Recent Headlines
October 2, 2009
Be Sure to Read Part One: Astroturf Overload — Broadband for America = One Giant Industry Front Group for an important introduction to what this super-sized industry front group is all about. Members of Broadband for America Red: A company or group actively engaging in anti-consumer lobbying, opposes Net Neutrality, supports Internet Overcharging, belongs to […]
October 2, 2009
Astroturf: One of the underhanded tactics increasingly being used by telecom companies is “Astroturf lobbying” – creating front groups that try to mimic true grassroots, but that are all about corporate money, not citizen power. Astroturf lobbying is hardly a new approach. Senator Lloyd Bentsen is credited with coining the term in the 1980s to […]
September 27, 2009
Hong Kong remains bullish on broadband. Despite the economic downturn, City Telecom continues to invest millions in constructing one of Hong Kong’s largest fiber optic broadband networks, providing fiber to the home connections to residents. City Telecom’s HK Broadband service relies on an all-fiber optic network, and has been dubbed “the Verizon FiOS of Hong […]
September 23, 2009
BendBroadband, a small provider serving central Oregon, breathlessly announced the imminent launch of new higher speed broadband service for its customers after completing an upgrade to DOCSIS 3. Along with the launch announcement came a new logo of a sprinting dog the company attaches its new tagline to: “We’re the local dog. We better be […]
September 23, 2009
Stop the Cap! reader Rick has been educating me about some of the new-found aggression by Shaw Communications, one of western Canada’s largest telecommunications companies, in expanding its business reach across Canada. Woe to those who get in the way. Novus Entertainment is already familiar with this story. As Stop the Cap! reported previously, Shaw […]
September 22, 2009
The Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission, the Canadian equivalent of the Federal Communications Commission in Washington, may be forced to consider American broadband policy before defining Net Neutrality and its role in Canadian broadband, according to an article published today in The Globe & Mail. [FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s] proposal – to codify and enforce some […]
September 21, 2009
In March 2000, two cable magnates sat down for the cable industry equivalent of My Dinner With Andre. Fine wine, beautiful table linens, an exquisite meal, and a Monopoly board with pieces swapped back and forth representing hundreds of thousands of Canadian consumers. Ted Rogers and Jim Shaw drew a line on the western Ontario […]
September 11, 2009
Just like FairPoint Communications, the Towering Inferno of phone companies haunting New England, Frontier Communications is making a whole lot of promises to state regulators and consumers, if they’ll only support the deal to transfer ownership of phone service from Verizon to them. This time, Frontier is issuing a self-serving press release touting their investment […]
September 7, 2009
I see it took all of five minutes for George Ou and his friends at Digital Society to be swayed by the tunnel vision myopia of last week’s latest effort to justify Internet Overcharging schemes. Until recently, I’ve always rationalized my distain for smaller usage caps by ignoring the fact that I’m being subsidized by […]
September 1, 2009
In 2007, we took our first major trip away from western New York in 20 years and spent two weeks an hour away from Calgary, Alberta. After two weeks in Kananaskis Country, Banff, Calgary, and other spots all over southern Alberta, we came away with the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: The Good Alberta […]
August 31, 2009
A federal appeals court in Washington has struck down, for a second time, a rulemaking by the Federal Communications Commission to limit the size of the nation’s largest cable operators to 30% of the nation’s pay television marketplace, calling the rule “arbitrary and capricious.” The 30% rule, designed to keep no single company from controlling […]
August 27, 2009
Less than half of Americans surveyed by PC Magazine report they are very satisfied with the broadband speed delivered by their Internet service provider. PC Magazine released a comprehensive study this month on speed, provider satisfaction, and consumer opinions about the state of broadband in their community. The publisher sampled more than 17,000 participants, checking […]
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How is this not illegal? This should be illegal!
If this isn’t illegal, it should be! It certainly looks bad for both the FCC and Comcast!
If there are people out there that DON’T think our government is rampant with corruption, they are living in a dream world. I agree, this should be illegal. Also it shows how morally bankrupt Meredith Attwater Baker is as a person. Way to sell us down the stream to our corporate overlords honey, appreciate it!!
And you STILL think that writing letters to FCC Commissioner’s, elected officials, etc. is going to have any effect what-so-ever???
Yes, I do. My theory of politics fighting these issues since the late 1980s (when it was about satellite dish access to cable programming) has remained largely the same: Expect politicians to respond first to their self-interests — their election campaigns, the money needed to fight them, and the people who come before them face to face. When voters are not paying attention, it’s easy to do the lobbyists’ bidding, especially if it can be spun as some pro-business policy. Your votes have consequences. Elect the people who do not sell you out. When voters are paying attention, politicians do… Read more »
But, Phil, my question is this: How do you show with your vote when the people you want to send a message to don’t care because they already got what they wanted, like this person?
My thoughts exactly. The people that do care are outnumbered by the people who don’t care, have no clue, or are part of the problem.
I don’t believe Ms. Baker represents the majority of public officials. As you can read this evening, Michael Copps is one of the good ones. This woman sees no ethical problem doing what she is doing, and the other Republican commissioner at the FCC is honestly no better. Michael Powell, still another Republican, used to chair the FCC under George W. Bush, and now he runs the cable lobby. Although not always true, I increasingly find the actions of the federal Republicans to be harder and harder to defend. They are simply anti-consumer on virtually all broadband issues, with the… Read more »
Absolutely effing disgusting. It’s a constant fight on all fronts between greedy vile corporations, government agencies run amok and the elected officials taking bribes/”campaign donations”. I’ll keep it up until the day I leave this earth, but it sure puts me in a sour mood more often than not these days.