Broadband isn't Broadband Unless its 2Mbps? 351
quanticle writes "According to House Democrats, broadband isn't broadband unless its at least 2Mbps. The view of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications is that the FCC's data collection standards are hopelessly outdated, and is proposing a number of updates to their criteria. For one, they want 'broadband' reclassified to at least 2mbs, up from 200kbps. Another requirement will change the FCC's outlook on broadband availability. Just because one household in a zip code has broadband access, that will not longer mean everyone in the zip code does. 'The plan went over well with the consumer advocates who appeared before the subcommittee. Larry Cohen, president of the Communication Workers of America, said that the US is "stuck with a twentieth century Internet" and that he would support increasing the "broadband" definition to 2Mbps. Ben Scott of Free Press echoed that sentiment, suggesting that the definition needs to be an evolving standard that increases over time, which is in contrast to the current FCC definition; it has not changed in nine years. "We have always been limited by the FCC's inadequate and flawed data," he said.'"
Forgive me (Score:5, Interesting)
Korea has 10MBPs to the home... (Score:5, Interesting)
So I don't have broadband? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Korea has 10MBPs to the home... (Score:5, Interesting)
At least in France, many of the problems were solved by local loop unbundling. I imagine the same would work here.
Re:Forgive me (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:T-1 (Score:3, Interesting)
A T1 is slow by broadband standards. Compared with Europe, I think 2Mbps is actually too slow. I'd set the limit at 5Mbps as a minimum, and probably 10. They chose 2Mbps to make us look bad compared to the rest of the world without looking as totally backwater as we are.
Of course, if the government came back with stats that said the U.S. had 0.0000000001% broadband deployment, people might start suing their broadband providers for calling 768/128 "broadband" and then things would get ugly. On the other hand, maybe that would be a good thing. Hard to say.
Re:T-1 (Score:3, Interesting)
LLU's dead; the FCC killed it. (Score:3, Interesting)
We had local loop unbundling here in the U.S., but then the FCC took it away. Now if you want DSL, it's back to the local phone company -- except for the places where they still have outstanding contracts with independent ISPs (like Speakeasy, etc.), there's no choice.
The FCC's rationale for reneging on the LLU decision was that consumers now had "choice" without it -- between the cable company, and the phone company. The nature of the decision had something to do with classing DSL as a 'data service' as opposed to a 'communications service' or something similarly pedantic, but the upshot was that it didn't require wholesale line leases to competitors, or let them charge more for it, or something.
I can't find a source on it right now, but I distinctly remember reading about it (maybe about a year ago, maybe a bit more).
Finally found some reference to it:
FCC Could Rule on DSL Line Sharing [betanews.com]
FCC Halts DSL-Sharing by Telcos [pcworld.com]
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20040303-348
(Reason I wasn't finding anything is that "LLU" or "Local Loop Unbundling" only seems to be used in the press in the U.K. and Europe; in the 'States they seem to call it 'Line Sharing,' probably to maintain their mandatory 6th-grade reading level.)
Government in action. (Score:3, Interesting)
Rather than siting down for a minute and actually, you know, thinking about something, or heaven forbid talking to someone who has thought about it, politicians and bureaucrats just up and make laws. It's sort of like Slashdot, except the rule is "legislate first, then maybe think" instead of "post frist ;-, think second".
The most important difference between broadband and not broadband is Always On (or, as we Mediacom customers say, "Sometimes On"). The definition ought to be stated in terms of connect latency: how much difference is there between the time it takes to establish the first connection of a particular online session and the average connection time during a session? If the first is no different than the average, you have broadband.
The next most important attribute is Quality of Service:
The top speed of that connection, and the uplink and downlink speed difference, is important, but less so. Caching, prefetch, and P2P techniques mean that as long as you have anything faster than 9600bps, if it's always on you will have essentially the same online experience as someone with a 2Mbps connection.
Now, with regard to live video audio as a substitute for broadcast media, the faster the better. And 2Mbps is not enough, and is certainly not a magic threshhold, given the QoS concerns above.
"Up to" should be considered deceptive advertising (Score:5, Interesting)
What we need is an FTC rule that advertising any service quality or quantity with the words "up to" or substantially similar language is, by law, considered deceptive. Advertising should have to specify a guaranteed level of service. That would put cable and DSL on the same measurement scale, discourage underprovisioning, and make cellular data transfer rates in ads something you could rely on.
There's precedent for this. At various times in the past, the FTC had to tighten up the definition of "horsepower" for cars and "watts" for audio gear. [angelfire.com]
CALEA Impact (Score:3, Interesting)
Fix "Internet Service Provider" too (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:broadband != speed (Score:3, Interesting)
What used to have something to do with carbon and hydrogen now means "yuppie approved".
Once you insert a technical term into the public vernacular, it will take on a widely different meaning.
Re:Good (Score:2, Interesting)
So What? (Score:3, Interesting)
No! No! Wrong thinking! (Local) utilities regulations require uniform service within an area if the franchisee desires to serve any one. Allowing broadband providers to claim that they don't provide service to an area even when they have already gone in and cherry picked the lucrative neighborhoods plays right into their hands.
The people just down the street from me (further from the CO, so distance isn't an excuse) have had DSL since it was originally offered by the local telco. When Verizon bought them out, they made decision to cease DSL expansion in our area (Heck, we can't even get proper POTS service anymore). They are able to to this because, unlike regulated utility service, serving one DSL customer in an area doesn't obligate them to provide service to anyone else. If it was subject to regulations, they would need to file tarrifs with the state utilities commission which establish standard fees for extending their service to anyone willing to pay. In my area, these fees are based on distance along the public right-of-way. Once any utility strings a line in front of your house, only a (standard) service drop charge can apply. They are obligated to maintain their facilities to meet added demand in areas served as a part of their operating costs. In other words, they can't say "Sorry, the cable is full and you'll have to pay for a bigger one".
Please don't let Congress create any more loopholes. We need to treat broadband access just like any other critical infrastructure.
Why Not Public Infrastructure? (Score:2, Interesting)
Is there anyone on /. or anywhere that doubts the importance of open and accessible roads? Of course not. Can you imagine what a pain it would be if roadways were privately owned and only accessible to those that sign up to use them? Yet we've let the opportunity to allow unfettered access to the internet cable infrastructure slip away and fall into private hands and, well, this is why 200Kbps is considered "broadband". There's simply no incentive to do more.
I'm not suggesting that local or state governments become ISPs. Anyone could be an ISP, but to get their service into a city or state, they would have to lease space on the public wires (or fiber as the case may be).
Verizon is now trying to get Massachusetts to enact legislation that would allow providers (like Verizon) to obtain a statewide franchise for their service, rather than go from city to city and have to deal with the local politicos, who always seem to be demanding more and more. I never thought I'd be rooting for the monopoly, but if it's the way we're going to get the long desired fiber infrastructure, well, so be it. Problem is, that will essentially eliminate competition for communications and it seems we'll be taking a big step backwards.
Obviously, there's much more to such a plan, and it can't be posted in a few sentences on here. I'd like to hear from the tech savvy /.ers and get some reaction to this plan. I am in no way suggesting that state or local government could do a better job than private enterprise. Connectivity is the future, and that future is a long way off for much of the US under the present structure.
"Central Office" (Score:3, Interesting)
In San Francisco, at least, they seem to be doing something about this. Apparently the definition of what a "central office" is has changed. Apparently it no longer needs to be some kind of big building; instead it might be an innocuous-looking box at the end of the block. Somebody who's a telco insider will have to give more details than that, because I only know what I was told by one field tech. That, and the fact that about eight years ago I moved from an apartment at one end of this street to one at the other, and then a couple years ago I moved again, back a few blocks up the same street. The first time I moved I kept my same phone number. The second time I moved the phone company told me that I could not keep the same phone number; in fact, I couldn't even have the same prefix. I can only assume that this is to allow the local phone company to roll out DSL more aggressively here in the City.
Not the FCC's fault (Score:4, Interesting)
Also: the distinction between a "telecommunications service" and a "data service" is most definitely NOT pedantic. In fact it is the crucial heart of the entire fight over "net neutrality." The two terms are given different definitions and treatments in the 1996 Act--in particular, telecom services are held to common carrier status, while data services are not. Thus when the 9th Federal Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that cable modem is a "data service", it exempted it from common carrier status--essentially granting permission to violate net neutrality.
Now the telcos want DSL classified the same way (it's currently considered a telecom service since it is delivered over phone lines), and they are lobbying extremely hard to get it. Plus, they are rolling out things like FiOS, which as a fiber optic line is considered a data service not a telecom service.
In the U.S., the "net neutrality" we took for granted for years was a direct result of the fact that we accessed the Internet over phone lines, and thus it was a common carrier service according to federal law. Now, with cable and fiber access, this protection is largely gone, and a fight for net neutrality protection must be waged.