Inouye Pans Latest Franchise Bill Draft

Senate Commerce Committee Co-chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) has parted ways with his friend Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) on Monday's draft of video franchise/communications reform. Sen Stevens has worked on maintaining the bipartisan tone set by his decision to share the title of chairman, but responding to the latest and likely last draft before the bill is marked up Thursday, Sen Inouye took issue with numerous changes, saying they were steps backward for the consumers Sen Stevens said he was looking out for. Sen Inouye was particularly concerned with portions that allow VoIP providers to "escape" some e911 obligations and what he said were states' lack of control over video service requirements. Sen Inouye said that new, somewhat tougher, network neutrality language still "utterly fail[s] to protect consumers and preserve an open Internet. Under the current language, network operators will have the ability to dictate what the Internet of the future will look like, what content it will include, and how it will operate. In the absence of meaningful consumer protections, network operators will have the unfettered capacity to discriminate against unaffiliated online content, degrade their quality of service, or impose steep charges for prioritized traffic. The dill does not mandate sports programming access requirements, which had been pushed by telcos and opposed by cable and had been included in an earlier, telco-friendlier draft. Prompted by some high-profile sports access fights, the second draft had closed the so-called terrestrial loophole, which allowed a cable operator like Comcast not to give the satellite competition access to its regional sports network because it was delivered terrestrially. Current law requires access only to satellite-delivered programming networks. A committee vote on the legislation is scheduled for Thursday (http://www.benton.org/node/2406).
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* Sports Access Out of New Senate Draft
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6345215?display=Breaking+News
* Inouye Rips New Stevens Draft Bill
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6345459.html?display=Breaking+News
* New Senate Draft Includes Key Changes
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-NTQA1150746577355.html
* No Free Ride for AT&T in Stevens Bill
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6345480.html?display=Breaking+News
* For more on the Communications, Consumer's Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006 (S.2686)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6345408.html?display=Breaking+News