I have commented before on the raging INTERnet-neutrality debate and how closely allied it is to the issue of LOCAL net neutrality - the focus of the OPLAN Foundation.

Well last week I was reminded again of just how much double talk some of the major vested interests in the telecoms and cable sector are engaged in on this issue. 

We already know the totally warped "let the market be free" argument of the likes of AT&T and Verizon who want to charge service providers and the likes of Yahoo and Google for use of the Internet on a differential basis - i.e. destroy 'net neutrality'.  The fallacy of their 'free-market argument' being that these major corporations would never exist as they do today, as vertically integrated behemoths, had they not been created as such through a century of state intervention, nationalisation and more recently, arbitrary sector-specific regulation.  Had the market been allowed to deploy the digital technologies of abundance free from state intervention and vested interest protection - then the likes of AT&T, Verizon, France Telecom and BT would have left the stage long ago.

Anyway, as we all know, given the fact that they are still with us, it is not surprising that large companies such as Google, Yahoo and Microsoft having been denied the power of the free market to ensure the continued neutrality of the internet - feel forced to turn to legislators to prevent the artifically long-lived dinosaurs from messing it up.  "Foul" cry the dinosaurs - "...government stay out of this - let the market decide!".  Some market, I say!...

An interesting telecoms news story broke last week which touches on the very heart of the OPLAN issue.  It concerned PCCW - Hong Kong's incumbent telecoms company.  Like all such beasts, in its home territory, PCCW is a vertically integrated business comprising the local network infrastructure and a bag full of service offerings ranging from plain old telephony through to broadband internet and TV for the residential market and 'you name it' for the corporate market.

Richard Li (younger son of legendry Li Ka-shing, No 10 on the Forbes billionaire list) who put together PCCW in the conventional vertically integrated mould, found that the company never really took off and neither did its shares.  So it was not surprising that eagle-eyed private equity players (Australia's Macquarie Bank and America's TPG-Newbridge) could see unrealised shareholder value to the extent that they made an offer of HK$60 billion for all the assets - including the local network infrastructure.

Then enter stage left, China Network Communications Group (China Netcom) which owns 20% of PCCW and expresses concern at the possible deal which would involve Chinese telecom infrastructure falling into foreign hands.  On July 10th, Francis Leung, a local tycoon, pops up with an offer to purchase Richard Li's 23% stake in PCCW for HK$9.2 billion ($1.2 billion).  China Netcom welcomed this with the statement,  "We think Francis Leung's participation can help PCCW develop in a sustainable and healthy manner"....

Back in September last year when BT (British Telecom - the UK incumbent telecoms operator) announced that having reached agreement with Ofcom, the UK regulator, on the establishment of a separate infrastructure division, it would be called OpenReach, I thought, "Here we go again!" 

Nobody is more masterful at redefining the English language than British Telecom and I take my hat off to them.   Back in the early 1980s when the UK led the world in public policy aimed at fostering the development of ‘next genus’ broadband networks – the term ‘broadband’ was universally used to denote a minimum of 2 M/bits symmetrical capacity.   Thanks to the drip, drip, drip persistence of BT (and the rest of the global telecoms cartel)and their remarkable success in influencing public policy and regulatory frameworks to shape the tempo and form by which the disruptive digital technologies of abundance are to be deployed, they have managed totally to redefine the term 'broadband' over the past two decades.  It now means something that suits 'them' with their outdated copper local networks and not 'us' as end users.  Broadband now equates to ADSL which offers (in whatever flavour) a mere fraction of the upstream capacity of that regarded twenty years ago as constituting 'broadband'.
 
ADSL is no more ‘broadband’ than their newly created access division is “OPEN”!   There is a growing understanding and appetite for truly ‘open public local access networks’(OPLANs).  Communities of all shapes and sizes around the world are beginning to plan and build OPLANs offering outrageously abundant bandwidth – access to and control of which, is not confined to the telecoms sector but is ‘open’ to all.  If BT’s plans were to develop a truly ‘open access’ network – then the UK would lead the world but we all knew that was not their intention with either OpenReach or their 21st century network - which will do wonders for their shareholders and very little for users.
...

Three things engaged my attention yesterday.  The most important was the informal gathering of the working group on Broadband within the EUROCITIES Knowledge Society Forum -TeleCities, to which I had been invited.  Meeting in Brussels it was one of, if not the only, euro-gathering where the heat of the room temperature outstripped the heat of the discussion!  Indeed, it was a remarkably common-minded gathering of officials from towns and cities across the EU who were united in their desire to see their citizens benefit from an open public local access network or in some cases, were already deriving the benefits of such an OPLAN.

The focus of the meeting was the European Commission’s Review of the Regulatory Framework for Electronic Communications and the input to the consultation on this which the TeleCities group and its constituent members would in due course be making.  The aim of such a submission being to persuade the Commission of the immense potential benefit to EU citizens of an open access strategy and the ‘unforeseeable’ social and economic benefit which such an approach might yield.

The meeting had the benefit of a senior EU official attending for part of the time, to outline the process and principles behind this major review.  Two things struck me about this.  Firstly, the very ‘framework’ itself is crafted and drafted and embedded in the old paradigm - heavily influenced by listening to powerful vested interests and incumbents.   The EU Commission constantly stresses that it is big on listening.   Any institution with such big ears – needs to find big voices to fill them.  And the telecoms and cable TV sector sure have big voices!  Secondly, the framework explicitly states that it will pursue an ‘evolutionary rather than revolutionary’ approach – despite also claiming that it is ‘technology neutral’.   If that isn’t a case of trying to make omelettes without cracking eggs – I don’t know what is!...