WISP runs into opposition in Georgia

For many areas of the U.S., terrestrial wireless Internet Protocol telecom infrastructure offers an interim solution until fiber to the premises wireline plant can be built. Particularly for those areas that lie outside the footprints of telco DSL and cable service.

But terrestrial wireless service for homes and businesses has its downsides. Achieving decent throughput, adequate backhaul and attractive price points have posed challenges for many Wireless Internet Service Providers (WISPs).

In addition, wireless IP signals often can't reliably penetrate terrain, foliage and even municipal building codes as one wireless provider recently discovered to its chagrin. The Marietta Georgia planning commission turned down a request by American Broadband Communications LLC, for a variance that would allow the WISP to erect a 150-foot-high tower, the Parkersburg News and Sentinel reports.

Marietta should like other U.S. local governments concerned about tall towers springing up in residential areas like Lafayette (Louisiana), Ashland (Oregon) and a muni consortium in Utah find a way to get fiber to homes and businesses, either directly or in partnership with private providers or nonprofit telecom cooperatives.

U-Verse won't bail AT&T out of its residential wireline woes

Here's a notable report by Todd Spangler of Multichannel News on AT&T's revenues from its hybrid fiber/copper VDSL triple play U-Verse service that suggests while posting increases in customers and revenue, they may be too little and too late to offset a dramatic decline in AT&T's residential wireline market segment. In a Dec. 21, 2009 filing with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, AT&T in unusually blunt language called the downward trend a "death spiral."

Spangler reports that while AT&T's U-verse revenue nearly tripled over 2009 (despite a sharp economic downturn) and is approaching an annualized rate of $3 billion, it nevertheless represents less than five percent of total wireline segment revenue. Spangler notes even that strong growth isn't sufficient to offset flagging wireline segment revenues, which fell six percent in 2009 to $65.7 billion.

Meanwhile, AT&T disclosed this week it would spend $2 billion on its wireless infrastructure -- money that won't be going into wireline CAPEX to build out the U-Verse footprint. Doing that is a costly proposition given U-Verse involves expensive field distribution equipment that can deliver service only 3,000 feet over existing copper cable plant -- plant that often requires even more money to bring it up to technical standards to reliably carry VDSL signals. That's not an issue in new neighborhoods, where U-Verse is delivered over fiber to the premises. But few such locales are being developed with new home construction at its lowest level in decades.

In sum, U-Verse isn't likely going to bail AT&T out of its troubles in residential wireline and may ultimately lead to the big telco pulling out of the market segment to concentrate on wireless in the retail market as I predicted in September 2008.

More signs of trouble for AT&T's U-Verse

AT&T continues to emphasize wireless as its future while deemphasizing the wire line market segment. As evidence, gigaom cites a June 4 report by UBS Research analyst John Hodulik that the big telco has slowed by nearly half deployment of its premier wire line product, U-Verse.

Hodulik projects AT&T's U-Verse buildout to reach an additional 4 to 5 million premises this year, down from 9 million new premises passed by the service -- which offers Internet connectivity, IPTV, and VOIP -- in 2008.

As predicted last September, I continue to expect AT&T to pull the plug on U-Verse sometime in the first half of 2010 as part of a general retreat out of residential wire line service in favor of more profitable wireless service. The Dallas-based company will likely blame unanticipated cost, technological and competitive market challenges for the move. In the residential and small business wire line segment, AT&T's future role will be a middle mile and particularly a long haul provider.

WISPs endeavor to provide needed broadband "third pipe" in El Dorado County

The pathetic state of wireline broadband Internet access in El Dorado County, California has spawned locally based Wireless Internet Service Providers (WISPs) to provide a much needed "third pipe" for county residents and small businesses who have been stiff armed for years by AT&T and Comcast.

Startup Remotely Located run by Jason and Jennifer Wilson is deploying Wi-Fi based service using both directional and non-directional transmission technology. Remotely Located is serving areas deprived of wireline broadband service in the Mosquito/Swansboro Country area and has recently expanded into West Camino and your blogger's neighborhood.

Sierra Advantage emerged out of the bankruptcy earlier this year of one of El Dorado County's first ISPs, Direct Connect. According to the WISP's service area map, it covers my area. Not quite yet, according to Brett Patterson, director of sales for Shingle Springs-based Sierra Advantage. "We continue to build out our network and get closer each week to offering you service," Patterson wrote in an email yesterday. "Soon we will have additional equipment up in your area. There are some very exciting, positive changes coming for us regarding our Internet services."

My hat's off to these WISPs. Providing fixed terrestrial wireless Internet access in El Dorado County's rugged terrain where steep canyons and tall trees create obstacles for wireless signals is no easy feat.

Aside from overcoming these technological hurdles and providing reliable service at advertised throughput speeds, a key challenge as they add customers will be obtaining sufficient backhaul connections to the Internet -- wireline circuits capable of providing large amounts of bandwidth -- to accomodate the growth. Subscribers won't be pleased if a bandwidth traffic jam at the backhaul makes their speeds slow to a crawl and drag with the high latency that afflicts substandard satellite-based Internet access.

Readers who subscribe to services offered by these WISPS are invited to share their experiences and satisfaction with them by posting comments to this post.

Revamp wireless USF charge to subsidize wireline broadband, Qwest reportedly urges FCC

The Denver Post reports Colorado-based telco Qwest wants the Federal Communications Commission to change the formula for wireless phone surcharges for the Universal Service Fund (USF).

Qwest is proposing that the wireless surcharge be applied on a per household rather than per customer basis. The difference between the two methods is estimated to be around $500 million, which Qwest says should be set aside to subsidize wireline broadband deployment.

Feds betting big on WiMAX

Forbes magazine is reporting today that the Federal Communications Commission and some in Congress are betting heavily on WiMAX technology to provide a wireless broadband alternative to the telco/cable duopoly.

They aren't the only ones. Forbes reports Yahoo!, Google, eBay, Intel , Skype and satellite TV providers EchoStar and DirectTV also want a so-called broadband "third pipe" installed to break the telco/cable choke hold whose incomplete wireline systems fail to bridge the "last mile" to bring broadband to far too many residences.

The FCC wants to auction off television broadcast frequencies currently used by TV channels 52 to 69 that will become available in 2009 when TV broadcasters are required by the FCC to convert from analog to digital transmission.

Forbes reports there are concerns that telcos like AT&T and Verizon could buy up the frequencies not to use them, but to keep them off the market in order to protect their wireline-based systems, prompting consumer groups to advocate for auction rules that would disallow the practice.

The FCC is also reviewing a wireless broadband concept being advanced by a coalition comprised of Dell, EarthLink, Google, HP, Intel, Microsoft, and Philips Electronics. A prototype device has been submitted for FCC testing by the White Space Coalition that uses different transmission technology to beam ultra-fast wireless broadband via unused "white spaces" in the current analog TV broadcast spectrum. It could come on line as early as February 2009 if approved.

The next year or so will likely determine if wireless broadband can become a viable "third pipe" alternative beyond the current coffee shop and airport Wi-Fi connections and which -- if any -- of these wide area wireless broadband technologies will provide that sought after third pipe.

Legacy analog copper, cable infrastructure stymies U.S. broadband growth

So said Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska at yesterday's Senate Commerce Committee looking into why the United States is falling behind other nations on broadband connections. And Stevens cautioned those who regard wireless broadband infrastructure as a suitable replacement:

"The problem is basically we can't use the legacy system of cable and wire" for broadband and have to build out across rural areas, Stevens said. "Wireless technology has brought new communication, but it is slower and not adaptable."