Verizon, Copper, Fiber, and the Truth

Alexander Graham Cracker writes "Starting last spring, reports began surfacing of Verizon routinely disabling copper as it installed its fiber-based FiOS service. We discussed the issue here a couple of times. In my experience, every time Verizon has installed FiOS at a friend's house, they have insisted they have to cut off the copper and move the POTS to the fiber. By doing so, they block anyone else such as COVAD or Cavalier from renting the copper for competitive access. Sources report that today, at a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, Verizon executive VP Thomas Tauke denied ever doing that. (The transcript should be up in a day or so. The AP coverage does not mention this detail.) I wonder if Rep. Markey's staff is interested in hearing from people who experienced Verizon disabling copper, and without notice?"

Re:Not really surprised

[nschubach]

That's my question. Can't other phone companies use the fiber line into your house as well? I thought all fiber/copper went back to the same switching station anyway.

All that need be done...

[packetmon]

All someone would need to do to validate these claims would be to bring in a competitor and have them try to offer services through said copper. It would be hearsay to make a statement without something other than a "word of mouth" to back up a claim. Doing so - bringing in an alternative provider - provides irrefutable proof. However being crafty I can think of an instance where someone @ Verizon can make an argument charging that the copper coming into the home was causing some form of crosstalk which caused attenuation issues and required the copper being "disabled". Note the intentional use of "disabled" as opposed to "cut". I personally could see some twobit Verizon shlum doing something stupid on their own accord. "If we cut the copper John we never have to worry about losing our job!"

Monopoly power

[MobyDisk]

This is why the company that provides telephone service should be a separate company from the one that maintains the wires. Same with power. Same with cable.

Re:Not really surprised

[CloneBot]

Fiber be damned, bring me lower prices. Competition between competitors is guaranteed to bring down prices. The fact that I have no choice in carriers is the one reason I have to pay $30-40 for a decent connection. Leaving down a cable would definetly lead to a competitive market.

And DSL be damned. When the DSL is sluggish like in my neighborhood, it is not an option.

Wait, I'm confused -- who started the mess?

[dada21]

What I want to know is why Covad can't run their own lines to your home themselves. Sure, copper is expensive, and so is labor to run it, but if you offer a competitive service and provide for your customers, they tend to stick with you for years and years. What's preventing Covad from just dropping their own cables city by city? Let's forget any laws that force Verizon to allow competitors to use THEIR copper, and focus on why competitors can't have THEIR OWN copper, or fiber.

Re:Only on slashdot

[chill]

Copper infrastructure was mostly paid for by government granted monopolies. In return, it was a tariffed service that the telcos had to lease to anyone, in a non-discriminatory way.

Yes, they had to lease to their competitors. That was the price of the gov't granting them a monopoly.

Fiber is paid for by the telcos, not the gov't so is not a tariffed service. While Verizon MUST lease copper to competitors, it isn't compelled to lease fiber access. Verizon cutting the copper is effectively cutting off any competition that was not a Baby Bell in a past life.

No, they can't just reconnect it. The copper is cut on BOTH ends -- telco CO and house. Feel free to reconnect one end, but they aren't required to let you hook it back up in their CO.

The only reason Verizon and AT&T and the others can afford to pay to lay the fiber is the wealth that was created by their guaranteed monopoly.

Are they cutting it at the demarcation point?

[johnny cashed]

Or further up the line? Because the Telco is responsible up to the demarcation point, after which, it is the customer's wiring. Which side are they cutting? How significant is this cutting? Whole sections, or just a snip here to isolate the premise wiring in preparation of new equipment installation?

Re:Not really surprised

[dada21]

And who told you that you can't allow a competitor to run a new cable to your property? It wasn't Verizon who made a regulation making them the sole provider -- it was your local and State government. Don't be mad at Verizon because your government is completely fraudulent and corrupt -- if you vote, kick everyone out on the next election, and keep doing it until someone removes the monopoly provisions.

Re:Yawn

[chill]

Verizon's telco predecessors made that capital investment with gov't guaranteed monopolies. In short, it really ISN'T Verizon's copper, it is copper paid for by taxes and a gov't granted monopoly. It is national infrastructure.

Re:cry me a river

[TechyImmigrant]

As someone who has FIOS, the difference in service is clear. With copper I was free to choose my ISP. I chose a very, very good local mom and pop ISP. With Fiber I'm stuck with Verizon.

The technology may be more modern, but the terms of service are in the stoneage. It would be better in the long run if the terms of service were forcibly opened, as with copper, since they don't appear willing to open them voluntarily.

This is something of a reversal of history though. Verizon didn't deploy the stuff until they got a waiver of the copper rules requiring they open them to other ISPs. They were active in closing the terms of service and the government went right along with them.

Bastards.

Re:Wait, I'm confused -- who started the mess?

[gurps_npc]

Yeah, you ARE confused. Verizon often did not lay the coper lines, Ma Bell did. Oh yeah, and Ma Bell (or Verizon later) was granted a MONOPOLY and made a huge amount of cash on it. In exchange they were told, you have to let other people rent those lines. It was part of the Deal. Oh, and also don't forget that when they installed the copper in the first place they often charged the home owner to do it. As in, I paid to put this stuff in, I will need it later, so how dare you rip it out So yeah, they are RIPPING US OFF. They are in effect paying their employees money to prevent them from having to fulfill their legal obligations to RENT (as in they get PAID for it) the copper. Totally illegal, totally a waste of cash and totally unethical. But you go on and and complaing about how what they are doing is 'ok' cause they own the copper.

Re:Not really surprised

[Red Flayer]

And who told you that you can't allow a competitor to run a new cable to your property?

Regardless of the law, there is a market disincentive to run cables that duplicate those run by someone else. Because of the high infrastructure cost (cabling especially) phone and cable (or fiber) internet are natural monopolies that reduce competitive forces.
This is the entire reason for granting certain rights to companies like Verizon in exchange for demanding certain things, such as allowing competitors to lease space on said cables.

The problem is not that the government granted the monopoly; the problem is that the government has been lax in forcing Verizon to comply with actions demanded of them by their common carrier status.

But, oh, I forgot -- if the government didn't exist, everything would be peaches and cream, and we'd all live in an ideal world of competitive business and market equality. /sarcasm.

Natural monopolies exist, and they do not benefit people, other than the holders of the monopoly. But again, I forgot, we can easily explain away the negative impacts of those monopolies by saying that some monopolists from a prior era did some good deeds.

Even the Austrian school of economic thought (among the most free-market espousing schools of thought that exists) agrees that natural monopolies require correction in order for optimal economic activity and efficient distribution of resources. So the question is, do you prefer a free market that exists because of restrictions on uncompetitive activity, or non-competitive market that results from unfettered activity?

Re:Not really surprised

[MightyYar]

I think that it's okay to be mad at Verizon, who seem to be in bed with whatever candidate you try to vote for.

Re:Not really surprised

[Shakrai]

Unfortunately, all major-party politicians (read: the only ones who are ever going to win until we do away with this damned two-party system) are the corporations' bitches.

Explain to me how we have a "damned two-party system" and what exactly is stopping a third-party from winning an election? There is no law that I'm aware of that states the United States has a two party system. The people bitching about our "two-party system" are missing the point.

The "two-party system" isn't the problem. The problem is that we as a people have allowed ourselves to be overly influenced by the media to such an extent that we buy it hook-line and sinker when they say that somebody can't win an election. We have allowed ourselves to invest so much of our voting decision in the opinions of the media that nobody has a realistic shot of winning a Federal election without massive amounts of capital to use on advertising. That's our fault -- not the fault of the Democrats or Republicans.

I'd make the argument that Ross Perot (a third-party candidate) in 1992 had a legitimate shot. Certainly a bigger shot then Dennis Kucinich or Ron Paul, both of whom happen to be members of the "two-party system". What did Perot have that they lack? Money and the willingness to spend it. Plain and simple.

Start convincing people to vote for your favorite third-party candidates in local and state elections. Build the infrastructure from the ground up instead of sitting on /. and bemoaning the "two-party system" as the source of our problems. If you don't build the third-parties from the ground up then short of a rich billionaire willing to spend his or her own money to get elected they will never have a shot. And that's not the fault of the Democrats or the Republicans.

Re:All that need be done...

[Dun Malg]

However being crafty I can think of an instance where someone @ Verizon can make an argument charging that the copper coming into the home was causing some form of crosstalk which caused attenuation issues and required the copper being "disabled".

Change "crafty" to "ignorant". Fiber conducts light. Copper conducts electricity. There's no crosstalk between them. Basic physics here.

I personally could see some twobit Verizon shlum doing something stupid on their own accord. "If we cut the copper John we never have to worry about losing our job!"

More work doesn't give them job security. There's always more work than they have people for. About 10-odd years ago, GTE (now Verizon) laid off just about every field tech with more than 15 years experience because they cost too much. Management is their biggest threat to job security.

Re:Not really surprised

[Belacgod]

The winner-takes-all congressional election system, and the committee system in Congress, ensures that voting for a third party will never be as effective as working within the locally-dominant party to bend it to your ends. The former also leads both parties into a race to the middle, which leaves no political space for a third party (this is just the Median Voter Theorem).

Bipartisan legislative rules, by which Congress is run, are largely deals between the two major parties at the expense of any potential third one. Even campaign finance reform's major effect is to make it harder to break out into the public consciousness, which redounds to the benefit of existing party organizations.

The two-party system is enshrined in no law, but the structure of the system makes it certain that we end up with that.

Re:Govt corrupt, but so is election process...

[E++99]

Color me cynical, but what do you suggest when the whole election process has been subverted to the point that only pro-business candidates ever seem to get far enough to be voted upon?

If by "pro-business," you mean people who haven't (openly) advocated lining up business owners against a wall and machine-gunning them, then you're right -- we sure are stuck with a lot of pro-business candidates. OTOH, if by "pro-business" you only include people who haven't threatened to directly confiscate the profits of private industries, and use the money for her own ends, (IOW, people using the same rhetoric as people who went on to machine-gun business owners against a wall) well then you have Hillary Clinton, for one.

(Since I'm always challenged for a citation when I make this accusation, here's your damn link. Thank God for youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1PfE9K8j0g [youtube.com])

Seriously, when was the last time a truly progressive (and I don't mean "liberal", I mean "working for positive change for more than the candidate's own pocketbook") candidate made it through all the primaries and other BS to reach the ballot with any serious chance of gaining office?

Oh, THAT kind of progressive! Well, GW Bush, Ronald Reagan, JF Kennedy, Teddy Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington come to mind, for starters.

Armed revolution has been brought up a few times as one possible option, but it really looks to me like the vast majority of the country is either too apathetic or too enamoured of the status quo to go that far. People aren't poor and pinched enough yet to really get motivated.

Hey, I'm game. The REAL descendants of Jeffersonian thought (I'll give you a hint, they don't refer to themselves as "progressives") happen to also subscribe to his views on the virtues of gun ownership.

Having had both Covad and Cavalier....

[gatkinso]

....Covad DSL and Cavalier for both Phone and DSL, I can truthfully say that Verizon is doing folks a favor.

I know this is not the point, but there it is.

Re:Yawn

[falconwolf]

It's Verizon's copper. They can do anything they damn well please with the stuff. They're not "preventing" competitors from competing -- said competitors can always make the same capital investment Verizon (or rather its predecessor telcos) did and lay copper down the street.

No, a competitor can't simply lay down more copper. In most places the incumbent has exclusive access to use the Right of Way [wikipedia.org] for a given purpose. In the case of the telcos, only the incumbent has the right to have telephone landlines lain down. Even if you had a billion dollars and could afford to put in cables or fiber the only way you would be allowed to is if you buy off the politicians.

Falcon

Re:Not really surprised

[bigpat]

Don't be mad at Verizon because your government is completely fraudulent and corrupt -- if you vote, kick everyone out on the next election, and keep doing it until someone removes the monopoly provisions.

Thanks, but I think I am right to be mad at both Verizon and my government. After all it was Verizon that has been screaming that it can't(won't) offer its customers the services they want unless they are give legal monopoly to do it. And because my elected representatives sacrificed long term consumer interests for a short term political benefit, I am mad at them too.

Re:Why wait?

[JesseMcDonald]

It makes sense to have the fiber in before requiring it be open.

Provided, of course, that one has no aversion to being exposed as a common thief.

I'd be the first to recognize that the history of the telco industry is insanely complicated, but the solution is to find a way to divide things up that takes both the private and public investments in the infrastructure into account and then leave things that way, with a clear division between public and private domains. Preferably the public part should be as small as possible to minimize the tragedy-of-the-commons issue. What's really insane is leaving the telecommunications infrastructure in its current half-public/half-private state. Trying to turn a private company into a quasi-government organization by way of intrusive regulation and handouts can only result in a combination of the worst aspects of bureaucratic inefficiency and regulatory capture.

infrasrtructure

[falconwolf]

I'd be the first to recognize that the history of the telco industry is insanely complicated, but the solution is to find a way to divide things up that takes both the private and public investments in the infrastructure

Oh, I agree. As I said many tymes I think ownership of some infrastructure should be separate from the services that it provides. For instance I think it might be better for a community to build and own the infrastructure but allow open access for any services the infrastructure can provide. Take cable, a nonprofit, for profit, or the city owns the cable but then it allows different companies to offer cable tv, internet access, phone service, or a Triple Play with all three. I would be able to go to one company for tv, another for phone service, and a third for net access.

Re:Not really surprised

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you're right. Without government to require easements, wiring across areas would be a practical impossibility, so telephone systems, electrical power grids, and cable systems would be impossible. Likewise running water, sewer systems, and gas and oil pipelines would be impossible. No roads, either. Libertarianism - because you know you miss the stone age.

scramble word - belches

WRONG!

[abricko]

Couldn't be further from the truth... I and a few others I know, have had our FIOS installed and still have the copper line attached... they didn't touch it or ask to touch it. I wouldn't have minded a bit, I'll NEVER go back to DSL it's crap compared to FIOS!

FUD

[dreamchaser]

When I got my FIOS installed late last year they asked me if I wanted to move my phone from copper to fiber. I said 'no' and they said 'ok'. Maybe they are doing this in some or many cases, but it certainly isn't a formal policy because they haven't done it to anyone on my street. Yes, my evidence is anecdotal, but so is this story.