https://urgentcomm.com/wp-content/themes/ucm_child/assets/images/logo/footer-new-logo.png
  • Home
  • News
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Multimedia
    • Video
    • Podcasts
    • Galleries
    • IWCE’s Video Showcase
    • IWCE 2022 Winter Showcase
    • IWCE 2023 Pre-event Guide
  • Commentary
    • Back
    • Commentary
    • Urgent Matters
    • View From The Top
    • All Things IWCE
    • Legal Matters
  • Resources
    • Back
    • Resources
    • Webinars
    • White Papers
    • Reprints & Reuse
  • IWCE
    • Back
    • IWCE
    • Conference
    • Special Events
    • Exhibitor Listings
    • Premier Partners
    • Floor Plan
    • Exhibiting Information
    • Register for IWCE
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Terms of Service
    • Privacy Statement
    • Cookie Policy
  • Related Sites
    • Back
    • American City & County
    • IWCE
    • Light Reading
    • IOT World Today
    • Mission Critical Technologies
    • TU-Auto
  • In the field
    • Back
    • In the field
    • Broadband Push-to-X
    • Internet of Things
    • Project 25
    • Public-Safety Broadband/FirstNet
    • Virtual/Augmented Reality
    • Land Mobile Radio
    • Long Term Evolution (LTE)
    • Applications
    • Drones/Robots
    • IoT/Smart X
    • Software
    • Subscriber Devices
    • Video
  • Call Center/Command
    • Back
    • Call Center/Command
    • Artificial Intelligence
    • NG911
    • Alerting Systems
    • Analytics
    • Dispatch/Call-taking
    • Incident Command/Situational Awareness
    • Tracking, Monitoring & Control
  • Network Tech
    • Back
    • Network Tech
    • Interoperability
    • LMR 100
    • LMR 200
    • Backhaul
    • Deployables
    • Power
    • Tower & Site
    • Wireless Networks
    • Coverage/Interference
    • Security
    • System Design
    • System Installation
    • System Operation
    • Test & Measurement
  • Operations
    • Back
    • Operations
    • Critical Infrastructure
    • Enterprise
    • Federal Government/Military
    • Public Safety
    • State & Local Government
    • Training
  • Regulations
    • Back
    • Regulations
    • Narrowbanding
    • T-Band
    • Rebanding
    • TV White Spaces
    • None
    • Funding
    • Policy
    • Regional Coordination
    • Standards
  • Organizations
    • Back
    • Organizations
    • AASHTO
    • APCO
    • DHS
    • DMR Association
    • ETA
    • EWA
    • FCC
    • IWCE
    • NASEMSO
    • NATE
    • NXDN Forum
    • NENA
    • NIST/PSCR
    • NPSTC
    • NTIA/FirstNet
    • P25 TIG
    • TETRA + CCA
    • UTC
Urgent Communications
  • NEWSLETTER
  • Home
  • News
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Video
    • Podcasts
    • Omdia Crit Comms Circle Podcast
    • Galleries
    • IWCE’s Video Showcase
    • IWCE 2023 Pre-event Guide
    • IWCE 2022 Winter Showcase
  • Commentary
    • Back
    • All Things IWCE
    • Urgent Matters
    • View From The Top
    • Legal Matters
  • Resources
    • Back
    • Webinars
    • White Papers
    • Reprints & Reuse
    • UC eZines
    • Sponsored content
  • IWCE
    • Back
    • Conference
    • Why Attend
    • Exhibitor Listing
    • Floor Plan
    • Exhibiting Information
    • Join the Event Mailing List
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Cookie Policy
    • Terms of Service
    • Privacy Statement
  • Related Sites
    • Back
    • American City & County
    • IWCE
    • Light Reading
    • IOT World Today
    • TU-Auto
  • newsletter
  • In the field
    • Back
    • Internet of Things
    • Broadband Push-to-X
    • Project 25
    • Public-Safety Broadband/FirstNet
    • Virtual/Augmented Reality
    • Land Mobile Radio
    • Long Term Evolution (LTE)
    • Applications
    • Drones/Robots
    • IoT/Smart X
    • Software
    • Subscriber Devices
    • Video
  • Call Center/Command
    • Back
    • Artificial Intelligence
    • NG911
    • Alerting Systems
    • Analytics
    • Dispatch/Call-taking
    • Incident Command/Situational Awareness
    • Tracking, Monitoring & Control
  • Network Tech
    • Back
    • Cybersecurity
    • Interoperability
    • LMR 100
    • LMR 200
    • Backhaul
    • Deployables
    • Power
    • Tower & Site
    • Wireless Networks
    • Coverage/Interference
    • Security
    • System Design
    • System Installation
    • System Operation
    • Test & Measurement
  • Operations
    • Back
    • Critical Infrastructure
    • Enterprise
    • Federal Government/Military
    • Public Safety
    • State & Local Government
    • Training
  • Regulations
    • Back
    • Narrowbanding
    • T-Band
    • Rebanding
    • TV White Spaces
    • None
    • Funding
    • Policy
    • Regional Coordination
    • Standards
  • Organizations
    • Back
    • AASHTO
    • APCO
    • DHS
    • DMR Association
    • ETA
    • EWA
    • FCC
    • IWCE
    • NASEMSO
    • NATE
    • NXDN Forum
    • NENA
    • NIST/PSCR
    • NPSTC
    • NTIA/FirstNet
    • P25 TIG
    • TETRA + CCA
    • UTC
acc.com

Call Center/Command


Reaching Broadband Nirvana

Reaching Broadband Nirvana

Editor's note: The following is a controversial speech given by FCC Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy at the United Power Line Council Annual Conference
  • Written by Urgent Communications Administrator
  • 1st October 2003

Editor’s note: The following is a controversial speech given by FCC Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy at the United Power Line Council Annual Conference on Sept. 22. We welcome alternative views.

As a regulator, I am keenly interested in [broadband-over-powerline] technology for a number of reasons. One of my central objectives as an FCC commissioner is to facilitate the deployment of broadband services to all Americans. I also fundamentally believe that the FCC can best promote consumer welfare by relying on market forces, rather than heavy-handed regulation. The development of BPL networks will serve both of these key goals. It will not only bring broadband to previously unserved communities, but the introduction of a new broadband pipeline into the home will foster the kind of competitive marketplace that will eventually enable the Commission to let go of the regulatory reins. I want consumers to have a choice of multiple, facilities-based providers, including not only cable and DSL, but also powerline, wireless, and satellite services. Such a robustly competitive and diversified marketplace is something I would call broadband Nirvana. We will not get there overnight, but the continuing development of BPL technology is a major step forward.

While the long-term objective is a robustly competitive marketplace that is free of regulatory distortions, a more immediate question is: What should the FCC do to help foster such an environment? Sticking with my Nirvana metaphor, I guess the question would be, what is the path to enlightenment?

I believe the answer, in short, is regulatory restraint. It is tempting for regulators to take every new technology or service that comes along and apply the same rules that govern incumbent services. After all, regulatory parity and a level playing field are intuitively appealing concepts. But I believe that it would be a huge mistake to carry forward legacy regulations whenever new technology platforms are established. Many of our regulations are premised on the absence of competition, and when that rationale is eroded, we must not reflexively hold on to regulations that no longer serve their intended purpose. In fact, many of our old rules not only become unnecessary as markets evolve, but they can be fatal to new services that need room to breathe.

The Nascent Services Doctrine

This policy of restraint is something I have described as the Nascent Services Doctrine. By avoiding the imposition of anachronistic regulations, regulators can best allow new technologies and services to flourish. Once facilities-based competition has taken root, regulators can begin to dismantle legacy regulatory regimes, rather than extend those regimes to include the new platforms. This is not a matter of picking winners and losers; it is about creating an environment conducive to investment in new infrastructure, because new platform providers create competition and innovation that ultimately benefits consumers far more than prescriptive regulation. In essence, short-term regulatory disparities are tolerated to generate long-term facilities-based competition.

Incubating new technologies and platforms helps establish new facilities-based competitors, and the increased competition ultimately delivers to consumers the benefits of lower prices, better service quality, more innovation, and more choice. Regulatory restraint is a necessary part of fostering such competition, because there is little doubt that overregulation can do substantial damage to nascent technologies and platforms. As the recent turbulence in the capital markets has shown, companies take enormous risks when they invest heavily in communications networks – such as the broadband networks being built today. To avoid creating additional disincentives to invest – beyond those risks that are inherent in the marketplace – we must resist the reflexive tendency to apply legacy regulations to new platforms.

As I will discuss in a moment, regulatory parity is an important long-term goal, because applying different regulations to providers in a single market inevitably causes marketplace distortions and leads to inefficient investment. As a short-term policy, however, accepting some degree of disparity is not only tolerable, it is essential. For example, when the DBS platform was created, it was appropriately exempt from most of the legacy regulations imposed on cable operators. This regulatory restraint allowed those nascent platforms to develop into effective competitors. Today, as electric utilities, wireless carriers, and satellite operators strive to bring new broadband platforms to market, it will be equally important to avoid stifling those nascent platforms with the heavy-handed broadband regulations associated with the wireline telecom platform. Just as you would not build a tree house in a sapling ? because you might kill the tree and hurt yourself in the fall ? it does not make sense for regulators to immediately and reflexively burden new providers with a full regulatory load. If the ultimate goal is to develop sustainable facilities-based competition — and I think it is — it seems reasonable to me to allow the new service to develop free of most legacy regulatory burdens.

There are two distinct applications of this doctrine. First, it applies to nascent technologies, which appear in the market without any clear sense of the services they will ultimately support or the markets in which they will ultimately compete. And second, it applies to nascent platforms, which I think of as new competitors to incumbents in already-defined markets. Ultra-wideband is an example of a nascent technology. We do not know precisely how this technology will be used, but we do know that it has tremendous potential and we should approach it in a restrained manner. Broadband over powerline is the quintessential example of a nascent platform. There is little question that BPL services will compete with more-established cable modem and DSL services, and satellite and fixed wireless services.

The FCC has a good track record of adhering to these principles. When wireless voice services were first developed, the commission refrained from imposing common carrier price and service-quality regulations, despite many calls to do so in order to establish parity with wireline regulation. Similarly, the commission generally took a hands-off approach to DBS services as they emerged as competitors to cable in the MVPD market.

I am especially pleased that, when the FCC adopted its Notice of Inquiry on BPL systems in April, we rejected proposals to seek comment on the application of legacy regulatory requirements to this platform. For example, some argued that the commission should consider issues such as nondiscriminatory access for unaffiliated ISPs, and other regulatory requirements imposed on common carriers. I opposed such efforts because it is premature even to consider such regulatory intervention. We do not know at this point how BPL systems will evolve or, candidly, the extent to which BPL services will succeed in the marketplace. The flow of capital at this formative stage is critical. If the commission signaled that it was heading down a path toward extension of our legacy rules, that would have a chilling effect on investment. Therefore, raising the specter of heavy-handed regulation — that is, ignoring the central premise of the Nascent Services Doctrine — would threaten to undermine our core goals of fostering facilities-based competition and broadband deployment.

Of course, the interest in nurturing nascent platforms cannot justify preserving regulatory disparities forever. While my Nascent Services Doctrine calls for tolerating short-term disparities, it also recognizes that the benefit of such disparities is that they provide the impetus to reconsider the appropriateness of our regulation of incumbent providers. If we succeed in spurring investment in new platforms — and robust facilities-based competition takes hold — we can then begin to dismantle regulations imposed on incumbent providers and replace them with more appropriate rules. In this way the Nascent Services Doctrine provides a laboratory to assess the necessity of our regulatory intervention on the incumbent provider when compared with its nascent competitor. In contrast, if we were to extend legacy regulations immediately in a reflexive drive toward symmetry, that would assume the ongoing need for the underlying regulation and never allow us to assess deregulation in the real world. Reflexive symmetry actually institutionalizes the legacy regulation by imposing it on more providers across all platforms, ultimately making it all the more difficult to remove regulations from the books even after they have outlived their usefulness. The Nascent Services Doctrine places the burden on the regulator to re-institutionalize the regulations after a new competitor has established itself in the marketplace.

We are seeing this process unfold right now as we review the rules applied to wireline broadband services offered by incumbent LECs. The emergence of cable operators as the leading providers of mass market broadband services makes clear that applying more stringent regulations to wireline providers at a minimum must be reconsidered. As other platforms, including BPL and wireless, become more widely available, that will further undermine the justification for regulating incumbent LECs’ broadband services as if they were the only available offerings. When the commission completes this rulemaking, I expect that we will eliminate many existing rules and substantially modify others; the central question is the degree of regulation that will remain during the transition to a more robustly competitive market.

Finally, it is important to recognize that although the emergence of new platforms like BPL will eliminate the need for many competition-related regulations, other types of regulation may well remain necessary. For example, the FCC must implement public policy goals unrelated to competition, or even at odds with competition. Universal service and access for persons with disabilities are examples of this kind of regulation. These public policy goals generally should be applied to all service providers, to the extent permitted by the Communications Act. The FCC also must intervene to prevent competitors from imposing externalities on one another and to protect consumers where market failures are identified. Although, as I have noted, the commission was right to refrain from imposing heavy-handed price and service-quality regulations on PCS services when the were introduced, it was also right to adopt strict interference rules to prevent competitors from externalizing their costs. The same principle will apply to BPL. They key point is that, while some degree of regulation is both inevitable and desirable, we should ensure that it is narrowly tailored to the particular governmental interests at stake.

Tags: Call Center/Command content

Most Recent


  • Airbus U.S.: Rebecca Purcell, Bob Baumann discuss MCX, Agnet offerings
      Two members of the business and mission-critical solutions unit of Airbus U.S. Space & Defense—Rebecca Purcell, business analyst for business and mission-critical communications, and Bob Baumann, head of sales for business and mission-critical solutions—talk about the company’s diversified portfolio, including mission-critical communications offerings like MCX services over its Agnet platform. Attendees of the IWCE […]
  • Microsoft Outlook vulnerability could be 2023's 'It' bug
    Microsoft recently patched a zero-day vulnerability under active exploit in Microsoft Outlook, identified as CVE-2023-23397, which could enable an attacker to perform a privilege escalation, accessing the victim’s Net-NTLMv2 challenge-response authentication hash and impersonating the user. Now it’s becoming clear that CVE-2023-23397 is dangerous enough to become the most far-reaching bug of the year, security researchers are […]
  • Getting to know the how—and why—of the telecom cloud
    A funny thing happened during the pandemic: The giant cloud hyperscalers burst into the telecom industry. And now it’s time for everyone to get acquainted with them. Why? Well, it seems increasingly inevitable that a certain percentage – ranging from “a little” to “most” – of telecom operators’ network functions are going to run in […]
  • Zipline delivery drone docks, charges by itself
    Zipline has unveiled its new autonomous drone platform, designed to provide accurate everyday delivery to homes in the U.S., including in busy residential areas. Zipline’s previous delivery system worked by parachuting parcels into a specified area. Now the new drone, dubbed Platform 2 or P2 Zip, sends its goods down to customers via a tether […]

Leave a comment Cancel reply

To leave a comment login with your Urgent Comms account:

Log in with your Urgent Comms account

Or alternatively provide your name, email address below:

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Content

  • New Orleans-area 911 center inks multiyear APEX deal with Carbyne to replace call-handling system
  • Reaching Broadband Nirvana
    Newscan: Feds recover millions from pipeline ransom hackers, hint at U.S. Internet tactic
  • Cyber is the new Cold War, and AI is the arms race
  • Private wireless networks in the US start going public

Commentary


Updated: How ‘sidelink’ peer-to-peer communications can enhance public-safety operations

  • 1
27th February 2023

NG911 needed to secure our communities and nation

24th February 2023

How 5G is making cities safer, smarter, and more efficient

26th January 2023
view all

Events


UC Ezines


IWCE 2019 Wrap Up

13th May 2019
view all

Twitter


UrgentComm

Airbus U.S.: Rebecca Purcell, Bob Baumann discuss MCX, Agnet offerings dlvr.it/SlJNqW

22nd March 2023
UrgentComm

Microsoft Outlook vulnerability could be 2023’s ‘It’ bug dlvr.it/SlC3Hh

20th March 2023
UrgentComm

Getting to know the how–and why–of the telecom cloud dlvr.it/SlBbD1

20th March 2023
UrgentComm

Zipline delivery drone docks, charges by itself dlvr.it/SlBNWy

20th March 2023
UrgentComm

State and local leaders can alleviate the burden on public-safety personnel by tackling three workforce trends dlvr.it/SlBH89

20th March 2023
UrgentComm

6G is shaping up to disappoint, and the industry can blame itself dlvr.it/Sl918J

20th March 2023
UrgentComm

Change is coming to the network detection and response (NDR) market dlvr.it/Sl4cts

18th March 2023
UrgentComm

Telcos need to build businesses, as well as networks dlvr.it/Sl4cRR

18th March 2023

Newsletter

Sign up for UrgentComm’s newsletters to receive regular news and information updates about Communications and Technology.

Expert Commentary

Learn from experts about the latest technology in automation, machine-learning, big data and cybersecurity.

Business Media

Find the latest videos and media from the market leaders.

Media Kit and Advertising

Want to reach our digital and print audiences? Learn more here.

DISCOVER MORE FROM INFORMA TECH

  • American City & County
  • IWCE
  • Light Reading
  • IOT World Today
  • Mission Critical Technologies
  • TU-Auto

WORKING WITH US

  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Events
  • Careers

FOLLOW Urgent Comms ON SOCIAL

  • Privacy
  • CCPA: “Do Not Sell My Data”
  • Cookie Policy
  • Terms
Copyright © 2023 Informa PLC. Informa PLC is registered in England and Wales with company number 8860726 whose registered and Head office is 5 Howick Place, London, SW1P 1WG.