the record") as well:
»gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/upload_v2.cgi
docket # 04-405
-SC
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"it seems like all you ever buy is Abercrombie and cell phones" --a friend
No-Bull SE US Wireless Info: »www.sewireless.info/
Atlanta Apt/Condo Cable & Broadband Info: »www.atlaptcable.info/ | |
| | |  ThalerPremium
join:2004-02-02
Los Angeles, CA
kudos:3 | Re: E-mail Powell So long as the comment link doesn't forward into sending an e-mail with "Re: Suspected Terrorist" in the title line to the FBI, it's all good. | |
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| | Not Adequate Broadband Competition The problem is, most places with broadband access only have access to DSL from one company and Cable Modem from another company. For example, if I want DSL, I pretty much have to go through Verizon. For Cable Modem, I have to use Time Warner's Roadrunner.
Now, on the face of it, you might think that this would make for good competition, but it's not. They both claim that the other is slower, more trouble, and more expensive in their commercials. However, when push comes to shove, my bill never goes down, only up.
Time Warner seems to be testing a 3Mbps -> 5Mbps shift now. Honestly, I would be happier at 1.5Mbps at $25-$30 per month instead of 5Mbps at $45 a month.
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-Jason Levine
http://www.jasons-toolbox.com/
http://www.PCQandA.com/
http://www.urateit.com/ | |
| | | | Re: Not Adequate Broadband Competition "Adequate broadband competition" my arse.
I can only go with one provider and I live in metro Orlando! There was more competition back in 1999 then there is now. We need another northpoint! | |
| |  Combat ChuckToo Many CannibalsPremium
join:2001-11-29
Erie, PA | said by Jason Levine:The problem is... ...Now, on the face of it, you might think that this would make for good competition, but it's not... ...However, when push comes to shove, my bill never goes down, only up. Competition and the free market only serve to make sure that goods and services are distributed in the most efficient way possible, not to make sure that you have $20 broadband. And what you have there is competition. Sometimes the real price of something at a particular point in time and space is much higher than you want it to be and theres not much you can do about it without making the situation worse.
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Attention all decks! Brace for whining! | |
| | | JPCass
join:2001-01-23
Denver, CO | Re: Not Adequate Broadband Competition said by Combat Chuck: Competition and the free market only serve to make sure that goods and services are distributed in the most efficient way possible, not to make sure that you have $20 broadband. Ideally, competition works like that. Reality is often different.
How many cases have we seen in recent years of price collusion amongst "competitors", in everything from wholesale electricity to insurance?
In the case of industries that are provide public utilities, like airlines and telcom (and, in the past, railroads), companies frequently compete one another towards bankruptcy in shared markets, while often virtually ignoring less glamorous smaller markets where small profits could be made.
Ego, greed, and corporate and industry short-sightedness often counterbalance market rationality. I'm not suggesting a solution here, just pointing out that irrationality in the distribution (and pricing) of goods and services is not unusual. | |
| | | |  calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA | Re: Not Adequate Broadband Competition Two points:
Collusion is bad. However, you make a small mistake when grouping airlines with the telecoms. Airlines are pretty competitive these days, and the process of some of them going out of business because they are whipped by new competitors with better business plans is natural. The phrase "ruinous competition" is oft used by monopolists who want to continue regulation and avoid competition--when in reality, all competition is "ruinous" to the loser.
Second point: When one player has a built in advantage because it was granted a century long monopoly and had already installed and largely depreciated the most difficult portion of the competitive model (the local loop), claiming that it needs a "level playing field" is pure hogwash. It's historical advantage should be recognized and shared, as the Telecom Act of '96 and the ORIGINAL implementing regulations from the FCC tried to do.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! | |
| | | | | JPCass
join:2001-01-23
Denver, CO | Re: Not Adequate Broadband Competition Yes, the situation is indeed quite complex with many variables. But companies, including the airlines, tend to get caught up competing in large markets where no one ends up making a profit, just as they persist in building the impressive oversized conglomerates (UAL's Allegis in the 80's, Tyco, Time Warner, etc.) that have been proven time and again not to be viable. Part of small and upstart airlines' trick may have been efficiencies and avoiding costs, but they also make money serving less glamorous small markets.
One of the greatest examples of all, and the most relevant, is the huge amount of "dark fiber" laid in the mad over-competition for a few corridors and major markets. Companies could have spread out their investments instead in slighly more obscure and complex ventures like FTTH and rural broadband - and yes, even $20 broadband tiers - and at least had marginal revenue streams rather than a complete loss. The market is hardly efficient when companies literally bury money in the ground, and potential paying customers go unserved. | |
| | | | | | calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA | Re: Not Adequate Broadband Competition Having grown up in a rural area, I understand your position, and I thought long and hard about introducing broadband to my small town.
However, Verizon has now got it in, and although I would have had a year or two lead time, they'd be cleaning my clock right now.
Also, I understand your "smaller markets" point. I watched Ozark Air Lines flourish when it served small markets, and then grow into a competitor that TWA eventually bought out. (When Bill Barr, subsequently VZ General Counsel, was US Attorney General.) TWA, then without a competitor in St. Louis, got fat, dumb, and happy, got stripped by Ichan, and eventually purchased by American. Sad, indeed.
On the other hand, if you think less contested markets are the better bet, you're free to go there. Gather some capital and install. It's a free country!
Calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! | |
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| Taranis
join:2001-12-06
Mount Vernon, WA | said by Jason Levine:..when push comes to shove, my bill never goes down, only up. ..Honestly, I would be happier at 1.5Mbps at $25-$30 per month instead of 5Mbps at $45 a month. Amen to that.. | |
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Reviews:
 ·AT&T DSL Service
 ·Virgin Mobile Br..
| I Agree: Competition is not real I agree with the last poster. Where I live, SBC/PacBell offers pitiful DSL service for the majority of their patrons because we live too far from a CO or RT where copper is turned into fiber optic cable. DSL here is very cheap, but that's because for most customers, DSL is very very slow. Only a select few live near a CO or RT and can get decent DSL speeds. Comcast cable offeres pretty good speedy broadband but at prices that are well over twice SBC's. So what competition is that? If you don't care about speed, you'll order cheap DSL. If you have or want speed, you pay double and get Comcast internet. That's not competition. | |
| | | | Re: I Agree: Competition is not real only a few select? i think youre greatly exxagerating it =) in a small town with only one CO and no RT's that might be more true but otherwise plenty of people can get decent speeds.... of course theres also plenty who cant | |
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| | Tomorrow? Thanks for giving people a heads-up. I wouldah gone. | |
| | DerchPremium
join:2004-10-16
Cross Plains, WI | Re: Tomorrow? Send an e-mail or comment instead. | |
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 TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY
3 edits | Big Suprise This surprises anyone here, I don't think so. The hand writing was on the wall years ago. Michael Powell has surely been one of the worse FCC chairman in history. The small ISP's are going the way of the 8 track tape.
This is to bad but there is nothing to be done for it.
It is amazing how lawyers assert in their filings how a dog turd smells like Chanel No. 5, Yellow snow tastes like Champagne, and they get people like Michael Powell to believe it.:(
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Real Men use Vacuum tubes, 25 pound filament transformers, and plate voltages no less then 2400 volts...BPL I'm coming to get you
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| | | pfft.. The reason BellSouth doesn't want competition is because they're pigs. They know that once their is competition, they're SOL unless they get off they're asses and do something right. | |
| | | | Reviews:
 ·Shaw
·TELUS
| companies are evil and they want to make the most money possible.
however it doesn't entirely sit well with me, that someone gambles, and builts all this fibre, cable whatever. They build it so they can make money, its a given.
but then they have to start letting other companies use what they built? won't that reduce their incentives to expand the areas that they service, or reduce incentives to upgrade.
it seems kinda lame, that they built it, probably at some point borrowed money to do, now they make money off it, but other people want to force them to let them use the infrastructure they built.
If they want to compete, maybe they can invent new technologies, that don't require wires everywere, or faster technologies.
piggybacking doesn't seem like something that will lead to pregress to me. | |
| | |  KonaguyLive From Kailua-Kona, HawaiiPremium
join:2000-10-21
Kailua Kona, HI
·RoadRunner Cable
·Hawaiian Telcom
| Re: pfft.. said by zod5000:piggybacking doesn't seem like something that will lead to pregress to me. I guess you want your yard ripped up everytime a new company
wants to put in their exclusive fiber-optic cable. Or you want
just one telecom provider providing you voice/TV/Internet.
None of which sounds very good to me. | |
| | | | | There's the issue, they did not build it, AT&T did, and it was taken off AT&T. They did not borrow money to build it, it was paid for with taxpayer money. The cable companies paid for theirs with private money. ISP owners should have access to the wiring that their tax money helped build. It should be public, not for the private use of a money grabbing, unethical monopoly hiding behind some paid off politician. | |
| | | | | Aside from the other valid statements said on this thread there is one major hole in what you're saying. The ILECs agreed to share their lines back in 1996. They wanted more long distance power and signed away an agreement saying competitors can share their lines. This isn't about the FCC being unfair to a company. It's about those companies trying to go back on their word because they were too greedy when they signed it, too shortsighted (and greedy) to see the emergence of affordable broadband, and too stubborn (and greedy) to adapt to the changing climate. | |
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| | The FCC should be shut down Am I the only one who believes that regulatory agencies such as the FCC shouldn't be allowed? These agencies were certainly not part of our constitution and should never have been allowed to be created in the first place. If the FCC had never existed, we can only imagine what type of broadband options we would have now, probably including fiber. | |
| | | | Re: The FCC should be shut down i can't believe i'm even replying.. ok. should i be allowed to broadcast on the same frequencies that law enforcement, military, or hospitals use? if yes, then there's no need for an FCC. | |
| | JPCass
join:2001-01-23
Denver, CO | said by fatejudger13:Am I the only one who believes that regulatory agencies such as the FCC shouldn't be allowed? Maybe not the only one, but one of how many?
Regulatory agencies were created in large part because businesses all too frequently do things that are not in the public interest, and often not even in their own interest. The last few years provide plenty of examples. While purists will argue that government regulation is the problem, and indeed it often creates some of its own problems, the period prior to government regulation provides ample examples of what went wrong to spur the beginnings of regulation.
I think that most complaints are about how the FCC is approaching things, and particularly about Powell's hands-off approach. | |
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