In my posting from Monday, the "changing times" reference originally included a nod to a New York Times interview that day with FCC Chairman Martin, on the agency's plans to end exclusive contracts between cable companies and building owners.
This should be a big win for telcos seeking to compete with cable companies to offer bundled packages of voice, data and video services to consumers.
So the FCC took that step Wednesday, effective immediately, finding that exclusive contracts could harm competitive entry by other video providers and may effectively insulate incumbent providers from improving their service.
But wait, there's more: the FCC also moved to extend to cable companies that same relief the FCC prevciously extended to telcos, whereby local franchising authorities may not unreasonably refuse to award competitive franchises.
The agency added "number portability" requirements to interconnected VoIP operators: said another way, it makes it easier for consumers seeking to dump their VoIP operator in favor of some other provider, and keep their number.
The agency also had a localism hearing, on the impact of media concentration (for those so interested, commissioners' statements may be found on the FCC's web site), and released Internet subscribership data, as of December 31, 2006.
The number of subscribers with "high speed" lines (at least 200 kbps in one direction) showed back to back increases of 27% in the first part of the year as it did in the second, ending with a total of 82.5 million residential subscribers.
Obtaining accurate broadband deployment data lies at the heart of H.R. 3919, the "Broadband Census of America Act of 2007," which passed out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday, by a unanimous vote.
On Tuesday, the full House also voted to adopt the Senate's Internet Tax Ban, by a pretty solid (402-0) vote, thereby increasing the duration (from 4 years in the previously voted House bill, to 7 years), and coverage (the Senate version included e-mails and IMs) from the prior House version.
For those who may recall, the title comes from Thomas Dolby's 1982 album, which included the hit "She Blinded Me with Science," and which is available, in whole or in part, from Amazon.
In yet another sign of the changing times, and unchained competitive spirits, today brings several stories worth a "look see."
For those interested in wireless: Verizon's earnings reflect the increased importance of wireless to its bottom line, while also revealing the impact of competitor AT&T's exclusive deal with the iPhone.
Verizon reports having an increase of 1.6 million wireless subscribers, for 63.7 million overall, 2 million less than market leader AT&T's 65.7 million users.
Here's an interesting tidbit: Verizon's data reportedly also shows two big jumps of customers "porting" their number to another carrier: once when the iPhone was introduced (in June, the previous quarter), and again when Apple cut the price of the phone in September.
Funny thing, though, about that exclusive AT&T Apple deal: Apple is once again limiting the sale of the phones to two (no cash, please), in order to discourage resellers.
Apple estimates that some 250,000 iPhones have been purchased with the intent of hacking the device to work on another carrier than AT&T.
That would seem to represent a lot of phones for people who don't want to be tied down to a particular provider.
In fact, one iPhone site estimates this to be about 18% (via Wired): so much for exclusivity.
The US Senate approved a seven year extension of the Internet Tax Ban Thursday night, October 25, 2007.
Previously, on October 16, 2007, the US House of Representatives passed a four year extension of the moratorium; so after some form of compromise between the two bills, it should become law.
The conceptual gymnastics are all there: a federal ban on state and local taxes not yet imposed (due to the current ban, which expires November 1), but which just might be levied, some day, depending upon one's locus in a global network. Maybe "billing address" or "ship to" would do.
Efforts to extend the tax moratorium united proponents that more often engage as opponents on telecom matters, including services and content providers, on one hand, and carriers on the other.
Not that any of this can remain truly distinct, though, for long. Microsoft now owns part of Facebook, having paid a pricey sum, with the goal of leveraging into new areas for the company.
In other related matters, earlier this week the Wall Street Journal reviewed Apple's newly upgraded operating system, called Leopard, which replaces the previous version, called Tiger.
Leopard is due to be released today, October 26, 2007, in so many hours and minutes, according to the countdown posted on Apple's website, which has a bit of a dramatic look about it, really.
The Journal's review gave high marks to the revision, in particular noting (and giving nods to) one's ability to more easily navigate and juggle various tasks (and fast boot up times, even when compared to Microsoft's also recently upgraded Vista operating system, which operates on PCs).
Other previews note additional features to allow users to more easily create and share content, and the growing number of Mac users, another form of leverage, itself leveraged off the company's popular iPods and iPhones.
Yesterday, the FCC acted to forbear from applying Title II and Computer Inquiry rules to Enterprise Broadband services for Embarq, Frontier and Citizens telephone companies.
While the relief granted yesterday largely follows that which was granted to AT&T on October 11, 2007, the subject applications were not subject to underlying merger conditions or previously agreed to price freezes, as was the case with AT&T, so these companies will feel the new relief immediately.
With these services no longer subject to dominant carrier tariff and pricing rules, these telcos will be afforded a measure of flexibility in crafting prices according to their enterprise customers and their particular needs.
The FCC found that, as in previous grants of forbearance from pricing rule, "many enterprise customers that purchase these types of services have national, multi-location operations and thus seek the best-priced alternatives from multiple potential providers having national market presences." Order at paragraph 20.
On the other hand, as FCC Commissioners Copps and Adelstein noted in their joint statement in dissent, they are "mindful of ongoing Congressional concerns with policymaking on forbearance petitions based upon inadequate analysis and data."
Some of AT&T's competitors and customers would appear to agree: Time Warner Telecom, Sprint, and a users group of large Fortune 500 companies appealed the FCC's October 11, 2007 AT&T Forbearance decision in filings earlier this week, claiming that the FCC's decision will lead to increased telecommunications prices for businesses.
So the results are in, sort of: AT&T got a big lift from its exclusive deal offering Apple's iPhone, adding over a million users for this device (with 2 million wireless user net adds overall).
Meanwhile, Apple too rode a big lift of its own this earnings period, having turned in good results earlier this week, with shares hitting all time highs on Tuesday.
All this forces competitors to play catch up, to introduce new handsets, for example, or to cut prices, all of which benefits us consumers.
There is, however, another drumbeat, perhaps several, urging carriers to unlock their phones, to allow more device interoperability, and in short let the domestic handset market more closely resemble that found overseas.
It is more than a little ironic that the industry segment once praised as a flourishing model of market-based competition should instead be subject to so much criticism, pillory and the lash, but customer stickiness is a sticky issue, or sticky wicket, as they say, and may not strike all consumers as cricket.
Joining the handset pressures (hand-in-hand?), US spectrum policies too may be changing, according to recent piece in the New York Times ("In Search of Wireless Wiggle Room").
The article neatly discusses the FCC's recently released rules on the upcoming 700 MHz spectrum auction, unlicensed spectrum, and the brewing fight over "White Spaces" - pitting the nation's broadcasters against tech giants such as Microsoft.
For some clarity on where all this wireless broadband ubiquity might lead, and what unforeseen problems may arise, perhaps it's time for another look at Japan, with its fascinating mix of ancient tradition and rapid integration of the newest technological ideas imaginable, the loopier the better.
Ordinary citizens' fears of crime has led to some nifty camouflage schemes for city 'scapes that are really quite profound, such as a dress that turns into a soda machine.
So I wondered, where's the "phone booth" disguise?
It is close to Halloween, isn't it? And then it struck me that a phone booth just might not be quite hip enough, from the all-things-urban-adoption point of view, plus there is the (minor) problem of simulating the glass.
But one just might be able to sell additional advertising space on it, while hiding from the bad guys.
Lots of moving parts, most of them wirelessly: Verizon Wireless is working diligently to spiffy up its choice of handsets, while Sprint announced plans to introduce a touch screen phone.
Speaking of choice, the wireless industry came in for some criticism earlier this week a hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee.
Consumer advocates and state policy makers noted, among other complaints, that handsets don't necessarily travel well from one carrier to another, when consumers "vote with their feet" and switch service providers.
Also panned were several other industry practices, such as re-extending customer contracts following any change in service (such as adding minutes, or choosing a plan with fewer minutes per month), and the Early Termination Fee.
I had mentioned previously that I thought this little gem was on the way out following another hearing earlier this year (blog 7.17.07) but it hasn't disappeared just yet.
AT&T joined the ranks of the pro-raters in an announcement Tuesday, but people still don't like paying the fee. One advocate today noted in his testimony today that while handset subsidies were once thought to justify the ETF, the (lack of any subsidy) for the iPhone may have cast some doubt on this remarkable theory.
In other Apple-related news, the company will release the Leopard OS-X on October 28, and some reviews are out, along with rebate, sort of, for consumers who purchased a laptop and wish upgrade from the Tiger to the Leopard (the engadget link also has a link to Verizon phones).
Bottom line: we'll see how well the synergies among the various products hold together.
For those so inclined, Apple will now permit third party developers to create applications for the iPhone, rather than blocking these. Apple's focus on blocking third party applications has angered many people, and, more to the point: has generated lots and lots of press for the company.
Recently, there have appeared a number of articles about the need for improving the Internet's plumbing, under stress due to the exploding amount of traffic being heaped upon the 40 year old system.
A reader sent me an article from the Wall Street Journal, about one of the original "networking pioneers," and his views on how to manage the bird's nest of e-mails, movies, files and photos that people send about, hither and yon. An older, but also fairly recent article, discussed the Japanese government's efforts to the same basic intent: developing a new Internet.
The Internet is easily one of the transformative innovations in today's society, and the race for technology leadership is one that no country can afford to lose. This is one of the themes to emerge from a recent congressional hearing, part of a series on a series on telecom competition.
The stakes are enormous. So much so that any discussion about how we retain leadership is subject to tremendous debate, from the technology side (what approach would work best, and in the meantime, what fixes do we need?) to making the right decisions on policy. One view is that we have already lost our technology leadership and now compete as also-rans.
Another theme that wove throughout the hearing was that access to broadband doesn't simply confer an advantage for consumers and businesses; it's absolutely critical. For those located in less densely populated areas, or, find themselves passed by the broadband stream for whatever reason, have to pay more to get service, or move their operations somewhere else.
In many cases, satellite broadband may be the only option, as another recent article explained, with equipment prices coming down and streaming rates going up. For those in remote locations, satellite may fill another need - it allows people to stay connected because that's what they are used to doing.
A month or so ago a friend remarked that his 8 year old son (and those of his generation), will never know what it's like to live in a world without being connected to some sort of network. The remark was prompted by observation (and some involvement) in his son's haphazard (but completely successful) effort to link a new electronic game to the wireless network on the family's farm in rural Virginia.
Essentially, it was today's version of putting a kid's bicycle together, complete with instructions containing the usual assumptions.
Anyway, within minutes of his ignoring what looked to be the majority of the instruction manual, and cleverly skipping over a multitude of steps, my friend's son virtually disappeared into worldwide Nintendo, later reporting that he'd been playing against some kid in China and another one somewhere else.
As partially tech savvy adults, his father and I only partially understood the process, and may only partially comprehend the result.
