On Rad's Radar? - politics Archives

Will the NSA Hurt US Cloud Revenue?

2013-06-10T04:13:22Z

The whistleblower / traitor was revealed in the NSA scandal: Edward Snowden. I have been reading a lot about this whole situation.

Apparently, this story was broken last year, but no one paid attention. "William Binney, a 32-year veteran of the secretive agency, and one of the best codebreakers in NSA history" was interviewed by the NY Times. Why didn't anyone pay attention (including me)?

Why aren't more people outraged?

Abe Lincoln at Gettysburg said, "It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

How did we get here? It started in 1978 with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Then in 1994, Clinton signed the CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act) for wire-tapping VoIP calls. Then in 2001, after 9/11, Congress passed - but did not read - the 363 pages of the USA Patriot Act, which Congress has extended too! Then the FISA was amended in 2008 - to give it more powers.

Besides the AT&T Room 641A and ECHELON, there are Stellar Wind, PRISM and Boundless Informant - all programs that the NSA employs to spy on the world. It spies on US citizens too. And the NSA chief lied to Congress about it on video.

Since 2004, we have known that the NSA had links into telecom companies. But will all of this now hurt the US Cloud services revenue?

There was an article in The UK Register titled "Why I'm boycotting US cloud tech - and you should too." This backlash will result in real revenue dips, despite the UN stating that many governments spy on their citizens.

The Politico states it this way, "If these companies didn't know the government had this kind of access, how can they assure people their data is safe? If they did know, are they lying about their complicity? Either way, how will anyone be able to trust companies that have for years been insisting your secrets are safe with them?" Rock and a hard place.

We will see, but the buzzword encryption will certainly be used a lot soon. And real privacy will be a huge factor. Smaller companies will have a lever that larger companies won't.

Microsoft is already feeling the backlash as it releases details about Xbox One, which has a lot of restrictions - like DRM, the box has to be plugged into the Internet and the Kinect camera has to be attached. Please spend $500 so we can keep an eye on you - either with an iPhone, the Xbox One, or Chrome book. That is all.

ASIDE

Obama replied, "I think it's important to understand that you can't have 100 percent security and then have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience," he said. "We're going to have to make some choices as a society." Yeah, but you didn't give us a choice -- you gave us a top secret order.

The NSA Spying Scandal isn't New

2013-06-07T17:27:59Z

Remember back in 2003 when a whistleblower from AT&T pointed out Room 641A that the NSA used to spy on all AT&T long distance calls and Internet traffic? Verizon and Qwest denied they did, too.

Put on your foil hat because I am going to make some crazy points.

The FCC only wants to deal with a few companies, not thousands of them. The FCC Chair likes having AT&T and VZ on speed dial - and the 2 remaining RBOCs like controlling a lot of the telecom infrastructure in the US.

I think a Duopoly was pre-determined. It's easier than free market competitive landscape that can't be controlled.

Think about how hard Vonage was pounded by patent lawsuits when it got too big for its britches. How come no other VoIP company has been attacked with patent suits since?

Who knew that a telephone carrier would need a veep of national security? Last job, for a CIA front company and he carries a double zero designation.

Who knew that everything that outraged me about the Cheney-Bush Administration would just become business as usual in the Obama Administration?

The voters have become so complacent that the best they can do is post a picture to Facebook and like it, instead of screaming at their Congressman or marching on Washington.

Since 9/11 and the passing of the Patriot Act, we have moved to a police state all in the name of national security.

The journalist who broke the latest version of the story - that VZW hands over daily call records to the NSA due to FISA court order - Glenn Greenwald has railed against these types of abuses for years. The next piece of the puzzle was PRISM, the NSA program that allows Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Facebook, Skype, AOL, Apple to all secretly sharing private user communications with NSA.

Remember that FBI laptop with millions of Apple IDs? Makes sense now huh?

You thought that what they did on 24 and Leverage was sci-fi, huh? It is straight out of fiction, like I said before when I wrote about Brad Thor's book.

You want to talk about a BIG DATA probelm - how does the NSA, even with 25,000 square feet of computing power in one place, sift through all of that data? How does it translate that data from the thousands of dialects and languages in use in the US?

Lifehacker has an article to explain what it means for the average person and how you might take precautions to gain back some privacy, but as anyone on Facebook knows, the only privacy is when you never post.

I wonder what these companies - ATT, VZ, VZW, Google, Microsoft, AOL, Facebook, T-Mobile, Qwest, Yahoo - got in return for violating every privacy policy.....

The New FCC Chairman Might be Biased

2013-05-02T15:40:52Z

In 2009, when Robert McDowell was nominated to be an FCC Chairman, the competitive telecom world cheered, because McDowell used to work at COMPTEL. They thought that Bush had given them a little help in the FCC. Oh, how very wrong they were. All the help in the FCC came from Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein.

Today, the Duopoly is cheering because President Obama nominated a lobbyist as the new chair of the FCC. I get the revolving door effect in DC, where people go from the regulatory agency to the private sector that they just regulated. To the average taxpayer - well, they don't notice do they? But to the taxpayer who is paying attention, we just want to kick their butts.

Today, the entire telecom industry is basically unregulated. Very few states still have a regulated LEC. With the clipping of copper, carrier of last resort options decline as does the ability for CLEC's to provide service. Oh, how we will wake up in a few years with huge bills, lousy service, no competition and no regulation. You will just have to like it a drink a cup of STFU.

This cracks me up: "Mobile operators including largest U.S. wireless carrier Verizon Wireless and No. 2 AT&T Inc. "should benefit from a focus on their economic health" by a Wheeler-run FCC, Paul Gallant, Washington-based managing director at Guggenheim Securities, said in a note today." Their economic health???? It isn't the FCC's job to worry about that. The FCC has one mandate: Protect the consumer.

Tom Wheeler ran both CTIA and NCTA, so the cable and wireless companies were popping corks last night. I hope they get the same surprise that the COMPTEL members got from McDowell. I doubt it though. This administration - both at 1600 Pennsylvania and at 445 12th Street SW - have been huge disappointments. N o one gets that our nation's very economy ebbs and flows with our telecom infrastructure. Idiots.

Florida Broadband Litigation Woes

2013-04-24T04:52:14Z

"Florida Rural Broadband Alliance, LLC (FRBA) is a regional collaboration of local governments, community activists and economic development agencies from rural and economically disadvantaged communities located throughout 15 counties within Florida's Northwest Rural Area of Critical Economic Concern (NWRACEC) and the South Central Rural Area of Critical Economic Concern (SCRACEC)," reads the website for FRBA.

It continues, "The FRBA project will build a new Middle Mile broadband infrastructure, which will link together providers of vital public sector commercial services with private sector non-profit entities for the first time in these two struggling regions of Florida. At this time, only 39 percent of the FRBA region has broadband service. ...At the end of the 3-year build out period, FRBA's project will deliver up to 1,000 times the existing capacity within the coverage area. Doing so will create jobs."

FRBA received a $24 million dollar BTOP broadband stimulus grant in 2010. [Details about the grant are in this case study and on the NTIA site.]Unfortuantely, three years later there isn't anything but lawsuits, federal investigations and accusations.

The investigation into FRBA started in September of 2011. The Columbia County Observer has been steadily reporting on the problem. The real problem: that these rural counties didn't get broadband due to problems large enough to bring the NTIA in and halt payments. This action only precipitated some of the engineering firms to not get paid. One of those firms, Rapid Systems, has been in a court battle with FRBA.

I don't have all these details yet but FRBA, the North Florida Broadband Authority (NFBA) and the GSG, a management firm employed by both authorities were mixed up in the whole grant mess. The Ripoff Report has some serious allegations and isn't far off from the what I have heard. Somewhere along the way $30M was spent by the NFBA - but no paying customers are on that middle mile network that is not completed. Full disclosure: I have consulted with Rapid Systems, the GSG and the NFBA in the past.

It seems like a soap opera with a wrongful termination lawsuit aginst NFBA and now Rapid Systems' litigation against FRBA for $25M!

It will be something I keep my eye on. When the BTOP and BIP programs were launched, many figured the money would not be as productive as the government hoped. These aren't shovel ready projects. They took time to hand out, spin up, and get moving -- but by then how much of the money actually built anything? There is waste and fraud in every billion dollar program. At least this one was investigated early and clamped down on.

Three Quick Thoughts on the Economy

2012-12-31T17:12:46Z

Fiscal Cliff (or whatever dreaded scenario that Congress is creating to profit from personally) is just one more emergency to keep the American public in check panic mode. Meanwhile, Congress got a raise.

This brings me to point 2: the top earners keep earning more money but the middle class remains flat.

Recently, I was part of a group in Tampa opposing tax dollars to bring in another big box retailer. The jobs promised changed over a year of opposition - from 400 to 230; however, net new jobs would be a lot less as many other retailers would be closing or laying off. The new jobs would not produce much economic development. Retail positions don't pay enough money to cause a ripple effect in our service-oriented economy. How does someone making less than $25K per year spend enough in the community to float the other retail businesses?

Simply put, point 3, the middle class is getting stomped. Middle manager position went away due to automation, business cost cutting and outsourcing. As the middle class struggles, so does our economy. Again, our economy is based on service businesses. These businesses require a lot of VISA transactions per week to remain open and employing people. As Rich points out, brick-and-mortar are getting beat by mobile. Malls are getting hit too.

Our industry has laid off hundreds of thousands in the last 7 years (mainly due to M&A). These were all really good paying jobs too. Many didn't get a replacement gig, but a position that paid less. There is a ripple effect to this. Less taxes - income and sales - is just one ripple. More than 60% live paycheck to paycheck. And this is just ONE industry.

The jobs available today are either in sales or require skills that did not exist even 8 years ago. That has an effect on unemployment, but it also has an effect on business growth. See the cycle? I'm not the brightest guy when it comes to finance and economics (just check my college grades in those subjects), but I see how all this ties together - How come the highest paid CEO's don't? Or the Wall Street geniuses?

Maybe it's just that they don't give a hoot.

How Much Does the Average Federal Employee Make Now?

"2,035,000 federal employees making an average of close to $75,000 – not including benefits which would have bumped the figure to more than $100,000," according to Forbes.

Another example of crazy compensation HERE.

Another interesting read:

5 reasons that Americans hate the stock market.

Everyone Uses Conferencing

2012-12-20T04:38:35Z

One of the first cloud voice services was audio conferencing. Audio and web conferencing are a big component of UC&C (unified comm and collaboration). I am as guilty as the next agent in not pushing enough of this product.

There are a lot of providers, including quite a few free ones. Apparently, politicians like using the free ones:

"During the 2012 election, both Presidential campaigns racked up millions of FreeConferenceCall.com minutes -- President Obama's campaign used over 1,000 FreeConferenceCall.com accounts and millions of conferencing minutes. Governor Romney's campaign also had multiple accounts and totaled considerable minutes of conference calls, although far less than the Obama campaign. This was the second consecutive national election where both presidential campaigns used FreeConferenceCall.com."

RBOCs Declare War on CLECs

2012-12-06T17:58:29Z

This is a letter from telecom lawyer Kris Twomey to the members of FISPA, an association for ISP's and CLEC's. I know that Politics and Regulatory talk puts you to sleep or bores you or you don't have time for it - but these proposed changes to the Telecom Act WILL affect you!

"One of the questions I am often asked by ISPs considering starting CLEC operations is whether access to unbundled network elements ("UNEs" or "the copper in the ground") will continue in the future. My response has always been something like, "Of course, the Telecom Act guarantees it. Congress would have to revise the Act for any changes to impact UNE availability." Those of you that know me know that I don't get involved in hyperbole, and I'm basically too optimistic to accept any sky is falling-type theories. Now though, there's something brewing in D.C. that genuinely worries me. Turns out AT&T has a plan to wipe out the Telecom Act of 1996, or at least, the parts regulating interconnection.

"I think the next great telecom policy battle is at hand-- nothing less than an attempt by AT&T and others to dismantle the Telecom Act, destroy CLECs, and essentially codify the ILEC/Cableco wireline duopoly. Smaller CLECs need to get organized and respond.

"Debate has begun on all fronts about the future of telecom regulation and I believe we are at the precipice of major change. Over the last couple years, AT&T and Verizon have been quietly lobbying for the FCC to consider rules to transition to an all-IP network, or in ILEC-speak "facilitate a sunset of the POTS network." Verizon is even using a natural disaster to justify removing copper (and therefore interconnection rights) from its network: Other ILECs have been murmuring that the Telecom Act is now 15 years old and needs to be updated.

"On November 8th, AT&T filed the first real proposal with the FCC to "modernize telecom regulation for an IP world." The petition is here [pdf].

"The AT&T petition is a direct shot across the bow of the FCC and CLECs, essentially daring the FCC to act. The petition is breathtaking in its audacity. Here are its main points and suggestions":

Eliminate the availability of copper loops (all UNEs, really) in certain central offices as an experiment and see what happens;
Limit the time that CLECs can object to ILEC notices of network changes;
Reduce state utility commission regulatory authority;
Allow ILECs to remove all copper facilities when the feeder (such as a remote terminal) is upgraded to fiber;
Eliminate legacy ILEC regulations such as carrier of last resort obligations, long distance parity, etc.

"Various stakeholders have responded. The National Regulatory Research Institute, a group representing state public utility commissions, issued a paper on the TDM to IP network transition (here).

"The trade associations have begun to weigh in on AT&T's proposal. CompTel and individual CLECs have lobbied for pro-competitive policies and filed proposals concerning the IP network transition, preserving access to copper loops in fiber-fed ILEC networks, and requiring direct IP to IP network interconnection.

"The cable trade association, NCTA, filed a response to the AT&T petition arguing that the FCC should take its time developing a record. After all, they've actually got a pretty good deal under the current rules. The NTCA, which represents smaller ILECs, filed its own petition on November 19th seeking regulatory relief.

"I am concerned that there is no organized coalition of smaller facilities-based CLECs to defend its interests and propose alternative ideas. I fear COMPTEL will push the interests of its large CLEC members over those of smaller CLECs. I do not think that necessarily the interests of Level 3, Windstream, etc., that do not purchase many copper loops, will adequately align with those of truly local competitors in suburban or rural markets reliant on central office connectivity at regulated rates. I'm especially worried because, well, those "local competitors" describes virtually my entire client base and the businesses of many people that I consider friends." [RAD's note: Mine too, btw]

"As a preliminary matter on strategy, I believe that it is fruitless to solely fight against a policy without offering clear alternative proposals. I also think that by refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of some opponents' suggestions detracts from the power of our unique ideas. I have several alternative, pro-competitive policy suggestions that would truly represent a modernization of the current system; seek to even the current playing field; and give the ILECs relief from some of the legacy regulatory requirements that are arguably outdated. For now though, it is better that these ideas remain off-list until consensus positions can be developed by a group.

"I have spoken to several of my facilities-based CLEC clients that are interested in forming an organized opposition to these attempts to gut the Telecom Act both at the FCC and to lobby Congress for a true modernization of the Act. I will be hosting a conference call for interested companies on Wednesday, December 12th at 2pm EST. The call is restricted to optimists--those that do not subscribe to the defeatist notion that the ILECs must always get their way. I have some very specific ideas and policy proposals, but am not pre-disposed to any particular strategy. I think it's time for like-minded companies to join forces to protect their interests and I'd be honored to represent them. Please contact me off-list at kris at lokt.net for call-in details."

[RAD Commentary] The RBOCs lost a court battle each recently.

VZW lost in Appeals court its fight to forbear cellular data roaming. It challenged the FCC's authority on this matter and lost.

Meanwhile, ATT lost a data throttling case in small claims court.

Copper clipping will affect Agents because EoC is a big deal - but requires copper plant!!!

XO, TelePacific, MegaPath and other CLECs would lose territories that they could offer EoC and flavors of DSL. ADTRAN, Zhone and Overture Networks make the geat gear that goes in the CO for CLEC's to provide EoC. These companies would be affected as well. Can you see the ripple effect?

How about affordable mid-band Internet Access for the SMB space? That is what EoC is - and it will go away.

The $14 Billion Dollar Announcement

2012-12-03T18:09:34Z

While I don't agree with everything that Bruce writes here about AT&T's $14 Billion network spend in the next 3 years, there were a few take aways.

The big one is that the ILEC's have been getting rate hikes for years to pay for fiber that most customers are not receiving. FiOS is where it is - and that's the end of that project. U-Verse is fiber to the node and that isn't deployed everywhere either.

Mike Powell, former FCC Chair and now CEO of NCTA, has often gotten in woefully wrong in presenting the state of telecom. You can talk about top speeds all day long, but that isn't what the Majority of US addresses have access to nor is it the top speed broadband even remotely affordable for consumers - and even some small businesses (at $300 per month). The average US broadband speed is 6.6 Mbps. And if you don't bundle that broadband, it costs a lot.

Despite the promises and the rate hikes, telcos have invested $249 per person on average for broadband per year. Consumers spend on average $529 on broadband annually. At a retail job at $10 per hour that is one week's pay. Unsustainable!

62% of Americans buy broadband. That is all. Period. The market is flat.

Verizon and AT&T have a plan to disconnect the copper plant. VZ has already done so in the shade of Storm Sandy at the battery Park CO. All the CLEC customers out of the CO are out of luck, time and competition.

Telcos are basically unregulated at the state level - and the FCC is useless when it comes to enforcement and competition.

The point that everyone misses is this: our economy in America is service based. It is broadband fueled too - ask Apple or Amazon or Google.

Without cheap, fast Internet everywhere, what happens to that economy?

Clipping copper is detrimental to not only the CLEC's but to the majority of small businesses in the US. Ethernet-over-copper is quick to deploy and gives a great MB for the buck. EoC is the last stand against the cableco becoming the ILEC and the ILEC becoming irrelevant. (I laugh when the stock pickers only point to the dividend as if that was somehow any indication if a telco will tank or not.)

Promises from the RBOCs - Verizon and AT&T - for rate hikes or mergers have largely gone unenforced. The $14B announcement was just PR - spin. Nothing either company does is good for the economy, it is just good for them - for now.

How will Cloud services take off if the broadband is too expensive, unreliable or unavailable?

How will the Internet-centric economy stay competitive in that same environment? How does any of that withstand broadband caps and metering? How do corporations have more tele-workers in that same scenario?

What You Can Learn From Romney's Campaign

2012-11-20T14:21:27Z

This isn't a political rant. I have been reading many of the summaries of why Romney lost his presidential bid. Channelnomics and ARS examined the IT spending of both campaigns and found that Romney bought from Best Buy's mindShift (an MSP). The one point they got wrong is that the Dems have two online systems for campaigning developed during Obama's first run for office. It is pretty impressive CRM. But it wasn't all IT. That's like saying that CLEC's are failing because they picked the wrong gear.

As I tell my clients, it has nothing to do with the technology that you are so enamored with. I know that techies love the boxes, the blinking lights, etc. However, that isn't why people buy.

Look at auto sales: it is all about a test drive. They want you to test drive the car, because then you can picture owning it. Romney's 47% speech might have given some voters a glimpse of what ownership would look like.

Really, his marketing was awful. I know Obama went negative early and pounded away, but they spent about $3B on the two campaigns, so it is wasn't the budget. It was the messaging.

In sales, especially in telecom, boy, do we talk about saving you money. That gets people's attention, right? So that's one message.

The other message is to talk to the pain points as a solution provider. Romney never gave details of how he was going to solve any problem. In the foreign policy debate, he pretty much just agreed with Obama, so switching providers wasn't getting you anything there.

Truly, the marketing failed to produce a clear, concise message. What was the value proposition? What pain was he going to solve and how?

Living in a swing state, I was inundated with TV ads from both parties and the SuperPACs as well as ads for the Connie Mack IV versus Senator Bill Nelson. Mack/Nelson was negative ads, but Nelson painted a clear picture of what you would get if his opponent won. Painting a picture, telling a story, giving a demo --- these are all ways to provide the prospect (voter or buyer) with concrete ways to understand your positioning (unique sales proposition).

You can have all the tech in the world. You can have the best and brightest staff in the world and it won't matter one bit if you don't talk to the marketplace about the pain you are solving. Period.

People buy for only two reasons: to get rid of pain or for Pleasure. That's it. And both are emotional decisions that are rationalized by the buyer (hence, buyer's remorse).

Moves and Changes This Week

2012-11-19T16:29:14Z

Cisco announced plans to acquire Meraki, a managed Wi-Fi company, for about $1.2B.

Broadsoft announced UC One and now Rich Communications Services (RCS) to be added to its BroadCloud SAAS platform. [UCStrategies]

After Softbank put $20B into Sprint, Sprint turns around and buys some US Cellular markets for $480M. Consolidation - that's all we have left as an industry.

RUMOR! Google and DISH launching wireless network! This is the rumor, since the FCC is about to rule on spectrum that DISH controls (40 MHz of MSS S-band spectrum in the 2 GHz band, that the FCC renamed AWS-4). This spectrum may get cropped and added to the H-block auction. Should have an FCC announcement by Thanksgiving.

Right now, One in five smart phones sold in the U.S. is from the Samsung Galaxy series. I guess the $1B patent fine was nothing!

Promises Broken and Unenforced

2012-11-19T02:21:06Z

When SBC went to buy BellSouth in 2006, then CEO Whiteacre assured Congress that the merger would be good for consumers and broadband. [HuffPro has a good story about it]

This has been the trouble with the FCC: the FCC has a poor record of merger conditions enforcement.

If this was the EPA, we would have pollution. If this was the FDA, we would have drugs killing people. Oh, wait.

Anyway...

We have a failed policy of competition that comes straight from the FCC. Granted that is a political organization with a change in thought every election. But when you consider the billions in Universal Service, RUS loans and grants, and the BIP and BTOP spent on telecom, especially rural telecom, why isn't creating a competitive environment Job 1?

Meanwhile, TheVerge is reporting that due to Storm Sandy, Verizon is taking the opportunity to cut whole copper lines. That's right, CLEC's out of that Central Office are now effectively screwed -- and so are their customers. Verizon's Executive Director of Operations, Christopher D. "Levendos says it's "far too tedious, time consuming, and not effective of a process to try and put this infrastructure back together," so Verizon's taking the opportunity to rewire with fiber optics instead."

Failed Policy.

CLEC's like TelePacific, MegaPath, integra and XO have spent tens of millions on EoC equipment from ADTRAN and Overture to provide mid-band Ethernet to the SMB marketplace nationwide. That investment is in jeopardy. The ripple effect of consolidation, lack of competition, and copper clipping will lead to many more layoffs, lost market and investment value, even less competition and the loss of hardware vendors as well.

Despite the RBOCs saying they are spending billions to build out fiber to replace copper, are they really doing it? Not really. With a contract in place, they will take 90-180 days to build out fiber to a customer. But overbuilding of copper stopped with the FiOS project.

This hurts the economy and competition. And it actually hurts the RBOCs. More CLEC's means more revenue (in wholesale dollars) and more feet selling against cable, who until recently were the enemy. Now, however, VZW and the MSO's are co-marketing!!! The FCC has basically punted on their responsibility. Nice job Julius, Kevin, and Michael.

Brad Thor's Black List

2012-09-04T18:30:26Z

I like spy novels. Since James Bond, I have been reading spy novels from Ludlum, Lustbader and Jack Higgins. The new breed of authors in this gnre are very good - Barry Eisler, Vince Flynn, Daniel Silva, Brian Haig, Randy Wayne White and David Hagberg. When I was reading Richard Clarke's novels, it was said that sometimes you get more truth in fiction than non-fiction. Sometimes I don't know where the fiction ends. This is certainly true in Brad Thor's latest book, Black List.

Thor has a list of books and articles that point to Total Surveillance on his website. After 9/11, the US starting giving away liberty in the pursuit of security theater - and we as Americans stopped questioning our government. Everything has been turned into two things: It is in the interest of National Security or Aren't you a Patriot?

Thor drops a remark about the US being in a permanently renewed state of emergency since 9/11. (I can't confirm it.) Then the comment about why no one questions GPS in all devices despite the fact that the DoD (Dept. of Defense) owns the GPS system. We even give up privacy and freedom for convenience. OnStar is lojack, cell phone and GPS in one -- tracked by your car! Google has a profile on every user, predicting your every move. And.... Google voice = Free voiceprint recognition for NSA. Facebook tracks you even when you log off!

Every Breath You Take, Every Move You Make - 14 New Ways That The Government Is Watching You. I won't be sleeping this week. This stuff terrifies me, because the people in DC scare me. They are dim, not doing their job, and owned by the very people they are supposed to protect citizens from. Oh, and Power Hungry! Because who is watching the NSA?

The RNC 2012 in Tampa was just another chance for DHS (Homeland Security) to try out its latest toys as well as its power in making protestors irrelevant. Let's not forget about the drones, being launched from 63 sites.

What does this have to do with telecom? Well, a couple of things, including the Kill Switch, cell phones and the digital splitters.

The whole AT&T was tapped by the NSA never received the outrage I thought it would. Citizens have turned into sheople. In fact, one might say that the lost war on drugs, the crappy education system, the increased poverty, and even the use of social gaming (using gay marriage to deflect from real issues for example) - are all just ways to keep the masses under control. Tapping the Internet backbone at core POP's certainly helps the NSA and the Total Information Awareness project collect every website, tweet, email, and like you send over the TCP/IP. Then you get the power structure of AT&T, Facebook and Google to collect even more data per individual and hand it over.

Here is the funny part of the book - oh, wait, not funny, frightening - at any time, with all that data, you can be labeled a terrorist and poof! gone. No rights under the Patriot Act and other edicts. They can kill you without a trial.

One thing that the Powers That Be learned from Arab Spring is that they need a Kill Switch for the Internet. Too much free thought on those inter-tubes. Open communication can give way to resistance. The Congress Critters would gladly sign that bill just for some more dough to run for re-election, since most of them know nothing about the Internet (except for Weiner's weiner).

The PTB even have the Cell phone companies profiling, logging and tracking your every move through that smartphone with GPS and a hundred leaky apps! It has become a revenue stream for the cellcos - they charge per wiretap! [Remember AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile were using CarrierIQ?]

Prediction engines are almost to the point of turning the US into the Minority Report! - closer and closer to thought police. I'm going to finish Brad Thor's book and figure out how to diminish my online footprint.

Ask yourself this: Why does an FBI agent's laptop have 12 million Apple ID's on it?

Women in Tech

2012-07-17T03:31:27Z

We need more women in telecom/tech*. The industry took a step closer today when Marissa Mayer, VP of Google, became CEO of Yahoo! She joins Meg Whitman, CEO of Hewlett-Packard Co.; Virginia Rometty, CEO of IBM; Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook; and Larissa Herda, CEO of tw telecom.

A search found not many female tech CEO's. According to this article, "Safra Catz has been one of Oracle's presidents since 2004 and started her second stint as CFO this year. Sheryl Sandberg is COO of Facebook after being a VP at Google. Linda Sanford is a Senior VP at IBM for enterprise computing. Weili Dai is co-founder and VP of Marvell Technology Group."

There is a big crop of women entrepreneurs in tech (some are here) that are in their 20's and in ten years are going to be kicking some serious butt. I hope I am around to see it.

Good luck to Marissa Mayer!

*(And in politics but that's a different rant.)

The Fight Over Spectrum Dominance

2012-07-16T20:32:54Z

It looks like the FCC is going to approve the Verizon acquisition of the SpectrumCo - cable companies alliance - spectrum. Competitors are hoping for conditions on the deal, including conditions on the marketing deal that the joint-venture is designed for.

Sprint's concern to the FCC is about equal access to cablecos for tower backhaul. I wasn't aware that the cablecos had a huge stake in the tower backhaul business. They might, but I hear claims that every carrier has its fingers in that pie.

The ITTA President Genevieve Morelli wrote on July 10: "Under the Commercial Agreements, the parties have created strong incentives to ensure that competitors such as the Midsize Carriers no longer receive backhaul business. For example ... they will effectively shut out all competition for backhaul contracts with Verizon Wireless."

"Thirty-two House Democrats today penned a letter to the FCC and the Justice Department urging the agencies to review Verizon's pending purchase of spectrum from several cable firms with extreme caution," from PCMag. And delay the decision if possible. The FCC decined to delay. However, "The full FCC will appear before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce's technology subcommittee tomorrow for an oversight hearing that will likely touch on the spectrum issue." So that will show them.

After saying NO to ATT-T-Mobile, it seems hypocritical to say YES to this deal, which puts VZW in bed with the Top ISP's and MSO's, who right now are the ONLY competition that the RBOC has.

Here's hoping the DOJ and the FCC put some restraints on them -- but more important actually ENFORCE the terms of the deal, which they have failed to do --- EVER!!!

Hey, Julius, maybe you can give them a pile of Connect America cash too, just to sweeten the deal.

Similar article on TMC.

What's Up With Private Line?

2012-07-03T00:14:58Z

"Private lines are leased point-to-point circuits, which are used for a variety of applications including connecting enterprise locations and backhauling cell towers to mobile switching centers," according to Insight Research.

"The $39 billion US private line services market is expected to show modest 2.3 percent annual growth over the next five years, as demand for higher bandwidth private lines offsets the shift of lower bandwidth private lines to packet-based services, says a market analysis study from Insight Research."

I have no idea how that will happen, unless they also include Ethernet, which the ILEC's do NOT.

AT&T and Windstream won a special access docket at the FCC, but without a vote. The FCC chair says that Special Access Reform is due to be reviewed. AT&T is not done. They have Petitions to Discontinue Private Line Dedicated Entrance Facilities in 27 Markets in at the FCC. According to Comptel, "These are facilities offered at bandwidths of OC-3, -12, -48, and -192, which AT&T contends are being replaced in the market by Ethernet services. According to the Public Notice, AT&T says that alternative services are available from AT&T and other carriers. Existing customers will continue to be served through April 2017." Everything is moving Ethernet.

In the broadband world, CenturyLink is looking to bury the Wireless ISP with federal funds because fixed wireless broadband is expensive, metered and unreliable. Hmmm. I just don't think taxpayers' money should be used to compete against small businesses that serve areas that ILEC's chose NOT to spend money - their own money any how.

You want to raise Special Access - okay. CLEC's have to pay what the landlords will charge. When ILEC's don't want to spend their own money to expand broadband, they shouldn't get federal freebies to do so.

Enough on the rant. How wil Private Line grow if the most of the business is going to MPLS and multi-point services?