Speakeasy Unaffected by FCC Ruling 20
NaDrew writes "Speakeasy, the favorite DSL provider of many a Slashdotter, has issued a press release stating that they do not expect to be affected by the FCC ruling allowing ILECs to refuse to lease their lines to third-party providers. This is because the ruling specifically states that CLECs--such as Covad, from whom Speakeasy resells service--are not to be denied unbundled wholesale access to ILEC lines."
ILEC and CLEC (Score:5, Informative)
CLEC = competitive local exchange carrier
ILEC = incumbent local exchange carrier
An ILEC is a telephone company that was providing local service when the Telecommunications Act of 1996 was enacted. Compare with CLEC, a company that competes with the already established local telephone business.
(from http://isp.webopedia.com/TERM/I/ILEC.html [webopedia.com])
Re:Will it help expand their service? (Score:3, Informative)
Second, I believe that Speakeasy does not have any sort of agreement with Verizon-owned lines. Speakeasy only has agreements with a few CLECs to bundle with their services. For instance, a COVAD tech came to install my connection (which was over SBC lines). Speakeasy, AFAIK, just routes you over their private network and throws in the other value-added packages and acts as a liason between your ILEC and CLEC.
Certainly, feel free to correct me if I'm off the mark.
Re:What you say? (Score:3, Informative)
What SpeakEasy is stating with their press release is that they will not be affected because unlike smaller ISPs they do not lease their last mile from the telcos themselves. They lease from the last man standing in the world of DSL providers who built their own infrastructure: Covad.
So, SpeakEasy did not say the FCC ruling isn't bad, just that it isn't bad to them because of their situation.
As the customer of a small ISP (CLIQ), I fully expect to get screwed in the long run by SBC using this ruling to force my ISP out of business.
-Chris