Nitasha Tiku at Wired has a fascinating look at a potential shift in competition law with regards to technology, fueled by trends in privacy and big data. Lina Khan, a former colleague of mine, is quoted extensively, offering some very sharp opinions and questions. Well worth a read.
Tag: competition
FCC eliminates condition on ISP merger
The hits keep coming under the new administration and with the new FCC chair. This time, Pai’s FCC has removed a condition of Charter merging with TWC and Bright House Networks. The agency’s thought process reads like the sort of double speak we’ve come to expect: by removing the requirement to provide meaningful access, they ensure the ISPs can focus on providing meaningful access.
2016-01-16 The Command Line Podcast
This is an episode of The Command Line Podcast.
This time, I chat about some recent news stories that caught my attention, including:
- EFF Confirms: T-Mobile’s Binge On Optimization is Just Throttling, Applies Indiscriminately to All Video
- T-Mobile chief: Video throttling claim ‘bullshit’
- As Its CEO Continues To Claim It Doesn’t Throttle, T-Mobile Spokesperson Confirms Company Throttles
- John Legere apologizes to EFF for mocking group in throttling debate
- Clarifying The Bullshit From John Legere: What T-Mobile Is Really Doing And Why It Violates Net Neutrality
- In 2016, The Coding Bootcamp Bubble Is Bound to Burst
- I Moved to Linux and It’s Even Better Than I Expected
- The Father of Online Anonymity Has a Plan to End the Crypto War
- Why I Carry a Newton
- The SuperSuit
- Resilience over rigidity: how to solve tomorrow’s computer problems today
- You Can’t Destroy the Village to Save It: W3C vs DRM, Round Two
You can subscribe to a feed of articles I am reading for more. You can follow my random podcast items on HuffDuffer too.
You can directly download the MP3 or Ogg Vorbis audio files. You can grab additional formats and audio source files from the Internet Archive.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
2016-01-03 The Command Line Podcast
This is an episode of The Command Line Podcast.
This time, I chat about some recent news stories that caught my attention, including:
- How the Internet of Things Limits Consumer Choice
- Tracing the Dynabook
- China Using US Encryption Fight To Defend Its New Encryption Backdoor Mandate
- Comcast Cap Blunder Highlights How Nobody Is Ensuring Broadband Meters Are Accurate
- New York is finally installing its promised public gigabit Wi-Fi
- After A Decade Of Waiting For Verizon, Town Builds Itself Gigabit Fiber For $75 Per Month
- The App-ocalypse: can Web standards make mobile apps obsolete?
- Tools, ads, and bad defaults: Web bloat continues unabated
- Google plans to remove Oracle’s Java APIs from Android N
- Microsoft to notify users of government spying after Chinese Hotmail hack goes public
- Lessig on how the economics of data-retention will drive privacy tech
- Debian Linux founder Ian Murdock dead at 42
You can subscribe to a feed of articles I am reading for more. You can follow my random podcast items on HuffDuffer too.
You can directly download the MP3 or Ogg Vorbis audio files. You can grab additional formats and audio source files from the Internet Archive.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Reducing Technical Reasons for Mobile Data Throttling
While the technology in this Technology Review piece is interesting and something I hope will make it onto cell towers, I am less convinced it will do anything to diminish the urge of mobile carriers to employ throttling.
Major carriers, arguing that their networks are clogged with smart-phone and tablet traffic, are increasingly implementing data throttling, the practice of targeting heavy users by slowing down data-transfer speeds. Now a gadget invented at Bell Labs—a programmable, pint-sized transmitter that requires no new traditional cell towers—could rapidly add capacity and thus help avoid data bottlenecks.
The article is full of a ton of technical reasons why these new components, called light radio cubes, are attractive–lower power consumption, increased capacity without expensive new rights-of-way. There is even good evidence for their adoption in some markets already.
The fact that the technology is related to another bit of kit that hasn’t seen as widespread adoption as initially promised, femtocells, has me skeptical they will change the current throttling practices of mobile carriers, at least here in the states. What it may do is more clearly reveal the lie that such throttling is about congestion and capacity rather than plain old rent seeking.
If light radio cubes enable abundant, cheap wireless in the bands and with the technologies (GSM, HSPDA, LTE, etc.) already in use, there is one less excuse for carrier who are simply not investing in keeping their capacity up with clear customer demand.
Tiny Transmitters Could Help Avert Data Throttling, Technology Review
Wholesale Provisions May Make a Comeback
Public Knowledge has news of a rumor that the FCC may be considering re-instating a requirement that carriers make their infrastructure available for lease by smaller, third parties. The basis for PK’s speculation is a study the FFC commissioned to look into the question of broadband competition.
It can be argued that a thriving market of dialup ISPs was enabled by the original wholesale provisions and that the decline in competitive offerings in the broadband space is a consequence of an absence of comparable requirements. It isn’t very surprising that this study’s findings are consistent with this view, one with which I happen to agree.
Based on my DSL experience, though, I will add a warning that the wholesale access alone may not be enough. The incumbents have proven adept at following the letter of regulation while still throwing up considerable barriers that may encourage consumers to choose the incumbent over their competitors regardless.