Uncategorized Related Posts

Posted June 24, 2016

The following may be attributed to an AT&T spokesperson: “Submarine cable facilities have important national security and commercial implications.  For this reason, a coalition representing cable providers sought to give the FCC constructive input on a meaningful yet reasonable cable outage reporting framework.  Today’s order, however, perpetuates flawed assumptions from the recent Part 4 Order…

Posted June 22, 2016

I’m often struck by the doublespeak that takes place in DC and, particularly, at the FCC when companies come to the agency to argue that the Commission should regulate their competitors. The Special Access proceeding at the Commission is one of those special dockets that is a real breeding ground for what I like to…

Posted June 14, 2016

The following may be attributed to David McAtee, AT&T Senior Executive Vice President and General Counsel: “We have always expected this issue to be decided by the Supreme Court, and we look forward to participating in that appeal.”

Posted June 9, 2016

The following may be attributed to an AT&T spokesperson:  “AT&T’s use of anonymous and aggregate set-top box information is entirely consistent with the statute. Our disclosures tell our customers exactly how we use that data and provide tools for customers to opt out.  Frankly, this complaint is bogus, and seems mainly designed to distract the…

Posted May 27, 2016

Today, we will file our official comments in the Commission’s privacy proceeding. The fundamental message will be that the FCC should follow the FTC’s lead and adopt a notice and consent framework for privacy that is entirely consistent with the FTC framework that has governed since the inception of the Internet.  That is contrary to…

Posted May 19, 2016

Yesterday, the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), an independent agency, released its report on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement. The following statement may be attributed to Tim McKone, AT&T Executive Vice President of Federal Relations: “We are encouraged by the ITC’s report, which finds that the TPP would help develop cross-border trade in services and…

Posted May 6, 2016

Yesterday, 60 members of Congress joined an already significant chorus of bipartisan Congressional voices questioning the impact that Google’s set-top box proposal will have on consumers and the broader video marketplace.  This time the focus was on the negative impact the Google proposal would have on the ability of smaller/rural video providers to continue innovating…

Posted April 28, 2016

The following may be attributed to an AT&T spokesperson: “Moving forward with a proceeding to allow real-time text (“RTT”) communications to replace outdated TTY technology is long overdue and the right thing to do.  We are concerned, however, that the FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) spends too much time looking backward to the rules…

Posted April 28, 2016

The following may be attributed to an AT&T spokesperson:  “Google’s argument exposes that their proposal makes absolutely no sense from a policy standpoint. What they suggest, amazingly, is that a customer’s info will have onerous restrictions and be subject to opt-in requirements if they use our set top box.  But if they use Google’s box,…

Posted April 27, 2016

Tomorrow, the FCC will release a Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking with the aim of resetting the conversation on “business data services” (BDS), the Commission’s new name for the decade-old proceeding on special access services. Despite the new moniker, we fear that this proceeding will just be more of the same – a proposal to…