Privatized telecom
p2pnet.net News:- Below are resources providing links to interesting observations you might want to consider.
First, we have the staff report to the FTC about what they think the arguments against municipal wireless internet boil down to as the main objections.
Second, we have a couple of references to state and federal requirements for roadband access in America when we were number one in the world of telecommunications.
Today, we’ve dropped to number 16, and are still falling rapidly, even though our government has switched its definition of the term ‘broadband’ from 45Mb/sec to 200Kb/sec.
Let’s not even begin to imagine how far down the list we are if we use the original definition in place when the Telecommunications Act of 1996 turned our infrastructure over to private companies.
IV. ARGUMENTS AGAINST MUNICIPAL WIRELESS INTERNET
Opponents of municipal wireless Internet provision have presented various arguments why municipalities should not be in the business of competing with the private sector. These arguments include:
(1) a government-run enterprise may not perform as well as a private enterprise; (2) a government enterprise may have incentives to engage in anticompetitive conduct against private competitors, distorting the marketplace; (3) the traditional justifications for government intervention in the marketplace do not support municipal provision of wireless Internet service; and (4) a municipality may become ‘locked-in’ to an inefficient operating standard if the chosen technology becomes quickly outdated.102 Thus, opponents generally suggest first looking to non-government solutions, such as contracting out to a private third-party or a public-private partnership.
http://www.ftc.gov/os/2006/10/V060021municipalprovwirelessinternet.pdf
13 years ago, the definition of “broadband” as used by Verizon (Bell Atlantic, NYNEX and GTE), SBC, (Pacific Bell, Southwestern Bell, SNET and Ameritech) BellSouth, and Qwest (formerly US West) was a service capable of 45mps (megabits per-second) or faster and could deliver high-quality video in both directions - and that was in 1992!
http://www.newnetworks.com/TeletruthBroadbandDQAmartin.htm
“. . . the Telecom Act of 1996 required broadband to handle ‘high-quality’ video services. The definition of ‘Advanced capability’ includes ‘broadband’ with a capability of high-quality voice, data, graphics and video telecommunications. Section 706(c)(1) defines “advanced telecommunications capability” as follows:
# “The term ‘advanced telecommunications capability’ is defined, without regard to any transmission media or technology, as high- speed, switched, broadband telecommunications capability that enables users to originate and receive high-quality voice, data, graphics and video telecommunications using any technology.”
The FTC staff report is striking because it attempts to legitimize objections to municipalities who wish to consider implementing wireless access for their residents.
If you look to the Telecommunications Act of 1996, when our telecommunications infrastructure was turned over to private corporations, you’ll realize just how pathetically lame this objection is, to the point of obscene lies from our government.
Their second objection attempts to create the impression that our privatized telecommunications infrastructure is acting in accordance with market place forces. If anyone looks for an example of what a monopoly is, they simply need to look no further than the telco/cable/satellite monopolies, and then look at their household bills.
Their third objection attempts to fill space and is incomprehensible as written. If anyone can restate this third objection in human readable terms, please let me know.
Their fourth objection attempts to impose historical arguments on 21st century technological advancement.
Wireless technology sits on desktop computers, today. Anyone can follow directions to build a tin can antenna that costs between $3 and $7. The costs for implementing city-wide wireless networks runs somewhere in the $5,000 per square mile range, as evidenced by projects such as the Champaign-Urbana experiment.
As technology advances continue, these nominal costs will drop and drop and drop, again. More importantly, interference issues that might require controls over geographic areas, no longer exist.
In other words, any telecommunications infrastructure in the foreseeable future lies with just one consideration, and that is: Will communities embrace the new technologies as they evolve, or will they continue to impose old and obsolete practices on our future?
Ten years of deregulation have been disastrous for America, and for Americans. The only result of this obscene Act has been billions of dollars of American taxpayer dollars flowing into the pockets of a few private companies. It’s important to think of the future, and that future does not include the FCC, FTC, and Congress.
Local activism and the creation of wireless community networks, powered by a proliferation in P2P networks, can help regain our prominence in the world, not to mention an economy that benefits everyone, rather than a handful of corporations.
The market place forces do not apply to a few “chosen” international corporations. They belong to Americans who work for a living.
Tom Poe
[Tom Poe is a VA pensioner, living in Iowa, USA.]
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