Month: March 2008

The FCC's New Broadband Data Gathering: Even the Deregulators Are Losing Patience.

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It is a delightful bit of timing that this piece on European broadband comes the same day the FCC voted to amend its broadband data collection for the annual “State of the Broadband” Report. I’d say it was a happy coincidence, except that there are so many articles about how Europe is kicking our broadband bottom these days that the odds were good someone would publish something contrasting the growing penetration (and associated economic benefits) in Europe with the anemic growth in the U.S.

Which highlights the key take away from the FCC’s decision to ramp up data gathering and propose looking at pricing. Even the Republicans in Washington are starting to lose patience. I will provide analysis of the substance (as far as we can tell before an order is published) in a later post, but this point is sufficient important it bears posting on its own.

You will find no shortage of telco/cable shills or hardcore deregulators willing to sing the happy happy joy joy song over our current “wildly competitive” broadband market, or explain why these international rankings are misleading, irrelevant, or just plain wrong, the song no longer gets applause and the excuses are wearing thin. All five FCC Commissioners went to the Consumer Electronics Show this year. They’ve gone on tours of Silicon Valley, talked with venture capitalists and start ups, traveled around Europe and Asia, and — most importantly — are not stupid. In 2005, the industry promised big things if the FCC would only deregulate them and set them free. It’s now 2008. In that time, we have seen a parade of other countries streak by us while we plod along and fall increasingly far behind.

Do not let the last minute squabbling between the Commissioners about the details of the Report and upgraded standards fool you. While the Democrats would definitely like to see more done to get at real data, and while McDowell still frets that the cost of collecting data outweighs the benefits and that using labels for speed tiers is too subjective, everyone wants to find out what the real state of broadband deployment is and how we are going to make it available and affordable for everyone. We’re done with happy songs, the FCC is signaling. If industry wants to avoid the kind of massive reregulation the FCC and Congress would bring to bear under a Democratic administration, you need to start getting it in gear and providing real data. Whether industry will take the hint, or whether it will still find it preferable to remain in a state of denial, still remains to be seen.

Stay tuned . . . .

700 MHz: Although Apparently The FCC Decided to Give Headlines . . .

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No sooner did the FCC clarify that they would lift anonymity after they collected the money when Martin held a press conference and the FCC released the results. Here are the headlines:

1) Verizon won C Block and a boatload of licenses;

2) AT&T took a boatload of licenses;

3) Google didn’t win anything (stupid oak leaves!).

I will have more details as I can track them down, and more analysis later. I also metaphorically owe Commissioner McDowell a dollar, for his prediction that the new entrants wouldn’t bite on the big C.

Stay tuned . . .

700 MHz Update: FCC Severs D Block, Refers Cyren Call Allegations To Inspector General.

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The FCC can certainly move fast when it wants to — and when it has had a few weeks to get used to the idea. The FCC just released a public notice that it will “de-link” the D Block from Auction 73, and will release the names of the winners as soon as the Commission collects the payments (ten days after it issues the official notice that the auction is over and that parties now need to file “long forms” and pay up).

Also of importance, Chairman Martin has referred the question of whether Cyren Call made all manner of demands of Frontline, and did this break any rules to the Office of the Inspector General. This extremely important detail was buried in this somewhat less than stellar Washington Post article about our letter to the FCC calling for an investigation. I say “less than stellar” because, in addition to “burying the lead” big time, the reporters did not trouble themselves to contact me despite that fact that (a) I broke this story in the first place (only narrowly beating out Dow Jones’ Cory Boles); (b) I drafted the friggin’ letter. I therefore recommend this far superior article in eWeek (i.e., it mentions me and links to the relevant blog entry — a clear mark of superior journalistic skills).

A bit more analysis below . . .

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Cindy Sheehan's Question

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So now we’re five years into this goddamn war.

Cindy Sheehan, whose camping out in Crawford, Texas, during the August heat of 2005 did as much as anything to get Americans to see George W. Bush for the puny coward he is, had a very simple question for the man who caused her son Casey to die. Bush had said that Casey Sheehan, Cindy’s son– an Army soldier who was killed by a bullet in the head in Sadr City in April, 2004–had died for a “noble cause.”

Cindy Sheehan asked, “What is that noble cause?”

Rather than answer this question, Bush ran and hid. (Of course. That’s what cowards do.) And then he had some bumsucking speechwriter gin up a response about how the brave soldiers who had been killed in Iraq had died for this reason, or for that. An afterthought, really, but a bumsucking speechwriter can usually be found when George W. Bush needs one.

If you listen to Bush or to any of his apologists or whores or spokespeople, or to war apologists on the TeeVee; to wingnut bloggers, television “news” talking heads & radio oh-so-serious pontificators and teleprompter readers; to Christianist preachers, ingnorami in the street, flagwavers and dolts of every hue and persuasion, they’ll give you some bullshit definition of the so-called noble cause that cost Casey Sheehan his life and Cindy Sheehan her son. But the thing is, whatever bullshit answer they give you, it is guaranteed to be bullshit. It’s not going to be the answer they gave in 2003, or the different one they gave in 2004, or the still different one they gave in 2005, and on and on and on. If it comes from anybody in this administration or from any of its supporters (such as John McBush McCain), it’s going to be the latest bullshit. It’s not going to have anything to do with the earlier, inoperative versions of the bullshit. It’s going to be a hollow, empty lie.

If we ever get a truthful answer to Cindy Sheehan’s Question from a president, such as, “there was no noble cause”, then we’ll perhaps be ready to look at solutions to our current situations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Until then, it’s nothing but lies, and sorrow, and waste.

Yo Google! Your Lawyers Are So Stupid, They Copy AT&T!

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I had an unfortunate head desk moment this morning on reading that Google Ads (such as the ones to the right on your screen) reserves the right to pull their service if you engage in “any action or practice that reflects poorly on Google or otherwise disparages or devalues Google’s reputation or goodwill.” This looks suspiciously like the terms of service my fellow travelers on net neutrality slagged AT&T for using.

In both cases, I expect that the intent is not to yank people who say nasty things about the parent company, but to reserve the right to yank the service when someone does something revolting. “Look, NAMBLA uses Google Ads, Google supports pederasts.” or “Look, the worlds worst spammers have AT&T connections, they support spam.” By why can’t my lawyer colleagues just say so, instead of writing something so broad that it covers even general criticism? Yes, “tarnish” is one of those words of art that all us legal folks understand has a very specific meaning. But it doesn’t do a damn bit of good when folks who are trying to understand the terms of service are not lawyers, which — outside of DC — covers most of the user population.

I have no doubt that the usual suspects will be out baying for blood and denunciations like the staff of the Clinton and Obama campaigns after a rival campaign staffer sneezes funny. So even though I did not give a rat’s patootie on the AT&T terms of service (being a lawyer and understanding what it meant), I shall now both condemn Google for being so stupid and test their policy by making several derogatory comments about GoogleAds.

[Begin OUTRAGEOUS accent]
Hey, GoogleAds! I fart in your general direction! I wave my very naughty bits at you! You are so lame, you copy terms of service from AT&T!

Now change your TOS to something sensible or I shall taunt you some more.
[end OUTRAGEOUS accent]

Did the ads on the screen disappear? No. Good. Can we consider this settled and actually get back to real policy?

Keep this up and I shall need to make a major speech about “Terms of Service In America” and invite us all together for some major healing.

Stay tuned . . . .

Quick 700 MHz Updates

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First, we at PISC have sent a letter to the FCC asking the FCC to sever the D Block issues, announce the winners of the rest of the auction, and thoroughly investigate the allegations around Cyren Call and its pre-auction discussion with Frontline. (Martin has apparently already circulated something that severs D Block, so they can announce results as soon as the other Commissioners vote and the wireless bureau finishes the necessary housekeeping.)

Perhaps more importantly for the long run, we ask that the FCC take a hard look at whether to try to fix the public/private partnership or possibly do something else. The FCC has a lot of options here. And with the auction clearing over $19 Billion and the statutory requirement to start an auction before January 28, 2008 fulfilled, the money pressure and time pressure are off. We have time to have a public process and do it right.

Second, here is Kevin Martin’s official statement explaining why the auction was a huge success (and, by implication, why he did a bang up job getting this done). Martin, sensitive to the grumblings from folks who say that different rules could have gotten more revenue, included this handy chart showing that, on a pure revenue basis, the 700 MHz auction is the most successful FCC auction ever.

(In the reading the tea leaves department, I note that the chart subtracts out the D Block bid. And indication the FCC won’t just pass off the D Block to the lone low bidder? Maybe, but no surprise if that turns out to be the case.)

You can find Tate’s statement here. I have not seen official statements from any of the other offices.

Stay tuned . . . .

That's It! The 700 MHz Auction Is Ovah ! On to Tasting And Judgment . . . .

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At long last, the FCC went three rounds without any new bids and declared Auction 73 (better known as Battle 700 MHz) closed. You can see the final provisional winning bids on the FCC’s Auction 73 page here.

Of course, we are all waiting to see who won what licenses, particularly C Block. But we have some preliminaries to go through first. Most importantly, the FCC has to make a decision on whether to sever the D Block from the Auction so that it can investigate what happened, especially the allegations around Cyren Call and Morgan O’Brien.

Even with the information available, Auction 73 has clearly succeeded on a number of key fronts. Unsurprisingly, I am inclined to credit anonymous bidding with the enormous surge in value for the licenses. Even if incumbents ended up walking away with the lion’s share of the licenses, at least they paid market value for a change (as opposed to the AWs auction, where they picked them up dirt cheap). I also note that at the end of the day, the FCC has only 8 unclaimed licenses (compared with 35 for AWS). As Greg Rose observed previously on his blog, there is good reason to believe we saw a lot of new people bidding.

It remains to be seen, however, whether the auction brought in new competitors or if, as the conventional wisdom predicted, AT&T and Verizon walked off with the big prizes. In particular, we all wait with baited breath on who won C Block.

Finally, two points on D Block. First, even if the experiment failed, that did not make it a dumb move. Babe Ruth used to lead the league in home runs and strike outs, because you can’t hit home runs unless you swing at a lot of pitches. With the FCC trying to satisfy the mandate of Congress to promote a national interoperable public safety network, but with insufficient spectrum allocated and with insufficient funds to build it. So the Commission tried to think outside the box and took a chance. turns out — for reasons still unknown — it did not work out.

Always punish innovators if things don’t go exactly right and you run out of innovators damn quick. Anonymous bidding was also an innovation. So is the open device condition. Before folks rush out to buy stink bombs to lob at Martin and the other Commissioners over D Block, consider if we want the next FCC reduced to such political timidity that we always get the same auction rules again and again and again, because the price of innovating is too high.

Second point: the FCC has a silver lining here. With the auction over, the FCC has fulfilled its statutory obligation to hold an auction commencing by January 28. Not only can the FCC take the time it needs to consider what to do, it can also consider other solutions besides trying to fix up D Block or even auctioning it off the highest bidder. That could include non-exclusive licenses, real time auctions, or even an unlicensed commons — if that would best serve the public interest.

I’m not saying what the best solution for D Block is, because we don’t know enough yet. It will depend on a lot of factors, such as who won the other licenses and how much stomach the FCC has to innovate. But I’m hoping that the FCC and others, when assessing Auction 73, will consider the successes as well as the D Block failure. Otherwise, they will vote to do the politically safest thing. Not a result I’d like to see.

stay tuned . . . .

SCOTUS Gets Down & Dirty with Indecency!

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The Supreme Court just agreed to hear the FCC’s appeal on the indecency case. This case involves whether the FCC acted correctly when it changed previous precedent and held that even a “fleeting utterance” of certain words (in this case, the “F-word”) can qualify as “indecent.” Previously, the FCC had a rule that it would take the entire context of the use of an obscenity into account, and that a mere “fleeting utterance” in the context of live television (especially of a newsworthy event) would not constitute indecency.

What’s at stake? See below . . .

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Mungo Jerry and the Bear Stearns implosion

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Well this post-capitalism capitalism is a grand thing, isn’t it. Privatize the profit, socialize the loss, and no matter what, make sure the hyperwealthy aren’t unduly taxed (or asked to serve in Iraq), for after all, they’re responsible for keeping this great financial engine running. (Cough! Cough! Sputter!.. .Wheeeeeeee! Crash!) Where would we be without hedge funds and their managers! One shudders to think! I mean, somebody has to play bridge and golf, don’t they??? Free up the magic market fairies! Deregulate! That’s what our great national poet Walt Whitman meant when he said

Unscrew the locks from the doors!
Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!

Thank God for the door-unscrewing Ayn Rand acolyte Alan Greenspan and the Reagan/Bush (hey, don’t forget Clinton!) revolutions, without which we might have had by now a decent health care system, peace, prosperity, a recovering (or never devastated) New Orleans, and some kind of plan to deal with the environmental and energy crises that threaten us all. Talk about bor-ring! How much more fun to do things the Greenspan/Cheney/Rove/Norquist/Dobson/Rumsfeld/Bush way! Imanentize the Eschaton, that’s what I say! Hasten the Coming! But whatever you do, don’t blame the rich (that’s “playing the class card”) or the Republicans (remember, whatever it is, it’s OK if you’re a Republican!) Just make sure that the Bear Stearns execs get a public-financed severance package in the reasonable seven figures (but not a dime more for the greedy limbless Iraq/Afghanistan vets who want to go to college–we’re not made out of money, you know!) Or in the words of Mungo Jerry,

If her daddy’s rich, take her out for a meal;
If her daddy’s poor, just do what you feel.

Life’s for living, that’s our philosophy!