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7 Comments
I have three words for you
Local Loop Unbundling.
It's what works elsewhere. It's what WAS working here until the Telecomms managed to talk the Courts out of it, bit by bit by bit.
That damn last bit of wire into the home. If that were looked at differently everything else would change.
Of course, if the FCC got REAL with the Spectrum Auction, made the bidding anonymous and only opened it up to NEW players, that might do it. With the new wireless protocol and the right spectrum bandwidth, who needs wires? And that's why Media isn't reporting THAT story . . .
The U.S. Needs to Do Better
Let’s face it; we can no longer rely on market forces, deregulation, and inadequate governmental programs that have caused the U.S. – the country that invented the Internet to fall behind many other countries in terms of high speed internet adoption and deployment. The U.S. is now ranked 15th in the world in broadband penetration.
After reviewing, the Communications Workers of America’s website Speed Matters, I realize we must invest more on communications; especially since the telecoms have enjoyed over $200 billion in tax breaks and other benefits from the Telecom Act.
Consumers shouldn’t be charged more for slower speeds; and the U.S. needs to find constructive ways to deal with the significant digital divide that is being created based on income and geography.
CWA believes that public policies should support growth of good, career jobs as a key to quality service. Not to mention High-tech innovation, rural development, and public safety require truly high speed, universal networks. All this could be accomplished if the government would require public reporting of deployment, actual speed and price.
I found the Speed Matters Campaign website to be very insightful and informative.
There's only ONE problem with Speed Matters Position
These people are a Union Group whose paychecks come from the Telecomms. And they've left out the most important piece of the puzzle for that reason-- Net Neutrality.
What's the most important piece of the puzzle
“The Internet was designed to prevent government or a corporation or anyone else from controlling it. It was designed to defeat discrimination against users, ideas and technologies.” The Union is not pushing against net neutrality.
The belief is, “the U.S. must preserve an open Internet." Consumers should be and are entitled an open Internet allowing them to go where they want when they want. Nothing should be done to degrade or block access to any websites.
Congress directed the FCC to “determine whether advanced telecommunications capability is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion in Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act on 1996. Congress also required the FCC to take immediate action to accelerate deployment of such capability by removing barriers to infrastructure investment and by promoting competition in the telecomm market.”
Unfortunately, the FCC has failed to implement this Congressional mandate. ConnectKentucky can serve as a model for the joint effort of state and local governments, communities, universities, labor and private sector companies.
In your response “to these people” you failed to mention what the most important piece of the puzzle actually is.
re: Astroturfing
I'm not real pleased with the Astroturfing I've seen here from the Speed Matters commenters. Their are legitimate views and observations that can be made about our need for better broadband; it's a topic that doesn't need artificial groundswell built up for it.
Astroturfing just gives your political opponents something to use against you later. Just make an honest statement folks, and keep it civil.
Speed Matters
The facts keep reaffirming that the US is falling further and further behind. This is not going to fix itself. Other countries passed us on broadband deployment and speed because they have public policy to make sure high speed networks were built, were made available to all citizens and were affordable. The Speed Matters Campaign at http://www.speedmatters.org has published a policy report that has a lot of information on the problems of our current broadband policy and concrete proposals for change. The first thing it calls for is for the FCC to redefine what it describes as high speed from the ridiculously low 200 kbps and then for a "broadband map of America" so we have an accurate place to start.
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