Friday, July 26, 2013

Telecom leaders, analysts debate IP transition regulations in Senate hearing

FierceTelecom
July 25, 2013 | By Samantha Bookman

Industry executives and association leaders including Windstream's (Nasdaq: WIN) Jeff Gardner, COMPTEL's Jerry James, and NCTA's Shirley Bloomfield joined analyst Larry Downes and Public Knowledge's Gigi Sohn to testify Thursday in front of the Senate Commerce Committee in a hearing--the fourth in a series--on the impending transition off the traditional public switched telephone network (PSTN) to IP technologies.

It was in every way a discussion about what's next for telecommunications. But the biggest issue lay in how much regulation, if any, should be created or revised as providers shift away from the PSTN.

While several topics were on the table--technology transition, FCC governance, rural access to voice and Internet services, the cord-cutting trend, and call completion problems--the question of maintaining competitiveness while continuing to both innovate and provide reliable services stayed at the forefront.

"We must create a pro competition industry for the IP era," said Gardner--also president of broadband advocacy organization US Telecom--who pointed out that wireless relies upon wireline technologies like backhaul. "The wireline network remains the linchpin. LTE (and other wireless technologies) all rely on robust wireline networks. Last year wireline networks handled 98 percent of total data traffic."

COMPTEL's Jerry James saw it as a simple technology transition. "This is not about the Internet, but just a different signaling protocol," he told the committee. The biggest issues from his organization's point of view are last-mile access and interconnection, but he felt that the current regulations, formulated in the 1996 Telecom Act, should continue to apply.

Analyst Downes said that regulating IP communications would stifle 15 years of rapid innovation and growth that have brought the industry to where it is. He said the FCC's proposed IP transition trials will answer many of the questions regulators and providers have about the migration.

"Many of those commenting (to the FCC) raise dramatic doomsday scenarios. But conducting the trials will make abundantly clear which (issues) are real and which aren't," he said. "Technology entrepreneurs believe the best solution to a technology problem is more technology. Not more regulation."

But Bloomfield and Sohn were deeply worried about the effect that nonregulated, competition-dependent IP services will have in rural areas that are typically underrepresented in these types of discussions.
"Some believe the transition should be a glidepath to eliminating FCC oversight," Sohn told the panel. Both she and Bloomfield pointed out that one of the worst problems for rural customers is dropped or incomplete phone calls.

On an IP-based network, latency or other issues sometimes trap calls and don't let them go through. "In a world ruled by competition, this doesn't get fixed," said Sohn, who said the FCC needs to enforce regulations on call completion while it still can.

Bloomfield said the "call completion epidemic" was part of several problems faced by rural carriers trying to navigate the Universal Service Fund, which is plagued by cuts, caps, and other restraints. She felt the FCC needs to review what is already in place for USF, and wait for an expected GAO report to be published, before making any more changes to the fund.

Sohn used the controversy raging around Verizon's (NYSE: VZ) Voice Link rollout on Fire Island, N.Y., as a prime example of the way critical services could be lost when transitioning to a new technology without thinking about its impact. She cited comments to the New York Public Service Commission from full-time island residents that outlined gaps in basic service on the Voice Link system, such as not being able to make emergency calls or get remote monitoring of pacemakers.

"These are not luxuries, they are necessities, and in many cases a matter of life or death," she said.




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Wednesday, July 24, 2013

AT&T U-verse subs top 9.4 million in Q2, 45 Mbps speeds coming soon

FierceTelecom
July 23, 2013 | By Sue Marek


AT&T's (NYSE: T) U-verse business continues be a feather in the telecom operator's wireline cap. The company reported U-verse revenues were up 30.1 percent year-over-year, with the IP service now contributing more than half of the wireline consumer business revenues. In addition, U-verse total subscriber count topped 9.4 million in the quarter.

U-verse revenues, including business, were $5.6 billion, up 2.4 percent from a year ago and up 1.8 percent from the first quarter 2013. U-Verse now represents 51 percent of consumer revenues, up from 41 percent in the same quarter last year.

During the company's earnings conference call, AT&T CFO John Stephens said that U-Verse is now a $12 billion revenue stream for the company. "Not bad for a business that just started seven years ago," Stephens noted. "We know how to build and scale new businesses," he added.

Interestingly, the company also reported that average revenue per user for U-Verse triple play customers is more than $170.  And overall ARPU is up 9 percent year-over- year.

Regarding Project VIP, the $14 billion initiative AT&T embarked upon late last year to upgrade its wireline network to an all IP-infrastructure, Stephens said that the company plans to boost  U-Verse speeds to 45 Mbps in the coming months, and then progress to 75 Mbps and eventually up to 100 Mbps speeds. In addition, he said that the company will increase U-verse broadband locations by 1.3 million this year.

Here's a rundown of other key metrics in the quarter:
Financials: AT&T's wireline revenue was $14.8 billion, down 0.9 percent vs. the year-ago quarter and up 0.8 percent sequentially. Operating expenses were $13.1 billion, up 1.3 percent vs. the second quarter 2012.

Broadband: U-Verse added 641,000 broadband subs in the quarter for a total reach of 9.1 million subs. The company had a net loss of 61,000 wireline broadband subscribers .  U-Verse high-speed internet customers now represent 55 percent of all wireline broadband customers compared with 50 percent in the year-ago quarter.
About 50 percent of U-Verse customers have plans with speeds delivering up to 10 Mbps or higher, up from 52 percent in the year-earlier quarter. More than 90 percent of new U-Verse TV customers also signed for high-speed Internet.

Video: U-Verse video subs increased 233,000 in the quarter with total customers now at more than 5 million. In addition, U-Verse TV penetration is at 20.1 percent at the end of the quarter and is growing.

Business services:  AT&T's business services revenue was $8.9 billion, down 2.2 percent vs. the year-ago quarter but up slightly from the first quarter of 2013. Stephens noted that the economy continues to be challenging but AT&T saw some growth in advanced business solutions, which includes VPN, Ethernet and hosting services, which grew 15 percent vs. the year-earlier quarter, and those services represent a $8.4 billion revenue stream.





Monday, July 22, 2013

Google's 2013 data center spending nears $3B

FierceTelecomGoogle

July 21, 2013 | By 


While Google's (Nasdaq: GOOG) second quarter earnings report last week for the most part disappointed Wall Street, details of the Internet giant's spending on its data center footprint may have given chills to other data center operators. According to the earnings report, Google spent $1.6 billion in the second quarter alone on its rapidly expanding data center footprint.

This outlay comes after Google invested about $1.2 billion in its data centers in the first quarter of 2013. With $2.8 billion put into its data centers through the first half of the year, the company is on pace to spend more on its data centers in 2013 than in any previous year. That is impressive, considering it invested $3.43 billion in data center buildouts in 2011, and then roughly $3.45 billion in 2012.

In the last two years or so, the data center market has been growing beyond anyone's wildest expectations, as telcos have joined Internet giants like Google, Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) and Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL), as well as other independent data center operators and wholesale telecom providers. Some telcos have bought their way into the market, but after getting a glimpse at Google's billion dollars-plus expense every quarter, they may gain some new perspective on where they rank in the data center world.


Thursday, July 18, 2013

'Free iPhone' Text Message Spammer Settles FTC Charges

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An Internet marketer has agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission allegations that he blasted consumers with millions of deceptive spam text messages.

Henry Nolan Kelly was the subject of one of a series of FTC complaints filed in March against those responsible for sending millions of spam text messages to consumers with false promises of free gift cards or expensive electronic devices.

The complaint against Kelly alleged that he sent more than 20 million unwanted text messages to consumers across the country, offering supposedly free iPhones and iPads to those who clicked on links in the messages. Those who clicked were instead taken to sites that requested substantial personal information and required an elaborate process – often involving other purchases or paid subscriptions – to be eligible for the “free” devices.

The stipulated final order against Kelly prohibits him from having any involvement with the sending of unsolicited or unwanted text messages to consumers. In addition, Kelly will be prohibited from misleading consumers about whether they have won gifts or prizes, whether a product is “free,” and from using text messages to do the same.
The order against Kelly also imposes a monetary judgment of $60,950, which is all of the money that he received in connection with the text message spamming scam. The financial judgment is suspended due to Kelly’s inability to pay. Kelly must also cooperate with the FTC in any future investigations. 

The Commission vote approving each of the stipulated final orders was 4-0. The stipulated judgment was entered by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia on July 17, 2013. 
NOTE: Stipulated orders have the force of law when signed and approved by the District Court judge. (FTC File No. X130041; the staff contact is Robin Rock, 404-656-1368.)

The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC’s online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357). The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 2,000 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. The FTC’s website provides free information on a variety of consumer topics. Like the FTC on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and subscribe to press releases for the latest FTC news and resources.
MEDIA CONTACT:
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Related Items:

Federal Trade Commission, Plaintiff v. Henry Nolan Kelly, Defendant.
(United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia)
Case No. 1:13-cv-00647
File No. 132 3057
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Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Dale Carnegie How to Win Friends & Influence People.wmv

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HAPPY 4th OF JULY!



In Congress, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.