Broadband service is available to 99.1% of the Bronx and 99.8% of the Rochester and its suburbs, but just 38.5% of Bronx residents are using the internet at broadband speeds (at least 25/3 Mbps) and only 54% of Monroe County residents are receiving a true broadband experience.

These two New York communities, one in the dense New York City area, the other straddling the Finger Lakes region and Western New York, are examples of the FCC’s vast over-count of consumers getting suitable broadband service and speed, according to Microsoft. The problem is much worse in rural areas where DSL speeds predominate and providers like Verizon and Frontier are in no hurry to upgrade their rural networks.

“These significant discrepancies across nearly all counties in all 50 states indicates there is a problem with the accuracy of the access data reported by the FCC,” Microsoft said about its findings. “Additional data sources like ours, as well as work by others to examine data in a few states or regions, are important to understanding the problem.”

Microsoft’s performance data is not alone representative of a local cable company not delivering advertised speeds. For example, in the Bronx, affordability issues mean that more residents rely on their cell phones and mobile connectivity for internet access. In Rochester, where true broadband speeds usually cost $50-65 a month depending on the provider, affordability is also a factor. But there is also the presence of local telephone company Frontier Communications, which has saddled Rochester with inferior DSL service it has no concrete plans to upgrade. Frontier DSL usually offers substandard speed of 12 Mbps or much less, making its customers part of Microsoft’s estimation of those underserved.

Schumer

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) complained about the state of broadband in New York, claiming internet speeds are “horrible” in much of the state and broadband providers are not being honest about advertised speed.

“When there’s slow internet, it drives you crazy​.​ ​You just sit and wait and wait and wait. It’s horrible,” Schumer said at a news conference held Sunday in Manhattan. “There’s a new report out that says our internet here in New York may​ ​be moving more like molasses than like lightning.”

Schumer is taking direct aim at the recent positive report from the FCC that broadband has dramatically improved in the United States, a conclusion the Republicans serving at the FCC took credit for, explaining policies of deregulation and elimination of net neutrality spurred private investment and better internet service for all.

“But Microsoft did its own report, and it shows that over four and a half million New Yorkers and Long Islanders are not getting the speed on the internet that the carriers say they’re getting​, [and] that’s a real problem,” Schumer argued, adding that most consumers are not getting consistent access to at least 25/3 Mbps service. “It’s like paying for the speed of a car but getting the speed of a bicycle.”

Schumer wants the FCC to hold providers to account for their broadband speed and performance. But last week, the FCC had other ideas, delaying broadband performance testing requirements until 2020 for internet service providers receiving taxpayer or ratepayer funds to build out their networks.

“T​he FCC is falling down on the job,” Schumer said. “I don’t think it’s nefarious but the providers, to upgrade to the required speed​,​ would have to pay for more equipment. They should. We’re all paying big bills for that.”

Altice USA could be your next cell phone provider, if you subscribe to Cablevision’s broadband service in the metro New York City area.

The Wall Street Journal reports Altice is preparing to launch an unlimited calling/texting/data plan that will cost between $20-30 per month, powered by Cablevision’s in-home Wi-Fi, its network of public Wi-Fi hotspots, and Sprint’s 4G LTE network.

The service, likely to be called Altice Mobile, is the latest entry from cable operators pitching low cost mobile service as an incentive to keep customers from switching providers. Altice will charge dramatically less for its unlimited plan than Xfinity Mobile and Spectrum Mobile ($45) — both reselling Verizon Wireless service — (with speeds reduced to 1 Mbps download and 512 kbps upload after 20 GB of data usage in a month.)

Customers using AT&T and Verizon pay even more. Unlimited monthly plans for a single phone start at $80 at Verizon and $70 at AT&T, depending on bundling certain other AT&T-owned services. For less than half the price, Altice Mobile would deliver all the same services larger providers offer, although Altice intends to offload as much usage as possible to its network of Wi-Fi hotspots, to keep costs low. Before Altice acquired the cable company, Cablevision built a major Wi-Fi presence in the New York City metro areas where it provides cable service. Altice announced it intends to strengthen that network to support its mobile initiative, including the possibility of deploying its own small cell network.

Where Altice cannot supply its own wireless connection, it will rely on Sprint to take over, paying the cell phone company for its customers’ traffic. In return, Sprint will be able to bolster its network in Altice’s service area, perhaps even using Altice’s fiber-to-the-home network, now under construction. That could help Sprint launch 5G service relatively soon in the region, regardless of whether its pending merger with T-Mobile USA is approved. To protect the venture, Altice has secured an agreement with both T-Mobile and Sprint not to terminate its contractual agreement with Sprint should a merger be approved. But the service will still be dependent on network owners like Sprint willing to sell connectivity. Should Altice Mobile take a significant share of the market, network owners may be reluctant to renew such contracts, or price them much higher at renewal time, raising prices.

The cable industry’s incentive for getting into the wireless business, even if it proves unprofitable, is plain to see. All entrants require their mobile customers to maintain a broadband account in good standing to qualify for mobile service. Comcast, Charter, and Altice are aware their video packages are increasingly untenable in a cord-cutter’s marketplace, but maintaining internet service remains essential. In most areas where the cable operators provide service, Verizon or AT&T also sells both broadband and wireless service. Customers may be reluctant to bounce between providers looking for a better deal if they also have to switch mobile providers at the same time.

Cinemax is under siege, after the nation’s two largest cable operators announced they have turned their backs on HBO’s sister premium movie channel.

Several months after Charter Spectrum stripped Cinemax out of its TV bundle packages, Comcast has announced it will do the same starting this July, replacing Cinemax with its own commercial-free, on-demand movie network Hitz:

We are excited to introduce Hitz, a new commercial-free on-demand movie service available as part of Xfinity Premier, Super and certain other TV packages. Hitz will feature more than 200 movies and will be included with these packages at no additional cost. It will replace Cinemax and its associated channels.

Movie lovers of all kinds will enjoy Hitz. This exciting new offering will provide even better value and variety for you. Here’s how:

• Hitz will offer a rotating list of more than 200 movie titles from a variety of top studios.
• Hitz will include an assortment of movie titles that complements the films already available to Xfinity Premier and Super TV customers on other channels and adds to the thousands of On Demand movies already available.

What is Hitz?
Hitz is a new on-demand movie service that includes more than 200 titles from a variety of top studios. This selection will rotate over time.

Where can I find Hitz?
The easiest way to find Hitz is by saying “Hitz” into your X1 voice remote. Hitz can also be found in the Networks section of the On Demand menu. You can also see current Hitz movies in the on-screen grid guide – frequently near other movie services.

Why are you doing this?
Most of the movies on Cinemax have also aired on HBO. By offering Hitz instead, we’ll be delivering customers a better variety of content.

How can I watch Cinemax original content?
While Cinemax will no longer be included in the packages being adjusted, Cinemax will still be available to purchase on its own for $12 per month.

Should I pay a different price now that I am no longer receiving Cinemax?
While Cinemax is being removed from these packages, we believe the new lineup offers a better value. Most of the movies on Cinemax have also aired on HBO. By offering Hitz instead, we’ll be delivering a better variety of content.

The dissing of Cinemax seems to have started after AT&T acquired Time Warner (Entertainment), which also owns HBO and Cinemax. Like Comcast, Charter Spectrum customers can still subscribe to Cinemax, but only as an a-la-carte option, typically $15 a month. Verizon FiOS dropped Cinemax from its bundles starting in 2018. When cable operators drop legendary networks like Cinemax, it is almost always a matter of money. Cable operators may have been asked to accept a reduced share of the subscription fee split (usually 60% sent to the network, the remaining 40% kept by the cable company) or required to carry new services as part of a contract renewal they ultimately rejected.

A war between RT, Russia’s external English language news channel and the New York Times over the health impact of 5G technology has given the telecom industry a new talking point: Claims that 5G signals are dangerous are nothing more than Russian fake news.

Generous news coverage about 5G deployment has brought out fringe critics claiming wireless mobile technology causes brain cancer, infertility, autism, heart tumors and Alzheimer’s disease. In some cities in the western U.S., mysterious “Public Health Warning” signs have been placed on utility poles, showing the alleged locations of future 5G cell sites as health is really important for many people, people want to feel healthy and relax, and that’s why so many try cbd products, or vape pens to relax as well, as you can even go online and visit this for different vape pens if you want to get one of your own. You may also want to experience tranquility with the 3chi purple urkle thca flower, as the calming attributes of the Purple Urkle strain combined with THCA offer a pathway to relaxation.

The Times instead blamed the Kremlin’s state-sponsored news outlet RT for stirring up opposition to 5G. Reporter William Broad claimed RT had largely ignored 5G until this year, when it suspiciously aired seven stories about its health risks:

RT’s assaults on 5G technology are rising in number and stridency as the American wireless industry begins to erect 5G systems. In March, Verizon said its service will soon reach 30 cities.

RT America aired its first program assailing 5G’s health impacts last May, its only one in 2018. Already this year, it has run seven. The most recent, on April 14, reported that children exposed to signals from 5G cellphone towers would suffer cancer, nosebleeds and learning disabilities.

[…] The network is now applying its playbook against 5G by selectively reporting the most sensational claims, and by giving a few marginal opponents of wireless technology a conspicuous new forum.

RT’s Rick Sanchez devoted a substantial amount of time on a recent show attempting to refute a New York Times article that claimed Russia was trying to interfere with America’s 5G expansion using fear-mongering. (19:32)

The “Balaclava EMF Shield” is designed to protect you from ambient radiofrequency energy.

One RT host, Rick Sanchez, devoted 20 minutes of a recent show critiquing the Times story and expressing disappointment over the caliber of its reporting. Sanchez suggested the New York Times report was virtually an advertisement for Verizon and narrowed in on an admission near the bottom of the piece that the phone company and the newspaper are now business partners:

Wireless high-speed communication could transform the news industry, sports, shopping, entertainment, transportation, health care, city management and many levels of government. In January, The Times announced a joint venture with Verizon to build a 5G journalism lab.

Sanchez also sought to tie the push for 5G as another example of corporate influence over Washington, noting FCC Chairman Ajit Pai was a former lawyer for Verizon. He also tied 5G into the assault on net neutrality, without explaining why. For its part, the Times suggests, with little evidence, that RT is running a propaganda campaign against 5G to slow down its deployment in the United States, allowing Russia to leap ahead:

Even as RT America has worked hard to damage 5G, the scientific establishment in Russia has embraced a contrary and questionable position: that the high frequencies of 5G communications are actually good for human health. It recommends their use for healing wounds, boosting the immune system and treating cancer. Millions of Russian patients are said to have undergone such high-frequency therapies.

Beauty clinics in Moscow use these high frequencies for skin regeneration, according to a scientific study. One company says the waves can remove wrinkles and fight hair loss.

The back-and-forth arguments have now attracted Washington’s attention, and some in Congress want to hold hearings about a reputed “disinformation campaign” run by Russia against 5G technology. Wireless carriers will welcome such hearings, allowing them to further argue for deregulation of cell placement rules and other zoning matters and claim the U.S. is falling behind in the global 5G race. It is also much easier to dismiss objections to 5G as Russian fake news than to finance a team of experts to counter those claims.

Lost in all of this is the original question about the risks of 5G technology. Much of the health an d safety opposition to wireless technology began long before the concept of 5G was unveiled. Some parents have opposed in-school Wi-Fi as medically harmful. Others fear traditional 3G or 4G radiofrequency energy, which some claim (without substantial evidence) causes cancer.

The health impacts of 5G have not been definitively proven, and it will be important to distinguish between different flavors of 5G to even consider the question. Millimeter wave 5G networks that depend on small cells those signs affixed to utility poles warn about operate at very high frequencies with very low power. No person will likely be within 10-15′ of a small cell because they will be erected on top of utility poles. They also emit a very short range signal unlikely to penetrate walls of buildings, much less your brain or vital organs. The other version of 5G will be placed on existing cell towers and will be no more harmful than 3G or 4G. If one fears radiofrequency energy, they are much more likely to get a large dose of it driving past (or living by) an AM, FM, or TV transmitter that operates at much higher power.

KOIN-TV in Portland, Ore. reported the sudden appearance of ‘Public Health Hazard’ signs warning of the risks of 5G. But are the signs for real? (2:31)

Pai

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai found a lot to like about the proposed merger of T-Mobile and Sprint and has recommended his fellow commissioners approve the transaction after the companies offered new commitments to ease anti-competitive and anti-trust concerns.

That typically means the FCC’s 3-2 Republican majority will quickly approve the deal in a forthcoming vote, with three Republicans in favor and two Democrats opposed, if tradition holds.

Pai’s support for the merger is hardly surprising. Since joining the FCC as a commissioner in the second half of the Obama Administration, Pai has consistently opposed every pro-consumer item on the FCC’s docket. He loves industry-consolidating mergers, hates telecom companies being forced to open their businesses to competition on things like set-top boxes, and considers almost all pro-consumer protection policies from net neutrality to merger deal conditions examples of “overregulation” that he argues are harmful to the free market and investment.

The troubled merger, which would create what we will call T-Sprint, has remained under review for months, recently stalled over revelations the two companies tailored the transaction to appeal to President Trump. T-Mobile executives spent $195,000 repeatedly renting rooms at the Trump International Hotel in Washington and spent large sums hiring Trump-connected “advisors” including Reince Priebus and Corey Lewandowski. The merger pitch was changed to emphasize its impact on rapidly growing 5G networks, a talking point favorite of President Trump, who wants to beat the Chinese over the development of next generation wireless networks.

The merger must win approval from both the FCC and the Justice Department. The latter is said to be troubled about the anti-competitive impact of reducing the number of national wireless carriers from four to three. Such a consolidation would likely permanently change the wireless competition paradigm, because there has been no interest among new entrants to construct multi-billion dollar national cellular networks to compete with established wireless companies.

On Monday, T-Mobile and Sprint delivered additional concessions which seem to have won the approval of Mr. Pai.

“Two of the FCC’s top priorities are closing the digital divide in rural America and advancing United States leadership in 5G, the next generation of wireless connectivity,” Pai said in a statement Monday. “The commitments made today by T-Mobile and Sprint would substantially advance each of these critical objectives.”

But a closer examination of “T-Sprint’s concessions” shows there is remarkably little there to protect competition and consumers:

• A proposed spin off of prepaid Boost Mobile, which relies on the weaker Sprint network, is hardly much of a concession considering it will likely be impacted by the decommissioning of Sprint’s network, requiring at least some customers to buy new equipment that works on T-Mobile’s network. T-Sprint would also continue to control Boost competitors Virgin Mobile and MetroPCS, putting Boost at a distinct disadvantage.
• The “nationwide” 5G network promised by T-Sprint is replete with fine print. The company will not be formally assessed on its expansion progress for three years, has demanded that T-Mobile’s own employees be allowed to conduct network performance tests — a conflict of interest, and that if it fails to meet its own proposed metrics, the FCC must forego the use of its regulatory forfeiture powers. Instead, the company agrees to pay “voluntary” fines if it fails coverage expansion commitments that are open to wide interpretation and litigation.
• T-Sprint agreed to expand its “5G” coverage, but will rely heavily on existing macro cell towers and low and mid-band spectrum, shared by a much larger number of users than millimeter wave/small cell technology. That will probably deliver a more modest, incremental upgrade over existing 4G LTE technology, not a game-changer that can deliver gigabit speeds to wireless customers. Nothing precludes AT&T and Verizon from deploying similar upgrades without a competition-crushing merger between the third and fourth largest competitors.
• T-Sprint’s proposed wireless home broadband replacement does not include a commitment to provide unlimited service. In fact, vague language in the commitment letter suggests T-Sprint will offer the service with a performance and usage expectation akin to other fixed wireless networks. That likely means customers will endure a data cap and speeds that are not comparable to wired technology. Once the company has signed up 9.5 million home broadband customers, any commitments offered to regulators about that service automatically expire.
• The FCC is expected to give up much of its regulatory authority in return for T-Sprint’s commitments. If T-Sprint walks away from its commitments and not invest billions on its network expansion, it can pay a much smaller fine and have its merger obligations disappear. The FCC will not be able to use its more effective compliance power: forfeiture penalties.

T-Sprint’s argument is that this transaction will accelerate the deployment of 5G technology in a war for 5G supremacy with China. But exactly what technology is deployed, on what spectrum, using small cells or macro cell towers, makes a lot of difference. China’s wireless companies are owned and controlled by the Chinese government, which is also underwriting some of the costs. America’s networks are financed with private capital (and customer bills). T-Sprint’s 5G plans are also far less ambitious than those from AT&T and Verizon, and the cost to long-term competition is too high. The FCC should know that.

Congress has noticed that this merger has been rejected before during the Obama Administration for being anti competitive. Nothing has changed with respect to that. But T-Mobile’s lobbying sure has — this time trying to appeal to the Trump Administration for approval. Pai is certainly on board, and that could cost American consumers plenty.

Most telling of all is Wall Street’s reaction to today’s news. A merger that is being sold as as an AT&T/Verizon killer appears to be anything but. Verizon stock rose by 4.2% and AT&T by 4%. Investors recognize that consolidation can mean only one thing: higher prices. It means the end of the wireless price war that had Sprint and T-Mobile taking potshots at their larger rivals, forcing them to cut prices and bring back unlimited data plans.

It would be ruinous for T-Sprint to continue slashing prices and taunting AT&T and Verizon with costly promotions and giveaways. AT&T and Verizon expect T-Sprint will join their comfortable cartel with suspiciously similar plans and pricing, while firing up to 30,000 redundant workers and decommissioning Sprint’s wireless network. That last fact is well known on Wall Street, too. Cellphone tower owners took a beating in the stock market on the news they could lose Sprint as a customer. American Tower was down 1.9%, Crown Castle fell 3.2% and SBA Communications Corp. dropped as much as 4.5%.

The deal still must pass muster with the Justice Department, and attorneys general from multiple U.S. states are also opposing the deal on the state level. But the Republican members of the FCC joining up to support the deal make it more likely that it will eventually get approved.