Telecom Policy Report articles from February 2004

Telecom Policy Report archives from February 2004

FCC's Rationale Challenged On Media Ownership.
February 4, 2004... Survey Exposes Major Flaws In Commission's Judgement If a new national survey from Consumers Union (CU) and the Consumer Federation of America (CFA) is accurate, newspapers may be a much more important source of news and information than...

FCC Left Unscathed As White House Cuts Federal Programs.
February 4, 2004... Even though the $2.4 trillion FY 2005 budget President Bush presented to Congress Monday (Feb. 2) would leave the government $521 billion in the red, the White House apparently has no problem about seeking increased spending for the FCC. Bush's...

Small Businesses Could Save $6 Billion On Phone Bills.
February 4, 2004... Telecom Competition Resulted In $4.4 Billion Saved During 2003 Small businesses in the United States saved more than $4 billion during 2003 and they stand to save more than $6 billion this year as a direct result of expanded competition and...

USTR Urged To Press China, EU Compliance On Telecom.
February 4, 2004... One of the most powerful and influential entities in U.S. commerce is urging the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to get tough with member nations of the World Trade Organization (WTO) who are not living up to the telecom...

How To Avoid The Rush To Regulate Without Really Trying.
February 4, 2004... By Dr. Hugh Donahue, Ph.D. Editor's Note: In this exclusive report for TPR, Dr. Hugh Carter Donahue, a telecom policy expert who now advises high-tech firms on regulation and business development, offers thought-provoking insight into the...

Third Circuit To Rule In Media Rules Dispute.
February 11, 2004... Judges Seen Likely To Remand At Least Some Provisions The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia at presstime (Wednesday, Feb. 11) was poised to hear legal challenges to the FCC's controversial order relaxing broadcast television...

FBI Pressures Powell On VoIP Regulation.
February 11, 2004... The Federal Bureau of Investigation is putting tremendous pressure on the FCC to issue an order forcing providers of Internet telephony, or VoIP, to comply with the federal Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). Currently,...

Analysts Dissect State Of Telecom Competition For Lawmakers.
February 11, 2004... Is the U.S. telecommunications market fully competitive? Maybe. Maybe not. It depends on whom you ask. At least that's what members of the House Energy & Commerce subcommittee on telecommunications and the Internet discovered during last week's...

FCC Gearing Up To Take On Directory Assistance Competition.
February 11, 2004... If The Europeans Can Do it, The U.S. Ought To Be Able To Do It Better Responding to the pro-competition elements of the 1996 Telecom Act, the FCC has begun focusing on the issue of opening up the $6 billion retail directory assistance (DA)...

Here's What The Europeans Learned About DA Competition.
February 11, 2004... The experience in the European markets and the U.S. wireless market demonstrates that consumers will realize significant benefits from the introduction of genuine competition in the market for retail directory assistance services. These...

LECs Charge FCC With Failing To Analyze Impact Of LNP Rules.
February 11, 2004... The FCC failed to properly analyze the impact that adoption of its socalled "intermodal" local number portability (LNP) rules would inflict on small telcos and therefore should stay the rules until the agency conducts such an analysis,...

Correction.
February 11, 2004... TPR's Top Lobbyists Picks for January included the name of Carol Ann Bischoff, chief legal officer for the CompTel/ASCENT Alliance. Unfortunately, TPR misspelled Ms. Bishchoff's name, a mistake we regret. This time, we made certain we spelled...

IPCC Braces For Fight To Keep VoIP Unregulated.
February 18, 2004... Group Calls For Broad Discretion, Industry 'Self-Regulation' ANAHEIM, Calif. - Even as the debate over Internet telephony continues to gather steam, major players within the telecom industry and its related subsets are preparing for a...

State Rate Watch: Minnesota Commission Appeals Federal Court's Ruling On Vonage.
February 18, 2004... The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) has decided to appeal a federal court ruling that permanently enjoins the state regulator from subjecting Vonage Holdings Corp., a VoIP service provider, to regulation as a telephone company. ...

California PUC Eyes Regulation Of VoIP Service Providers.
February 18, 2004... Last Wednesday (Feb. 12), the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) issued an order calling for an examination of a regulatory framework for VoIP services. The CPUC order, similar to the FCC's NPRM, gives the state commission a chance...

Dingell Signals Intent To Regulate VoIP.
February 18, 2004... Meanwhile, Congress has signaled its intent to re-examine the 1996 Telecom Act, a law whose critics charge as being wholly inadequate in its treatment of Internet-related issues. House Energy & Commerce Committee Ranking Member John Dingell...

Approval Of Cingular-AT&T Wireless Merger Seen Likely.
February 18, 2004... While this week's stunning announcement of a merger agreement between Cingular Wireless and AT&T Wireless poses some interesting challenges for regulators, TPR predicts the deal will be approved, though a final decision to that effect should...

Deal Prompts Harsh Criticism Of Bells' Claims.
February 18, 2004... The Tuesday (Feb. 17) announcement that Cingular Wireless, a joint venture between SBC and BellSouth, confirmed its agreement to purchase AT&T Wireless for $41 billion in cash sparked harsh criticism from two of the Bells' toughest critics. ...

GAO Studies Broadband Providers' Competitive Impact.
February 18, 2004... One of the primary purposes of the 1996 Telecommunications Act was to promote competition in telecommunication markets, but wire-based competition has not developed as fully as expected, according to a new report from the General Accounting...

Major Companies Start Pushing Policymakers To Be VoIP-Friendly.
February 25, 2004... Eleven of the nation's foremost providers of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services on Monday (Feb. 23) launched an initiative aimed at keeping the new technology free from regulation. The group of companies, which includes AT&T, MCI,...

Cingular's Bid To Acquire AT&T Wireless Could Attract Some Harsh Criticism - Much Of It Coming From Shareholders.
February 25, 2004... Not only do the Justice Department and the FCC have to approve the AT&T Wireless-Cingular merger, shareholders at SBC and BellSouth also have to approve it. And while it's possible that shareholders at SBC and/or BellSouth will have second...

Group Organizes To Fend Off Threat Of Internet Taxation.
February 25, 2004... Speaking of coalitions, a number of consumer organizations, technology providers and tax reformers Monday (Feb. 23) joined together to form yet another new coalition - this one committed to keeping the Internet free from predatory taxes. ...

Eye On VoIP Policy: The Members Of The VON Coalition.
February 25, 2004... AT&T, in business for more than 125 years, is backed by research and development capabilities of AT&T Labs. The company is a global leader in local, long distance, Internet and transaction-based voice and data services. Callipso provides...

SBC Continues To Fight The UNE-P Wars In Illinois.
February 25, 2004... SBC Communications is continuing to forge ahead with efforts to raise its wholesale UNE-P rates in Illinois. The company is asking the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) for permission to hike wholesale rates from $13.26 per line to $23.82 - an...

Consumer Group Charges FCC's Market-Based Policy Has Failed.
February 25, 2004... The Consumer Federation of America is asking the FCC to immediately halt implementation of the agency's decision to sunset its line sharing policy and to launch an investigation into why its market-based competition policy has failed. As...

Industry Deregulator Barton Replaces Tauzin As Chairman.
February 25, 2004... Last October when Rep Joe Barton (R-Texas) spoke to an audience at the U.S. Telecom Association's national convention in Las Vegas, he said the 1996 Telecom Act hasn't been implemented "as well as it could have been." In Barton's view, it was...

TPR's Top Telecom Lobbyists For February.
February 25, 2004... TPR is fast approaching its first anniversary - mid-April (just in time for the tax season) - which means we are also approaching the moment of truth for all of the telecom lobbyists we've listed as our picks of the month in each of the past 10...