FCC seeks delay to US broadband plan
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is asking lawmakers to give it more time to draw up a national broadband plan. In a letter (PDF) to Congress on Wednesday, FCC chairman Julius Genachowski requested an extension of the report's February 17 deadline by one month. The plan is to be funded by Congress under President …
Break up vertical monopolies!
End of story. The last mile is far too expensive to have redundant operators maintaining separate networks. Simply forcefully break apart last-mile networks from ISPs, and the resulting competition will straighten the market out.
We'll all have fibre to the door and a-la-carte programming in no time.
"From preliminary details, the FCC is expected to recommend an overhaul of the $7bn annual federal telephone service subsidy program for rural areas to include broadband services."
If the US governemnt did not cough up *$7Bn * a year to the US phone companies there are some place they just would not *bother* to cable up.
This is an interesting side light on the UK "Broadband tax" being proposed as the UK AFAIK has *never* subsidised rural subscribers.
So why should they start now?
Thumbs up as this is important, but buying bakc a chunk of spectrum they proesumably auctioned off only a little while ago seems a bit stupid, unless this is a back door subsidty to TV and mobile companies (who I did not think were doing that badly).
They need another 30 days to "get right" a plan that they've been supposed to be developing since we got the Internet phone tax way back when AlGore was in the VP's office, and we're suppose to expect they'll be keeping up with evolving technology?
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