SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- @Amazon Web Services, Inc. ( #AWS ), an @Amazon.com company (NASDAQ:AMZN), today announced that @Comcast Cable has selected AWS as its preferred public cloud infrastructure provider. Comcast Cable will expand its use of AWS by migrating material workloads and building new applications on AWS.
Last week, the @FederalCommunicationsCommission went ahead with its deeply unpopular plan to end net neutrality protections, giving internet service providers like @AT&T, @Verizon, and @Comcast unprecedented control of our experience online. But what if you and your community could become your own internet service provider?
Congress can still reject the FCC’s decision, though at least one proposed bill suggests there’s reason not to be overly optimistic they will save the day. Either way, maybe it’s time to rethink our relationship with the internet — and with big ISPs that facilitate our access to the web. Instead of depending on monopolistic corporations, internet users can take back the net by building their own community-supported internet networks. Mesh networks can help. A mesh wireless antenna in Chinatown, New York. What is a mesh network? When we access the internet via an ISP, we are likely connecting via broadband, which is literally a giant cable that connects our ISP to top-level internet exchanges. In other words, the ISP acts as the central gatekeeper that ultimately controls our point of online access. Mesh networks, on the other hand, connect devices directly to each other. Rather than going through a central point, mesh networks allow for how we connect to automatically reconfigure according to the availability and proximity of bandwidth and storage. Since they are decentralized, the only way to shut down or otherwise disrupt a mesh network is to shut down every node in the network. This makes them much more resilient to interference or other disturbances. In more practical terms, by setting up specially configured wireless routers (known as “nodes”) that connect to other configured wireless routers, mesh networks allow local users to create a network that is physically distinct from the internet. (Although it can connect to the internet, it can also exist as its own local network.)Then, antennas installed on the outside of buildings connect to each other, forming a mesh network. Does this exist in the real world? A map of NYC Mesh's current nodes. Active nodes are in red, and lines show supernode connections. Mesh wireless networks have already been deployed across the world, from New York’s NYC Mesh, Detroit’s Equitable Internet Initiative to eastern Afghanistan’s FabFi — though that was eventually shut down under pressure from local telecoms — to rural communities in South Africa. One of the most sophisticated mesh wireless networks is Guifi.net, a community network in Spain that has grown from a single node in 2004 to more than 30,000 in 2016. It has spawned the creation of local ISPs that connect its users to fiber Internet. In the short time since the FCC’s net neutrality ruling, there have already been a number of new mesh internet projects popping up, including Honolulu Mesh in Hawaii, while a group in Los Angeles just announced its first meet-up to begin planning. Other mesh wireless networks have been temporary, serving as a backup source of internet when the normal networks were knocked down. After Hurricane Sandy, when Internet and cell phone networks were knocked out in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Red Hook, a mesh wireless network became the backbone of communication for the mostly low-income community. FEMA ended up installing a satellite internet connection at the community center, which then spread the internet via the mesh. How to Make Your Own How a mesh wireless network that connects to the Internet would look like Several organizations offer guides and free resources to create your own mesh wireless networks.
https://www.inverse.com/article/39507-mesh-networks-net-neutrality-fcc
#ATT and #Comcast have convinced a federal judge to nullify an ordinance that was designed to bring more broadband competition to #Nashville, #Tennessee. The @Nashville Metro Council last year passed a "One Touch Make Ready" rule that gives #GoogleFiber or other new ISPs faster access to utility poles. The ordinance lets a single company make all of the necessary wire adjustments on utility poles itself, instead of having to wait for incumbent providers like @ATT and @Comcast to send work crews to move their own wires. AT&T and Comcast sued the metro government in US District Court in Nashville, claiming that federal and local laws preempt the One Touch Make Ready rule. Judge Victoria Roberts agreed with AT&T and Comcast in a ruling issued Tuesday. Google Fiber is offering service in Nashville despite saying last year that it was waiting for access to thousands of utility poles. "We're reviewing [the] court ruling to understand its potential impact on our build in Nashville," a Google spokesperson said this week, according to The Tennessean. "We have made significant progress with new innovative deployment techniques in some areas of the city, but access to poles remains an important issue where underground deployment is not a possibility." AT&T poles The case centered on two sets of utility poles: those owned by AT&T and those owned by the municipal Nashville Electric Service (NES). The Nashville ordinance is preempted by federal law when it comes to poles owned by AT&T and other private parties, the judge ruled. The Federal Communications Commission has jurisdiction to regulate pole attachments for privately owned poles except when states opt out of the federal regime. "Tennessee has not opted out of FCC jurisdiction over pole attachments," Judge Roberts wrote. In August, a similar One Touch Make Ready rule in Louisville, Kentucky, survived despite another AT&T lawsuit. Kentucky is one of 20 states that has opted out of the federal pole attachment regime, giving Louisville a leg up over AT&T in that case. Utility-owned poles While AT&T owns nearly 20 percent of the poles, the NES utility owns around 80 percent. AT&T and Comcast argued that NES has sole authority to regulate the terms of pole attachments for NES-owned poles and that the Metro Nashville Council therefore overstepped its authority. The court agreed with AT&T and Comcast's argument, saying, "It is clear that the [Metro Nashville] Charter grants NES broad, unencumbered power to manage and control the properties of the Electric Power Board. It expressly denies that power to the Mayor, the Council, and any other agency of the Metro Nashville government." The court declined to make a final ruling on NES-owned poles, but AT&T and Comcast could get what they want soon. Nashville Metro argued that the claim should be dismissed because NES failed to join the case despite being an "indispensable party." But the judge is letting AT&T and Comcast amend their complaints in order to add NES as a party in the case. NES previously told the court that it is "agnostic to the validity of the ordinance." Unless NES changes course, a ruling would be automatically entered in favor of AT&T and Comcast. NES will be asked to make a statement on whether it intends to take a position. "If it continues to have no position, the Court will enter the declaration and injunction sought by Plaintiffs," the judge wrote. Nashville Metro could appeal the ruling, but hasn't said whether it will do so. "We are reviewing the court's decision and will make a determination regarding our next course of action in the near future," Jon Cooper, Nashville Mayor Megan Barry's law director, told The Tennessean. View article comments
Add #AT&T to the list of companies that want to sell you TV over the internet: AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson says his online-only #DirecTV Now package will cost $35 a month and offer more than 100 channels when it launches next month. DirecTV Now will join Dish’s #Sling and #Sony ’s #Vue, which have been on the market for a while and may have around 800,000 subscribers so far. Next year, #Hulu, the service owned by #Disney, #21stCenturyFox and #Comcast, will launch its own live TV service. #Google, among others, is working on one as well. One selling point AT&T will have, for now, is that AT&T mobile subscribers who sign up for DirectTV Now will be able to watch on their devices without having the data usage count against their caps. The bulk of long-form video viewing happens on Wi-Fi networks, not mobile, but that’s still a differentiating feature.
http://www.recode.net/2016/10/25/13408984/att-directv-now-cbs-web-tv
#ATT on Thursday sued Metro government over the new "One Touch Make Ready" ordinance aimed at helping #GoogleFiber expand its gigabit internet to Nashville, setting the stage for the next battlefront in the city's fight over broadband.
In the company's complaint, AT&T argues that under federal law the Federal Communications Commission, not local municipalities like Metro, have jurisdiction to regulate privately owned utility poles. In Nashville, 80 percent of the city's utility poles are owned by #Nashville Electric Service, while AT&T owns the remaining 20 percent.
AT&T is seeking a declaratory and permanent injunction from the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee to stop Metro from enforcing the new law.
We've been talking about how the next great battlefield in broadband is utility pole attachment reform. In many cities, the incumbent broadband provider owns the utility poles, giving them a perfect opportunity to hinder competitors. In other cities, the local utility or city itself owns the poles, but incumbent ISPs have lobbied for laws making it more difficult for competitors to access them quickly and inexpensively. #GoogleFiber has been pushing "one touch make ready" rules in several cities aimed at streamlining this bureaucracy by letting a licensed, third-party installer move any ISP's gear (often a matter of inches). And while incumbents like #AT&T and #Comcast will often breathlessly proclaim they're all for streamlining regulations, in this instance they're actively preventing the streamlining of these rules in a feeble attempt to slow Google Fiber down. In Louisville, AT&T sued the city after it passed one touch make ready rules. And in Nashville, both Comcast and AT&T have been actively working to prevent Google Fiber from getting similar rules passed. In a recent blog post explaining the stand off, Google Fiber highlights just what this entrenched, anti-competitive regulatory capture looks like in graphical form:
It’s been no secret that a lawsuit from #AT&T against Metro is a possibility if Nashville approves a One Touch Made Ready ordinance backed by #GoogleFiber. But on Thursday, addressing reporters at a news conference from the lobby of the downtown AT&T building, Joelle Phillips, president of AT&T Tennessee, came close to guaranteeing a lawsuit if the bill passes.
But on Thursday, addressing reporters at a news conference from the lobby of the downtown AT&T building, Joelle Phillips, president of AT&T Tennessee, came close to guaranteeing a lawsuit if the bill passes.
Jae S. Lee / The Tennessean
“The short answer is the One Touch Make Ready proposal Google has offered is a proposal that we expect would result in litigation,” said Phillips, who was speaking to reporters one dayafter negotiations between Google Fiber, Comcast and AT&T hit a snag.
AT&T sued Louisville, Ky. after that municipality approved a similar One Touch Make Ready ordinance. The company has argued that the Federal Communications Commission – not cities – have the power to regulate privately-owned AT&T utility poles. From the beginning, the company has said Nashville lacks the authority to implement the ordinance Google Fiber covets.
#AT&T (T) , #Verizon (VZ) , #T-Mobile (TMUS) , #Comcast (CMCSA) , #Dish (DISH) and others start bidding Tuesday for the most appealing wireless spectrum left in the government's portfolio. The Federal Communications Commission opens the second phase of a groun dbreaking auction -- the first of its kind in the world -- that allows wireless carriers and others to buy licenses to the wavelengths that TV stations use to broadcast their programs. The FCC concluded the first part of the auction last month, asking station owners how much they would take to sell. The government made a series of descending bids, starting with high offers and reducing the payment until it reached the lowest amount at which enough TV station owners in each market would sell.
For years, #Google has been building a lobbying machine that outpaces its Silicon Valley peers, turning the internet giant into a major Washington presence. In 2014, the company surpassed #AT&T, #Verizon, and #Comcast in lobbying spending dollars, and it's been particularly adept at building relationships with the White House. As of March 2015, Google averaged about one meeting a week with the Obama administration, and Google staff frequently move into jobs with the White House, or vice versa. But the figures on meetings and revolving doors don't always show how Google maneuvers those relationships when facing a fight.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/10/12416766/google-white-house-ostp-emails
After months of talks, #TimeWarner is buying a chunk of #Hulu, the web TV service. The deal means Time Warner will be partners with existing owners #Disney, 21st Century Fox and #Comcast ’s NBCUniversal*, and that Time Warner’s channels like Turner and CNN will be part of a new pay TV service Hulu wants to launch next year. Time Warner says it is buying a 10 percent stake in Hulu; a person familiar with the deal says it is putting in around $580 million (Update: Make that $583 million, per Time Warner’s CFO, during the company’s earnings call this morning) for that stake, which values the entire company at $5.8 billion. Hulu, which industry sources estimate is losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year, had originally wanted Time Warner to buy as much as 25 percent of the company.
Consumers really like #GoogleFiber. Or, at the very least, they like the idea of Google Fiber: when the company says it’s considering bringing its super-speedy internet service to town, prospective subscribers happily sign up and towns do what they need to do to make themselves attractive to the business. And that sits very, very poorly with the companies that are already in town and don’t want to deal with a pesky thing like competition. That’s what’s happening this week in two different cities, Louisville and Nashville. The companies fighting, and the tactics they’re using, are different, but the overall outcome is the same. In Louisville, it’s #Charter doing the complaining, as the Louisville Courier-Journal reports. Charter is telling the city that it’s unfair that they are being held to different standards, in a different franchise agreement, than Google Fiber. In a letter to the city, Charter wrote that there is “no justification for different regulatory treatment,” and claimed that they were trying to advance consumers’ best interests. “Consumers win when they have a fair choice of service providers,” a spokesperson told the paper. “That’s why Louisville Metro and the area’s suburban cities should make sure all like service providers are treated the same.” Charter is not the first provider to claim that Louisville treats the area’s broadband siblings too differently. #AT&T filed a suit against the city of Louisville back in February, Google, meanwhile, has not yet formally said whether or not it will bring Fiber to the area at all. The city is still on a shortlist of “potential” cities, in which Google is “working with city leaders to explore the possibility of building a super fast network” in the area.
Nashville, on the other hand, does actually have its Google Fiber rollout in progress, with construction underway. And the incumbents are fighting there, too.
Over in Tennessee, it’s Comcast, not Charter, that’s raising objections, and AT&T once again keeping them company.
Nashville is considering the same kind of pole access regulations that Louisville passed, and the incumbents aren’t happy. And as DSL Reports, well, reports, they’re trying basically everything.
AT&T told the site that it’s concerned that the proposed new ordinance — which they have not seen — would interfere with their agreement with their union workers.
Additionally, the AT&T representative said, “We have serious concerns with other companies being allowed to perform work on our facilities,” and then deferred to the FCC claiming it, not local government, has authority.
Comcast didn’t make the same excuses, but did suggest that the legislation would be better off not seeing the light of day anytime soon, or perhaps ever. “We believe that the appropriate next step would be to conduct a meeting of stakeholders, a representative told DSL Reports, adding, “this should be accomplished prior to any proposed legislation.”
As we’ve seen over and over again, high-speed broadband competition is hard to come by in huge swaths of the country. And one reason for that is because incumbent companies, especially AT&T, have a habit of throwing their weight around when competition does finally (try to) come to town.
Meanwhile, though, it remains the best chance for consumers: both Comcast andAT&T charge less for their service in cities with Google’s super-speedy competition.
The IT team at #Comcast Corp. leaves nothing to chance when it comes to managing the performance of its Hadoop data lake. The data lake is a big body of information, with tens of thousands of CPUs and more than 30 petabytes of storage capacity. To keep it all running smoothly, IT has implemented proactive #Hadoop monitoring and governance processes and a mix of cluster management tools.
http://searchdatamanagement.techtarget.com/news/450299825/IT-teams-hone-Hadoop-monitoring-governance-to-boost-big-data-value
