FCC idea sets off firestorm over access to mobile Net
For months, the nation’s largest telecommunications companies and biggest technology brands have maintained an uneasy truce while investing billions of dollars in an attempt to dominate the mobile Internet. Now, thanks to a proposal by a little-known government official, all-out war has broken out between the two sides over the potential payoff for those huge bets. The idea would enable a company like Google to launch a wireless service without spending billions of dollars to build its own network.
Neither the telecoms nor the technology companies are happy with a proposal circulated last week to the four members of the Federal Communications Commission by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, which included a requirement that the network be accessible to new applications and devices, similar to the traditional Internet. While that provision was part of what public interest groups and technology companies requested, Martin left out a crucial requirement that the owner of the new network be required to resell broadband access at wholesale rates.
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