[IP] Broadband needs a nonpartisan FCC
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: September 14, 2004 8:35:15 AM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Broadband needs a nonpartisan FCC
Reply-To: dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Broadband needs a nonpartisan FCC
By Rep. John Conyers (D-Michigan)
<http://news.com.com/2010-1034-5364174.html>
Story last modified September 14, 2004, 4:00 AM PDT
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In seeking to formulate an economic policy for the technology sector,
President Bush last spring identified a seminal goal: providing every
American household not only broadband service by 2007, but also a
choice of broadband provider.
"There's nothing like choice, by the way, if you're a consumer, to
make sure that (broadband) stays reasonably priced," the president said
at the time.
But right now, a handful of telecom titans are hard at work carving up
the potential broadband marketplace.
Most consumers feel they have little, if any, choice in providers. As
such, they are relatively disinclined to purchase pricy services from
what they see as a monopoly or duopoly marketplace. In rival countries
like Japan, by contrast, where 60 percent of the DSL (digital
subscriber line) market is now controlled by competitors rather than
the incumbent telephone monopoly, prices have dipped to the lowest
anywhere in the world--ranging from $17 to $25 a month--and usage is
near ubiquitous.
Unfortunately, after massive lobbying assaults by the regional Bell
companies, the Federal Communications Commission has left us on the
wrong road--moving away from telephone competition and choice. It seems
that years of political infighting at the FCC will likely only produce
a new set of rules set to squelch telephone competition, ceding the
markets essentially to those who own (or in the case of the telephone
industry, were given) the networks.
But there is a ray of hope--at least for broadband competition--which
should not fall victim to the FCC's intramural jockeying.
In late August, Chairman Michael Powell's FCC issued new interim rules
that will all but end competition in the telephone marketplace. As his
final coda, however, Powell left open a crack in the door with an
invitation for the FCC to ameliorate the interim rules. In a letter to
his fellow commissioners, Powell hinted at his interest in preserving
line-sharing--a key to broadband competition. The commission should put
aside internal squabbling and work together to ensure the survival of
this critical broadband policy.
Line-sharing, in layman's terms, refers to a set of rules--near
expiration--that allows broadband competitors to use the unused,
"high-frequency" portions of the telephone lines to deliver high-speed
services.
Line-sharing seems to have been one of the few tech policies that
worked in the past five years. Originally implemented in 1999, the
rules were instrumental in more than halving the average price of
broadband service--from $70 a month to below $30 a month today. And,
not unexpectedly, broadband usage by the public has skyrocketed, with
the number of DSL subscribers jumping almost 2,000 percent between 1999
and 2002. Billions of dollars invested in these markets will be
stranded if the policy does not continue.
So what's the rub? This issue is a case study of how a sensible,
bipartisan policy falls victim to Washington horse-trading. Powell,
having recently won a green light from the White House, now seems bent
on writing rules to phase out local telephone competition. Democrats,
upset at what they see as Powell's obeisance to the telephone
monopolies, don't seem inclined to play ball.
Unfortunately, this division has brought the FCC to a standstill in
making progress on other critical issues such as line-sharing. While
there is near unanimous support for line-sharing within the FCC, it is
now being used as a political pawn and proxy for other fights.
It's this kind of gamesmanship that turns so many people off politics.
If this stalemate continues, the only winners will be telecom
incumbents like the Bell companies, who will be free to carve up the
broadband marketplace among themselves. Meanwhile, the FCC--already
stung by the media concentration debacle and criticism over telephone
rules--and the president's vision of ubiquitous broadband deployment,
will be the big losers, along with consumer choice.
With the opportunity to promote this pro-broadband policy before them,
the Democrats should seize the day on it, and without committing to
other provisions that will hurt telephone competition, should readily
embrace it. Powell, for his part, should seize the day by making
line-sharing one of the few bipartisan telecom policy victories, and
refrain from trying to barter it for other issues opposed by consumer
groups.
The truth is that a significant bipartisan victory can be had if both
sides simply stand down from their battle lines in the name of a policy
on which they both agree. Now that would be refreshing.
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