VIEW ON THE FCC FROM THE CONGRESSMAN FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN

Interesting points. Check it out. (means i'm too lazy to provide my thoughts right now)

Broadband needs a nonpartisan FCC

CNET NEWS.COM
By John Conyers
September 14, 2004

In seeking to formulate an economic policy for the technology sector, President Bush last spring identified a seminal goal: providing every American household not only broadband service by 2007, but also a choice of broadband provider.

"There's nothing like choice, by the way, if you're a consumer, to make sure that (broadband) stays reasonably priced," the president said at the time.

But right now, a handful of telecom titans are hard at work carving up the potential broadband marketplace.

Most consumers feel they have little, if any, choice in providers. As such, they are relatively disinclined to purchase pricy services from what they see as a monopoly or duopoly marketplace. In rival countries like Japan, by contrast, where 60 percent of the DSL (digital subscriber line) market is now controlled by competitors rather than the incumbent telephone monopoly, prices have dipped to the lowest anywhere in the world--ranging from $17 to $25 a month--and usage is near ubiquitous.

Unfortunately, after massive lobbying assaults by the regional Bell companies, the Federal Communications Commission has left us on the wrong road--moving away from telephone competition and choice. It seems that years of political infighting at the FCC will likely only produce a new set of rules set to squelch telephone competition, ceding the markets essentially to those who own (or in the case of the telephone industry, were given) the networks. (full article)