It didn’t take long for consumers to start flooding the Federal Communications Commission with thousands of complaints about poor Internet service, usage caps, and speed throttles.

The complaints arrived as the FCC began formally enforcing Net Neutrality by reclassifying broadband as a telecommunications service, subject to oversight by the federal agency.

Consumers used the occasion to deluge the commission about the sorry state of Internet access in the United States, whether it constituted a Net Neutrality violation or not.

National Journal obtained a sample of 50 complaints through a Freedom of Information Act request and it was clear data caps were at or near the top of the complaints list and consumers wasted no time slamming cable and phone companies over the practice.

“Our data should not be capped at 350[GB]!!!!” one consumer pleaded, likely a Suddenlink or Mediacom customer, which both have 350GB caps on certain speed tiers. “Please, please make data caps illegal!!”

No more Netflix and Hulu watching for this family: “I have to tell my kids to stop using YouTube and other services and stuff they need for school so we don’t go over the cap,” another consumer wrote, explaining that their Internet-enabled home security camera uses up a significant amount of their monthly data. “By Comcast having this data cap, I don’t have a open Internet … I also think this data cap is very inaccurate, it goes up without anybody being home, and sometimes by a lot.”

Comcast also received heat for poor performing broadband service, with one customer forced to use Wi-Fi at a local McDonalds to take an online exam because Internet service at home was so poor.

“The Comcast modem is such crap that we can’t even access the Internet,” the consumer wrote. “I’m livid.”

AT&T was roasted for speed throttling its “unlimited data” wireless plan — a practice that already resulted in a $100 million fine from the FCC for misleading consumers. AT&T is appealing.

In all, the FCC reports it received about 2,000 complaints from consumers in June, the first month Net Neutrality rules took effect. The agency has just 30 days to respond to the complaints, most lodged using this online form. The FCC may be able to answer many with a form letter because poor service and usage caps are not strict violations of Net Neutrality, unless the FCC determines the practices “unreasonably interfere” with Internet access. AT&T’s speed throttling comes a lot closer to meeting that test, because many throttled customers report their wireless data service is rendered effectively unusable once throttled.

But the broad-ranging complaints may still prove useful, suggesting to the FCC stronger rules and oversight are required for a broadband market many consider barely competitive and often customer abusive.

Seeking comment, National Journal reported the National Cable and Telecommunications Association and the U.S. Telecom Association, which both represent major Internet providers and have sued to overturn the regulations, declined to comment on the complaints.

Residents of one of the world’s most isolated countries will soon have the option of getting fiber-to-the-home service that will offer faster Internet access than most Americans get with traditional DSL from their phone company.

Thailand’s Benchachinda Holding Company has partnered with four other technology companies to launch Myanmar Information Highway Limited (MIH), with the goal of wiring fiber-to-the-home service to every home and business that wants service in Yangon and other major economic cities. It’s a remarkable investment for a country that had until recently been run by a military dictatorship for more than 50 years and is still liberalizing its economy and implementing democratic reforms.

Benchachinda’s president, Vichai Bencharongkul, said the group’s investment in international businesses in Myanmar is the first of a few foreign investments in other nations. Bencharongkul told the Thai press fiber broadband sells itself and investment in Myanmar would make good business sense.

Bencharongkul

He can point to the fact MIH was able to quickly get permission to lay fiber-optic cable from Yangon Electricity Supply Corporation, the country’s dominant electric utility. Myanmar’s bureaucracy can prove daunting to doing business in the country, but the promise of faster broadband overcame those concerns.

Internet access in Myanmar, better known internationally as Burma, has traditionally been a frustrating experience. Despite some fiber Internet rollouts by state-owned Myanma Posts & Telecommunications (MPT), offering up to 100Mbps, the average upper income Myanmar household still relies on DSL service and gets only up to 6Mbps speed. The country is ranked 159 out of 198 by Net Index for consumer download speed, averaging just 5Mbps. Fiber optic broadband will change that.

In a cost-saving measure, MIH will launch service with speeds averaging 20Mbps — four times faster than the current average speed in the country — and raise speeds and capacity going forward. They intend to deliver stiff competition to both Yatanarpon Teleport (YTP) and the state telephone company, which charges almost $65 a month for a basic DSL line. MPT charges $1,200 a month for 20Mbps fiber broadband and focuses on business customers. MIH is expected to charge lower prices for service and will rely on its own network instead of the one owned and controlled by the state-owned telephone company.

Zibelman

After the N.Y. Public Service Commission heard an earful about Verizon’s broken promise to deliver FiOS service to every resident in New York City, the head of the PSC has sent a letter to Verizon reminding them of their obligation and requesting an explanation:

At a recently conducted July 15, 2015 Public Statement Hearing held in the City of New York in the matter of the Study on the State of Telecommunications in New York State […] citizens of the City expressed concern over the pace of Verizon New York Inc.’s (Verizon) Fiber-to-the Premises (FTTP) build-out. Some of the commenters stated that they called Verizon to find out when FiOS would be available in their building and the Company could not provide a specific date or time. Others asked why some buildings had been wired for FiOS while others were still being served over the copper network.

Among the Commission’s minimum requirements and terms included in the approval of Verizon’s cable franchise agreement with the City, is the requirement to complete upgrading its wire centers to video serving offices (VSO) and have its FTTP network “pass all households served by [Verizon’s] wire centers within the Franchise Area” 1 by no later than June 30, 2014.

Audrey Zibelman, chair of the PSC, acknowledged Verizon’s repeated explanation that building owners have often been reluctant to let Verizon engineers into their buildings to initiate the FiOS upgrade, noting Verizon has filed more than 45 petitions for Order of Entry with the PSC over the past two years, identifying over 3,000 buildings with “access” issues of one type or another. Approximately 50% of the building access problems have been identified in Manhattan; about 20% each in Bronx and Queens; 13% in Brooklyn, and the rest in Staten Island and Long Island.

But Zibelman assumes at least some of those disputes have since been settled and now wants details about where Verizon is still unable to offer FiOS in New York City and why. She also wanted to make sure Verizon was not favoring certain areas over others for fiber service:

The agreement also provides that Verizon will conduct the build-out in a way that will prevent redlining, or discrimination based on income, by requiring Verizon to build-out simultaneously to all boroughs and in a manner relatively proportionate to household income. Specifically, the median household income of all homes passed shall not be greater than the average household income of all the households in the City.

“Indicate whether Verizon has achieved its six-year build-out in the cable franchise agreement,” Zibelman asked. “If Verizon has not achieved that build-out, please provide all documentation that Verizon provided to the City to justify the basis for any delay. In addition, please provide a current status of the FTTP build-out, by Borough, indicating the percentage and number of buildings served, and the remainder of buildings yet to be served. Provide a status update of the buildings identified in previous Verizon petitions for Orders of Entry.”

Zibelman reminded Verizon it has an absolute obligation under 16 NYCRR §895.5 to “provide service to any customer upon request.” To verify that, Zibelman wants Verizon to accept and record all requests for service and respond to all of her concerns within 14 days.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WNBC NY Verizon FiOS Not Installing High-Speed Internet for 25 Percent of NYers Who Want It Audit 7-15-15.flv[/flv]

WNBC in New York reports a quarter of New Yorkers still cannot sign up for Verizon FiOS, despite a commitment from the company to wire the entire city. (2:01)

Vice President Biden in Rochester, N.Y.

Vice President Joe Biden and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo today announced Rochester, N.Y., a city notorious for its slow broadband, will be the home of the $600 million Integrated Photonics Institute for Manufacturing Innovation, a hub supporting the development of photonics — technology that powers everything from fiber optic broadband to laser surgery.

Rochester, the home of dramatically downsized household names like Eastman Kodak, Xerox, and Bausch and Lomb, could see thousands of new high technology jobs created in the western New York city to develop new products and services that depend on light waves.

“The innovation and jobs this institute will create will be a game changer for Rochester and the entire state,” said U.S. Rep. Louise Slaughter, (D-Rochester). “This is a huge win that will shape our region’s economy for decades to come.”

Slaughter reportedly spent three years working to bring the center to Rochester and helped secure $110 million from the Defense Department and another $500 million in state and private sector funding to finance its development. The project could prove transformational for a community ravaged by downsizing, most dramatically exemplified by Eastman Kodak, which had 62,000 workers in Rochester during the 1980s but employs fewer than 2,500 today.

Today, Rochester’s largest employers are no longer manufacturers. Health care service providers now lead the way, including the University of Rochester Medical Center/Strong Health (#1) and the Rochester General Health System (#3). Upscale grocery chain Wegmans calls Rochester home and is the community’s second largest employer. The bureaucracies that power the Rochester City School District and Monroe County Government are also among the area’s top-10 employers.

Despite the job shifts, the fact 24,000 workers in the region are already employed in photonics-related jobs may have been a deciding factor in selecting Rochester for the center.

“The photonics center we are now bringing to Rochester will harness the power of the Defense Department and the prowess of Rochester’s 24,000 employee-strong photonics industry and focus it like a laser beam to launch new industries, technologies and jobs,” Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement.

Employers, small business start-ups and workers moving into the region are likely to be considerably less impressed by Rochester’s incumbent telecommunications service providers. Although institutional and large commercial fiber networks are available to those with deep pockets, with the exception of Greenlight Networks, a local fiber to the home retail overbuilder providing fast gigabit fiber Internet to a tiny percentage of local residents, the area’s fiber future remains bleak.

Time Warner Cable, by far the largest Internet provider in the region, has left Rochester off its Maxx upgrade list, leaving the city with a maximum of 50/5Mbps Internet speed. Frontier Communications still relies on 1990s era DSL service and the anemic speeds it delivers, evident from the company’s poor average speed ranking — 11.47Mbps — less than half the minimum 25Mbps the FCC considers broadband.

Rochester is hardly a broadband speed leader in New York State, only managing to score in 332nd place. (Image: Ookla)

The performance of the two providers has dragged Rochester’s broadband speed ranking to an embarrassingly low #336 compared with other communities in New York. Suburban towns in downstate New York enjoy more than twice the speed upstate residents get, largely thanks to major upgrades from Verizon (FiOS) and Time Warner Cable (Maxx). But even compared with other upstate communities, Rochester still scores poorly, beaten by small communities like Watertown, Massena, and Waterloo. Suburban Buffalo, Syracuse, and Albany also outperform Rochester.

In contrast, in Raleigh, N.C., home to the Power America Institute — another federal manufacturing center — broadband life is better:

• Raleigh is a Google Fiber city and will receive 1,000/1,000Mbps service for $70 a month, around $20 more than what Time Warner charges for 50/5Mbps with a promotion;
• Raleigh is a Time Warner Cable Maxx city with free broadband speed upgrades ranging from 15Mbps before/50Mbps after to 50Mbps before/300Mbps after;
• Raleigh is an AT&T U-verse with GigaPower city with 1,000/1,000Mbps service for $120 70 a month.

This article was updated to correct the pricing of AT&T U-verse with GigaPower in Raleigh, N.C., with thanks to reader Darrin Evans for the corrected information.