Category Archives: IP Transition

Finally Moving from Words to Action on the IP Transition…

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For over a year, momentum has been building for the Federal Communications Commission to establish a series of wire center trials to test exactly how an all-IP world might work.  To FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s credit, last January the agency issued a formal IP Transition Trial Order outlining exactly what it wants to see in these trials, and yesterday AT&T took up the challenge by filing the inaugural test proposal.  Overall, I was impressed with the IP Transition Trial Order—it was written with a professionalism that has largely been absent from the Commission in recent years.  Like most FCC orders, Continue Reading »

Takeaways from Our Rooftop Policy Roundtable on the IP Transition…

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Two weeks ago, the Phoenix Center held its Second Annual Rooftop Policy Roundtable where we focused our attention on the complex issue of the IP Transition.  We really appreciated everybody coming out to the event, particularly given the Washington DC heat and humidity (not to mention the thunderstorm).  After giving myself some time to think about the excellent conversations we had, I thought I would use this blog to highlight what I believe to be the major takeaways from the event. First, it became immediately apparent (at least to me) that the IP Transition is not a discrete issue; instead, Continue Reading »

The FCC Contradicts Their Facts (Again) To Justify Expanded Broadband Regulation…

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Last year, we released a paper entitled Justifying the Ends:  Section 706 and the Regulation of Broadband (and forthcoming, Journal of Internet Law) where we demonstrated how the Federal Communications Commission deliberately ignored its own evidence to support expanded regulatory jurisdiction over IP-based services.  With the release of its new Measuring Broadband America Report last week, the FCC once again undermines its factual predicate for Internet regulation.  Let me explain. Over the last several years, we have seen the Federal Communications Commission put forth a rather clever argument to expand its regulatory authority over broadband services.  Under Section 706(a) of Continue Reading »

Looking Ahead to 2013…

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Over the course of the last several weeks, we at the Phoenix Center held Part I and Part II of our Annual U.S. Telecoms Symposium.  Part I, held on December 6th, focused on the impact of the recent election on U.S. broadband policy; while the more “wonky” Part II, held last week on January 3rd, focused on emerging issues in broadband policy for 2013.  As always, we had a fantastic array of speakers at both events, and the presentations were excellent.  While interested folks are welcome to watch the video of the full proceedings on-line (Part I may be viewed Continue Reading »

Is it Time to End Asymmetric Regulation?

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This week, USTelecom filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission requesting the agency to issue a declaratory ruling that incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) are no longer subject to dominant carrier regulation when providing interstate mass market and enterprise switched access services.  As the Commission begins to evaluate USTelecom’s petition, we need to keep in mind that the policy question at the heart of this proceeding is not necessarily one of de-regulation per se (although deregulation is the end objective of USTelecom’s petition), but one of regulatory symmetry.  That is, does it make sense to maintain asymmetric regulation for Continue Reading »

When the CLECs Jumped the Shark…

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Last month, I authored a blog entitled It’s Time to Start the Conversation on the IP Transition where I argued that we could no longer postpone the development of a cohesive regulatory paradigm to manage the complicated issue of facilitating the transition from legacy TDM networks to the more efficient IP-based networks.  This view is shared by FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai,who has long-proposed the creation of an “IP Transition Taskforce.”  And now, the chorus of supporters widens to include FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, who announced today that the FCC intends to form an agency-wide “Technology Transitions Policy Task Force” that Continue Reading »

Professor Susan Crawford and the Looming “Cable Monopoly”…

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Next month, a new book entitled Captive Audience:  The Telecom Industry and Monopoly Power in the New Gilded Age (Yale University Press 2012) from Cardozo Law School Professor Susan Crawford will hit the bookshelves.  According to her publisher’s blurb, Professor Crawford’s book will examine how the United States has “created the biggest monopoly since the breakup of Standard Oil a century ago.”  But what is this “monopoly” to which Professor Crawford refers?  While the publisher’s promotional blurb is silent on this question, according to a 2010 paper authored by Professor Crawford in the Yale Law and Policy Review, it appears Continue Reading »

Stepping Out of the Pack: Broadband Investment and Private Sector Job Creation…

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Although the National Bureau of Economic Research tells us that the recession ended in July 2009, the U.S. economy nonetheless remains in a period of sluggish and uncertain growth.  Consumer confidence remains low, and, with a pending “fiscal cliff,” the “Recession Probability Index” jumped from about 2 to nearly 20 in August.  Unemployment remains exceptionally high.  As we discussed in our paper Can Government Spending Get America Working Again? An Empirical Investigation, the government’s effort to jump start the economy with spending has failed (and will continue to do so), and recovery is likely to depend on the expansion of Continue Reading »

It’s Time to Start the Conversation on the IP Transition…

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Every now and then, a genuine and radical change occurs in the telecommunications business that can no longer be ignored and, as such, a policy response can no longer be postponed.  In the past, these cycles have been relatively long, but today significant supply-side and demand-side shocks seem common.  Such is the case of the need to develop a cohesive regulatory paradigm to manage the complicated issue of facilitating the transition from legacy TDM networks to the more efficient IP-based networks. For those of us who study telecom policy closely, the need for the Federal Communications Commission to start to Continue Reading »