Although the Rev. Jesse Jackson urged FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler not to reclassify broadband as a Title II Communications Act service to impose net neutrality rules (see 1411180058), the reclassification argument is as strong as ever, a MoveOn.Org spokesman told us Wednesday. He referred to a statement by Anna Galland, executive director of MoveOn.org Civic Action, responding to President Barack Obama’s Nov. 10 backing of Title II: “With millions of Americans having submitted comments to the FCC in support of Net Neutrality and Title II, the pressure is now squarely on Chairman Wheeler and the other FCC commissioners to quickly deliver on the vision that President Obama and the American public share -- an Internet free and open for all.” Jackson expressed concern Title II would deter broadband deployment in minority communities, said a TechFreedom ex parte notice on the Nov. 13 meeting. A Title II approach “would effectively redefine broadband as a regulated telecommunications service, which could subject the broadband industry and its services to existing state and local taxes,” said an ex parte letter sent by the American Consumer Institute Center for Citizen Research, posted in docket 14-28 on Wednesday. Higher taxes would “raise consumer prices," it said. "In turn, higher consumer prices would reduce both subscribership and consumer welfare. For the broader economy, demand suppression would reduce economic output, jobs and employment earnings.”
Mobile roaming rules work as intended, so it's unnecessary to change them as T-Mobile seeks, Verizon executives told an aide to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. "Carriers are negotiating and entering into data roaming agreements," said Verizon in an ex parte filing posted Tuesday in docket 05-265. "In the three years since the FCC’s order, Verizon Wireless and its 59 roaming partners, including dozens of rural carriers, have executed 48 new or revised roaming agreements." There is no evidence that carriers won't keep negotiating data roaming deals with "commercially reasonable rates, terms and conditions," said Verizon. T-Mobile said last month it needed quick commission action on its request (see 1410290007). Verizon noted that the smaller carrier's request would change the rules to determine the commercial reasonableness of carrier fees by referring to what a company charges for retail roaming.
Staff of the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute and CTC Technology and Energy, which did a study for OTI saying imposing net neutrality rules on wireless networks won't technically hurt carriers (see 1411130052), lobbied an aide to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai on this month's report. "The study demonstrates the fallacy of wireless industry claims that adherence to strong network neutrality protections for consumers and for edge providers is not technically feasible for mobile carrier networks," said an OTI ex parte filing posted Tuesday in docket 14-28. "Contrary to the claims of mobile carriers, the study demonstrates that LTE technology has the capability now to manage even situations of severe network congestion by treating like applications alike, without favoring carrier-sponsored or carrier-affiliated applications, content or services." An industry expert who has had concerns about Title II Communications Act reclassification of broadband service said CTC's report had technical problems. "It assumes essentially static conditions on the wireless network, and is completely devoid of a mechanism to provide feedback to the application as things change," wrote systems consultant Richard Bennett on Hightechforum.org's blog Tuesday. "Most mobile networks are moderately congested for hours at a time."
Capital investments by broadband providers could decline by as much as nearly a third over the next five years if the FCC bases net neutrality rules on Communications Act Title II, said a study released Wednesday by USTelecom, which has said it would challenge reclassification in court. In an ex parte letter USTelecom also asked Wednesday for the commission to review the study. Title II proponents Free Press and Public Knowledge quickly dismissed the study. “This is another example of a made-to-order industry study, with predictions giving them the result they want, facts be damned,” said Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood. The study’s authors, Kevin Hassett and Robert Shapiro, said they had devised a new model that measures investment trends for services covered under Title II and not covered by the classification, then estimates the impact reclassification to Title II would have for both wireline and wireless. The study estimates that under the current regulatory structure, broadband providers are expected to make about $218.8 billion in new capital investments over the next five years. If the commission opts for reclassification, investments by ISPs would drop over the next five years to as low as $173.4 billion. Additional regulation, as well as the current regulatory uncertainty over net neutrality, and whether other aspects of the Internet will fall under Title II, would reduce the rate of return on the investments and deter spending, said Hassett, director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. He was chief economic adviser to Republican presidential candidate John McCain during the 2000 primaries. Responding to a question, Shapiro said it’s not possible to factor how forbearance from Title II, as reclassification’s proponents advocate, would affect their projections. “To what level [there will be forbearance], how long it would take, what the legal process would be are all in a state of uncertainty,” said Shapiro, chairman of Sonecon, and chief economic adviser to President Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign. A reduction in investment would be significant, Shapiro said, because “the Internet plays such a critical role in the economic, social and political life” of the U.S. “Reclassification of broadband as Title II would be contrary to the national interest of broadband deployment and investment,” USTelecom President Walter McCormick said during a call with reporters. Wood called the study “absurd,” and said telecom investment reached its peak while still under Title II. “USTA's flimsy study is nothing more than a cynical attempt to scare Washington policymakers,” Wood said. The study didn’t factor in that the same infrastructure is used for voice, video and data, which are regulated differently, said Free Press Research Director Derek Turner. It also measured all capital investments, when nine “out of every 10 capital dollars spent by cable companies goes to set-top boxes and modems, not to the network,” Turner emailed. Turner's criticisms "unfortunately do not advance the debate," Hassett and Shapiro said in a statement to us. The economists said they included "reasonable assumptions" to account for the use of the same infrastructure by various services. The researchers said they did not examine cable, and stood by measuring capital investments, calling that the "the best metric for the overall impact of Title II regulation." Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld also criticized USTelecom’s request for the study to be considered. “Of course the FCC will 'review' it, just like they review any other submission," Feld said. Of USTelecom, he said, "What do they want, a gold star?”
Tablets are adding accessibility features, while e-readers "are becoming even more distinct" from tablets, said Amazon, Kobo and Sony representatives and their lawyer in lobbying the FCC to grant their request for a longer waiver of accessibility rules. E-readers have "become even more specialized for digital reading, featuring a long battery life and decreased size, weight, and complexity," said the Coalition of E-Reader Manufacturers, which represents the three companies. "Tablets are increasing in functionality and continue to add accessibility features." In a recent one-week sample of more than 400,000 e-reader devices, 4.2 percent of users launched the product's browser, and no more than 2.5 percent used it for what might have been advanced communications services, said a filing recounting executives' lobbying of FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler's office and Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau staffers. "It would be arbitrary and capricious for an agency to conclude that an activity (ACS) is a primary or coprimary use of a device" based on such evidence, said the coalition in an ex parte filing posted Tuesday to docket 10-213. Two library groups recently opposed the accessibility waiver that CEA and the Internet Association backed (see 1411120048).
The FCC should clarify that “called party” under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act refers to the “intended recipient” of a call or text to a cellphone, Twitter said in a comment, supporting the Consumer Bankers Association petition for a declaratory ruling seeking clarification of the term. Twitter tries to identify reassigned cell numbers and remove them from its messaging platform, said the company’s filing in docket 02-278. The issue involves a spate of TCPA lawsuits about whether companies are liable for autodialing people who have not consented to getting the calls, but use a reassigned phone, in which the previous owner had given consent, said a CBA comment, also posted Tuesday. Twitter gathers information about reassigned numbers from wireless carriers and updates its records, but carriers provide it at varying and sporadic levels, Twitter said. It’s “not possible for businesses to learn comprehensively and in real-time whether a given cell phone number has been reassigned to another person,” Twitter said.
The FCC should move ahead with Connect America Found Phase II by providing adequate funding “to bring robust broadband service to 4.2 million residential and small business locations in the hardest to serve parts" of the country. That's what Steve Davis, CenturyLink executive vice president and USTelecom chairman; Melissa Newman, CenturyLink senior vice president-federal regulatory affairs; Walter McCormick, USTelecom president; and Jonathan Banks, USTelecom senior vice president-law and policy, told commissioners Ajit Pai and Mike O’Rielly and an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel in separate meetings on Wednesday, according to ex parte filings posted Monday. The minimum broadband speeds required under the program should be increased from 4 Mbps to 10 Mbps under certain conditions to make it economically feasible, they said. A number of factors should be considered in increasing speeds, including a requirement “to serve all very high-cost locations,” to eliminate “the cherry picking likely in auctions” and to create “a path to bringing broadband to the greatest number of locations within CAF Phase II’s limited budget,” the filing in docket 14-28 said. The “sooner the program is implemented, the sooner this massive infrastructure deployment can begin, bringing investment, jobs, and economic development to the approximately 18 percent of the land mass of country that stands to benefit from this program," the filing said.
The FCC should consider the interests of small broadband providers as it works on net neutrality rules, the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association said in a meeting with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler last week, according to an ex parte filing posted in docket 14-28 Monday. Many WISPs have small staffs and cannot depend on USF funds for support, said the association. Additional disclosure and reporting requirements would create a substantial burden for WISPs under either Title II or Section 706 authority, WISPA said.
The FCC may not be able to forbear away all the collateral effects of Title II reclassification under the Communications Act of the Internet, said a group of cable executives in a meeting with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler last week, according to an NCTA ex parte filing posted in docket 14-28 Monday. The group included Cox Communications President Pat Esser, Midcontinent Communications President Pat McAdaragh, NCTA President Michael Powell and Suddenlink CEO Jerry Kent, the filing said. One aspect of Title II reclassification that may be beyond forbearance is the web of state and local taxes that apply to utilities and telecom services but hadn’t previously been applied to broadband, the filing said. The “impact of Title II reclassification would be to stifle investment and innovation, raise consumer prices, and hurt broadband adoption,” the filing said. Rules based on Section 706 of Telecom Act would be “consistent with industry practices that have provided consumers with an open Internet experience for the past two decades,” the filing said.
Wireless net neutrality rules could hamper the ability of small carriers to compete, said Cellcom CEO Patrick Riordan and Bluegrass Cellular CEO Ron Smith in a series of meetings at the FCC. The two carried the message for CTIA in meetings with Commissioners Ajit Pai and Mignon Clyburn, Wireless Bureau Chief Roger Sherman and others at the agency, said filings in docket 10-127. “They both explained that adopting onerous open Internet rules could make it more difficult to raise capital and invest in their communities, at the detriment of service to rural America, areas where cable and telecommunications broadband companies often do not reach,” said the filing made by CTIA on the Pai meeting. It said the CEOs “also explained that adoption of expansive open Internet rules for mobile broadband would hinder their ability to offer the alternative business models at the heart of competitive differentiation and engage in practices designed to improve network performance.”