Cable Internet Service Not Common Carrier 304
l2718 writes "The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed with the Federal Communications Commission that cable Internet service is an 'information service' rather than a 'telecommunication service.' This means that cable companies don't have to make their infrastructure open for competing ISPs to use. This is in distinction to the case of telephone companies and long-distance service, for example. For more information try the Center for Digital Democracy or read the Telecommunications Act."
Let them keep their network! (Score:5, Interesting)
Personally, I say hooray for the cable companies. They get to keep control of their equipment and the users who are utilizing it. Broadband and dial-up wholesale outfits generally provide poor service and limited capability (no Static IP or PPP Multilink.) Some of the outfits that have recently come (and gone) in this area went so far as to charge for tech support ($2/minute.) How tempting do you think it is for them to 'generate revenue' by causing issues on their own network.
"Numbers are down this month Bob, run that script that resets random passwords again."
No more Earthlink over Time Warner? (Score:3, Interesting)
Does this mean my option to use anyone but Time Warner as a cable ISP will vanish?
May Be Good News If... (Score:3, Interesting)
E911 impact (Score:4, Interesting)
I guess I don't understand. (Score:5, Interesting)
Is it unreasonable for me to be confused? Is a little consistency too much to ask here?
A safe haven? (Score:5, Interesting)
The Supreme Court is on a roll. (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem here....... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Let them keep their network! (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm glad you think so highly of the cable companies internet services, because you can expect them to get worse due to this ruling. Before, they had to compete with those independant ISPs, now they don't because they can just shut them down. Do you think the cable companies internet service will become better with less competition?
Also, you're painting some pretty broad strokes on the range of independant ISPs. Many of the ones I've had in the past had much better service than did the cable and phone companies offerings, across the board. I'll admit that the later businesses have improved by leaps and bounds as of late, which is why I get my internet directly from the cable company. But they did so because they were losing customers to the independants. This development is definitely bad for the consumer.
Re:Major difference between phone and cable (Score:3, Interesting)
Disclaimer, I'm not a network engineer for a major cable company, phone company, or other for-profit infrastructure provider. Just a lifelong customer.
Last time I looked at phone infrastructure laying around, it was labeled "QWest", or "Northwestern Bell" if it's old enough. I realize there are subsidies, but still, I had the distinct impression that most telephone infrastructure was originally built up at telco expense.
Correct me if I'm wrong. (Hell, this is Slashdot; someone will correct me even if I'm right.)
Re:The Real Problem Here (Score:5, Interesting)
In that case, Cable provision is a natural monopoly and there is nothing to be gained by having it run by a private company (the theory of capitalism being based on competition), so it should be taken under public ownership.
Competing companies can sell services on the infrastructure if they like, but not access itself.
This would also lower the barrier of entry right down to the little local companies.
Infrastructure wants to be Free (Score:5, Interesting)
Hmm...considering last week's supreme court ruling, perhaps the gov should just TAKE all the wires away from the companies by eminent domain. Infrastructure is about the only thing I consider a valid "public use".
This may soon be a moot point (Score:3, Interesting)
End of independent VoIP? (Score:3, Interesting)
Robert
Liability. (Score:5, Interesting)
I think (IANAL) this could render them liable for any "information" provided from their "service" -- from copyright violations to kiddy porn to libel. It's "common carrier" status that protects the phone company and other ISPs from this liability.
Re:The Real Problem Here (Score:3, Interesting)
Personally, I think that the government should buy up the cable AND phone line networks, and let any company capable have service on it, but that's my "let everyone be equal" stance.
Good Ruling (Score:3, Interesting)
Cable companies, on the other hand, built their networks in a competitive environment. Yes, there are things like local franchise agreements but the ones I've seen (Florida, mostly) aren't prohibitively expensive or exclusive. I have seen a lot of little, local cable providers that service just a subdivision or a few blocks.
The cable companies didn't have government imposed monopolies to assist them in getting going. If you don't like your options in cable, you can either get a satellite or start your own [pbs.org] micro-cable company.
Since the biggest cost in delivering cable television and telephone services is the "last mile" -- running & servicing the cables -- this could provide a major boost to the wireless entrepeneur or small business. If the cable companies start jacking up internet access prices, a demand will be created for an alternative. Where a demand exists, a supply will be found.
The 1992 Cable Act provides right to leased access (Score:3, Interesting)
I quote from the FCC website http://www.fcc.gov/mb/facts/csgen.html [fcc.gov]:
"Channel set-aside requirements were established in proportion to a system's total activated channel capacity, in order to 'assure that the widest possible diversity of information sources are made available to the public from cable systems in a manner consistent with the growth and development of cable systems.'"
A company called IVI tried this before around the same time. It fell on the FCC's ears with a resounding thud. One comment I remember is that they did not, at the time, consider the Internet an information service.
Cable companies are tiny municipal monopolies. The FCC has found in the past that they try to lock out competition so they established the framework required promote that competition. Why don't they use it?
Cable companies part of greater media companies (Score:5, Interesting)
That was my first question as well (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:The Real Problem Here (Score:3, Interesting)
Patent nonsense. There are places in CT where as many as THREE cable systems are built on top of each other.
The SBC/SNET Americast system was overbuilt on top of the local cable systems and shortly thereafter shut down after SBC decided they were telecom primmadonnas and not "cable guys". Their infrastructure going to rot on the poles, competitors petitioned to open it to competition and the state regulators ruled against SBC, saying that the lines had to be either used or sold/leased to competitors. This is not incompatible with the SCOTUS ruling as they did not necessarily have to open up their system if they actually used it. They just weren't being allowed by regulators to squat on utility right of ways and let the system go to pot.
Another company overbuilt a good amount of West Hartford, CT and provides (provided?) high speed Internet access over that system.
The problem is that there is no money in overbuilding. Existing cable operators have made incremental ongoing investments in their systems for decades and putting in a brand new system from head end to local hubs to fiber and nodes to actives and passives, etc., can cost billions in just a few cities.
For those companies which have overbuilt like RCN and so forth, there's plenty of argument as to what their focus should be. For instance, so-called "deep fiber" is generally believed to be more of an endeavor for overbuilders than incumbents.
However, it is patently false to say there's a monopoly. You're definining it like people define Microsoft's. It isn't the cable company's fault that people look at the cost of doing in one shot what they've (the cable companies) taken decades to build up as being prohibitively expensive and decide not to do it. It's not Cox or Charter's fault that these ISPs haven't banded together to create their own corporation to overbuild and get into the game.
Also, the economics of cable service are brutal. The work force is large, the work is constant, the content providers are cutthroat and their stuff growing more expensive yearly, the profit margin thinner that people think, because they generally only see the cost of their bill and not what the cable company is paying to thousands of employees, material and equipment suppliers, local/state/federal taxes and fees, content provider fees, etc., ad nauseam.
In my book, these ISPs want all the bandwidth and none of the expense of keeping it up. If a cable company tallied up all the expenses that should be charged to an ISP using their lines, they'd find that they'd end up charging about the same as the cable company. And since my cable company has a better and bigger backhaul than any local ISP (OC-3s and OC-12s and more compared to at most a DS-3), never mind more resources for e-mail and so on, I have zero reason to want a competitor ISP on my cable company's lines.
It's a matter of economics and the people who want all that access over night don't have the money independently and won't make the effort collectively, to build a system that the cable company certainly didn't create overnight, nor do they show the money or inclination to be on the same level as the cable ISPs in terms of committing resources and effort and being in it for the long haul.
Re:The Real Problem Here (Score:3, Interesting)
Tell that to RCN. Not only did they add their own cables to the existing ones in the Boston area, but they added their own phone lines as well. They decided to compete with two existing 'monopolies'. They seem to be doing well as far as I can tell. In the Boston area we have 3 broadband ISPs: RCN, Comcast, and Verizon. Both RCN and Verizon offer local telephone service as well. Whether that has reduced prices is another question of course. It definitely adds some real competition though. I recently told RCN that I was going to switch to Comcast and they responded by upgrading my cable modem config file to allow for (theoretical) higher download speeds. I remember when RCN first started building around here. I liked how it seemed to directly contradict my old microeconomics professor about so called 'natural' monopolies. Someone at RCN decided to try the 'impossible'.