bruceb news

An article in today’s Washington Post reviews some of the major decisions the Federal Communications Commission will be making in the next few months, moves that could fundamentally rewrite the rules for the broadcast media and Internet service providers. The likely result is that a handful of mega-corporations will control virtually all aspects of our entertainment and our online experiences. There is no reason to think that this will be an improvement for consumers; instead, there’s a strong possibility that prices will rise, new tolls will be charged at every opportunity, and restrictions will be placed on your ability to access “competing” content. […] continued

XO Communications may yet survive. It is on schedule to emerge from bankruptcy proceedings as a going concern, with a manageable debt load and Carl Icahn holding more than 80% of the stock. Here’s an article with more details.

The high-speed broadband providers, especially the cable companies, are driven to distraction that some people download more than others. Some people are using their broadband connection for broadband purposes – watching streaming movies, downloading music, doing video conferencing, and the like. It drives the ISPs crazy that they’re not yet picking the pockets of those users more deeply.

So it won’t be long until tiered pricing is introduced. Most likely will be a meter that measures how much traffic goes across your connection, and turns on steadily increasing charges if you go over the daily or weekly or monthly limit. Also watch for experiments where the ISPs monitor your connection and bill additional charges if you use file sharing programs like Kazaa or WinMX. […] continued

Teledesic was the brainchild of Bill Gates and Craig McCaw, set up a few years ago to launch a constellation of low-earth orbiting satellites and provide global high-speed Internet service. An ambitious plan, but during the late ‘90s ambitious broadband plans looked exciting and worthwhile. Another company with a similar vision, Iridium, tanked a while ago, and yesterday Teledesic announced that it was going to cut its losses and stop work on the satellite venture. According to this press release, “the company does not believe that it is prudent, purely on speculation, to continue the substantial capital expenditures required to construct and launch the satellites consistent with the timing required to meet FCC and ITU regulatory milestones.”

The recording industry heavyweights – the usual gang, including Vivendi, Sony, Bertelsmann and Warner Bros – have now filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against a number of the major Internet service and network providers, including Sprint, AT&T, and UUNET. This time, they’re trying to get a court order compelling the ISPs to block access to a Chinese web site that allows folks to download music. Here’s an article about the lawsuit.

As always, The Register has its own pithy take on the situation:

“They’ve sued Napster and Scour into submission; realizing that this is expensive, they’ve bought numerous Congressional lapdogs to force the DoJ to become their personal ‘Copyright 911′ so that challenges to their production and distribution monopoly can be hounded down and eliminated at the taxpayer’s expense rather than their own; they’ve lobbied Congress to impose DRM controls on virtually all media and virtually all devices, including your computer; and now, for a final assault on human dignity, the Recording Industry Ass. […] continued

A coalition of technology companies – including Intel, Microsoft, Dell, IBM, and Sun Microsystems – filed a complaint with the FCC about “troubling restrictions” imposed by some cable providers on how consumers can use their broadband connections. Here’s a Washington Post article with details.

Comcast, Cox, and others are moving towards “tiered pricing” – charging more for Internet access to heavy users. But they also are taking steps to prevent home users from using the connections in certain ways: preventing access to company computers using VPNs, preventing users from setting up servers for work or games, and restricting access to certain graphics-heavy Internet sites, for example. […] continued

XO Communication filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings today, as expected. It’s intended to be a reorganization with no disruption in services. Covad Communications went through a bankruptcy and came out the other side with a solvent company. With luck, XO can do the same – but its creditors are squabbling, which makes it hard to predict whether there will be a happy ending. Here’s an article with more details.

The extraordinary collapse of the telecommunications industry continues apace. XO Communications has been trying to engineer an infusion of capital from two lenders that would help it survive a planned bankruptcy, but yesterday the lenders made it clear that they’re going to try to pull out of the deal – which might be the final death blow for XO.

Starband Communications has been selling consumer satellite service for the last couple of years. It’s caught up in corporate shenanigans between its parent corporation and Hughes (owner of the competing DirecWay satellite service), as they try to push a merger through the FCC. […] continued

Salon is doing an extensive series of articles about the consolidation of power and ownership in the media world. This week’s article is particularly interesting. It describes how the Federal Communications Commission is quietly handing over control of broadband in America to a handful of massive corporations. There’s every reason to expect that these giant telecommunications, cable, and media companies will establish a monopoly in each market. After that, “(o)ne worry is that the lack of competition will yield high prices and poor service. But the far more urgent concern is that media conglomerates will use their control over broadband pipes to restrict access to content, information, or technologies that compete with their own content or otherwise threaten their interests.”

The prospect of broadband provision reduced to a few competitors, each with a monopoly on their own platform, scares the hell out of consumer groups that have fought the creation of corporate monopolies over media and information sources for years.

[…] continued

It’s almost over for XO Communications. According to this article, XO is weighing a takeover bid by Carl Icahn, and it may file for bankruptcy soon. More telling to me is that XO filed its annual report with the SEC; in it, the accounting firm said it has “substantial doubt about (XO’s) ability to continue as a going concern.” I understand those to be code words meaning the company is near death. Again, there’s no information yet about whether anyone’s web hosting or DSL service will be affected.