IP: Why FCC isn't pushing AT&T to share its pipes

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

> From: "Gillmor, Dan" <DGillmor () sjmercury com>
> Reply-To: farber () cis upenn edu
> To: "'Dave Farber '" <farber () cis upenn edu>
>
>
> http://www.mercurycenter.com/svtech/columns/gillmor/docs/dg072599.htm
>
>   It must be galling for AT&T. The company was well on the way to carrying
> out its master plan to assemble a new kind of soup-to-nuts
> telecommunications powerhouse. Then a few busybody local governments woke up
> to one of the implications.
>
>   First was Portland, Ore. Then came Broward County, Fla. On Monday it may
> be San Francisco.
>
>   The issue in each case is whether AT&T should be allowed to freeze
> competing Internet service providers out of its high-speed data pipes --
> upgraded cable-TV lines -- or whether access to those pipes should be more
> open.
>
>   They should be more open. But the federal government is siding with AT&T,
> at least for the time being, leaving some local governments to keep a
> crucial policy issue burning while Washington fiddles.