Analysis & commentary on America's troubled transition from analog telephone service to digital advanced telecommunications and associated infrastructure deficits.
Friday, March 20, 2009
4 of 5 proposed California state subsidized broadband projects challenged
The reason, according to a recently issued CPUC resolution as well as other documentation posted on the CPUC's Web site is they were challenged by unnamed providers on the grounds they didn't comply with CASF funding guidelines targeting unserved areas (no broadband access) and underserved areas of the Golden State (broadband access at speeds less than 3 mbs down and 1 mbs up).
There's a lesson here as the federal government revs up its own plans for subsidizing broadband infrastructure buildout: avoid going down this slippery, ever changing slope of throughput requirements and attempting to define what constitutes served, unserved and underserved when it comes to advanced IP-based services.
These metrics are simply too subjective and prone to being manipulated and gamed by providers, particularly incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) more interested in preserving their territorial hegemony than serving their customers' telecommunications needs.
The better course is to allow entities such as local governments and telecommunications cooperatives with priority for federal broadband economic stimulus funding determine for themselves where infrastructure buildout is most needed. Most of these entities will likely opt for fiber and avoid the issue of throughput speeds altogether given fiber's tremendous capacity to accommodate current and future bandwidth requirements.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Feds shouldn't provide broadband funding directly to large telcos, cablecos
March 16 (Bloomberg) -- Groups representing companies including Comcast Corp. and AT&T Inc. pressed U.S. regulators to let broadband providers and equipment makers apply to a federal program disbursing $4.7 billion in grants to expand high-speed Internet. Companies already providing broadband “have extensive technical, financial, and managerial experience and expertise,” Curt Stamp, president of the Independent Telephone and Telecommunications Alliance, told a meeting in Washington today. The program is part of the U.S. economic recovery package.
Bad idea. True, these companies have technical expertise to deploy broadband infrastructure. But their role -- except perhaps for small, locally owned providers -- should be limited to that when it comes to distributing $7.2 billion in grants and loans contained in the recently-enacted federal economic stimulus legislation. They should NOT be the direct recipients of any grants or loans for last mile infratructure.
Instead, the stimulus finding should be directed to nonprofit telecommunications cooperatives and local government entities to put in place buried and aerial fiber optic cable and distribution plants over the last mile the telco/cable duopoly has neglected for years.
We should not forget the lessons of history and repeat the fiasco following the enactment of the Federal Communications Act in 1996 that saw an estimated $200 billion in tax breaks and subsidies to deploy advanced digital telecommunications infrastructure virtually disappear, spawning in the current plague of broadband black holes instead of near ubiquitous fiber that was to be in place by 2006.
If the feds directly provide the telco/cable duopoly broadband infrastucture monies as either part of the stimulus measure -- described by the Obama administration as a down payment on America's sorely needed telecommunications upgrade -- or in follow on funding, the U.S. will likely find itself shortchanged again with a substandard telecommunications infrastructure done on the cheap that won't meet the nation's current or future needs.
California PUC sets March 23 public meeting re broadband funding in federal stimulus act
The governor's office has asked the California Public Utilities Commission as well as the nonprofit California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) to get stakeholder input on how best to use the CETF and the CPUC's California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) as vehicles to "quickly target initial federal stimulus funds toward California." The goal is also to determine how to leverage California’s existing broadband programs to assist applicants seeking federal funding available for broadband infrastructure in the stimulus bill.
The CPUC has set a public hearing for March 23 in San Francisco.
"We seek input from a broad spectrum of interests, including broadband providers, public agencies, and consumer groups," the CPUC's notice states.
California PUC approves broadband subsidies for 9 Northern California, Central Valley communities
The $728,093 in funding for the projects comes from the CPUC's California Advanced Services Fund, which is funded by a surcharge on intrastate long distance telephone calls.
Here's the CPUC's press release.
Friday, March 13, 2009
Using U.S. economic stimulus funding for native fiber backbone and FTTH
The article also discusses the downside of Broadband over Power Lines (BPL), which in the opinion of this blogger isn't deserving of either investment capital or federal stimulus subsidies.In addition to building fiber backbones in rural areas, some ISPs also think that subsidizing fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) connections would be feasible for certain rural areas that have relatively high population densities. Patrick Knorr, the COO of cable and broadband provider Sunflower Broadband, says there are some suburban communities in his vicinity that have been sprouting up in rural areas that would have enough population density to justify building out FTTH infrastructure.
"Fiber to the home, like a lot of wire-based solutions, is cost intensive," he says. "But it is cheaper than DSL or coaxial cables. Fiber works better over long distances because it doesn't require as much maintenance as a lot of other technologies. The issue is that there is a significant initial infrastructure cost, which is why there should be opportunities for subsidies to build FTTH in areas that otherwise wouldn't be able to access fiber service."
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Analyst calls it wrong: DOCSIS doesn't support U.S. policy to expand broadband access
The Silver Spring, Md.-based research house also predicts that DOCSIS 3.0 will garner a lot of support from government officials distributing funds from the economic stimulus package."Considering the massive bandwidth increases that will be enabled by upgrading DOCSIS 2.0 to 3.0, the government is likely to view DOCSIS 3.0 as a most feasible and affordable near-term solution to perceived bandwidth scarcities," says P&F Chief Analyst Tim McElgunn, who authored the report.
This analysis is fatally flawed and reflects a major misapprehension of U.S. government policy. That policy is to expand broadband access -- and not to subsidize efforts by cable cable operators to increase their throughput speeds.
The issue with cable providers isn't that their broadband throughput is lacking for current needs. Rather it's the limited footprints of their local access networks that were planned decades ago when they served as single purpose TV delivery platforms that are no longer revelevant to current build out of homes and businesses that could benefit from their IP-based advanced services including high speed Internet and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol).