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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I am ordinarily no fan of Schumer myself, and object to his positions on a number of issues–but I do not dispute his track record of fighting in the trenches for the interests of his constituents, and I applaud his early intervention in this issue. If we continue to support him on fighting TWC’s (and others’) blatant abuses of the market, we have a real honest chance of pushing forward legislation that will prohibit this practice outright. Frankly, if he continues to deliver on this issue and drives back the threat for good, this is one conservative voter who will… Read more »
“and also deals with conservatives who reflexively objected to Senator Charles Schumer’s involvement in the Time Warner debacle.”
Ahh come on now Philliip, how do you know these guys are conservatives? I am conservative but I am against these caps. Conservatism isn’t “pro-business” but for lesser government. Please next time, be a little more careful attaching a label on something because it is in contrast to your ideology. I thought that was one of your rules anyways to keep political stuff out of it.
If you followed our adventure here over the last two weeks, when Schumer came to town, a whole lot of conservatives piled on in the comments section of the newspaper and many TV stations. I debated the issue with them to illustrate that it’s not a conservative vs. liberal issue, bringing up the competition angle as a resolution. They either didn’t reply or the few that did said the reason they were mad is that Schumer himself got involved and they can’t stand him. The ones that weren’t saying this was part of an Obama Communist takeover (they were hit… Read more »
I agree, it isn’t a political issue. When there is no competition around and the business has a virtual monopoly, all we have to protect us is the government. To strictly be “pro business” blindly because you think it is being “conservative” is just stupid. They might of been mad at Schumer but at least Schumer jumped in there and got his hands dirty which is something the other side can’t say. I am just glad someone jumped in and spoke for us when TWC obviously wouldn’t listen to customer. I really hope this becomes a movement nationwide. These caps… Read more »