FCC determining US IPs don't have to provide hardline?

[Hunter259]

Uh. What can you not do on 10Mb that is absolutely necessary?

[HalGameGuru]

Just as an aside until 2015 broadband was defined as 4Mbps down and 1 up. It was then changed to 25 down and 4 up. But this is specificially, so far as I can tell about mobile networks, it sets 10 down and 1 up as qualifying as broadband coverage from a mobile network, I don't see from my source whether it changes the hardline requirement from 25/4, does someone have a more direct quotation?

[Sniperfox47]

On the plus side, while this may cripple the internet for pretty much everyone, it would make Google Fibre's low latency/high bandwidth line-of-sight wireless systems compatible with the FCC's requirements.

[mr moose]

1 hour ago, Hunter259 said:

Uh. What can you not do on 10Mb that is absolutely necessary?

be prepared for the future is the first thing that springs to my mind.  It's just like asking 20 years ago what can you not do on 56.6k that is absolutely necessary?

[Jito463]

2 hours ago, Jrock said:

I can get 1Gb/1Gb fiber from Rogers Business for like $1200 a month(unlimited IP's)

 

It's not bad.

 

Or 1Gb/50Mb cable with a dynamic ip for like $200 a month

Ouch.  I can't get it in my specific area yet - as they're still running the fiber - but Allo is offering 1Gb/1Gb for $95/mo, no data cap.  Or are you talking only business pricing?

1 hour ago, Hunter259 said:

Uh. What can you not do on 10Mb that is absolutely necessary?

While I'm looking forward to getting 1Gb fiber, my 12Mb/768Kb currently does everything I need it to.  The only downside to that speed is when I'm downloading something and it saturates my bandwidth, preventing me from browsing.  The biggest issue is the price, which is the primary reason I'm switching once fiber becomes available.

[You_are_a_cunt]

woah. Another reason to NOT move stateside (DAMMIT)

Seriously though. I get more speed on my freakin' phone from a mobile carrier!

[Kamina]

Now I'm pissed.

Google had already pissed me off. But this, this is something else.

[vanished]

tbh, it makes sense to not specify that they must build infrastructure of type A or type B, etc.  A good problem description does not imply a solution.

What they do need to do however is specify clearly what level of service must be supplied, regardless of how they decide to achieve that.  Ie, mandate certain minimum speeds, rules about how many users should be able to access simultaneously without issues, etc. and I think we all know that's not happening, or at least not properly, so this will end up just being the disaster everyone is expecting.

[r3d3mpt10n]

I find this amusing... I have 100/50 and live in South Africa with 1000/1000 possible with some providers

[Bananasplit_00]

1 hour ago, r3d3mpt10n said:

I find this amusing... I have 100/50 and live in South Africa with 1000/1000 possible with some providers

While I can't get more then 60/10 which I would not even get judging by the fact I'm paying for 30/5 and getting 15/1 at max, without spending $4000 on getting hooked on the fiber connection that goes like 3m from my door. Yay

[Lurick]

8 hours ago, HalGameGuru said:

Just as an aside until 2015 broadband was defined as 4Mbps down and 1 up. It was then changed to 25 down and 4 up. But this is specificially, so far as I can tell about mobile networks, it sets 10 down and 1 up as qualifying as broadband coverage from a mobile network, I don't see from my source whether it changes the hardline requirement from 25/4, does someone have a more direct quotation?

I believe in the article they talk about removing the requirement to have hardline and data and just let it be one or the other.

Couple that with what the FCC considers "covered" for an area and it can be pretty nasty. Last time I checked they said that if ONE home in an entire ZIP CODE was covered the whole area was considered "covered"

[Denis Rakhmanov]

I live in a place where all plans are symmetric. 50 up/50 down, 80 up/80 down, 100 up/100 down. Basically, thats all the plans of ISPs here. Noone provides less than 50 and more than 100.

 

It was always a mystery to me, why in so many places ISPs provide asymmetric link?

[AvocadosGuac]

11 hours ago, themctipers said:

200/10 for $90 (actually 100/10 but they give me x2 because they're nice apparently) 

1gb here starts at $90 unlocked ..

my 100/10 goes up to about 190/12 while downtime(2am etc)

[HalGameGuru]

2 hours ago, Lurick said:

I believe in the article they talk about removing the requirement to have hardline and data and just let it be one or the other.

Couple that with what the FCC considers "covered" for an area and it can be pretty nasty. Last time I checked they said that if ONE home in an entire ZIP CODE was covered the whole area was considered "covered"

But they didn't say that hardline's speed requirement was changing. Only that one or the other would suffice. 25/4 hardline or 10/1 mobile. And this is more about where it is being pushed out new than where it is already provisioned. The speed you can get with mobile HERE is already a lot higher than that. But in rural areas, where they are talking about, that speed from either source is hard to come by. But this change in regulation will allow mobile to compete with hardline for infrastructure handouts, make home internet a dedicated competing product from mobile, and make bigger infrastructure investment more attractive, to both hardline and mobile. Mobile because they have a new competitive product to focus on, hardline to prevent mobile providers from taking over new areas and earning subsidies that they want.

[HalGameGuru]

10 hours ago, mr moose said:

be prepared for the future is the first thing that springs to my mind.  It's just like asking 20 years ago what can you not do on 56.6k that is absolutely necessary?

Well considering the people they are talking about are still relegated to dial up or satellite... I think 10/1 is a healthy improvement.

[Lurick]

3 minutes ago, HalGameGuru said:

But they didn't say that hardline's speed requirement was changing. Only that one or the other would suffice. 25/4 hardline or 10/1 mobile. And this is more about where it is being pushed out new than where it is already provisioned. The speed you can get with mobile HERE is already a lot higher than that. But in rural areas, where they are talking about, that speed from either source is hard to come by. But this change in regulation will allow mobile to compete with hardline for infrastructure handouts, make home internet a dedicated competing product from mobile, and make bigger infrastructure investment more attractive, to both hardline and mobile. Mobile because they have a new competitive product to focus on, hardline to prevent mobile providers from taking over new areas and earning subsidies that they want.

What worries me is the consolidation. Sprint and Charter are being looked at for a possible merger which will mean less competition in the space and if the FCC considers anything with a half mile of the other to be "competition", I'm worried it will result in a halt of expansion and investment at a much greater rate. My biggest concern is if they say "mobile OR hardline" then the companies will see it as "if A exists, why bother with the other?" and not expand and compete less in an area, instead of more. It's all about getting money with the least amount of effort and if that means not competing and expanding involves spending money, then why bother.

 

Look at Tennessee recently, politicians were caught letting AT&T and others literally write a law against Google Fiber and then just blindly trying to pass that bill. They don't want competition and will do whatever to stop that.

[Donut417]

21 minutes ago, Denis Rakhmanov said:

I live in a place where all plans are symmetric. 50 up/50 down, 80 up/80 down, 100 up/100 down. Basically, thats all the plans of ISPs here. Noone provides less than 50 and more than 100.

 

It was always a mystery to me, why in so many places ISPs provide asymmetric link?

Because most places dont have fiber. Cable internet by design is not symmetrical. While Cable Labs is working on a Full Duplex version of DOCSIS 3.1, it will be a while before its out. Comcast currently can only provide something like a max of 35Mbps on upload speeds. And DSL is a dead technology. So thats where we are at. 

[HalGameGuru]

46 minutes ago, Lurick said:

What worries me is the consolidation. Sprint and Charter are being looked at for a possible merger which will mean less competition in the space and if the FCC considers anything with a half mile of the other to be "competition", I'm worried it will result in a halt of expansion and investment at a much greater rate. My biggest concern is if they say "mobile OR hardline" then the companies will see it as "if A exists, why bother with the other?" and not expand and compete less in an area, instead of more. It's all about getting money with the least amount of effort and if that means not competing and expanding involves spending money, then why bother.

 

Look at Tennessee recently, politicians were caught letting AT&T and others literally write a law against Google Fiber and then just blindly trying to pass that bill. They don't want competition and will do whatever to stop that.

They aren't competing now. And Mobile already is pushing everywhere, this gives them an avenue to compete for subsidies in rural areas that established ISPs have been monopolizing but not capitalizing on. Mergers don't concern me, the unlevel playing field is a bigger issue than consolidation. Do not forget this is specifically aimed at pushing access to those that don't have it. It doesn't effect urban areas with established internet access. Half a mile is fallacious. If it is by Zip code that is dictated by property and addresses, Not size or distance.

 

That is an argument for getting state interference out of the system entirely. Not an argument for tweaking which favorites get which handouts. Do not forget that Google Fiber leases dark fiber, they don't currently lay their own backbone. They only lay from backbone to node. Node to property is covered by the subscriber

[Guest]

I'm glad that I learned that my town now has Gigabit internet available town wide (In Mississippi of all places) before hearing about this news. Guess that is a perk of living in a college town.

[themctipers]

4 hours ago, Jrock said:

my 100/10 goes up to about 190/12 while downtime(2am etc)

ree

[mr moose]

7 hours ago, HalGameGuru said:

Well considering the people they are talking about are still relegated to dial up or satellite... I think 10/1 is a healthy improvement.

But will it be enough in 10 years?  And if isps dont have to maintain a physical connection what happens if mobile technology doesn't turn out to be good enough?

[KuJoe]

With the direction current ISPs and the FCC are heading, I foresee WISPs being the future considering how cheap bandwidth and hardware is these days.

[jagdtigger]

13 minutes ago, KuJoe said:

With the direction current ISPs and the FCC are heading, I foresee WISPs being the future considering how cheap bandwidth and hardware is these days.

Maybe, but as soon as you want to use something latency sensitive you are basically screwed...

[KuJoe]

Just now, jagdtigger said:

Maybe, but as soon as you want to use something latency sensitive you are basically screwed...

It all depends, the PTP stuff is pretty awesome compared to consumer grade hardware.

[jagdtigger]

Just now, KuJoe said:

It all depends, the PTP stuff is pretty awesome compared to consumer grade hardware.

I doubt it depends on anything, if its wireless it will be horrendous for latency sensitive stuff. Top it off with the fact that in most(if not all) cases the latency will be inconsistent which worsens the situation even more.