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To: FR1 who wrote (12333)	7/13/1999 12:55:00 PM
From: Ron Dior	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 29970

Tuesday July 13, 11:57 am Eastern Time Company Press Release California Legislature: Regulatory Intervention of Cable Internet Access Unnecessary At This Time SACRAMENTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 13, 1999--Legislators on Monday reinforced that California's high speed Internet access marketplace is competitive and robust and does not require regulatory intervention at this time. Due to lack of Committee support, SB 1217, (Alarcon, D-Los Angeles), was not brought up for a vote in the Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee today. SB 1217 would have forced cable companies providing high-speed Internet access services to relinquish their cables to any Internet Service Provider. The failure of SB 1217 to go to vote sends a strong signal that regulatory intervention of high-speed access to the Internet is unwarranted at this time. Currently, there is vigorous competition in the marketplace to offer high-speed access via cable, a phone company's digital subscriber lines (DSL), satellite, wireless and other emerging technologies. ''Competition works,'' said Lois Hedg-peth, president of AT&T's Pacific and Western Region Consumer Marketing Division. ''We applaud the committee members for seeing through the smokescreen thrown up by local phone monopolies and others who want to slow down Internet access via cable.'' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ron Dior

To: FR1 who wrote (12333)	7/13/1999 6:29:00 PM
From: Frank A. Coluccio	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 29970

Franz, the short answer to your question is I don't know. The longer answer... actually, it's not an answer at all, call it a placeholder, follows: "Perhaps you could clarify something for me. The FCC, as I understand, has the ability to stop this." I don't know that that is entirely, if even in part, true. "Question: What type of formal legal action does the FCC have to take to end "Open Access"? Everyone is saying that they need to clarify their position but I don't know how this is done in a formal way." If any regulatory body thought that they had such carte blanche powers I think that you could rest assured that they'd have done it [or, at least attempted it] already. Notice the unofficialness and light stepping that everyone is taking care to exercise here. There is a great deal of disharmony and differing views by regulators on all fronts, concerning the the emerging telecomms/cablecomms areas, and how those areas meet the Internet, in particular. There are vested interests not only in the carriers and service providers serving these industries, but in the regulatory and legislative offices as well. These interests start with the the individual voter, then at the municipality and county levels, and then right up through the state capitals, and onto the federal government. The Communications Act comes into play, as well as previous cable laws, and FCC and PUC policies and rules, and there's always a Congressperson somewhere willing to take pen to paper to write a new bill. Some states have threatened to sue the FCC if they (the FCC) steps in in a broad sweeping way. Nothing new there. Even in the plain old POTS dialup Internet arena, no one can decide if Internet access constitutes Long Distance or not. The FCC says that it is, and 21 states turn around to reverse them on it. Waffling on this subject has been taking place now for several years in the most recent spate of cases, and before those, it was an issue in the Early Eighties, when the original waivers for enhanced service providers were granted. VoIP is another area, which is clearly using the PSTN for many forms of delivery, and yet is considered an Internet service and thus, it is unregulated. I don't have to get into all of the possible areas of contention, and all of the permutations of services... I'm sure you see what it is I'm getting at. The technology has outstripped the precepts and the underlying assumptions by which the regulators have operated over the past hundred years. The Internet was never in their table of contents, so to speak. Now these same regs are like dear frozen in their tracks on the road, mesmerized and paralyzed by the oncoming lights. The only thing I know for sure is that the regulators are not in agreement with one another from one level to the next, as to whom it is exactly (if anyone) that should be stepping up to the plate to face these issues. They all want to address certain dimensions of each issue in their own way, it seems to me, since now most services are by nature both local and potentially distance related, as well, while being both on- and off- 'net at the same time. Broadcast... I don't even want to go there now. Wither the Regs? Regards, Frank Coluccio