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  2. January 2016

January 2016

FCC’s Gigi Sohn Remarks on Lifeline Modernization at the Digital Pathway Summit

In remarks at the Digital Pathway Summit, the Federal Communications Commission’s Gigi Sohn focused her remarks on broadband adoption and, in particular, the commission’s efforts to modernize the Lifeline program which ensures the affordability of communications services. Noting recent Pew Research Center findings, she noted that home broadband adoption seems to have plateaued. Although people – just about everyone – understand that broadband has gone from luxury to necessity. The major barrier to adoption these days is cost. To address that, the FCC is working to expand its Lifeline program to allow discounts for broadband service.

Sohn offered a preview:

  • Allowing Lifeline to support both fixed and mobile broadband service;
  • Establishing minimum standards of service that Lifeline providers must deliver to receive funds, and the Commission will continually evaluate those standards using objective data and make adjustments as needed;
  • Creating a national eligibility verifier, which would work in tandem with the state-run eligibility verifiers across the country;
  • Streamlining the requirements to become a Lifeline provider; and
  • Encouraging greater participation in the program by eligible consumers.

She concluded saying, “When Lifeline was created telephone adoption in the US was 92 percent. At first blush, 92 percent probably sounds pretty good. Until you think that this number means millions of Americans were shut off from our primary communications network. I hope that we can get to 92 percent broadband adoption in the not-too-distant future. And if and when we do, I hope we will show the same resolve to keep pushing toward 100 percent. It won’t be easy, but working together, I know that we can keep moving forward and keep expanding the benefits of the Internet revolution to all Americans.”

Cell phone companies are charging more overages than ever

Just when you thought cell phone companies were becoming more customer-friendly, they keep finding ways to get you. Overage charges, already at record highs, are up yet again, according to a survey conducted by Cowen & Co.

Nearly one in five cell phone customers reported paying overages during the past six months. But AT&T continued to lead all of its rivals -- 28% of AT&T customers told Cowen & Co. that they were charged for overages, compared to 20% of Verizon customers, 12% of T-Mobile customers and 5% of Sprint customers. That's up across the board from Cowen's survey in October -- which then showed overages were at record levels. So what's behind such high data overage charges? The usual suspects are 4G connections, which let customers easily stream bandwidth-sucking video and music. Unsurprisingly, Cowen noted that customers with big-screened, media-playing 4G tablets were far more likely to be charged overages than customers who only had smartphones. The wireless industry expects mobile data usage to double each year for the next several years, but many customers may be unaware that their data consumption is rising.

Commissioner Pai: FCC Partisan Rancor 'Unprecedented'

In an upcoming appearance on C-SPAN’s The Communicators, Federal Communications Commissioner Ajit Pai said the partisan rancor at the FCC over the past year-plus has been unprecedented in scope, pointing out that about half of the public meeting votes are strictly along party lines, while that number was more like 10% under the previous chairs. He said that on enforcement matters, there have been more party line votes in the last 14 months than in the previous 43 years.

He took aim at the FCC's recent requests for data from and meetings with Comcast, AT&T and T-Mobile about various zero-rating and sponsored video broadband-related business plans as they pertain to new FCC Open Internet rules. "What we are now seeing is that net neutrality has morphed from a concern about last-mile connectivity to the FCC micromanaging all kinds of business plans and hauling in companies to flyspeck whatever innovative service offerings they might choose to put out into the marketplace. Commissioner Pai said the FCC should not have called the companies in at all, and that regardless of whether the FCC takes any action, it has set the precedent that "if a band of special interest groups inside the Beltway decide to protest a particular offering, the agency is going to jump to the tune."

Point Topic: US Broadband Connections Top 100 Million

The number of global fixed broadband subscribers rose at its second-highest rate in six quarters in 3Q 2015, rising 1.36 percent sequentially, according to Point Topic.

A rise in new fiber-to-the-home subscribers was the main growth driver. Fiber was the broadband access technology with the strongest worldwide growth rate for the second consecutive quarter. The number of new fiber subscribers exceeded that for end-to-end copper for the quarter, showing that the decline in end-to-end copper is accelerating. FTTH’s share of the broadband subscriber base in the US and Canada increased, as it did for the Americas region collectively. The US became the second country in which broadband connections surpass 100 million in 3Q’15.

FCC Seeks More Info on Charter-TWC Deal

In its review of Charter’s proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks, the Federal Communications Commission is collecting lots of information; it’s what it does after all.

On Jan. 11, Time Warner Cable supplemented its response to an earlier filing to clarify certain data. Also on Jan. 11, Liberty Corp. (Malone has a 27% stake in Charter) supplied answers to a bunch of questions, though conceding that the documents it supplied related to terms and conditions of affiliation, distribution and program license agreements and negotiations were not responsive "at this time" to the FCC requests. Liberty did supply documents in response to FCC questions about Liberty's relationship to Starz and Discovery, Malone's involvement in programming and distribution decisions, including making that programming available to over-the-top providers, and Malone's or Liberty's "incentive or ability" to withhold programming from online video distributors and pay-TV providers other than New Charter. On Jan. 8, the FCC asked Level Three for the most recent interconnection agreement with Bright House and with others.

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