When the U.S. Federal Communications Commission votes to reclassify Internet access as a common carrier utility under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934 as expected April 25, it’s unlikely to increase affordable access. The primary reason is the FCC is forbearing rate filing and regulation in the joint federal-state framework with state public utility commissions that regulate rates for as they do for legacy voice telephone service under Title II authority. While Title II would subject Internet service providers (ISPs) to Title II’s universal service and nondiscrimination provisions r ..read more

 2000-2020 Incumbents slow walk, cherry pick FTTP buildout; business models cannot accommodate capex need. Publicly owned FTTP emerges as lower cost business model alternative, built by some municipalities in densely settled areas and handful of private operators and utility coops in rural areas. Some limited interest by private infrastructure funds (Macquarie) and Euro pension funds as sources of more patient capital to finance FTTP construction. 2020-2030 COVID public health measures spotlight need for more FTTP as knowledge work, education, medicine and retail increasingly virtualiz ..read more

Conventional economic theory distinguishes a public utility from a supplier of goods and services in a market by identifying whether the good in question is a monopoly. In many parts of urban and rural California, internet services are indeed a monopoly—or at best a duopoly. The common policy response to the monopoly is to either place the service provider into public hands or use a regulatory framework to curtail the ability of the provider to exploit a monopoly position. Once in the public hands, the service provider can be compelled to prioritize social outcomes, such as equity of access ..read more

In Colorado, municipally-owned Pulse was able to fund its network through revenue bonds which were backed by the Loveland electric utilities enterprise fund. A revenue bond is a type of municipal bond typically used to fund projects that are expected to generate revenue, like public utilities. Unlike general obligation bonds, which are backed by the taxing power of the issuing government, revenue bonds are supported by the income generated from the project they are financing. https://www.fiercetelecom.com/broadband/communities-gain-diy-network-guide-despite-public-broadband-skeptics This ..read more

2000 Democratic Party Platform on "Bridging the Digital Divide" Democrats believe that every American - regardless of income, geography, race, or disability - should be able to reach across a computer keyboard, and reach the vast new worlds of knowledge, commerce, and communication that are available at the touch of a fingertip. That is why Democrats fought for the e-rate to wire every classroom and library to the Internet. In the next four years, we must finish connecting the job and then go further. We must launch a new crusade - calling on the resources of government, employers, the high ..read more

"AT&T said in a statement that input and feedback from community stakeholders, including comments in public hearings held and planned “is a critical part of the process of upgrading customers from outdated copper lines to more advanced, higher speed technologies like fiber and wireless, which consumers are increasingly demanding.” (Emphasis added) https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/02/28/opposition-mounts-to-atts-plan-to-stop-landline-service-in-most-of-bay-area/ There is a logical flaw in this reasoning that suggests modernizing the legacy copper voice telephone lines to fiber to the premis ..read more

Excerpted from Service Unavailable: America’s Telecommunications Infrastructure Crisis U.S policymaking on Internet infrastructure began shortly before the Internet was decommissioned as a government-run network in the mid-1990s. In 1993, the Clinton administration issued a policy framework titled The National Information Infrastructure: Agenda for Action.50[i] It called for the construction of an “advanced National Information Infrastructure (NII),” described as “a seamless web of communications networks, computers, databases, and consumer electronics that will put vast amounts of information ..read more

Alphabet (Google’s parent) alone has a market cap of nearly $2 trillion – roughly twice that of the top 10 companies contributing roughly 77% of all universal service funding combined. Yet Google and others in the Big Tech pantheon like Facebook, Netflix, and Amazon contribute not a dime. These dominant Big Tech companies that benefit financially from the connectivity that USF makes possible should contribute to our shared goals of connectivity and affordability. Policymakers have long explored ways to hold these companies more accountable for their dominant market positions. Contributing to ..read more

Gigapower CEO Bill Hogg – the brand name for AT&T’s joint venture with BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Fund to build open access fiber delivery advanced telecommunications infrastructure -- boasted other open access networks would be unable to scale up like Gigapower. Gigapower will be “much larger than any other provider in the space,” Hogg declared at a webcast panel presentation last September hosted by Broadband Breakfast. “The scale at which we are going to operate will be a differentiator in the U.S. marketplace.” Publicly owned open access networks like UTOPIA Fiber, owned and fi ..read more

AT&T appears to be pursuing a two pronged strategy to build out fiber to the premises (FTTP) delivery infrastructure. The first is targeting densely built up metro areas with its Gigapower joint venture with BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Fund. The second using subsidies extended to the states from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act’s (IIJA) Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program to build FTTP infrastructure in less densely developed areas that meet the program’s funding eligibility requirements. Last fall, AT&T urged states to award the BEAD subsidies ..read more