NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] 5 Signs Our Broadband Plan May Already Be In Trouble
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 2009 19:54:18 -0400 From: David Farber <dave@farber.net> Subject: [IP] 5 Signs Our Broadband Plan May Already Be In Trouble Reply-To: dave@farber.net To: ip <ip@v2.listbox.com> Begin forwarded message: From: dewayne@warpspeed.com (Dewayne Hendricks) Date: August 14, 2009 9:15:08 PM EDT To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy@warpspeed.com> Subject: [Dewayne-Net] 5 Signs Our Broadband Plan May Already Be In Trouble 5 Signs Our Broadband Plan May Already Be In Trouble Meet the new heavily-lobbied boss. Same as the old heavily-lobbied boss? 06:08PM Thursday Aug 13 2009 by Karl Bode <http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/5-Signs-Our-Broadband-Plan-May-Already-Be-In-Trouble-103936 > As the government continues to work on crafting our first national broadband plan, there's been a lot of talk about how that process is consumer-centric, transparent, and data-driven. The FCC has spent the last few months talking about how they might actually start using real data to make policy decisions (astounding). Uncle Sam has unveiled a series of workshops to help consumers feel involved in the process (amazing). The FCC even says they'll be using more scientists and engineers and fewer lawyers and policy wonks (incredible). But beneath all of this recent bubbly enthusiasm, there's some telltale signs that corporate lobbyists are still running the show, transparency isn't quite the priority the government claims, and consumers are little more than an afterthought. Yes, it's early, and these are all things that may not be show stoppers. But they're all things that need to be watched lest the process devolve into farce. A transparent, well-documented farce, but a farce all the same. Five things that need watching over the next 188 days if consumers want this to work: Uncle Sam Is Already Wimping Out On Data Collection If you've been paying attention the last ten years, you know that ISPs have fought tooth and nail in court to avoid having to release any raw data into the public sphere, be it coverage gaps, network congestion, or real world throughput. ISPs like to argue they fight the release of such data because it would tip off competitors, but in reality incumbent ISPs know precisely where a competitor offers service and at what speeds, because they spend millions of dollars on intelligence gathering. Think Verizon doesn't know exactly where competitors offer service before it invests $24 billion to deploy fiber to the home service? The real reason ISPs don't want that data exposed is because it would show limited competition and significant coverage gaps, resulting in new laws aimed at fixing things, and in turn lowering revenues. Instead, the government has willfully used flawed data that suggests everything is rosy. The illusion of a competitive, rosy broadband market has allowed government (and the lobbyists who love them) to justify the elimination of price controls and other consumer protection laws. The result of years of government pandering to industry lobbyists, sucking down junk science lattes and ignoring consumer welfare? U.S. broadband customers are paying more money for less bandwidth with more restrictions than dozens of developed countries. Step one to turning things around? Making sure that the government has accurate, independently verifiable data. While the government has clearly admitted this problem and been paying lip service to it, their actions are busy saying something completely different. After being lobbied by telecom carriers, the Commerce Department this week announced they'd be drastically reducing the volume of data ISPs have to provide Uncle Sam. ISPs will no longer have to provide government with data on connection speed, actual price paid per user, technology type or address-specific data. Instead, carriers now only have to hand over vague, market-area data that's not particularly useful in forming policy. It's August. What other metrics will be watered down by industry lobbyists by the time the plan runs the lobbyist gauntlet and gets finalized in February? Why not just force ISPs to sign a certified certificate of their own awesomeness, and make hard data completely optional. [snip] RSS Feed: <http://www.warpspeed.com/wordpress> ------------------------------------------- Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/ Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com ----- End forwarded message -----