#Comcast broadband

[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: lunar construction, Verizon 5G goals, Twitter trust-and-safety warning, 1Password upgrade, Comcast rate hikes, Google Messages encryption

Weekly output: lunar construction, Verizon 5G goals, Twitter trust-and-safety warning, 1Password upgrade, Comcast rate hikes, Google Messages encryption

My week has an unusual road trip coming up–to Wallops Island, Va., where Rocket Lab plans to conduct the first U.S. launch of its Electron rocket Friday evening. This is a much smaller vehicle than the others I’ve been privileged to see lift off, but driving to the Eastern Shore’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport is also a lot simpler than traveling to the Kennedy Space Center. In addition to the…

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#3D printing #Comcast #Comcast broadband #Comcast broadcast fee #Comcast regional sports network fee #Icon Technology #iMessage #Kara Swisher #password manager #RCS #regolith #sign in with Apple #SMS #Snapdragon Summit #social logins #SSO #text messages #Twitter content moderation #verizon #Verizon 5G #Verizon C-band #Yoel Roth

[lordrakim]

Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes | Ars Technica

Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes | Ars Technica

Jared Mauch, the Michigan man who built a fiber-to-the-home Internet provider because he couldn’t get good broadband service from AT&T or Comcast, is expanding with the help of $2.6 million in government money. (more…)

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#at&T #broadband #comcast #FCC #internet #michigan #washtenaw fiber properties

[christianstepmoms]

A small victory to celebrate for today

[needtricks-blog]

The Internet: A Revolution in Communication and Information Access

Dive deep into the fascinating world of the internet! Explore its history, impact on society, essential services, future potential, and valuable tips for safe and responsible usage. Continue reading Untitled

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#airtel broadband #broadband #comcast internet #comcast xfinity #dsl #fast internet #google speed test #internet #Internet Privacy #internet providers #internet security #internet speed test #network speed test #online marketing #sky broadband #speed #t-mobile home internet #tm speed test #vodafone internet #wifi speed test #xfinity internet

[kp777]

#comcast corp #broadband fees #fcc

[wilwheaton]

In an ironic twist, cable TV and Internet provider Comcast has announced that it, too, will sell a bundle of video-streaming services for a discounted price. The announcement comes as Comcast has been rapidly losing cable TV subscribers to streaming services and seeks to bring the same type of bundling that originally drew people away from cable to streaming. Starting on an unspecified date this month, the bundle, called Streamsaver, will offer Peacock, which Comcast owns, Apple TV+, and Netflix to people who subscribe to Comcast's cable TV and/or broadband. Comcast already offers Netflix or Apple TV+ as add-ons to its cable TV, but Streamsaver expands Comcast's streaming-related bundling efforts.

Cable TV providers ruined cable—now they’re coming for streaming

All they have to do is provide decent customer service and reasonable prices. They’ll still make billions.

But they won’t, so I kinda wish them all the worst, just a little bit.

[sniperct]

Amazing what happens when you vote republicans out of office.

The US government on Thursday banned internet service providers (ISPs) from meddling in the speeds their customers receive when browsing the web and downloading files, restoring tough rules rescinded during the Trump administration and setting the stage for a major legal battle with the broadband industry. The net neutrality regulations adopted Thursday by the Federal Communications Commission prohibit providers such as AT&T, Comcast and Verizon from selectively speeding up, slowing down or blocking users’ internet traffic. They largely reflect rules passed by a prior FCC in 2015 and unwound in 2017. The latest rules show how, with a 3-2 Democratic majority, the FCC is moving to reassert its authority over an industry that powers the modern digital economy, touching everything from education to health care and enabling advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence.

[msprayforever]

Net neutrality restored as FCC votes to regulate internet providers | AP News

[mariacallous]

Lobbyists for cable companies and advertisers yesterday expressed their displeasure with a proposed “click-to-cancel” regulation that aims to make it easier for consumers to cancel services.

Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan has said that changes are needed because “some businesses too often trick consumers into paying for subscriptions they no longer want or didn't sign up for in the first place.” The FTC proposed the new set of rules in March 2023, and comments from industry groups were taken this week in a hearing presided over by an administrative law judge.

NCTA – The Internet & Television Association, the primary trade group for cable companies like Comcast and Charter, said the rule would make it harder to offer deals to customers who are trying to cancel.

“The proposed simple click-to-cancel mechanism may not be so simple when such practices are involved. A consumer may easily misunderstand the consequences of canceling, and it may be imperative that they learn about better options,” NCTA CEO Michael Powell said at the hearing. For example, a customer “may face difficulty and unintended consequences if they want to cancel only one service in the package,” as “canceling part of a discounted bundle may increase the price for remaining services.”

Powell said that cable company reps can usually talk customers out of canceling. “Out of millions of cancellations, complaints received by NCTA members amount to only a tiny fraction of 1 percent,” he said. “Three out of four of the cable and broadband customers who called to cancel end up retaining some or all service after speaking with an agent.”

Powell worries that retaining customers will become tougher because, he said, the FTC “proposal prevents almost any communication without first obtaining a consumer's unambiguous, affirmative consent. That could disrupt the continuity of important services, choke off helpful information, and forgo potential savings. It certainly raises First Amendment issues.”

Powell also said the cost of complying—including retraining employees and maintaining records for longer than current practice—could force cable companies to raise prices. He claimed that the FTC's estimate of compliance costs is too low.

FTC: Sellers Must Take “No” for an Answer

The FTC said one of its proposed rules “would require businesses to make it at least as easy to cancel a subscription as it was to start it. For example, if you can sign up online, you must be able to cancel on the same website, in the same number of steps.”

Sellers would also have to obtain customer consent before they “pitch additional offers or modifications when a consumer tries to cancel their enrollment,” the FTC said. Before making those pitches, sellers would have to “ask consumers whether they want to hear them. In other words, a seller must take ‘no’ for an answer, and upon hearing ‘no’ must immediately implement the cancellation process.”

The FTC also proposes that sellers be required to “provide an annual reminder to consumers enrolled in negative option programs involving anything other than physical goods, before they are automatically renewed.”

At yesterday's hearing, the FTC also heard from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), a lobby group for the online advertising industry. “The proposed rule would disrupt the current regime by adding specific requirements dictating what auto-renewal disclosures must say and how they must be presented,” said Lartease Tiffith, the IAB's executive VP for public policy.

Tiffith argued that the rule will burden businesses “and restrict innovation without any corresponding benefit. And as the technology develops, these prescriptive requirements will constrain companies from being able to adapt their offerings to the needs of their customers.”

Tiffith defended auto-renewals generally, saying the practice of automatically renewing services brings “significant benefits to both businesses and consumers in the form of cost savings, convenience, and heightened value.”

Cable Lobby Complains About Cost

Powell claims that complying with the rules would require “rebuilding” cable company systems and that the cost “could easily exceed $100 million for initial implementation by our industry alone.” These costs “would likely lead to higher prices for consumers,” he said.

An FTC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking offered a much different take on the costs, estimating that the “annual labor cost for disclosures for all entities is $4,695,800.” That's based on “an estimated hourly wage rate for sales personnel of $22.15” and an “estimate of 212,000 hours for compliance with the Rule's disclosure requirements.”

The FTC said that non-labor costs for complying with record-keeping and disclosure rules, “such as equipment and office supplies, would be costs borne by sellers in the normal course of business.”

Powell argued that the proposal shouldn't be applied to the cable industry. “The ominously labeled ‘negative option’ feature is merely a plan that continues until the customer cancels,” Powell said. "Most such plans present few concerns … In many industries like ours, automatic renewals are the only model that makes any sense. Consumers expect their internet service to flow reliably and without interruption."

The cable lobbyist contended that consumers are happy with cable company cancellation practices, and that adding the rules to “established processes that are well understood by subscribers will create more confusion, not less.”

“Tens of millions of consumers use our services. They know they are paying for continuing service … and they know how to cancel, rarely complaining about the process,” he said. “The FTC's highly prescriptive proposal requiring numerous disclosures, multiple consents, and specific cancellation mechanisms is a particularly poor fit for our industry.”

Referring to the requirement to obtain consent before offering new deals to customers who are trying to cancel service, Powell said that “placing speed bumps on conversations between consumers and providers will deny them a rightful chance at a better deal and providers a fair opportunity to retain a good customer.”

[tomorrowusa]

Elon Musk has turned Twitter X into a haven for hate speech as well as bots from Russia and other malevolent countries.

Musk himself promoted an antisemitic tweet – probably to show his far right pals that he's just one of the guys. Because of that, he's losing his few remaining respectable advertisers and is coming under scrutiny by governments in the US, UK, and the EU.

An advertising boycott of social media platform X is gathering pace amid an antisemitism storm on the site formerly known as Twitter. Apple, Disney, Comcast and Warner Brothers Discovery have all halted advertising on X, US media report, following hot on the heels of IBM. The European Commission, TV network Paramount and movie studio Lionsgate have also pulled ad dollars from X. It comes after X owner Elon Musk amplified an antisemitic trope. The corporate boycott has also been picking up steam in the wake of an investigation by a US group which flagged ads appearing next to pro-Nazi posts on X. A spokesperson for X told the BBC on Thursday that the company does not intentionally place brands "next to this kind of content" and the platform is dedicated to combatting antisemitism. Mr Musk came under fire on Wednesday after he replied to a post sharing an antisemitic conspiracy theory, calling it "actual truth".

Yeah, "actual truth" as the type of stuff you'd find on Truth Social. 🙄

The White House denounced Mr Musk's endorsement of the post. "We condemn this abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate in the strongest terms," said spokesperson Andrew Bates.

The Washington Post has a list of major advertisers who have suspended their ads on Musk's platform.

IBM IBM pulled its advertising from X on Nov. 16 after the Media Matters report identified it as one of several blue-chip companies whose ads had appeared next to tweets promoting antisemitism. [ ... ] Apple The maker of iPhones and MacBooks decided to pause all advertising on X on Friday after Musk endorsed an antisemitic post on platform, according to Axios, citing unnamed sources, and the New York Times. Apple was reportedly the platform’s largest advertiser, spending nearly $50 million in the first quarter of 2022. [ ... ] Lionsgate A spokesperson for the entertainment and film distribution company told The Washington Post it suspended advertisements on X on Friday afternoon, saying the decision came after “Elon’s tweet.” [ ... ] Disney The entertainment giant suspended advertising on the social media platform Friday, a company spokesperson said. [ ... ] Paramount The media, streaming and entertainment company is suspending all advertising on the platform, a spokesperson said in an email to The Post on Friday.

[ ... ] Comcast The global media and tech company is pausing ads on X, company spokesperson Jennifer Khoury said in an email on Friday. Philadelphia-based Comcast, with a market cap near $171 billon, provides a range of broadband, wireless and other services.

The European Union has also stopped all advertising at MuskX.

No more ads on Elon’s X, EU Commission tells staff

Truth Social is having HÜGE financial problems. Perhaps the two ought to merge; a lot of people wouldn't notice the difference except for the logo. 😆

Chris Hayes at MSNBC put Elon Musk's antisemitism in historical perspective.

To people still on Twitter/X: How do you explain to others why you remain on a platform associated with vile hatemongers?

#social media #twitter #x #elon musk #antisemitism #extremism #hate speech #advertisers fleeing twitter #ibm #apple #comcast #disney #lionsgate #paramount #european union #leave twitter #delete twitter #quit twitter #truth social #chris hayes #henry ford #rachel maddow

[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: net neutrality (yes, again), FCC's Brendan Carr tees off on Apple, Comcast's Converge sales pitch, Android 15 developer preview

This holiday-shortened week will be condensed further by my travel to Barcelona for MWC starting Friday afternoon. This will be my tenth in-person edition of the trade show formerly known as Mobile World Congress, but this trip will bring one first-time ingredient for me: I’m moderating a panel on information-security issues at the MWC setup of a new nonprofit tech-policy publication called…

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#10G #Android 15 #Beeper Mini #Brendan Carr #broadband privacy #Comcast #Comcast data cap #DOCIS 4.0 #FCC #iMessage #net neutrality #Philadelphia #State of the Net #Xfinity

[gwydionmisha]

#Net neutrality #FCC #internet #News

[akaratna]

This is a qualified victory for freedom of communication.

The consumer protections restored by this vote parallel those stipulated by the original Net Neutrality Order of 2015. However these protections remain subject to the whim of whatever party has control of the White House. The original order was overturned as soon as Trump took office, and the 2024 order can just as easily be voided by any administration that aligns with ISPs against the public.

To strengthen protections for our free access to information and communication, we need LEGAL, not merely regulatory, protections for net neutrality. We also need copyright protection and 4th Amendment protection for digital content and personal data that we generate through our internet usage. Laws codifying net neutrality, AND digital rights, AND users' ownership of all data they generate through internet use -- ALL need to be pursued at both the state and federal level, in order to protect us from arbitrary reversals of regulatory practice.

In addition, the 2024 net neutrality format includes a new wrinkle which empowers the FCC to shut down foreign providers deemed to be national security threats. This is a power that goes hand-in-hand with the Tik Tok ban and allows the government direct surveillance and control over our access to information from any 'unauthorized' source.

It is dangerous.

So. A qualified victory over corporate control of communications, but an intensification of State surveillance and control over our communications and thought.

#net neutrality #freedom of communication #digital rights #data ownership #surveillance and control

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

#20yrsago Steven Levy on Trusted Computing https://web.archive.org/web/20031212101452/http://www.msnbc.com/news/998345.asp

#20yrsago London tube map, remixed https://memex.craphound.com/2003/12/11/london-tube-map-remixed/

#20yrsago Transformation from the Internet as a subset of telecom to telecom as a subset of the Internet https://web.archive.org/web/20040202211357/https://werbach.com/blog/2003/12/11.html#a1334

#15yrsago FCC commissioner: Warcraft is a “leading cause” of college dropouts https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/fcc-blames-world-of-warcraft-for-college-dropouts/

#15yrsago Carl Malamud, rogue archivist, in Wired https://www.wired.com/2008/12/online-rebel-publishes-millions-of-dollars-in-u-s-court-records-for-free/

#15yrsago Apple gets into the book-banning business https://mikecane2008.wordpress.com/2008/08/26/apple-forfeits-ebooks-by-banning-a-comic-book/

#15yrsago MPAA to Obama: censor the Internet, kick people off the Internet, break other countries’ Internet https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/12/mpaa-obama

#15yrsago Mexico to fingerprint mobile-phone owners https://web.archive.org/web/20081218201523/https://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hbIC6ZYe2A2fSIe1q-1dnh4TphiwD94VK6K81

#15yrsago Last days of an NYC library https://www.drivenbyboredom.com/2008/12/11/the-donnell-library-center-a-eulogy-in-pictures/

#15yrsago UK culture secretary: “Screw the facts, I’m extending copyright anyway” https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/screw-the-evidence-says-burnham-lets-extend-copyright-term-anyway/

#10yrsago DHS stops NYT reporters at border, lies about it https://www.techdirt.com/2013/12/10/dhs-interrogates-ny-times-reporters-border-then-denies-having-any-records-about-them/

#10yrsago Little Brother stageplay now available for local performances https://littlebrotherlive.wordpress.com/2013/12/09/lets-get-little-brother-back-on-stage/

#10yrsago Potty with built-in tablet holder is “worst toy of 2013” https://web.archive.org/web/20151016182213/https://reasonsmysoniscrying.com/post/69503973203/this-was-just-named-the-worst-toy-of-2013-and-the

#10yrsago KC cop threatened to destroy home and kill pets unless he was allowed to conduct a warrantless search https://fox4kc.com/news/man-says-police-officer-threatened-to-kill-his-dogs/

#10yrsago Satanists offer “good taste” monument to complement Oklahoma Capitol’s Ten Commandments monument https://tulsaworld.com/news/government/satanists-seek-spot-on-oklahoma-statehouse-steps-next-to-ten/article_d7a11ac2-60dc-11e3-ac3b-0019bb30f31a.html

#10yrsago Why haunted houses have suits of armor https://longforgottenhauntedmansion.blogspot.com/2013/12/armor-gettin.html

#5yrsago Verizon writes down its Yahoo/AOL assets by $4.6 billion https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-11/verizon-writes-down-4-6-billion-of-value-of-aol-yahoo-business

#5yrsago Small Massachusetts town decides to spend $1.4m building its own fiber, rather than paying Comcast $500K for shitty broadband https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/12/comcast-rejected-by-small-town-residents-vote-for-municipal-fiber-instead/

#5yrsago Shitty Tumblr pornbot inception https://memex.craphound.com/2018/12/11/shitty-tumblr-pornbot-inception/

#5yrsago Surveillance libraries in common smartphone apps have amassed dossiers on the minute-to-minute movements of 200 million+ Americans https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/10/business/location-data-privacy-apps.html

#5yrsago Congressional Republicans say Equifax breach was “entirely preventable,” blames “aggressive growth strategy” but reject measures to prevent future breaches https://thehill.com/policy/technology/420582-house-panel-issues-scathing-report-on-entirely-preventable-equifax-data/

#5yrsago The EU says it wants Europeans to engage with it: now that 4 MILLION of them have opposed mass censorship through #Article13, will they listen? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/12/four-million-europeans-signatures-opposing-article-13-have-been-delivered-european

#1yrago Plato Would Ban Ad-Blockers https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/11/plato-would-ban-ad-blockers/

#pluralistic

[kp777]

By Jessica Corbett

Common Dreams

Sept. 26, 2023

Open internet advocates across the United States celebrated on Tuesday as Federal Communications Commission Chair Jessica Rosenworcel announced her highly anticipated proposal to reestablish FCC oversight of broadband and restore net neutrality rules.

"We thank the FCC for moving swiftly to begin the process of reinstating net neutrality regulations," said ACLU senior policy counsel Jenna Leventoff. "The internet is our nation's primary marketplace of ideas—and it's critical that access to that marketplace is not controlled by the profit-seeking whims of powerful telecommunications giants."

Rosenworcel—appointed to lead the commission by President Joe Biden—discussed the history of net neutrality and her new plan to treat broadband as a public utility in a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., which came on the heels of the U.S. Senate's recent confirmation of Anna Gomez to a long-vacant FCC seat.

Back in 2005, "the agency made clear that when it came to net neutrality, consumers should expect that their broadband providers would not block, throttle, or engage in paid prioritization of lawful internet traffic," she recalled. "In other words, your broadband provider had no business cutting off access to websites, slowing down internet services, and censoring online speech."

"Giant corporations and their lobbyists... will try every trick to block or delay the agency from restoring net neutrality."

After a decade of policymaking and litigation, net neutrality rules were finalized in 2015. However, a few years later—under former FCC Chair Ajit Pai, an appointee of ex-President Donald Trump—the commission caved to industry pressure and repealed them.

"The public backlash was overwhelming. People lit up our phone lines, clogged our email inboxes, and jammed our online comment system to express their disapproval," noted Rosenworcel, who was a commissioner at the time and opposed the repeal. "So today we begin a process to make this right."

The chair is proposing to reclassify broadband under Title II of the Communications Act, which "is the part of the law that gives the FCC clear authority to serve as a watchdog over the communications marketplace and look out for the public interest," she explained. "Title II took on special importance in the net neutrality debate because the courts have ruled that the FCC has clear authority to enforce open internet policies if broadband internet is classified as a Title II service."

"On issue after issue, reclassifying broadband as a Title II service would help the FCC serve the public interest more efficiently and effectively," she pointed out, detailing how it relates to public safety, national security, cybersecurity, network resilience and reliability, privacy, broadband deployment, and robotexts.

Rosenworcel intends to release the full text of the proposal on Thursday and hold a vote regarding whether to kick off rulemaking on October 19. While Brendan Carr, one of the two Republican commissioners, signaled his opposition to the Title II approach on Tuesday, Gomez's confirmation earlier this month gives Democrats a 3-2 majority at the FCC.

"Giant corporations and their lobbyists blocked President Biden from filling the final FCC seat for more than two years, and they will try every trick to block or delay the agency from restoring net neutrality now," Demand Progress communications director Maria Langholz warned Tuesday. "The commission must remain resolute and fully restore free and open internet protections to ensure broadband service providers like Comcast and Verizon treat all content equally."

"Americans' internet experience should not be at the whims of corporate executives whose primary concerns are the pockets of their stakeholders and the corporations' bottom line," she added, also applauding the chair.

Free Press co-CEO Jessica J. González similarly praised Rosenworcel and stressed that "without Title II, broadband users are left vulnerable to discrimination, content throttling, dwindling competition, extortionate and monopolistic prices, billing fraud, and other shady behavior."

"As this proceeding gets under way, we will hear all manner of lies from the lobbyists and lawyers representing big phone and cable companies," she predicted. "They'll say anything and everything to avoid being held accountable. But broadband providers and their spin doctors are deeply out of touch with people across the political spectrum, who are fed up with high prices and unreliable services. These people demand a referee on the field to call fouls and issue penalties when broadband companies are being unfair."

Like Rosenworcel, in her Tuesday speech, González also highlighted that "one thing we learned from the Covid-19 pandemic is that broadband is essential infrastructure—it enables us to access education, employment, healthcare, and more."

That "more" includes civic engagement, as leaders at Common Cause noted Tuesday. Ishan Mehta, who directs the group's Media and Democracy Program, said that "the internet has fundamentally changed how people are civically engaged and is critical to participating in society today. It is the primary communications platform, a virtual public square, and has been a powerful organizing tool, allowing social justice movements to gain momentum and widespread support."

After the Trump-era repeal, Mehta explained, "we saw broadband providers throttle popular video streaming services, degrade video quality, forcing customers to pay higher prices for improved quality, offer service plans that favor their own services over competitors, and make hollow, voluntary, and unenforceable promises not to disconnect their customers during the pandemic."

Given how broadband providers have behaved, Michael Copps, a Common Cause special adviser and former FCC commissioner, said that "to allow a handful of monopoly-aspiring gatekeepers to control access to the internet is a direct threat to our democracy."

Rosenworcel's speech came a day after U.S. Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) led over two dozen of their colleagues in sending a letter calling for the restoration of net neutrality protections. The pair said in a statement Tuesday that "broadband is not a luxury. It is an essential utility and it is imperative that the FCC's authority reflects the necessary nature of the internet in Americans' lives today."

"We need net neutrality so that small businesses are not shoved into online slow lanes, so that powerful social media companies cannot stifle competition, and so that users can always freely speak their minds on social media and advocate for the issues that are most important to them," they said. "We applaud Chairwoman Rosenworcel for her leadership and look forward to working with the FCC to ensure a just broadband future for everyone."

#net neutrality #FCC #Jessica Rosenworcel #ACLU #Common Cause #open internet #democracy

[thoughtportal]

More than 600 communities across the U.S. have decided to build their own broadband networks after decades of predatory behavior, slow speeds, and high prices by regional telecom monopolies.

That includes the city of Bountiful, Utah, which earlier this year voted to build a $48 million fiber network to deliver affordable, gigabit broadband to every business and residence in the city. The network is to be open access, meaning that multiple competitors can come in and compete on shared central infrastructure, driving down prices for locals (see our recent Copia study on this concept).

As you might expect, regional telecom monopolies hate this sort of thing. But because these networks are so popular among consumers, they’re generally afraid to speak out against them directly. So they usually employ the help of dodgy proxy lobbying and policy middlemen, who’ll then set upon any town or city contemplating such a network using a bunch of scary, misleading rhetoric.

Like in Bountiful, where the “Utah Taxpayers Association” (which has direct financial and even obvious managerial tethers to regional telecom giants CenturyLink (now Lumen) and Comcast) launched a petition trying to force a public vote on the $48 million in revenue bonds authorized for the project under the pretense that such a project would be an unmitigated disaster for the town. (Their effort didn’t work).

Big ISPs like to pretend they’re suddenly concerned about taxpayers and force entirely new votes on these kinds of projects because they know that with unlimited marketing budgets, they can usually flood less well funded towns or cities with misleading PR to sour the public on the idea.

But after the experience most Americans had with their existing broadband options during the peak COVID home education boom, it’s been much harder for telecom giants to bullshit the public. And the stone cold fact remains: these locally owned networks that wouldn’t even be considered if locals were happy with existing options.

You’ll notice these “taxpayer groups” exploited by big ISPs never criticize the untold billions federal and local governments throw at giant telecom monopolies for half-completed networks. Or the routine taxpayer fraud companies like AT&T, Frontier, CenturyLink (now Lumen) and others routinely engage in.

And it’s because such taxpayer protection groups are effectively industry-funded performance art; perhaps well intentioned at one point, but routinely hijacked, paid, and used as a prop by telecom monopolies looking to protect market dominance.

Gigi Sohn (who you’ll recall just had her nomination to the FCC scuttled by a sleazy telecom monopoly smear campaign) has shifted her focus heavily toward advocating for locally-owned, creative alternatives to telecom monopoly power. And in an op-ed to local Utah residents in the Salt Lake Tribune, she notes how telecom giants want to have their cake and eat it too.

They don’t want to provide affordable, evenly available next-generation broadband. But they don’t want long-neglected locals to, either:

Two huge cable and broadband companies, Comcast and CenturyLink/Lumen, have been members of UTA and have sponsored the UTA annual conference. They have been vocally opposed to community-owned broadband for decades and are well-known for providing organizations like the UTA with significant financial support in exchange for pushing policies that help maintain their market dominance. Yet when given the opportunity in 2020, before anyone else, to provide Bountiful City with affordable and robust broadband, the companies balked. So the dominant cable companies not only don’t want to provide the service Bountiful City needs, they also want to block others from doing so.

Big telecom giants like AT&T and Comcast (and all the consultants, think tankers, and academics they hire to defend their monopoly power) love to claim that community owned broadband networks are some kind of inherent boondoggle. But they’re just another business plan, dependent on the quality of the proposal and the individuals involved.

Even then, data consistently shows that community-owned broadband networks (whether municipal, cooperative, or built on the back of the city-owned utility) provide better, faster, cheaper service than regional monopolies. Such networks routinely not only provide the fastest service in the country, they do so while being immensely popular among consumers. They’re locally-owned and staffed, so they’re more accountable to locals. And they’re just looking to break even, not make a killing.

If I was a lumbering, apathetic, telecom monopoly solely fixated on cutting corners and raising rates to please myopic Wall Street investors, I’d be worried too.

#article #telecommunications #AT&T #comcast #monopoly #internet #municipal governments #municipal internet #CenturyLink #corporate lobbying #wall street