Subject: [NEXTEL-1] FCC's FOCUS ON VoIP SERVICE IS MISDIRECTED, HUNDT SAYS

From: Marcelrf <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 21:50:10 -0500

FCC's FOCUS ON VoIP SERVICE IS MISDIRECTED, HUNDT SAYS
3/10/04

Former FCC Chairman Reed E. Hundt today criticized the Commission for
focusing on voice-over-Internet protocol service as a stand-alone issue.
IP voice service is just one application that runs on broadband lines,
Mr. Hundt said, and the Commission should focus on spurring demand and
deployment of broadband service.

He also disputed the notion that the Telecommunications Act of 1996
needed revisions, as current Chairman Michael K. Powell has proposed. "I
don't think VoIP is revolutionary," Mr. Hundt said during a speech to
the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies. "Voice as an
application in the data stream has been many years in coming. Broadband
is what is revolutionary. It is the great shark of a new medium of
communications that will devour all the old mediums." Although the FCC
has issued a notice of proposed rulemaking on VoIP issues, Mr. Hundt
argued that new rules to accommodate VoIP service weren't needed. "Call
me a conservative, but I think broadband in general and VoIP in specific
should be governed by certain rules of the 19th century, namely the
antitrust laws. The essential questions of network law are and always
have been, who has got a bottleneck and what is to be done about that."
Mr. Hundt suggested calling VoIP "broadband voice" to make clear it is
just one of many broadband applications. "I don't think we have to
regulate VoIP with a light or heavy hand. I do think we have to describe
the right paradigm for the broadband market," he said. "Then we can let
VoIP be just one of many applications that evolve under that paradigm."

He questioned the wisdom of rewriting the 1996 Act after only eight
years. Chairman Powell has called for revisions in the law, as have many
members of the House and Senate. "I do not think we need a new
congressional statute," he said. "The much maligned 1996 telecom law was
a necessary repeal of much of the 1934 Communications Act, because in
1934 the nation committed itself to monopolies or oligopolies in
communications and media markets." Before passage of the 1996 Act, Mr.
Hundt recalled, Commissioners had tried to bend the 1934 Act as much as
possible. But it became clear "only a new statute could empower the FCC
to create competition and by doing so reduce regulation, especially rate
regulation," he said. - Howard Buskirk, [email-masked]

tr.com
--
    "NEXTEL-1 IT'S NOT JUST NEXTEL"
  Note The New address
Subscribe to Nextel-1: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL-1

  "NEXTEL2 FOR iDEN SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS"
Subscribe to Nextel2: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL2

  "WIRELESS FORUM HOMELAND SECURITY GROUP"
     The Complete Resource for Wireless Homeland Security.
Subscribe to WFHSG:  http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/WFHSG

-- 
    "NEXTEL-1 IT'S NOT JUST NEXTEL"
  Note The New address 
Subscribe to Nextel-1: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL-1

  "NEXTEL2 FOR iDEN SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS"
Subscribe to Nextel2: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL2

  "WIRELESS FORUM HOMELAND SECURITY GROUP"
     The Complete Resource for Wireless Homeland Security.
Subscribe to WFHSG:  http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/WFHSG

Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
     http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEXTEL-1/

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
     [email-masked]

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
     http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/