Over the next three months, customers of Insight Cable will notice some major changes from their cable operator.

New owner Time Warner Cable is retiring the Insight name for good and replacing it with their own.

Customers will gradually see Time Warner Cable’s logo introduced on company trucks, billing statements, channel guides, and all correspondence.

The company promises one thing is not changing for now: your rates. But that promise won’t last long. Time Warner adjusts rates annually.

Time Warner Cable will also leave current channel lineups in place, but expect to see technology upgrades that will deliver services like online video and faster broadband speeds that may not yet be available in all Insight Cable areas.

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WCPO’s consumer reporter lets northern Kentucky subscribers know ‘Insight Cable’ is a name headed for the history books.  (1 minute)

The city of Olathe, Kansas will be the next home for Google Fiber, according to an announcement published yesterday on the Google Fiber Blog.

The Olathe City Council unanimously approved an agreement to wire the city for the benefit of its 127,000 residents, located 20 miles southwest of Kansas City.

This is the first expansion of Google Fiber outside of the immediate Kansas City area, but unlikely to be the last.

Rich Greenfield from BTIG Research predicts Google will likely announce a second major city for its fiber network sometime this year. Olathe doesn’t qualify at that city because it technically within the greater Kansas City metropolitan area.

The agreement with the Olathe City Council also includes permission to build a city-wide Wi-Fi network.

Google noted the city’s willingness to cut red tape and to ease the introduction of the service were partly determining factors. Google earlier cited the importance of having a smooth working relationship with utility companies and local government officials that make fiber installation a lot easier.

Comcast will be Google’s largest competitor in the city.

“We think that fiber and widespread Internet access will help to create jobs, grow local businesses, and make Olathe even stronger as it grows,” said Rachel Hack, community manager for Google Fiber. “We still have a lot of planning and engineering work to do before we’re ready to bring fiber to Olathe. Once we get those processes underway, we’ll be able to announce more about pre-registration and construction timing.”

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KCTV Kansas City Olathe OKs Google Fiber Deal 3-19-13.mp4[/flv]

KCTV in Kansas City reports the Olathe City Council unanimously approved the entry of Google Fiber into the community of 127,000.  (2 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”382″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KMBC Kansas City Olathe OKs Google Fiber deal 3-20-13.flv[/flv]

KMBC in Kansas City notes Olathe is Kansas’ fastest growing city, but Google’s decision is leaving residents of larger cities like Overland Park feeling left out. But Olathe already has a lot of pre-existing fiber installed independent of Google, making it easier to provide service.  (2 minutes)

Verizon officials have announced they will abandon their damaged wireline network serving several hundred permanent residents and businesses on Fire Island, replacing voice telephone service with a wireless system called Voice Link critics say will end high-speed Internet service and hurt business.

Fire Island’s landline network has been barely functional since Hurricane Sandy struck last October. Verizon has yet to make significant repairs, leading to ongoing complaints from residents who live on the island year-round. Verizon’s wish to eventually abandon its wired network facilities entirely has created concern among island officials and public safety agencies, noting the summer population on the island swells well into the thousands.

Verizon’s plan may leave businesses unable to process credit card transactions and prevent residents from getting back DSL broadband service they lost during the storm, much less get it in the future. For some, it represents turning the clock back to the days before Internet access.

“Verizon has given us a dial tone basically,” Ocean Beach Mayor James Mallott told Newsday. “But as far as DSL, ATMs, point-of-sale systems, all the rest of that stuff, we’re pretty much on our own.”

Fire Island resident Meg Wallace notes Verizon’s plan has not gone unnoticed by the New York State Public Service Commission. The PSC is currently monitoring the situation and invites comments from interested parties.

“Right now, only Saltaire has filed a formal complaint with them, along with one village’s fire official,” Wallace reports. “It is easy to register a complaint either by filling out a complaint form on their website or calling the NYSPSC directly at (800) 342-3377. They are concerned about public opinion, so the more calls and formal complaints filed by both home and business owners the better.”

Verizon officials have defended their decision, claiming a wireless system is more robust and can withstand severe weather better than a wired network. Another reality impacting the decision is the ongoing loss of landline customers. Verizon, the sole provider on the island, has lost 25 percent of its landline business in the last two years. The company claims 80 percent of Verizon-handled calls to and from the island are through Verizon Wireless.

Fire Island

Verizon told local officials that Cherry Grove and points east still have undamaged fiber optic and copper lines that should be able to work as usual this summer and will be left in place for now. On the west end of the island  from Kismet to Sailor’s Haven, the damage was more significant and Verizon has announced its intention to abandon wired service.

Although west end customers will be scheduled for Voice Link installations starting in April, those on the east side should not get too comfortable with their wired service because Verizon has announced it will not upgrade or make future significant repairs to its wired infrastructure going forward. When the remaining landline facilities eventually fail, affected customers will also be moved to Voice Link.

How It Works

Starting April 1st, customers calling with service problems on Fire Island will be redirected to special operators trained to pitch customers the Voice Link service as a replacement. These agents will also handle billing adjustments and drop phone package features Voice Link does not support. If the customer only wants phone service, Verizon will schedule an installation date for Voice Link. A technician will arrive with a wall-mounted box about 8″ high that will be installed in the room that provides the best reception from a nearby Verizon Wireless tower. The box will then be connected to your home telephone wiring and a nearby power outlet so existing telephones will work once again. The box has battery backup powered by customer-installed and maintained AA batteries.

If a customer also had broadband service with Verizon, they will not be getting it back. Instead, an agent will attempt to sell the customer a Verizon Wireless mobile broadband package at a significantly higher cost. For example, a 10GB monthly usage plan added to an existing Verizon Wireless account will cost an extra $20 a month for the “Mi-Fi” mobile hotspot device fee and $100 a month for the data package. Verizon DSL in comparison offered unlimited access for $30-50 a month, depending on the plan selected and any promotional discounts.

Verizon said it is currently improving reception of its 4G LTE network in areas worst-affected by storm damage.

Voice Link is a voice-only product. It does not support broadband, telephone modem connections, faxing, alarm monitoring, home medical monitoring, certain communications equipment for the impaired, or other data services including credit card processing. It does support E911, which gives detailed address information to a 911 operator.

Verizon’s Voice Link also creates a problem for some satellite dish customers. Some satellite companies need a landline connection for handling pay-per-view orders. That data connection does not work with Voice Link either.

Your voice line bill will remain the same if you switch to Voice Link. But customers will lose the benefit of oversight from the Public Service Commission if things go wrong. Voice Link, unlike traditional landline service, is an unregulated service not subject to government oversight.

Voice Link: Coming Soon to Your Area?

Verizon’s Voice Link service is by no means intended to be used only on Fire Island.

Voice Link is being trialed in Florida (Project Thunder) as a landline replacement option for use in areas where Verizon’s copper network has deteriorated and the company is unwilling to spend money on fiber upgrades. If successful, Verizon intends to switch a growing number of Verizon customers nationwide outside of FiOS fiber areas to the wireless service when they report trouble with their phone lines.

Local 824 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers provided insight when one of their workers attended a training class and participated in a ride-along with Verizon technicians installing the service in Florida.

John Glye reports that Verizon considers a customer a candidate for Voice Link if they have chronic phone line problems and only want traditional voice telephone service.

Currently, if customers in Florida are persuaded to switch, a migration order is created. If they want to keep the service they have, a traditional copper trouble ticket will be created and repair crews will be dispatched.

The unit is about eight inches tall and has the following connections:

• 2 RJ 11 ports
• Antenna
• Voice Message indicator
• Signal strength indicator
• Power Button
• Power Port

Installation time is about 45 minutes. The unit must be mounted inside and the customer must supply power and a safe place for the unit. The customer’s existing copper line connection from the home to the pole is disconnected/removed. In the ride-along Glye participated in, he reports the customer was pleased with the outcome, having reported constant static aggravated by rain on her copper landline. After the wireless service was installed, the static was gone and the call quality was good.

Heartland Midwest headquarters (WDAF-TV)

Time Warner Cable and its contractor Heartland Midwest are among the most likely targets for negligence lawsuits that could run well into the hundreds of millions of dollars after the Kansas City Fire Department blamed a contractor for piercing a natural gas line while trying to install fiber optic cable for the cable operator.

The resulting explosion on Feb. 19 destroyed portions of the Country Club Plaza, killed one employee of a landmark Kansas City restaurant that was flattened in the blast, and left 16 injured.

Attorneys are already laying the groundwork for several lawsuits that are expected to be filed shortly.

Heartland Midwest may be deemed the most culpable by those attorneys. Pieces of the contractor’s drill were found inside the broken gas line, according to a report from an investigations team. Time Warner Cable’s deeper pockets make them a natural target because they hired Heartland as a third-party contractor. A lawsuit could claim the cable company was negligent by hiring the contractor and inadequately supervising their work.

Because of the large amount of anticipated damages requested, legal experts expect lawsuits could also target the agency responsible for marking utility lines before digging —  they may have missed the buried gas line. Other targets: Missouri Gas Energy, the owner of the gas line, the Kansas City Fire Department, which may not have moved fast enough to evacuate the immediate area, and even the owners of JJ’s Restaurant which was destroyed in the explosion. Observers note it was their gas pilot light that ignited the natural gas vapor.

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WDAF Kansas City Potential lawsuits ahead after JJs blast 3-19-13.flv[/flv]

FOX4 in Kansas City reports attorneys are laying the groundwork to file lawsuits against Time Warner Cable, its contractor, and others they may accuse of negligence in a February natural gas explosion that killed a restaurant employee. Damages could run more than $100,000,000.  (3 minutes)

Find the Frontier Fiber

After spending tens of millions of dollars in taxpayer money to wire more than 500 miles of fiber broadband cable in public buildings across West Virginia, Frontier is allegedly withholding detailed engineering maps detailing the new fiber network from its competitors.

The Charleston Gazette’s Eric Eyre has kept a close watch on broadband stimulus funding in West Virginia, and the circus of controversy surrounding how the money has been spent.

But now that Frontier’s taxpayer-funded institutional fiber network has been built, efforts to install Internet connections to end users has become complicated… unless you choose Frontier Communications as your vendor.

State Broadband Deployment Council member Jim Martin from Citynet has been a vocal critic of the broadband spending priorities in West Virginia for several years. He’s particularly irritated taxpayer funds have been effectively diverted to Frontier to build a modern fiber network that mostly benefits Frontier and its shareholders. Now his company wants to see if it can use the new fiber network to connect more West Virginians to fiber Internet service, but Martin claims he has been given the runaround by Frontier, state officials, and a broadband council that includes a Frontier executive as a member.

“A number of providers have inquired about where that fiber is located so they can expand broadband to customers,” Martin told the Gazette. “The engineering maps are important so they will know exactly where the fiber is connected, and so they can tap it.”

Only Martin cannot get the detailed engineering maps he needs. Eyre describes the high-tech equivalent of “button, button, who’s got the button?”

Martin started asking about the maps eight months ago. State officials overseeing the broadband expansion project promised to check into his request, but they haven’t released the engineering maps.

On Wednesday, Frontier executive Dana Waldo, who also serves on the Broadband Deployment Council, told Martin to request the maps from the state “broadband grant implementation team,” which heads the broadband expansion project.

“Those are requests that have to go to the implementation team,” said Waldo, who heads Frontier’s West Virginia operations. “It provides for a consistent process.”

However, Gale Given, who serves on the project team and heads the state’s Office of Technology, referred Martin to Frontier.

“If you need detailed engineering maps,” Given said, “it’s my understanding the [broadband project] team is not going to produce those.”

Given noted that less-detailed maps are available on the state’s broadband project website.

“If you need a specific area,” she said, “tell us the specific area you need.”

Martin says the maps on the website mentioned are hand-drawn Google Maps, unsuitable to work with because they lack detail.