Wheeler: FCC Will Protect Competition in All-IP Era

Chairman Leads the Cheers

Everybody join in now: competition, competition, competition

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KBode 10/8/2014 | 11:09:13 AM

Re: Missing something AT&T's version of the "IP transition" involves going state by state attempting to gut those very regulations. It's nice to see Wheeler say he's at least aware of this, as the concept of cable getting a competitive windfall from this migration hadn't been something I'd seem them talk about much thus far...

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brooks7 10/8/2014 | 10:41:13 AM

Re: Missing something Kb.

Your scenario makes at least 1 assumption that is not true today but could be true tomorrow. AT&T in your case is the Carrier of Last Resort (COLR). They must provide a phone line to every home in their territory. At least today, Wireless is NOT considered an equivalent.

seven

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KBode 10/8/2014 | 10:22:33 AM

Re: Missing something "I seem to be missing something here. Why should the transition to all-IP networks reduce competition?"

Example: a rural user in an area that has both AT&T DSL and Comcast cable suddenly sees an "IP transition," which in rural areas means AT&T pulls the copper plant entirely, and pushes those users on to LTE. That means a consumer that previously had the choice of two fixed-line options suddenly only has the choice of one.

Said user can either go to Comcast cable, who now faced with less fixed-line competition than ever before will raise rates and provide even worse customer service, or they can transition to AT&T LTE services (if they can get it) and face low caps and high overages that make Netflix streaming financially unreasonable.

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brooks7 10/7/2014 | 7:42:37 PM

Re: Missing something FTTP networks in the US are exempt from unbundling today. Even if they use TDM Voice.

seven

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mhhf1ve 10/7/2014 | 3:36:50 PM

Re: Missing something Mitch, There is some concern about moving to all-IP because the old non-IP stuff is governed by rules that force the incumbents to share their networks with others (at [un]favorable pricing schemes, depending on how you look at it). If the incumbents are allowed to ditch all the old stuff, then they wouldn't necessarily have to share their equipment (if you agree with them that the FCC rules are *not* technology-agnostic). The FCC could make the rules more clear to explicitly make the regulations technology-agnostic like most CLECs would like, but.... that hasn't happened yet.

So, basically, if the incumbents get it their way, a switch to all-IP would mean they get to control and own their own networks completely without having to share any of it... which would effectively reduce competition because not many other companies are going have or start building out new IP networks of their own.

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Mitch Wagner 10/7/2014 | 11:10:25 AM

Missing something I seem to be missing something here. Why should the transition to all-IP networks reduce competition?

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brooks7 10/7/2014 | 8:52:33 AM

Re: The Future of Copper mhhf1ve,

The only way to put bandwidth on copper is shortening loops and putting in more fiber. This drives up the cost of the copper dramatically because the size of DSLAMs has to shrink.

There is an optimal size of an apartment building of under 20 units that can work. Otherwise you end up having to have more than 1 DSLAM/building to shorten loops. Having been through that with VDSL & VDSL2 it ends up being not very useful. Verizon eventually just ran fiber to every apartment as it was easier and cheaper.

In single family home construction, FTTC has been an overwhelming failure as a deployment method. The reasons all have to do with power. The Reltec/Marconi team that did Vegas and BellSouth powered the FTTC ONU from an upstream cabinet. NLC used to do local poewring and it had few deployments. In Phoenix, the US West guy in charge of that NLC deployment said he needed to get 1,400 permits and AC drops. Imagine the battery maintenance for that.

So, there is this small niche where new Copper tech can work. Other than that, Copper is dead.

seven

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mhhf1ve 10/6/2014 | 10:29:12 PM

The Future of Copper It will be interesting to see what happens to the fate of copper. It seems like the mainstream media is focused mostly on fiber, but the utility of copper isn't quite at its end yet. Hopefully, copper thieves haven't made off with valuable infrastructure that could be rejuvenated with some newer tech....

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