When asked if the merger of AT&T and T-Mobile will limit customer choice, NAACP’s local executive director Stanley Miller told a Cleveland, Ohio television station, “I don’t think that’s an issue in today’s environment; I think the companies are smarter today and they will make people understand and give them the beneficial services that they’ll need.”

The civil rights group had nothing to say about how much AT&T will charge for these “beneficial services.”

At least WEWS-TV in Cleveland is bothering to ask the question.  Most of America’s television news has either ignored the enormous merger on offer from AT&T and T-Mobile, or didn’t wade much further beyond AT&T’s press release about the “benefits” the merger will bring.  Unfortunately, the television station never bothered to alert viewers to the fact the civil rights group receives substantial financial support from AT&T.

Miller’s performance trying to tout his parent organization’s unqualified support for the merger sent a very clear message to anyone watching NewsChannel 5 — he doesn’t really understand what he is talking about.

On the issue of expanding wireless service into rural Ohio, Miller was left tongue-twisting his way into advocating a monopoly because they’ll be best equipped to get service to those who need it.  That’s a fascinating prospect — a monopoly spending money expanding service where it is unprofitable to provide.  That’s the reason companies like AT&T have ignored rural America, and will continue to do so — merger or not.

In fact, AT&T’s claim that it needs the network of T-Mobile to stop the persistent problems of dropped calls and slow data service doesn’t make much sense either.  Verizon, AT&T’s closest competitor, doesn’t seem to be suffering those problems, perhaps because it has made investments in upgrades AT&T has avoided.

In California, consumer advocate Jon Fox was taking an equally skeptical look at AT&T’s claims on behalf of CalPIRG, the California Public Interest Research Group.  Fox noted AT&T’s promotion of the merger in his state came at invitation-only cheerleading sessions run by company officials:

Earlier this month, AT&T California President Ken McNeely explained to an invitation-only audience that the proposed merger with T-Mobile will create new jobs, help communities and improve wireless phone service. AT&T preferred not to take questions from the general public on how that vision fits with AT&T’s history of consolidation, layoffs and aggressive market behavior.

Nearly 30 years after regulators broke up AT&T’s unprecedented control over the U.S. wired phone market, consumers are asked to believe that this time things will be different. This notion defies both experience and common sense. Unless significant market regulation is put into place that encourages a competitive wireless arena to flourish, this proposed merger will be bad for consumers, innovation and economic growth.

Fox notes the wireless marketplace in the United States is hardly a paragon of competitiveness today.  If the merger were approved, 76 percent of Americans would receive wireless service from two providers — AT&T and Verizon.  Fox observed America’s next-most-hated conglomerate — the oil and gas industry — wishes it could have that sort of market power.  The top two oil companies in the U.S. have a combined market share of only 24 percent.  America, he notes, wouldn’t tolerate that kind of consolidation in the gasoline market, so why should we tolerate it in the mobile market?

Fox advocates more competition, not less.  He suggests the government force AT&T and Verizon to open their cellular networks to independent third party competitors at fair prices, and let everyone compete.  That could germinate competition that would end the chorus of rate increases from the largest players and allow for innovative pricing plans that don’t force customers into the nearly identical service plans AT&T and Verizon want to force you to accept.  T-Mobile already provides the most innovative pricing in the wireless marketplace, and AT&T is about to swallow that innovation whole.

What ultimately happens to a well-dwarfed Sprint remains an open question, but one many on Wall Street have already answered, suspecting America’s third largest carrier simply won’t be in a position to compete.  Fox thinks the situation is dire when two companies will have a virtual lock on wireless data services Americans increasingly depend on.

That’s not the view of the NAACP, of course.  But then the NAACP is hardly an independent observer, being the recipient of a considerable amount of money and executive talent from AT&T.  That counts for a whole lot more than the rank and file members of the organization, who will be paying the increased prices AT&T has in store for everyone.

[flv width=”360″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WEWS Cleveland ATT T-Mobile Merger 7-14-11.mp4[/flv]

WEWS-TV in Cleveland investigates the ramifications of a merger between AT&T and T-Mobile.  More than 94% of all Ohioans filing comments with FCC oppose the merger, but groups like the NAACP support it.  NewsCenter 5 wanted to find out why.  (3 minutes)

The state of California is in receipt of a letter from AT&T objecting to a state workshop on the AT&T/T-Mobile merger that included 70 minutes for a panel of academic experts to share their views of one of the state’s largest wireless mergers in years.

J. David Tate, AT&T’s general attorney and associate general counsel, sent the letter in response to news California regulators would open the workshop to a presentation from academics about the impact the merger would have on California consumers, ranging from competition to roaming access to spectrum issues.

Tate called that inappropriate and asked the California Public Utilities Commission to ban their testimony:

“AT&T is raising objections to the panel because having a panel of ‘academic experts’ present at this workshop will pose significant risk of tainting the record with potentially uninformed and biased opinions. These opinions do not constitute the facts upon which the transaction should be reviewed.

“[…] Allowing academicians with unknown expertise in the wireless telecom industry the opportunity to place on the record their personal opinions regarding AT&T’s planned purchase of T-Mobile USA is procedurally improper, unfairly prejudicial to the parties, and contrary to due process principles.”

Instead of allowing those outside of the industry to present their views on the merger, AT&T suggested the best solution would be to allot the 70 minutes originally given to the academics to AT&T (and the three remaining panels AT&T does not object to) instead.

AT&T’s record of delivering reliable landline service has remained an open question for Bakersfield, Calif. residents for more than six months, as repeated outages leave several AT&T landline customers without access to a dial tone.  Even worse, some of the customers impacted have been left without any phone service for weeks on end, including one woman whose life literally depends on a working phone.

Andrea Williams, who lives alone in her Bakersfield home, suffered a stroke and has a heart condition — making access to a phone absolutely essential to her well-being.  Williams is also legally blind, making a cell phone an insurmountable challenge.  Instead, Williams says she has memorized the location of the buttons on her long-standing cordless landline phone, a phone that was out of service just after Christmas and largely stayed that way for three weeks.

Despite having made numerous calls to AT&T trying to get the problem corrected, Williams says no one from AT&T ever showed up.  It took an investigative report from Bakersfield’s KGET-TV newsroom to finally get AT&T to respond.

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KGET Bakersfield ATT Phone Lines Crossed 12-29-10 and 1-10-11.flv[/flv]

Back in December, AT&T in Bakersfield left hundreds of customers without service or cross-connected with other customers’ phone lines.  It all culminated three weeks later in one health-challenged resident breaking out in tears when local TV station KGET finally helped get her service restored.  (5 minutes)

Fast forward to late June, and AT&T’s reliability is again up for a challenge, as some residents in the unincorporated community of Glennville, 30 miles north of Bakersfield, are fed up with repeated outages, even after eight families collectively paid $16,000 to AT&T to extend wired phone service and broadband to their neighborhood.

Around the same time Williams was experiencing problems with her phone line in December, residents in Glennville began experiencing repeated outages of their own.

“I think from December to January, it was 15 times it went out,” said resident Ray Schill.  “From February to now, [the lines have been out] another 10-15 times.”

Residents in Glennville are especially concerned because they cannot count on their landlines, and cell service is spotty to non-existent in the area.

“My major concern is we’re going to have a big problem up here — someone is going to be ill, we’re going to have a fire, someone’s going to die — who is liable,” Kathryn Ervin, a Glennville resident told KGET News.

What happens when residents call AT&T for help?

We get the runaround, says Schill, with promises extending through the months of May, June, and now July 15.

Schill doesn’t hold much confidence in AT&T’s promises, especially after the company responded to an inquiry from the state’s Public Utilities Commission which culminated in his complaint being closed-as-resolved.

Once again, KGET-TV was on the case for the benefit of its viewers, and reporter Kelsey Thomas received a remarkable response from AT&T — the company “couldn’t handle the number of people using the phones in Glennville.” (population: 280)

The company promises to “upgrade its software” to resolve the problem, but could not give Thomas a time frame for when that would be complete.

[flv width=”360″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KGET Bakersfield Folks in Glennville fed up with ATT 6-27-11.mp4[/flv]

KGET-TV gets involved with AT&T once again, this time to help hundreds of residents of Glennville, Calif., who are also experiencing trouble with the company’s landline service.  (3 minutes)

San Francisco city officials last night remained in a stalemate with AT&T over the installation of hundreds of utility boxes to aid the company’s U-verse fiber to the neighborhood system.

Since 2008, AT&T has sought to install the metal cabinets — dubbed “lawn refrigerators” by critics — that would house links with AT&T’s fiber network and copper wire connections leading to individual homes.  The plan has been in limbo since the threat of lawsuits and controversy over whether the boxes could reduce the visual appeal of neighborhoods and harm property values.

AT&T’s latest plan, now also on hold, seeks to allow the company to install 726 4-foot-tall cabinets around the city.  That’s completely unacceptable to groups like San Francisco Beautiful, which say the cabinets block public sidewalks and attract graffiti, eventually leading to urban blight.  The group wants AT&T to install the boxes on private property or underground.

[flv width=”600″ height=”358″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KGO San Francisco Showdown Over ATT Boxes 6-23-11.flv[/flv]

KGO-TV in San Francisco covers the fracas over AT&T’s “lawn refrigerators” — cabinets designed to support its U-verse fiber to the neighborhood service.  (2 minutes)

With the matter generating intense media scrutiny, local politicians have become cautious and a Board of Supervisors vote on the matter has been repeatedly postponed.

AT&T’s U-verse cabinets have been controversial in many areas where they suddenly appear in public rights-of-way, often in front yards.

In Greensboro, N.C., Doris and Dave Robinson learned this the hard way when a tractor, backhoe, and truck appeared in their front yard one morning to install a six foot high metal cabinet with an ominous warning painted on the front telling passersby – “WARNING – AT&T Underground Cable.”

Doris Robinson called and wrote AT&T to no avail, and took their story to a Greensboro television station to warn the neighbors.

“It’s just hard to believe that anyone can come onto our property, put something on the property we disapprove of and leave it on our property,” Dave Robinson told WFMY News. “It’s just not right.”

Doris added, “It struck me as being just terrible to be digging in your front yard and they hadn’t said a word to us.”

In the case of North Carolina, it turns out they don’t have to.  The North Carolina legislature passed laws at the behest of AT&T giving them near carte blanche access to easements established for utilities.  In the past, these have been used for buried and overhead wiring.  Today, they are increasingly used to place enormous metal cabinets, sometimes on the ground, other times attached to a utility pole.  Many have fans that can be heard several yards away.

In California, it will take an affirmative vote by local government officials before AT&T can install similar equipment in San Francisco.

[flv width=”480″ height=”340″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WFMY Greensboro ATT U-Verse Service Means Giant Boxes On Homeowners Front Lawn 6-29-11.flv[/flv]

WFMY-TV in Greensboro shares the story of Doris and Dave Robinson who awoke one morning to find AT&T installing boxes nearly six feet tall on their front lawn.  (5 minutes)

It doesn’t take trillions of dollars to offer world class broadband service in America.  Companies large and small are building gigabit broadband networks to reach customers at prices your local phone or cable company would charge at least $1,000 a month or more to receive, if you consider many charge around $100 a month for 100Mbps.  Now, 700 families in California are going to be offered 1,000Mbps service for just $69.99 per month — including a phone line.

Sonic.net has been in the ISP business for more than 15 years, selling DSL service to California customers at prices that offer value for money.  Most recently, Sonic has been pitching bonded DSL service offering speeds upwards of 40Mbps for the same price it plans to sell its new Fusion gigabit fiber broadband.  For customers who don’t need that much speed, Sonic recently reduced the price for its 20Mbps service to $39.95 per month (including phone line.)

For those in the Sebastopol area lucky enough to qualify for fiber service, Sonic promises unlimited access and an exceptional online experience.

Sonic’s qualifications to run the project are not in question, considering Google selected the company to operate and support the trial fiber-to-the-home network the search giant is building at Stanford University.

Google itself is building an extensive fiber to the home network to serve Kansas City residents and businesses, and promises service at a profitable, but reasonable price.  So has Sonic.net CEO Dane Jasper, whose written views on the state of American broadband explains his personal drive to make Internet access better and faster, without ripping people off with Internet Overcharging schemes or unjustified high monthly prices.

Jasper recognizes much of North America is trapped in a broadband duopoly that delivers all of the benefits to investors, while leaving the continent saddled with slow and overpriced service.  Nine months ago Jasper explained the business model to Benoit Felten, a Yankee Group broadband analyst:

During the construction of this network we have given a lot of thought… to the business model in the US, and how we could do things in a different and more interesting way. The natural model when you have a simple duopoly capturing the majority of the market is segmentation: maximize ARPU [average revenue per user] by artificially limiting service in order to drive additional monthly spending. But fundamentally this is the wrong model for a service provider like us, and we have looked to Europe for inspiration. The model pioneered by Iliad under the Free brand is a better fit, both for us and for our customers.

As the marginal cost of providing more bandwidth or less, and providing [phone service] or not are both minimal, we have adopted a simple flat rate model instead of the more typical US model of “$5 more goes faster”… I believe that removing the artificial limits on speed, and including home phone with the product are both very exciting.

It’s exciting to customers as well, most who give the company nearly five star reviews for excellence, without five-star pricing.  An added bonus: Jasper occasionally responds to customer service inquiries himself.

Reviewing Sonic.net’s blogs and website shows off a company that loves the business it’s in.  If a switch 100 miles away has a problem that interferes with Sonic’s service, you will promptly read about it on the company’s technical blog.

Jasper’s frustration with the enormous corporate-owned ISPs that dominate the country (and Washington) was on full display in a blog entry in March, answering a question about why American broadband is lagging behind:

[…] In 2003 and 2004, the then Republican led FCC reversed course [on policies guaranteeing a level playing field for broadband], removing shared access to essential fiber infrastructure for competitive carriers and codifying instead a policy of exclusive use and “multi-modal competition”.

This concreted our unique US duopoly: cable versus telco, the two broadband choices that most Americans have today.

In exchange for a truly competitive market, the US received promises of widespread deployment. And, to some degree this has worked. Unfettered by significant competition or price pressure, broadband in at least in its most basic form can now be delivered to most homes in America, albeit at a comparatively high cost to the consumer.

What was given up in exchange for this far-reaching but mediocre pablum was true competition and innovation.

Elsewhere in the world, regulatory bodies followed the lead of the US Congress and separated essential copper and fiber infrastructure from the services and providers who used them, and the result has been amazing. In Asia and Europe, Gigabit services are becoming common, and the price paid by consumers per megabit is a tiny fraction of what we pay here at home.

I won’t deny the innovation that has occurred in the telco/cable duopoly. They’ve got TV, Internet and telephone bundles designed to serve up prime time network shows in over-saturated HD glory, with comparatively middling Internet speeds, all offered with teaser rates and terms that would baffle an economics professor. The clear value of the bundle is to baffle, and pity the consumer who wants to shed a component. At least during the intro periods, it’s often cheaper to take the whole package than just a component or two.

For cable companies, the entrenched interest in the television entertainment portion creates a clear conflict: why should they offer an uncapped broadband connection that can deliver enough video entertainment to allow consumers to cut the TV cord? And if you do drop the TV, up goes the price for even this slow and capped Internet connection, so you pay more either way. And now that telcos have gotten into the television business too, their interest in slowing the pace of increasing broadband speed is aligned as well.

This has yielded a competitive truce in America.

In a slow tide, back and forth, cable delivers a slightly better product, then telco slightly better again, all at the highest possible cost. It is iterative, not innovative, and Americans deserve more. After all, we invented the Internet, right?

Among the giant phone and cable companies providing broadband today are a growing number of innovation outliers — companies challenging the prevailing views that Americans don’t need or want fiber-fast speeds (not at the prices some providers charge), that there is no economic justification for the capital spending required to construct fiber networks when incremental upgrades can suffice (the Wall Street view), or that the best way to drive increased revenue from a maturing broadband market is to throw away today’s flat rate pricing model and establish a guaranteed growth fund collecting tolls on Internet traffic that is sure to rise in the days ahead (Time Warner Cable’s CEO).

Google cannot understand why 1Gbps broadband “doesn’t work” in the United States and intends to construct its own network to prove otherwise.  EPB, a municipal utility in Chattanooga, Tenn. sells gigabit broadband, in their words, because they can.  The concept of a provider offering the fruits of their innovation, even if they aren’t certain how to price or sell the service, is a remarkable and refreshing change from the usual obsession with nickle-and-dime “extras” for add-on features or not selling service that your marketing department does not understand or find useful.

It also exposes the indefensible gap between the cost of providing the service and the price paid to receive it.

Thanks to Stop the Cap! reader Mark for sharing news about Sonic.net’s fiber network.