Broadband plan brings big changes
The Federal Communications Commission will soon dig into the National Broadband Plan to chart the future of high-speed Internet. What changes could it bring? Tamara Keith reports.
Woman surfs the Internet (GOH CHAI HIN/AFP/Getty Images)
TEXT OF STORY
Kai Ryssdal: It's got all the makings of another long, drawn-out, Washington-insider regulatory hearing. But tomorrow's meeting of the Federal Communications Commission could wind up hitting all of us right where we're spending more and more time: sitting in front of our computers. If you've ever wished your Internet hookup could be faster, or cheaper, this is the hearing for you. The FCC's digging into something called the National Broadband Plan. And Tamara Keith reports it could bring big changes to high-speed access.
TAMARA KEITH: The FCC is supposed to explore the most efficient ways to get high-speed Internet to the masses, to the places where the major phone and cable companies haven't extended their broadband lines. Or where service is mediocre. And to people who just haven't signed on because of price. Art Brodsky with the group Public Knowledge says there's plenty of room for improvement.
ART BRODSKY: You know you see a lot of prices going up, you see speeds still relatively slow.
He has a directory of Internet service providers on his desk. It's from 1998 and has more than 500 pages. These days the options could fit in a Cliff's Notes version because, Brodsky says, companies aren't forced to sell space on their high-speed lines to other providers.
BRODSKY: Maybe there'd be more innovation. Maybe there'd be more features and prices and faster speeds if they sold line-sharing access to their networks, what we did back in the old days.
But a change like that would bring unwanted government interference says Walter McCormick, president of the U.S.-Telecom Association, which includes broadband providers from small local telephone cooperatives right on up to Verizon. He says the industry spent $60 billion last year to upgrade its networks.
WALTER MCCORMICK: There is nothing that will chill investment faster than to increase uncertainty or to suggest that there might be an increase in risk.
With billions at stake, the plan will no doubt be contentious.
For Marketplace, I'm Tamara Keith in Washington.
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From Sylvania/Toledo, OH, 04/08/2009
I would really like to know where I could make my voice heard effectively regarding this story. I have a bone to pick with Verizon especially. Because if they have even spent millions, why did they cut back on my neighborhood's dial-up phone connection speed, which is all I can afford to use, from my normal great max speed of 53.2Kbps to a range of 40Kbps, on non-busy internet days, to 26.4Kbps connection speed, on most days, which tends to be the norm now. I called Verizon and complained back when this first occured and they set out a Tech to check out the outside connection when I was not at home and said that the speed was OK according to their Laptop test. The Customer Service Rep. I talked to later told me that they (Verizon) would not guarantee any speed over the required minimum of 14.4Kbps for a home user's dial-up speed. I can't even update my Anti-virus now at home, to me that just stinks. I wish the FCC or some organization with authority and no politics could do something to keep the phone companies from squeezing us out-of-necessity dial-up users. I sure could use a nearby free or low cost high speed internet connection. Verizon is offering $26 per month "high?? speed" whiich translates to $312 per year at least.
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