We recently learned that the Gigabit Squared project in Seattle is in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using city-owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news.
AT&T’s Sponsored Data is bad for the internet, the economy, and you
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
AT&T’s Sponsored Data program is a way for AT&T to levy taxes on companies who can afford to pay. That has huge implications for the free market of the internet.
Why Comcast and other cable ISPs aren’t selling you gigabit Internet
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
Gigabit-class broadband is capturing the imagination of Internet users throughout the country. Cable companies haven't been ignoring this consumer demand… but they haven't done anything to satisfy it, either.
When Ads Look Like Content
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
The Federal Trade Commission on Dec 4 will host an informal workshop for advertisers, publishers and legal experts titled "Blurred Lines: Advertising or Content?" to discuss whether media outlets are adequately identifying sponsored stories on their websites as promotional pitches, and to consider if consumers might be misled.
New FCC chairman Tom Wheeler starts term on pro-consumer note
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
There are few jobs in the US government with more power to help or harm the country's tech landscape than the chairmanship of the Federal Communications Commission, the agency that ultimately decides how telecoms and cable companies go about their business. And Tom Wheeler starts his five-year stint at the helm of the FCC under a fair amount of scrutiny: a former lobbyist for both the cable and wireless industries, it's easy to extrapolate that the President Obama-nominated venture capitalist might not have the best interest of consumers in mind. But are the fears unfounded?
Video Streaming Continues To Gain Acceptance Among TV Viewers
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
Streaming video on a connected TV device is now the second most popular way for adults 18-49 to view primetime TV programming behind watching traditional live television, according to a recently completed survey commissioned by Crackle, the unit of Sony Pictures Entertainment that offers ad-supported on-demand streaming video programming.
Want to know if your ISP is capping data? Check GigaOm’s updated chart
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
An updated look at how Internet service providers (ISPs) around the US are trying to implement broadband data caps.
A new way to skin the net neutrality cat
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
The main trouble with the Federal Communications Commission’s network neutrality rules is that the rules, as written, don’t really address the problem they’re trying to remedy. They attempt to regulate what is essentially anti-competitive behavior by Internet service providers, or the potential for anti-competitive behavior, by treating it as a matter of communications law, instead of antitrust law.
Wireless competition is good for consumers — even if it costs taxpayers extra
Filed Under: Benton Headlines
The Federal Communications Commission, under the leadership of freshly-confirmed chairman Tom Wheeler, is hard at work on rules that will govern an upcoming spectrum auction. AT&T and Verizon, the nation's largest wireless carriers, want the FCC to hold an unrestricted auction that could allow them to maintain or even widen their lead in premium low-frequency spectrum. Their smaller competitors, especially T-Mobile, are urging the FCC to adopt rules to guarantee that the largest carriers do not wind up with a disproportionate share of that spectrum.