More broadband troubles from down under

I've posted about the ongoing broadband "drought" in Australia. Looks like things aren't much better next door in New Zealand. The government is reportedly considering subsidizing satellite service for about seven percent of New Zealanders who won't be able to get ADSL wire line broadband despite the government's telecom reforms apparently designed to promote wider broadband access.

There are rumours that the Government may consider subsidising the cost of satellite equipment that could be used to deliver broadband to the 7 per cent of New Zealand homes that couldn't be served using Telecom's ADSL network. It is understood some work is under way within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, but suggestions of a major initiative are being played down.

The cost of satellite equipment has hindered take-up to date, though there are other drawbacks to the technology such as latency, which make satellite connections less suitable for delivering interactive applications such as Internet telephony.

New Internet architecture on the drawing board

While many still lack broadband connections to the existing Internet, researchers are planning a new and improved Internet architecture:

No longer constrained by slow connections and computer processors and high costs for storage, researchers say the time has come to rethink the Internet's underlying architecture, a move that could mean replacing networking equipment and rewriting software on computers to better channel future traffic over the existing pipes.

The National Science Foundation wants to build an experimental research network known as the Global Environment for Network Innovations, or GENI, and is funding several projects at universities and elsewhere through Future Internet Network Design, or FIND.

NY legislation would mandate 85% build out requirement

New York Assembly Bill 3980 would create a Broadband Development Authority to increase the availability and quality of high-speed broadband Internet to Empire State residents.

At first glance, it would appear the measure is backed by the telco/cable duopoly since it features a key component of industry sponsored broadband regulatory reforms: preemption of local government authority to regulate advanced digital services and instead putting state regulators in charge of issuing digital franchises.

But telcos and cable companies don't like the bill, which sets a higher build out requirement than the 50 percent or less over six years favored by the industry and enacted in several states such as California's Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition Act that took effect this year. AB 3980 would instead require that level of system build out be achieved in just three years and 85 percent in six years.

Click here and scroll down to read the report High-Speed Debate in the New York alternative weekly Metroland Online.

Two emerging alternatives to the telco/cable duopoly

AT&T and Comcast are like the big kids on the block prone to bragging and boasting about what they can or are going to do. Ma Bell boasts she's rolling out Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) including HD channels. Comcast says it's introducing digitial voice telephone service in addition to its TV programming and high speed Internet (HSI) services.

Behind the braggadocio, however, there exists a far different and less boastful reality. Fully one fifth or more of AT&T customers can't even get broadband Internet access over Ma Bell's aging copper cable system let alone IPTV. They're told to suck it up and get by with sluggish, impractical dial up connections running at 24kbs or plunk down hundreds of dollars and pay too much for too little from a satellite provider.

The story's the same for many would be Comcast customers who don't happen to reside where Comcast currently provides service. The big cable company doesn't appear to be expanding its service areas, calling into question its strategy of going head to head with the telcos for telephone service. Comcast can't compete with the telcos if it doesn't penetrate their service areas.

The situation won't change unless local governments and/or public utility districts partner with companies with expertise in installing and operating fiber optic-based infrastructure that can form the basis for open access telecommunications networks.

Without these local endeavors, the alternative is back to the future -- a 1984-style federal government ordered break up of the telco/cable duopoly, only this time in combination with a government takeover of the nation's telecommunications system on the principle that it is vital infrastructure that can't be left to the whims of monopolistic private sector providers.

Public utility districts can provide cable TV service, California Court of Appeal rules

In a case of first impression in California, a panel of the California Court of Appeal Third District ruled that the Public Utilities Code permits public utility districts to provide cable television services. The three-judge panel based its opinion on section 16461 of the statute that allows PUDs to "acquire, construct, own, operate, control, or use, within or without or partly within and partly without the district, works for supplying its inhabitants with light, water, power, heat, transportation, telephone service, or other means of communication, or means for the disposition of garbage, sewage, or refuse matter, and may do all things necessary or convenient to the full exercise of the powers granted in this article."

The ruling is significant because it provides solid legal authority for California utility districts to partner with private companies to build open access telecommunications networks over the objections of existing cable providers and telcos who don't want new competitors offering superior broadband services. These networks can provide much needed alternatives to bringing broadband and other advanced digital telecommunications services to areas existing providers choose not to provide and introduce competition that can benefit consumers.

The ruling clears the way for Roseville, California-based SureWest Communications to explore a public/private partership with the Truckee Donner Public Utility District to install a fiber optic-based cable system in the district's jurisdiction, The Sierra Sun reports.

Charter, AT&T draw fire from South Lake Tahoe customers

Charter Communications, the cable provider in the South Lake Tahoe Basin, and AT&T, the incumbent local exchange carrier, are drawing flack over a recent article appearing in the Tahoe Daily Tribune reporting on Charter's service quality problems and poor reception of some TV channels.

One commentator says both companies have left the area in the digital stone ages without advanced digital services and broadband. Another called for Charter to upgrade or get out of the area.