Re: AT&T/Scary!

:-P I forgot the standard disclaimer that I hope is obvious to everyone: I'm
speaking for myself, not for AT&T. These are all my own personal opinions and
views, I may be (and probably am) mistaken in areas.

On Mon, 6 Mar 2006, Arthur Corliss wrote:

> I hate participating in discussions relating to the company I work for, but
> I'm going to make an exception in this case. There is no overall movement
> that I'm aware of to make Internet access a toll-based system in general.
> Yes, some carriers and cable companies down south have suggested that we pay
> more for downloading certain types of media, but the suggestion itself is
> pretty stupid because it's so easy to work around any such system they might
> deploy. In short, it's not technically feasible for them to do so, the only
> thing they can accurately do is what most (mostly cable companies) do now:
> charge for raw bandwidth utilization.
>
> Now, when you get to VOIP there are legitimate questions of fairness to
> consider. Real telcos have to pay into the Universal Service Fund, which in
> turn subsidizes telecommunications access in areas that aren't economically
> feasible. Carriers of last resort are federally mandated to
> provide services in areas, but the subsidies only offset part of the cost of
> providing that service. There is no way to make CLR a profitable business,
> you have to have diversity in other services (like long distance, extra
> calling features, voice mail, etc.).
>
> Pure VOIP companies place a greater burden on traditional telcos because they
> don't pay into the USF while taking away customers that also help keep CLRs in
> the black. In short, USF participants are now subsidizing *VOIP* companies,
> with no return.
>
> Issues like VOIP & USF are complex issues, and the current system is
> *definitely* not fair to all parties involved.
>
> Then there's the recent report concerning (I think) Verizon, wanting to
> preserve most of their bandwidth for paid-for features, while allocating a
> smaller percentage to equal-access Internet traffic. I don't like the sound
> of that either, but if they're talking about doing that with dark fiber that's
> currently unused (because there's no business case to support turning them
> on), I say go for it. Backbone providers must maintain equal-access use, but
> they should also be allowed to use a portion of it to provide next-generation
> services that help the company prosper (and in turn provide jobs and
> investment opportunities for us little folk).
>
> Now, if AT&T ever decided to try to make the Internet in general a
> pay-for-play marketplace I will vehemently oppose it internally. But before
> everyone has a knee-jerk reaction, you should give a few thoughts to how this
> whole economic ecosystem works. It's not often as cut & dried as some would
> have us believe.
>
> --Arthur Corliss
> Bolverk's Lair -- http://arthur.corlissfamily.org/
> Digital Mages -- http://www.digitalmages.com/
> "Live Free or Die, the Only Way to Live" -- NH State Motto
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         --Arthur Corliss
           Bolverk's Lair -- http://arthur.corlissfamily.org/
           Digital Mages -- http://www.digitalmages.com/
           "Live Free or Die, the Only Way to Live" -- NH State Motto
---------
To unsubscribe, send email to <aklug-request@aklug.org>
with 'unsubscribe' in the message body.
Received on Mon Mar 6 11:33:50 2006