TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: FCC: Consumers Can Put End to VOIP Port Blocking


FCC: Consumers Can Put End to VOIP Port Blocking


Jack Decker (jack-yahoogroups@withheld)
Wed, 09 Mar 2005 13:23:04 -0500

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1773983,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03119TX1K0000594

By Mark Hachman, ExtremeTech

SAN JOSE, Calif. Members of the Federal Communications Commission
claim market forces, not regulation, will likely prevent a repeat of
an ISP blocking voice-over-IP traffic.

In a "town hall" meeting Monday night at the VON Conference & Expo
here, Jeffrey Carlisle, chief of the FCC's Wireline Competition
Bureau, and Robert Pepper, chief of policy development at the FCC,
answered audience questions on regulatory issues. A key topic was the
recent blocking of VOIP traffic by Madison River Communications, a
wholly owned subsidiary of Madison River Telephone Company LLC, and
whether that scenario could repeat itself with other ISPs.

PointerVOIP port blocking draws congressional interest. Click here to
read more.

According to Carlisle, consumers are becoming more savvy about their
broadband providers and will notice if services such as those provided
by Vonage Holdings Corp. stop working. The industry is going through a
"frontier period," Carlisle said, where corporations could press the
limits of the law.

"Consumers will know if they're not able to get something," Carlisle
said. "If I see a Vonage box in the store, [bring it home], and I
can't get Vonage, I'm going to know about that." In that case,
consumers will simply choose another broadband provider that provides
the services that they're looking for, he said.

[COMMENT: Well, heck, yes, if I don't like what my current broadband
provider is doing I'll simply go down to the local broadband service
store and select another provider from among the multitude of choices
there. Riiiiiight. Sounds like some people at the FCC still need to
get a clue!]

Full story at:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1773983,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03119TX1K0000594

How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home:
http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html

If you live in Michigan, subscribe to the MI-Telecom group:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MI-Telecom/

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