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Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai has proposed a new spending cap on the FCC's Universal Service programs that deploy broadband to poor people and to rural and other underserved areas.
Pai reportedly circulated the proposal to fellow commissioners on Tuesday, meaning it will be voted upon behind closed doors instead of in an open meeting. Pai has not released the proposal publicly, but it was described in a Politico report Wednesday, and an FCC official confirmed the proposal's details to Ars. Democratic FCC commissioners and consumer advocacy groups have criticized Pai's plan, saying it could harm the FCC's efforts to expand broadband access.
The FCC's Universal Service system's purpose is to bring communications service access to all Americans and consists of four programs: The Connect America Fund, which gives ISPs money to deploy broadband in rural areas; Lifeline, which provides discounts on phone and broadband service to low-income consumers; the E-Rate broadband program for schools and libraries; and a telecom access program for rural health care providers.
Pai's plan suggests an $11.4 billion annual cap on the total cost of the four programs, which is more than current spending but would put an upper bound on what the program could spend in the future. The cap would be indexed for inflation, FCC Commissioner Michael O'Rielly wrote on Twitter.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mobydisk on Tuesday April 02 2019, @04:29PM (7 children)
Based on the headline "wants to cap spending...for poor people" I think I am supposed to be outraged. But the summary says that the proposal increases the amount of money, and indexes it to inflation. Is that not... perfectly fair and logical?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by HiThere on Tuesday April 02 2019, @04:48PM
How about getting upset about the fact that he's keeping the details of the plan secret, and the voting will be secret, so we won't really know what it does until "O, that's policy. We can't change that.".
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 02 2019, @04:49PM (4 children)
Fair and logical? Try this in your fair/logical detector - we've already PAID FOR broadband that we don't have. Then run this through it - Ijit is dividing the nation along a class line that hasn't existed in the past. One tier of infrastructure for the rural class, and another tier for the urban class. Now this one - Ijit wants to set a top limit to the money spent in rural areas and poor urban areas, so that all the rest is freed up for those lucrative urban areas.
We already see the most lucrative urban areas built, built again, redundantly, then upgraded just as redundantly. Yet, within only a mile, sometimes less, there are poor urban areas that are seriously underserved. Those poor urban areas are miles ahead of the rural hayseeds, though, because THEY only get one monopolized service, which has zero intentions of EVER upgrading anything, so long as their monopoly lasts.
I don't know how fair and logical that all seems, but the fact that we've ALREADY PAID for millions of last miles, just seems terribly unfair and illogical to me. Logic says, we should stop paying any of the bastards until they start listening to what we need. We certainly don't need twelve more fiber lines run in to the White House, the house, and the senate this summer. There is more than enough hot air escaping all three of them, we don't need any more conduits for that. Probably don't need 30 more fibers run in to Wall Street, either. The wealthy neighborhoods of Chicago and the California coast almost certainly are saturated by now. I doesn't serve any purpose to build new lines where there are multitudes of lines already, while the rest of us do without.
(Score: 4, Informative) by AssCork on Tuesday April 02 2019, @06:29PM
I've got $20 on RunAway in the next DeadPool.
Any takers?
Just popped-out of a tight spot. Came out mostly clean, too.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday April 02 2019, @09:39PM (1 child)
One of the things we need is an audit of where all that money has gone. I've had my own phone accounts since the very early 1980's, and I'm pretty sure I've always been paying a special "Universal Service Fee". Where is all that money?
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Tuesday April 02 2019, @10:13PM
Among other things, it goes to subsidize telecom services to schools and libraries in rural or impoverished areas; though, recently, they cut subsidies for telephony (because everyone uses VOIP now) and other useful telecommunications and infrastructure, in favor of subsidizing broadband with mandatory filtered internet (with contradictory filtering requirements)--which, in addition to the onerous paperwork to apply, confirm application, accept and then report, is why most rural public libraries in my state have stopped applying.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @04:50AM
Of course he's going to help keep the pariah class in their place, whatever their skin color, in America.
He knows his place in the world, and he has to help America establish its places according to the system India has.
If you think I am joking, look at his habits and activities more closely.
This is why America was nominally supposed to be a secular state. It has never truly lived up to that ideal, but for a time in the late 80s until 9/11, it was making progress towards true secularism. Now....
(Score: 2) by Kalas on Wednesday April 03 2019, @01:59PM
Read it more carefully. This is merely setting a cap on future spending that happens to be higher than the current annual budget. It will only serve to reduce then stop future increases in spending as the budget approaches cap. Considering that Pai has turned the FCC's official goal into screwing over Americans (but especially the poor ones), plus that this proposed policy can only serve to limit spending on infrastructure, you'd be deluded to think this is a good thing for anyone other than the politicians taking a percentage to screw over their fellow countrymen and the ISPs who will continue building practically nothing with the money they're given for rural development.
If it weren't for that last part this wouldn't be quite as bad, but none of Pai's actions so far indicate concern for anything other than profits so you can be sure this policy won't implement more regulation and oversight ensuring that the govt. money bestowed upon ISPs is properly spent.