The origins of the FCC "speed trap" and U.S. digital exclusion, inequity

Longtime telecom industry observer and blogger Doug Dawson delves into the origins of the “speed trap” U.S. telecom policy has fallen into as it struggles to provide ubiquitous, affordable advanced telecommunications infrastructure. It begins with the definition of the colloquial term to describe advanced telecommunications: “broadband.”

This raises a question of the purpose of having a definition of broadband. That requirement comes from Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that requires that the FCC make sure that broadband is deployed on a reasonable and timely basis to everybody in the country. The FCC interpreted that requirement to mean that it couldn’t measure broadband deployment unless it created a definition of broadband. The FCC uses its definition of broadband to count the number of homes that have or don’t have broadband.

https://potsandpansbyccg.com/2023/07/28/too-little-too-late/

Section 706 is codified at 47 U.S. Code § 1302(d)(1), to define advanced telecommunications capability:

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. (Emphasis added).

"Broadband" isn’t defined in the statute. As Dawson notes, the FCC has attempted to define it over the past three decades, distinguishing it from narrowband dialup connectivity commonplace when the 1996 law was enacted. This created sluggish dialup as an anchor, making a commercial market in incremental improvements over dialup sold as an upgrade at a price premium. The more bandwidth, the larger the upgrade and the higher the price.

That market has become firmly entrenched, creating a perception of bandwidth scarcity and digital exclusion leading to what is now termed the “digital divide:” a split between those who can order and afford to pay for sufficient bandwidth to access “high-quality voice, data, graphics, and video telecommunications” referenced in the law and those who cannot – typically those living where the commercial return on infrastructure investment is insufficiently profitable in the broader market context. The commercial market in incremental bandwidth improvements reinforced the FCC policy Dawson describes as both are based on the metric of incremental bandwidth gains.

Supporting this circumstance is the lack of an affirmative policy to modernize copper to fiber to the premises connections. The technology came about two decades before the emergence of the mass market Internet.

First developed in the 1970s, fiber-optics have revolutionized the telecommunications industry and have played a major role in the advent of the Information Age.[7] Because of its advantages over electrical transmission, optical fibers have largely replaced copper wire communications in backbone networks in the developed world.[8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiber-optic_communication

Legacy telephone companies built on copper developed for carrying analog voice telephone service saw fiber’s potential to deliver high-quality voice, data, graphics, and video telecommunications. By the early 1990s, they planned to replace their legacy copper with fiber to support the rollout of video services. But they opted not to make the transition, instead investing in more readily profitable mobile wireless services according to industry analyst Bruce Kushnick. They included NYNEX, the regional bell operating company created after the 1982 court ordered breakup of AT&T that was rebranded as Verizon. Verizon’s copper to fiber transition was short lived, from 2005 to 2010.

AT&T likely to seek BEAD subsidies for fixed wireless serving “extremely high cost” locations

WASHINGTON, July 26, 2023 – AT&T is set to be competitive in the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity Access and Deployment subgrant process, said CEO John Stankey during the company’s second-quarter earnings call Wednesday, adding fixed-wireless technology will be key to connecting hard-to-reach areas using the subsidies.

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Stankey estimated that fixed-wireless services will be in demand following the allocation of BEAD funds despite the program’s preference for fiber connection, saying that fixed-wireless is the only way to connect every address in hard-to-reach geographies. He expects that AT&T’s fixed-wireless offerings will be a competitive offer in broadband builds for decades to come.

https://broadbandbreakfast.com/2023/07/att-expects-fixed-wireless-itself-to-be-competitive-in-bead-applications/

AT&T appears to be targeting fixed wireless access (FWA) to what are defined in the NTIA’s BEAD program guidance as “extremely high cost” locations. Those are addresses where deploying fiber would exceed a subsidy amount threshold “above which (a state) may decline to select a proposal if use of an alternative technology meeting the BEAD Program’s technical requirements would be less expensive.” (Given materials and more recently labor pool constraints, those costs are likely to be considerably higher than they would have otherwise been with a more timely and orderly migration from copper to fiber.)

Those technical requirements define “reliable” service by throughput (at least 100/20Mbps with latency less than or equal to 100 milliseconds) as well as delivery infrastructure (fiber, hybrid fiber-coaxial technology; digital subscriber line (DSL) technology or terrestrial fixed wireless technology utilizing entirely licensed spectrum or using a hybrid of licensed and unlicensed spectrum).

For extremely high cost locations, BEAD program guidance allows states to choose fiber alternatives involving a less costly technology for that location “even if that technology does not meet the definition of Reliable Broadband Service but otherwise satisfies the Program’s technical requirements.” (Emphasis in original)

That gives those proposing FWA-based BEAD deployments an out. However, as Doug Dawson writes at his POTS and PANS blog, the quality of fixed wireless service varies considerably based on the distance from the radio transmitting it and the amount of mobile wireless traffic. In addition, the challenging topography likely to exist in extremely high cost locations as well as tall trees pose propagation challenges to line of sight FWA signals.

Stankey acknowledges these limitations as he was quoted in this Light Reading analysis:

"It's going to be key in certain parts of our consumer segment as we work through the next phase of our cost-reduction efforts," Stankey said. "It is [also] a means for us to begin finding a good catch to shut down other infrastructure and still serve customers." He added that one big caveat is ensuring that there's ample wireless capacity for Internet Air to deliver the kinds of speeds that customers require.

As for shutting down “other infrastructure,” Stankey is apparently referring to its legacy copper outside plant built for voice telephone service. AT&T is petitioning state telecom regulators to relieve it of Title II Carrier of Last Resort requirements in high cost areas to get out from under the high cost of maintaining this deteriorating, decades old delivery infrastructure. They mandate telephone companies provide landline voice service over the legacy copper to all customers requesting it.

Analysis: Timid, fearful public policymakers led to U.S. telecom infrastructure deficits

Politicians and regulators talk a lot about how they want to “bridge the digital divide.” But most of them lack the political courage to correctly identify why that divide still exists in 2023: regional telecom monopolies, protected by corrupt state and federal politicians, that have worked tirelessly over thirty years to consolidate power, crush all meaningful competition, and jack up the cost of service.

After FCC Debacle, Gigi Sohn Shifts Focus To Challenging Comcast, AT&T With Community-Built Broadband Networks

The cited lack of political courage is counter cultural and ahistorical. Americans have history dating back to the founding of the nation of mustering backbone, standing up to bullies and saying no. Appears their elected representatives better find that backbone -- and soon. Or they'll have something to truly fear: angry constituents and voters inclined to boot them from office.

Frustrated by decades of monopoly dysfunction, towns and cities all over the country have decided to build their own networks, whether it’s municipal, built on the back of city-owned power utilities, or via cooperatives. There’s a lot of very cool stuff happening in this space that was supercharged by the peak COVID frustration with unreliable broadband and home schooling.

Utilities function as a natural monopoly. The dysfunction is the result of flawed public policy that regards advanced telecom as a competitive market, defined as one having many sellers and buyers with relatively equal access to information on costs and value. Without the framework for a competitive market and the operation of market forces, public and cooperative ownership is not only superior but necessary. And it shouldn't just be individual communities. The scope should be regional such as Utah's UTOPIA Fiber in order to generate more favorable economies of scale, crucial now amid tight material and labor markets.