Clearwire in WiMAX alliance with satellite TV providers

This deal looks at bit sketchy at first glance. On one hand, it makes some sense inasmuch as many satellite TV subscribers live in areas where over the air TV broadcast reception is poor and there's no wireline broadband infrastructure from the telco/cable duopoly.

Many of these folks would likely prefer a fixed terrestrial wireless option that provides broadband faster and cheaper than satellite ISPs such as WildBlue and HughesNet.

On the other hand, however, there are few if any proven WiMAX deployments in these areas that have an established track record. I asked Clearwire how its service would overcome rugged terrain and tall trees which are often found in areas that lack wireline broadband. Tellingly, the company demurred, declining to respond to the inquiry.

Ma Bell forsakes existing customers, deploys fiber for new ones

AT&T doesn't give a rat's patootie for its existing customer base, large numbers of which have no wireline broadband options at all.

New customers however get first class treatment and state of the art fiber optic connections to the Internet.

Way to go, Ma Bell! If you don't want your existing customer base and thus don't want to invest in it, why don't you sell it off instead of letting it die on the copper vine?

Virginia governor makes broadband access a priority

The governor's office is forming a Broadband Roundtable to develop a plan for ensuring broadband access for every Virginia business. The roundtable is to be led by former Gov. Mark Warner and Virginia Secretary of Technology Aneesh Chopra.

"Broadband access is a priority for my administration, and we intend to build on the successes of the Warner Administration, which worked to install 700 miles of broadband in our rural communities," Gov. Timothy M. Kaine said in a news release.

North Carolina municipalities attack proposed state franchise bill as uncompetitive

Where the private sector telco/cable duopoly won't provide broadband Internet access, local governments that have long been in the utility business want to step up. But local government officials complain duopoly-backed legislation, the Local Government Fair Competition Act, is really protectionist and would result in less competition and less densely populated areas being cut off from broadband access.

Mooresville Mayor Bill Thunburg agreed. "Folks, this bill is a pig with lipstick on," he said. "The whole notion of this being a Fair Competition Act is really absurd."

Mooresville entered the broadband Internet business after years of struggle with private industry. Town leaders haven't been able to convince Time Warner to launch cable modem Internet service—the company couldn't make enough profit, they were told.

"This is why we get into that business," Thunburg said. "Private sector's not going to build out into rural communities or poor neighborhoods because there's no money in it for them. Municipalities serve those folks, and we can serve them better than private industry can because we can be sure that they've got fiber to the home." He urged the legislators to consider the need for economic development.

"You don't do that by slamming the door in the face of the poor people or rural people, and that's what this bill does," he said. "One thing's for sure: If municipalities are in the broadband business, big businesses have competition. Right now, in Mooresville, they don't have any competition."

For legislators representing rural areas, Mooresville's dilemma has a familiar ring. Rep. Angela Bryant (D-Halifax, Nash), who sits on the public utilities committee, says Nash County has had a similar experience.

"Technology's moving so fast, some of my cities and counties say that as far as they're concerned, broadband service is almost like electricity, water and natural gas in terms of how essential it would be for citizens to have it and how much of a deprivation it would be not to, just because private industry won't do it," she says. She'd like to find some balance between the concerns of the industry and needs of local communities. As it stands, she says, the bill "is putting us too much at the mercy of the private businesses."

The telco video challenge: 25Mbs or bust

Here's an interview in the DesMoines Register with Qwest's Iowa President Max Phillips. It shows while telcos like Qwest desire to get into offering video programming like cable companies and push for state statutes easing the way into the market, they face a daunting technological challenge doing that over existing copper cable pair that was originally designed to carry analog voice signals and not huge amounts of digital data.

"We offer up to seven megabits in Des Moines. You've probably got to get those speeds up somewhere in the 25-megabit range to make this product work," Phillips tells the newspaper.

Getting that kind of throughput on a reliable level in order to support video appears to be a major reach, particularly when much of the telcos' existing copper cable plant can provide only 1.5 Mbs DSL service tops -- and in many areas can't provide DSL at any speed.

Verizon sends mixed messages on need for Mass. state franchise legislation

Last month, I noted local government franchising doesn't seem to be slowing down telcos like Verizon who have backed legislation in various states that would put the state instead of local governments in charge of issuing franchises. I pointed to Verizon's progress in New York and also questioned why given the slow pace of telco broadband infrastructure deployment there would be any need to bypass the locals in the first place.

The telcos complain it takes too long to deploy new broadband infrastructure to support IPTV (Internet Protocol Over TV) when they have to negotiate agreements with local governments one jurisdiction at a time.

This week, The Boston Globe reports Verizon officials concede that local governments in Massachusetts are not slowing Verizon's rollout of its fiber to the home FiOS infrastructure, undercutting Verizon's claim state franchise legislation is needed in that state.

Why the private market fails on broadband

Robert D. Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a Washington, DC-based technology policy think tank, explains why the private sector -- mostly represented by the telco/cable duopoly -- fails when it comes to deployment of broadband infrastructure, resulting in uneven distribution where some neighborhoods have broadband access while others don't:

To be sure, the conservative faith in markets is amply justified in many areas where consumer choice leads to the best outcomes. No one is calling for a national iPod policy or for tax subsidies on Blu-Ray DVD players, for the good reason that these are consumer items that the market best allocates.

But broadband is different: market failures lead to it being undersupplied. The principle market failure is that the provision of broadband involves what economists call "positive externalities."

For example, the fastest broadband connections simultaneously support a host of digital video, voice, and data applications, like telemedicine. Yet the success of these applications is hindered by a classic "chicken or egg" dilemma: they will not develop without a market of high-speed broadband subscribers, but consumers need these applications as a lure to enter the high-speed broadband market in the first place.

So yes, conservatives are right. Proactive policies and incentives for more broadband might "distort" the market. But they are wrong in saying that this distortion would outweigh the benefits. In fact, the innovation and productivity spurred by more and faster broadband is likely to vastly exceed any minor losses from "misallocation" of economic resources.

Broadband has become the 21st century equivalent of a "chicken in every pot." Everyone is in favor it. But the real issue is not whether broadband is good and more is better, but whether the market alone will provide the right amount of it anytime soon. The OECD numbers suggest that we can do better. Now it's up to us to do so. We can start by crafting and implementing a proactive national broadband policy.

Waxman calls for GAO review of federal broadband efforts

More than a decade after the enactment of the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996 that directed the Federal Communications Commission to encourage the deployment of broadband, a House oversight committee wants to determine what has actually been accomplished.

Henry A. Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, asked for the review in a May 22 letter to Comptroller General David M. Walker. Waxman also wants information on how widely broadband is deployed and who has access to it.