Category: Communications

Public Ownership of Our Communications Infrastructure: It Just Works Better.

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Harold Feld, a specialist in telco and spectrum issues with an eye toward public access, points me to an interesting bit of information, that while the UK, with its largely free market (by Europe’s standards) broadband market place lags behind the rest of Europe, the town of Nuenen, population 7500, provides its residents with 100mbs connectivity, with triple play access (internet, phone, TV) for €39/month (about $60), on a municipally owned network.

What’s more:

If a community-funded ISP sounds like a wacky European socialist plot, consider this: OnsNet generated an operating profit of about €1 million on revenues of €4 million in the past financial year – and that’s after a massive upgrade in which it wired the entire community with dual-fibre capability. What has your ISP done for you lately?

Faster, better, and cheaper than what you can get in the UK, where they require that the last mile wiring and internet service must be separate, which in turn is faster, better and cheaper than what you can get in the US, where the only rule is maximize the next quarter’s profits.

The idea that an unregulated market in broadband to the home creates innovation is simply wrong. We have had nearly 20 years of this policy now, starting with ISDN, and the US has the worst broadband service in the industrialized world.

The goal of a company is to make a profit, and the easiest way for incumbents to make profit is to create barriers to entry, not by providing better of cheaper service.

Steny’s Telco Deal: Time for Obama to Step Up and Stop It

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There is a deal for telco immunity going that Steny Hoyer is shepherding through congress, and as American Civil Liberties Union says, it stinks.

The court review consists of only verifying that the telcos got a letter from Bush and His Evil Minions™. Glenn Greenwald has the skinny on what is going on, and it’s Hoyer who is at the center of passing a law that will cover up for the Bush’s illegal wire tapping (and probably spying on political opponents).

If you want to do something, check out the Blue America PAC vs Retroactive Immunity, which has raised about $180K in the past 24 hours to target someone.

This betrayal goes beyond party politics, so if you live in Hoyer’s district, MD-5, don’t vote for him in the general election.

One bit of bright news in all this is that the New York Times came out against the Telco immunity deal today. What’s more they called for Obama to do something more than just vote against it.

Word up on that. Obama is now the de facto leader of the Democratic party, and he needs to make it clear that this deal is not good for the country.

[Update] I just checked Greewald’s latest, and it now appears that Hoyer is trying to pretend that he hasn’t been working for this for months, but instead it’s all those Bush Blue Dogs that are making him do it.

Bull sh$@!

FWIW, we now know that the targets of the campaign, and the nearly two hundred thousand dollars raised for it, will be Steny Hoyer, Chris Carney, and John Barrow, the latter two having been the most prominent of the Vichy Democrats on this issue.

Note that the primary for Barrow is not until July, and he has an opponent with a lot more progressive cred, Regina Thomas, who I have added to my act blue page so money spent against him could defeat him in July.

No surprise, all of them are big recipients of telco largess by way of campaign contributions.

Your best place for updates is Glenn Greenwald’s blog.

Damn! Looks Like Hoyer May Have Found a Way to Sell Out on Telco Immunity

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According to this report, Steny Hoyer, Jay Rockefeller, Christopher “Kit” Bond, and Roy Blunt have hammered something out.

Seriously. This is like social security. No compromise, no proposals.

This is not just a core Democratic value, it’s a core American value.

The telcos knew the law, and they broke it, and Bush and His Evil Minions&trade have a hard on about shielding them because they know that it can get them sent to jail.

More Evidence of the Bush Terror Over Warrantless Wiretapping Revalations

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We know that Bush and His Evil Minions™ are determined to create immunity for the telecommunications companies that spied on Americans, probably to cover up the fact that they used the program to spy on political enemies, particularly Kerry in 2004, but the fact that they are now cutting Kit Bond (R-MO), the ranking ‘Phant on the Senate Intelligence Committee in their negotiations with the House indicates that they are getting a bit desperate.

Normally, they don’t want their finger prints on something like this.

The Bush administration is talking directly with Democrats over rewriting the nation’s surveillance laws and leaving the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee out of the debate, a senior Senate Democrat said Wednesday.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) said that negotiations were occurring without Sen. Kit Bond (Mo.), the ranking Republican on the panel.

………

“You know, Bond, he’s just complicating things,” Rockefeller said. “And I’ve never talked to him about [his one-on-one talks with Hoyer], so I don’t understand it.”

The only reason that the Bushies are so intent on this is because this program involves something so awful that they would all go to jail, and the only thing I can think of that would do that is their use of the program for partisan electoral advantage.

I could be wrong on this. When ever I think that I’ve mined the depths of the Bush administration, it turns out that I’m insufficiently imaginative.

D.C. Cir. to Comcast: “Making You Obey The Law Is Not A ‘Vendetta.’”

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Care of Harold Feld’s Tales of the Sausage Factory.

One of the things I like about Harold Feld’s writings on the FCC regulatory process is that, in addition to being relatively easily understood, it’s also a fun read:

But the ultimate bitch slap to Comcast and its bully boys and useful idiots comes on page 11 n.2:

The briefs filed by Comcast, the intervenors, and the amici make assertions bordering on accusations of the Commission’s bad faith. We must presume an agency acts in good faith, Thomas v. Baker, 925 F.2d 1523, 1525 (D.C. Cir. 1991), but in any case we see no substance to these assertions. (emphasis added)

Or, to translate from the legalese: “Comcast, you and the rest of the cable industry need to get over yourselves and get a clue. The FCC requiring you to obey the law is not a ‘vendetta,’ even if previous FCC

Heh.

In this case, the Federal Court slapped down Comcast hard over its insistence that it needed an exemption from set top box interoperability rules.

Verizon Supports Linux for Handsets

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Verizon’s joining the LiMo Foundation (Linux Mobile)

Some people were expecting them to go with Google’s “Android”, but there are some reasons to go LiMo:

  • It’s further along, with some handsets deployed.
  • After Google’s driving up the bidding high enough to require open access in the spectrum auction, Verizon wanted to do a “screw you” to them.

According to my friends in the biz, Verizon is the most locked down of the carriers….We’ll see how it proceeds.

What’s Going on in Lebanon

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Well, it appears that proximate cause of this conflict boils down to two thing, control of the Beruit airport and Hezbollah’s communications system:

It has been announced by all sides that today is the first day of the civil war in Lebanon. This has been building with the steady assassination of political leaders since the conclusion of the war in 2006. Hezbollah is not happy, and all of a sudden the government of Lebanon has access to some very accurate intelligence.

It started with a tip regarding airport security and the means by which Iran was reportedly flying in military supplies to Hezbollah. It didn’t go over well with the militia when the government announced they were going to seize control of a security camera system in the Beruit airport. That was followed by the removal of the head of airport security, a member of Hezbollah.

It’s not particularly surprizing that this would lead to violence. You are talking about the supply lines and the communications network of Hezbollah, which are crucial to them tactically.

Hezbollah has now appeared to lave largely withdrawn from west Beruit, but they appear to still be aggressively confronting Walid Jumblatt’s pro government Druze forces east of the city.

Telco Immunity Update

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Well, first it appears that Bush and His Evil Minions™ are coordinating with the Telcos to lobby, and are trying to move heaven and earth to make it so.

I can only conclude that in addition to evidence of illegal wiretaps, that the telcos have information of something much worse, my guess would be that there was specific spying done on political opponents.

If they mutter terrorism to a jury, it is unlikely that a jury would convict them, or that a judge would give them anything more than a slap on the wrist, but if, and there are indications of this, that there is evidence of spying on their opponents, it becomes a whole new ballgame.

If it is discovered that Bush, Cheney, and Rove were spying on Democrats communications, we just might see that impeachment that is “not on the table”, or serious prosecutions starting in 2009.

There have always been rumors that they wiretapped Kerry’s senior adviser for national security affairs, James Rubin, by surveilling his wife CNN reporter Christiane Amanpour for “national security reasons”, and using the inevitable of intercepts of him for political purposes.

My guess is that these activities were far broader and deeper than just one reporter or one candidate.

The Democrats victory in 2006 may very well have been helped along by the NY Times finally breaking the story on the wiretapping, and the telcos getting skittish enough to stop asking “how high” when Bush asked them to jump.

It may all be moot however, as Steny Hoyer and Jay Rockefeller appear to be doing their level best to create full immunity for the phone companies, which would prevent the real story from coming out. Ever.

I’m simply not clear on why Hoyer and Rockefeller are so gung ho about this, unless, of course they were in some way criminally complicit with the program.

What is interesting is that, for now at least, the Vichy Blue Dog Democrats have been remarkably uninterested in getting immunity passed.

As I’ve said before, I think that they headed home after it did not pass the house, and instead of the storm of criticism they expected, they got high fives from the voters, which gave them some backbone.

And In the Conuing Tradition of Fanboi Pimping for SAAB

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It appears that SAAB has a pretty competitive entry into the smaller AEW field, the Saab 2000 Airborne Early Warning (AEW) system:

SAAB had previously created a system for the Swedish Military based based on a slightly smaller member of this turboprop family.

The E-2 C/D from Northrop Grumman, and the IAI’s Conformal AEW (CAEW) based on the Gulfstream G550 airframe are its nearest competitors.

Telco Immunity Update

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First, it appears that Steny Hoyer is working a capitulation compromise on a FISA update, but interestingly enough, the Vichy Blue Dog Dems are not in the least bit interested in talking to Republicans about immunity.

What the Vichy Blue Dog Democrats realize, and what the Quisling Hoyer does not, is that their constituents have their back.

When the Vichy Blue Dog Dems went home, they were not inundated by angry phone calls, they were given high fives for standing up to the least popular president ever.

Not one step back.

Telco Immunity Deal

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It appears now that name calling, invocations of 911, and threats of dire political consequences to Democratic members of Congress, it appears that Bush and His Evil Minions™ are willing to negociate in food faith.

Honestly, I don’t trust them, but it’s clear that something has changed:

The White House’s more conciliatory posture reflects a recognition that the Bush administration’s leverage on national-security matters has slipped since this past summer, a top Republican congressional aide said. “There’s a recognition that if they’re actually going to get a product they can support, there’s going to have to be some new level of engagement,” the aide said.

Pa4rt of this, IMSNHO, was that Representatives got many enthusiastic high fives from constituents when they left for the recess, and part of it is because it is increasingly clear that DNI Mike McConnell is a lying sack of sh*% (like his lying about telcos refusing to wiretap) who does nothing but carry water for Bush.

There is talk of a compromise along the lines of something like limits on liability, or some sort of government indemnification (which was probably already part of the deal).

I don’t object to indemnification or damage limits, there are precedents for this, and it would not have the effect of covering up Bush’s law breaking.

What worries me is that Steny Hoyer is point man on this, and when the going gets tough, he folds like overcooked broccoli.

Clear Channel’s Going Private Likely to Collapse

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It appears the deal for private equity firms Thomas H. Lee Partners LP and Bain Capital Partners LLC to take Clear Channel Communications’ Private is in the process of imploding.

The banks that are supposed to back the deal, “Citigroup Inc., Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank AG, Credit Suisse Group, Royal Bank of Scotland PLC and Wachovia Corp”, appear willing to eat the termination fees, and the private equity firms aren’t to interested in going forward either.

The only folks looking eagerly toward closing the deal are the founders, the Mays family.

The article describes the process as, “The negotiations have turned into a bizarre “kabuki” dance, said one person familiar with the situation. To protect against litigation, neither the private-equity firms nor the banks want to leave any doubt that they are committed to closing the deal. But their public actions have little to do with what’s going on in private, say a number of people involved in the matter.”

Basically, the first person to blink gets sued.

The deal is supposed to be for $19 billion, and a breakup fee is likely to be around $600 million, and if the banks repackage and resell the loan, which they really have to do, they are saying that it would have to be at around a 15% discount, which seems to me with my imperfect non-MBA math to show that it is cheaper to back out.

I wish that there was a way for all of them, particularly the Mays family, the creator of the cancer of the airwaves, Clear Channel, to lose.

Video below:

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Best Telecommunications Regulation Joke Ever!

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Courtesy of Harold Feld’s Tales of the Sausage Factory

The intervention of the Jewish holiday of Purim, which is celebrated by getting drunk until you cannot tell the difference between Verizon winning the C Block and Google winning the C Block, kept me from posting sooner.

OK, there aren’t that many great telecommunications regulations jokes, but still, this is really funny….If you are Jewish…..and if you have been following the FCC’s C Block auction.

OK, it’s a limited audience….but I find it funny, OK?

Verizon Big Winner in 700 Mhz Auctions

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No Google, though I think that the Goog was playing to lose, they just wanted to ensure open access on part of the spectrum.

The auctions were quite successful, with the exception of the “D Block”, the which was supposed to cover emergency first responders too, which is now under a corruption investigation as to whether Morgan OBrien and Cyren Call, who vetted the bids, were self dealing. (The answer is pretty clearly, “yes”)

FCC Forbids Exclusive Telco Deals With Apartments

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This is the correct decision, which is why I’m surprised that the FCC made it:

Regulators on Wednesday unanimously approved a rule banning exclusive telephone service agreements in apartment buildings, giving tenants their pick of providers.

The five-member Federal Communications Commission said in a release that exclusive contracts between carriers and apartment-building owners “hurt consumers and harm competition, with little evidence of countervailing benefits.” It noted that the deals have also blocked residents from getting bundled voice, video and high-speed Internet service packages.

…

Regulation Fuels Competition In Euro Broadband

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So now, the New York Times finally notices that the rest of the industrial world is beating our brains out in boradband.

It’s very simple. If you don’t regulate in a market with high barriers to entry, it is more profitable for the incumbent to work on keeping, and raising, those barriers to entry. It’s more profitable than attempting to build a better cheaper product.

The US have given thousands in subsidies to the incumbent telcos, and done nothing by way of regulation, and as a result we have 2nd rate service (hi Comcast users):

Ms. Reding emphasized her determination to encourage greater competition in the market and to give regulators the power to force “functional separation” — obliging the owners of telecommunications networks to free the networks from their operating divisions.

Word up on Ms. Reding.