Groups praise FCC's inquiries on net neutrality
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Two public-interest groups praised the U.S. Federal Communications Commission for opening three inquiries into network traffic management practices by broadband providers and mobile phone carriers.
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(InfoWorld) - Several lawmakers protested a spectrum auction proposal from the chairman of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), saying his plan could limit the number of bidders and raise costs to consumers. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin's plan would require winners of part of theÂ 700MHz band of spectrum, to be auctioned by early next year, to accept any wireless devices, including phone handsets, allowing customers to transfer devices between mobile providers. Martin's plan would also include net neutrality-like rules, prohibiting auction winners from blocking or slowing Web content from other providers. But several members of the House of Representatives Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, many of them Republicans, questioned Martin's proposed rules, which have support of the majority of the FCC. Representative Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, said he was "very disappointed" that fellow Republican Martin was proposing regulations for part of the 60MHz of spectrum to be auctioned. Some proposals byÂ consumer groups and Frontline WirelessÂ would also require auction winners to provide wholesale access to competitors, and Barton praised Martin for not including that provision. "It's not quite as bad as the Frontline plan, but I don't think it's as good as absolute no-condition auction," Barton said. Many Republicans suggested that auction conditions would decrease the value of the spectrum. Congress has budgeted the auction to raise $10 billion with about half of that going toward reducing the U.S. government budget deficit. "Congress has already spent that money," said Representative Charles Gonzalez, a Texas Democrat. Questions about Martin's proposal came from a handful of Democrats. Representative John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the full House Energy and Commerce Committee, asked FCC commissioners whether the device-portability rules would increase the cost of wireless phone plans. Customers want to be able to take their mobile phones with them when they switch carriers, but carriers generally haven't offered that option, Martin said. "I think the benefits outweigh the costs and concerns," he said. Barton suggested that winning bidders could implement the device-portability and net neutrality proposals without FCC mandate. Google has indicatedÂ it could bid billions of dollars, Barton noted. "Why shouldn't we just let Google bid?" Barton said. "If they've got a better idea, why don't they go into the marketplace and bid their four or five billion dollars?" There's customer demand for device portability, but carriers haven't acted on it, Martin said. Wireless carriers didn't offer phone number portability until the FCC forced them to in late 2003, then millions of U.S. residents took advantage of it, he said. Asked whether they supported Martin's proposals, the FCC's two Democrats said they did, while the two other Republicans said they hadn't made their minds up yet. "Please let me keep my phone and let me take it wherever I want," said subcommittee chairman Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat. The so-called open-access rules are necessary for new broadband competition to challenge cable and telecom providers, said FCC commissioner Michael Copps, a Democrat. The 700MHz auction is the last major spectrum auction on the horizon, many participants said. "This is one proceeding where we cannot fail," Copps said. Some lawmakers suggested Martin's proposal doesn't go far enough. Representative Charles "Chip" Pickering, a Mississippi Republican, called on the FCC to require wholesale access rules as well. Wholesale access would allow new and innovative services to flourish on the networks using the spectrum, he said. Martin's plan would "enhance markets and competition," he added.
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Citizens have until Friday to sway government regulators on net neutrality, the principle that ISPs should treat all packets of internet data equally.
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In a filing with the U.S. FCC, Comcast told regulators it is using reasonable methods to regulate Web traffic.
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Consumer groups and broadband vendors want more market competition for wireless spectrum.
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The Federal Communications Commission will investigate complaints that Comcast Corp. actively interferes with Internet traffic as its subscribers try to share files online, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said Tuesday.
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The FCC uses fines to get its message across.
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Comcast's response yesterday to its public thrashing by the FCC may have had a second, more important, purpose: A prominent Congressman has introduced legislation paving the way for a ban on Internet throttling.
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Proponents of Net neutrality laws call for a hearing on the issue, arguing reports of peer-to-peer traffic interference support need for rules banning that practice.
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Justice Department tells FCC that internet service providers should be allowed to charge a fee for priority Web traffic. DOJ says it's opposed to "Net neutrality," the principle that all Internet sites should be equally accessible to any Web user.
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The Federal Communications Commission will investigate complaints that Comcast actively interferes with Internet traffic as its subscribers try to share files online.
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Group including Amazon, Google, and TiVO lobbies for a national broadband policy that would provide affordable access for all.
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(InfoWorld) - U.S. senators questioned Thursday whether members of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission plan to enforce merger conditions that AT&T Inc. agreed to in its December acquisition of BellSouth Corp. Democratic members of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee questioned why FCC Chairman Kevin Martin and Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate issued a joint statement while approving the merger saying the FCC couldn't broadly enforce some of AT&T's concessions. "What I find difficult to understand is that ... you said that you do not intend to stand by the deal that was reached," said Senator Daniel Inouye, the committee chairman and a Hawaii Democrat. Martin and Tate, both Republicans, had protested a net neutrality condition, preventing AT&T from giving priority transmission speeds to its own or its partners' Web content for at least two years. The net neutrality conditions "very well may cause greater problems than the speculative problems they seek to address," Martin and Tate said in the statement Dec. 29. Martin on Thursday said he intends to hold AT&T to the net neutrality agreement, but he doesn't plan to impose those standards on other broadband carriers. "Since [AT&T] volunteered to do that, we would enforce that," he said. "That does not mean we were changing our policy." Martin also suggested another part of the agreement setting out wholesale rates for some data services may be unenforceable. "What is your legal authority as chairman ... to not enforce something you just did?" asked Senator Mark Pryor, an Arkansas Democrat. AT&T agreed to lower the wholesale special access prices for DS1, DS3, and Ethernet services available to some regional telecom carriers and large businesses, but not to large competitors. But the FCC's policy in the past has been that wholesale discounts should apply to all customers, Martin said. "That tariff actually has some components that I believe are illegal under the commission precedent," Martin said. "They can file [the proposed discount], but I'm not committing to approving something that would be in violation of our precedent. We don't allow for that kind of discrimination." But Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein, a Democrat who pushed for conditions on the AT&T merger, noted that the FCC adopted the AT&T merger conditions on a 4-0 vote. "It's hard for me to understand why we can't implement something we adopted unanimously," he said. Senators also urged the FCC to work on ways to get broadband service to rural, inner city and poor areas. The FCC on Wednesday issued a report saying the number of high-speed lines in the U.S. increased by 26 percent during the first half of 2006, from 51.2 million to 64.6 million lines in service. The number of high-speed lines grew by 21 percent in the second half of 2005. Senators also pointed to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's latest study saying the U.S. ranks 12th in broadband adoption rate among industrialized nations. Commissioner Michael Copps called on Congress and the FCC to develop a national broadband strategy. He called the U.S. broadband adoption rates "woeful." "I am really worried that we can go into the 21st century and have a bigger digital divide in this country ... than we had back in the days of plain, old telephone service in the 20th century," he said. "This just isn't feel-good liberal theory -- we're talking about the competitiveness of the United States of America."
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WASHINGTON, March 5  /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Consumers for Cable Choice (C4CC) today applauded the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for developing rules that will hasten consumer competition in broadband and video service.
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Some advocacy groups praise a new net neutrality bill in Congress.
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WASHINGTON -- New rules approved this week by the Federal Communications Commission are aimed at making high-speed Internet available to more Americans.
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As Congress debates disputed Internet neutrality laws, supporters and defenders of the concept of equal pricing for all on the Web faced off yesterday at the VON (Voice Over the Net) trade show in Boston.