Verizon Starts Passing On RIAA Infringement Letters To Users

from the what's-next,-though? dept

Allison K alerts us to the news that Verizon is the latest US broadband provider to agree to pass along the RIAA letters accusing Verizon customers of unauthorized file sharing. AT&T, Comcast, Cox and some other ISPs already do this. The letters don't include specific threats of action (so, no "three strikes" type policies), but the RIAA is clearly hoping that by passing on the letters it will discourage unauthorized file sharing. It's a bit of a waste for Verizon to need to spend resources on this, and it really is just the RIAA's first step in the door to eventually push for kicking people off of the internet, but on the whole it's not that terrible to pass along notices. In the end, my guess is that it will actually serve to do a lot more to promote encryption services than anything else. Maybe some encryption service can approach Verizon about "sponsoring" those customer notifications.

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AT&T Sues Verizon Over 'There's A Map For That' Ad Campaign

from the doesn't-like-the-maps dept

Recently, Verizon came up with a rather clever ad campaign, mocking the iPhone ads that claim "there's an app for that" with ads that showcase Verizon's wider 3G footprint, claiming "there's a map for that," and showing the two services' 3G coverage maps side by side:

It does a nice job poking fun at one of AT&T's weaker points: its mobile network infrastructure. But apparently, AT&T is not happy with the ad campaign and has sued Verizon over those ads, claiming that it uses an unfair comparison. That's because the maps only show 3G coverage, and Verizon has significantly greater 3G coverage. However, AT&T feels that the map showing its coverage implies, falsely, that AT&T has no coverage outside of its 3G coverage areas. While you can see why AT&T would make this complaint, it does make you wonder if it's really worth the effort to sue. All it's really doing is attracting a lot more attention to the original ad, which does accurately state that it's talking about 3G coverage, not overall coverage, though you can see why some people might not realize that AT&T's network also includes non-3G areas.

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Fresh Off Victory Over Dish, TiVo Sues AT&T, Verizon

from the can't-compete?-litigate! dept

Why bother competing in the market when you can just sue everyone else? That appears to be TiVo's big strategy these days. Just a month after winning a big court victory over EchoStar/Dish over a patent that the USPTO is not really sure it should have issued, TiVo has moved on to sue both AT&T and Verizon in a nearly identical lawsuit. And, of course, you know exactly how the negotiations on this one start. TiVo will point to the headlines about the millions the the court has told Dish to pay. Whatever happened to the good old days when companies competed in the marketplace rather than in court? TiVo is a great and innovative product, no doubt. While not really the first such product, it did a great job convincing the market of the value of DVRs. But then others innovated as well, sometimes making their product even better. That's called competition and it should drive everyone to make better products. It appears TiVo would rather that the competitors be kept out of the market, rather than bothering to innovate in the market.

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The Problems Of A Legacy Business: Verizon's Union Freaks Out That Verizon Wants To Look Forward

from the what-a-shame dept

It's really sad to see some of the struggles that legacy businesses go through in trying to adapt to a more modern world, but not all of it is the fault of those businesses themselves. Look, for example, at what's happening with Verizon. Subsidiary Verizon Wireless -- which is 55% owned by Verizon -- began a marketing campaign pushing people to ditch their landline phone and go completely wireless. That's not a bad marketing campaign (and, in fact, might be a very good marketing campaign these days). So what happens? The union that represents Verizon's landline telco workers flips out and accuses the company of trying to undermine the union by helping Verizon get out of the landline business, so it can get rid of those workers. Seriously. First of all, there's little evidence to suggest that's true. Like most traditional telcos, Verizon still sees its basic landline business as a useful cash cow that I'm sure it intends to milk for as long as possible. Chances are, since VZW is a separate company, the marketing plan had nothing to do with the parent's marketing efforts. But, either way, at some point the company should be pushing customers to ditch landlines and other older technologies and embrace better solutions. Not because it puts old union guys out of work, but because it's where the market is headed.

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Verizon: US Broadband Is Really Competitive, If You Just Redefine The Market The Way We Want...

from the that-whole-'and-wireless'-bit dept

Almost all of the issues facing broadband in this country (our slow speeds and high prices relative to other countries, questions about "neutrality" and things like customers being forced into broadband tiers) are really symptoms of a lack of significant competition in many markets. Many customers really only have one or two options, neither of which they like (I'm in that camp myself). Yet, the broadband providers want to make everyone believe it's a really competitive market. That's why they've done everything possible to block the FCC from getting accurate data about actual broadband deployments and competition over the years. Their most recent plan has been about pitching the idea of an organization called "Connected Nation" to "map" broadband penetration. However, as has been discussed previously, Connected Nation seems more like a front for the big telcos to try to pretend there's significant competition... and an increasing number of doubts are being raised about Connected Nation's efforts -- even as it seems to remain a darling of DC politicians. However its "mapping" still won't look at house-by-house penetration and competition (by demand from the broadband providers) and the collected data will remain proprietary, rather than open.

Meanwhile, Verizon has put up a video claiming to explain why there's plenty of competition in broadband in the US, but it does so by pulling a neat little trick: rather than defining the market as DSL and cable providers, it dumps wireless providers into the mix... So when you add mobile data providers, yes, there are more players in the space, but that ignores the fact that (1) many of the mobile players and broadband players are actually connected (i.e., AT&T has both, as does Verizon) and (2) that the cellular wireless broadband providers are all greatly limited, and use terms of service that tend to forbid using the data account as a primary connection. In other words, they're not really part of the same market at all.

But, most importantly, the video fails to back up its thesis that the US is "one of the most successful broadband markets in the world." It says there's lots of competition, investment in new technologies and consumers are getting more as prices go down. That suggests there is, in fact, some competition in the market -- a point pretty much everyone agrees on. But it does nothing to compare the US to other markets around the world that have much more competition, much more investment and much greater consumer value per dollar spent. Just saying that because there's some competition, the US is one of the most successful in the world, doesn't back up the thesis at all. It's like saying that you won a baseball game because you fielded nine guys. You forgot about the actual game.

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As Expected, Judge Dismisses Warrantless Wiretapping Lawsuits Against Telcos

from the it's-the-law... dept

This isn't a huge surprise, but a judge has tossed out the ACLU and the EFF's various lawsuits against telcos for enabling warrantless wiretapping for the government. The reason it isn't a huge surprise is that the gov't last year, in a well publicized move, granted the telcos immunity from prosecution, and the judge basically pointed that out in dismissing the case. Instead, the judge said that if these groups have a complaint, it's with the gov't for granting immunity (not to worry, there are lawsuits against the gov't as well). Not surprisingly, the EFF and ACLU are appealing. Still, it does seem like these lawsuits are a longshot, even if it's disappointing. It seems ridiculous that the gov't can grant widespread immunity to a company for potentially breaking the law -- but, again, it seems that's an issue to take up with the government -- and once that's solved, go back and deal with the companies specifically. The judge's job is to interpret the law, and in this case, the law says that the telcos are immune. Now, if you believe (as I do) that such a law is ridiculous and should be seen as unconstitutional, than the issue is to take it up with the government. So, the judge's ruling makes sense, even if it's disappointing to see telcos potentially get off the hook for violating customer privacy rights.

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Long Island Continues To Be The Place To Be For Broadband

from the amazing dept

I left Long Island for Silicon Valley years ago, partly on the assumption that the cooler things were happening here. Yet, when it comes to broadband, that doesn't seem to be the case. I have had rather notorious problems getting broadband at home here over the years, despite living in the heart of Silicon Valley. Where I used to live (until a year and a half ago) I had one single broadband provider who provided absolutely terrible service. Where I am now, I do have two choices, but neither choice is compelling, and my speeds top out about about 1 Mbps. So... consider me a bit jealous of my parents back on Long Island who now have the opportunity to be among the first US homes to have 100 Mbps connections with no caps or meters.

A few years back, we noted how the battle between Cablevision and Verizon on Long Island had turned nasty, involving all sorts of underhanded tricks on both sides, but noted that the end result might actually be good for competitors, as it was one of the rare situations where the two competitors were actually investing in technology to top each other. So, while Verizon is offering FiOS connections, Cablevision is now rolling out those 100 Mbps using DOCSIS 3.0. The fight is still a bit nasty, with Verizon calling Cablevision's announcement nothing more than a parlor trick, but that's misleading itself. Cablevision has, no matter how you look at it, significantly increased the bandwidth available to home users.

Unfortunately, in most other areas (such as right here in the heart of Silicon Valley) it seems the focus is on seeing who can avoid being the "least worst" provider, rather than on pushing the boundaries forward. In a normal market, this would be a huge opportunity for a third provider to come into the market and offer much better service, but thanks to the structure of the broadband market, and quite a bit of regulatory capture, most folks are limited to just two choices. If only they'd start competing on quality like the two choices on Long Island...

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Verizon's Take On Broadband Caps: A Sign Of Competitive Market?

from the hmm...-not-quite dept

Of the broadband providers out there, Verizon has certainly been better than others in terms of actually trying to create a much better product, rather than focusing on ways to just squeeze more for less out of their customers. I've always thought that Verizon made the right move six or seven years ago, when it decided to invest heavily in providing fiber to the home, while other providers said it was too costly. While it was costly, at some point (say: now) it would give Verizon a real leg up on the competition in offering a much better service. While I have plenty of disagreements about some of Verizon's other positions, the company has at least focused on providing value.

So, I was hopeful that when Verizon weighed in on the whole "broadband cap" debate, it would take a much stronger position than simply claiming that broadband caps are a sign of "highly competitive markets with companies trying to come up with more value, innovation and differentiated offerings to help them attract customers." While the discussion does make it clear that Verizon is focused on investing in adding more value, it's a bit disingenuous to claim that the caps are somehow a sign of a competitive market. If anything it's the opposite. The public reaction to the caps shows that the problem is the lack of competition, allowing these providers to move forward with such plans, knowing customers in many cases can't switch to a competitor. Also, it's difficult to see how providing less service for more money is "coming up with more value [and] innovation."

So, Verizon is right to point out (as it does), that it's more focused on providing higher quality service, rather than caps, but it's not being entirely honest in saying that this is a sign of competition. It's not.

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Verizon, Too, Turns To Subsidized Netbooks

from the lock-em-in dept

We've wondered before why mobile operators say they hate the subsidies they pay to discount handset prices, but then expand their use of them to include laptops and netbooks. The trend looks like it's here to stay, as Verizon Wireless has now confirmed it will start selling 3G-equipped netbooks by the end of June, so now, in addition to tying yourself into a 2-year contract where you're paying back the cost of your cell phone, you'll soon be able to tie yourself into a long-term data-service contract to pay back the price of a laptop, too. Of course, once that contract's up, the device will still be locked to the operator from which you bought it, making it difficult (or impossible) to take your business elsewhere. Meanwhile, business is flowing the other direction, too: Dell is reportedly looking to set up a virtual operator in Japan, selling its customers network access on another operator's mobile network to use with their mobile-equipped laptops. It's an interesting contrast in models, because it's unlikely Dell will subsidize the hardware like the operators. Part of the issue with handset subsidies is that consumers are used to paying the lower subsidized prices, and so any change that raises prices will be met with disdain. But people aren't used to the benefit of subsidies for their PCs, so may be more open to paying a higher upfront cost for the hardware if it means they don't have to sign a long-term contract with a high monthly service charge.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Verizon's Claims That Its Info-Sharing Plans Are Harmless Ring Hollow

from the that-which-is-made-not-immediately-full-of-clarity dept

Over the weekend, David Weinberger, one of the co-authors of The Cluetrain Manifesto wrote that he'd gotten a 45-page pamphlet of legalese from Verizon Wireless saying he could opt out of letting the company share "Customer Proprietary Network Information" with other groups. The rather broadly worded statement, which said the company could give info like call records to "affiliates, agents and parent companies," kicked up some fuss online. GigaOM says that this is the same issue that popped up in late 2007, when Verizon sent a similar notice to its customers. Verizon's PR bloggers say that now, just like in 2007, there's nothing to worry about -- in fact, the PR person went so far as to merely cut and paste his comments on the issue from two years ago. He says that Verizon won't sell customer's info to third parties; it just needs their consent to share it among the Verizon group of companies so it can offer people bundled services.

Given the way the company is communicating the issue -- a bill insert few people will likely pay attention to, written in a format that's pretty difficult, if not impossible, for most average people to divine any real meaning from -- it's hard to accept the explanation at face value. This is representative of the lack of transparency telcos and ISPs often take on privacy issues. Instead of clearly explaining themselves and what they're doing with customer data, they shroud their efforts in secrecy and legalese, then just say "there's nothing to worry about, just move along." If there really is nothing to worry about, why can't they do a better job of making that clear to the public? Their method of communication, and the way they explain themselves, simply increases consumers' skepticism and makes it look like they've got something to hide. In addition, making the system opt-out, rather than opt-in, doesn't help either.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Dear ISPs: When Launching Value Added Services, How About Actually Adding Value?

from the just-a-suggestion dept

At the beginning of January, I thought it was amusing that Verizon was launching its own backup service for a stunning $31/month (with a limit of 50GB of backup storage). That seemed fairly ridiculous, given that you could get an unlimited backup service from Carbonite or Mozy for $5/month, or using JungleDisk with Amazon's S3 for exceptionally low prices as well (depending on how much you use -- but 50GB comes in at way less than $31). Now comes the news that Comcast is also launching its own backup service, with a few different price points, but starting at $5/month for only 10GB and going up from there. It's not a bad service to offer -- and, surely, Verizon and Comcast see these as ways to lock in consumers, since it now has possession of their backup data -- but it seems quite odd that these companies would offer "value added services" where the prices are more expensive than rolling your own, which doesn't come with the lock-in. And, as noted, with Comcast, using the service counts against their new broadband caps, so there isn't even a benefit there. These ISPs seem to be missing the point of these value added services. If you want to get people to use them, they should actually add value.

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Can't Compete? Sue For Patent Infringement!

from the it's-easier! dept

It happens over and over again... if you can't innovate to compete, why not litigate to compete? Broadband Reports points out that Charter Communications is now suing Verizon for patent infringement relating to Verizon's FiOS fiber optic internet connections. The article makes it pretty clear this has nothing to do with any "stolen" technology, and everything to do with Charter not wanting to have to compete with Verizon's faster fiber optic offering. Progress, just the way Jefferson intended, right?

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No One Can Find ISPs Who Have Agreed To RIAA's 3 Strikes Plan

from the keep-looking dept

It's been a few weeks since the WSJ announced that the RIAA was supposedly dropping its lawsuit strategy, in favor of a backroom deal with ISPs, negotiated under dubious circumstances by NY's Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, whereby those ISPs would start cutting off connections from those accused (not found guilty) of file sharing. However, since then, we've heard from a variety of ISPs who don't like the plan, and Wired went on a wild goose chase trying to find a single major ISP that has agreed to the plan and came up empty. Of course, most of them refused to comment. The only one who said anything straight up was Verizon -- who had earlier confirmed that it had no interest in doing a deal with the RIAA. The big cable companies and AT&T have shown some interest in the past -- but now refuse to admit that an agreement has been worked out.

The big question is why?

If this is such a great deal for consumers, as Cuomo and the RIAA insist, then why wouldn't an ISP want to step right up and proudly admit to such a deal? Obviously, it's because they know that such a deal is a sham, based on no legal reasoning, that will harm their position in the market and piss off customers. The RIAA will likely claim that no deals have been announced because the details haven't been finalized -- but again, that makes no sense. We've been questioning from the beginning why these negotiations haven't been more open. And with record labels like Warner Music and EMI insisting that they want to be seen as more open and willing to hold a "conversation" with critics, the fact that no one will talk openly about this backroom deal shows what a bunch of liars they are again. They don't want an open conversation. They want the government and ISPs to protect their business model, and they've convinced Andrew Cuomo to fall for it.

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Some ISPs Push Back On RIAA Plan

from the good-for-them dept

While there was big news on Friday concerning the RIAA's supposed plan to stop suing everyone in favor of having ISPs police networks for the RIAA, it seems that some ISPs are clearly not on board with the plan (and, in fact, the details of the plan seem rather lacking). News.com has the story of one smaller ISP that has been responding to every RIAA notification by sending a request back for a billing address where he can send an invoice for the time it takes to respond to takedown requests. For the most part, the RIAA simply ignores these responses, though in some cases its representatives seem to feign ignorance, claiming "In regards to billing, we fail to understand what you mean with that!"

At the same time, it appears that Verizon is one large ISP refusing to cooperate. This is not really that surprising, given that Verizon was really the only major ISP to stand up to the RIAA's original campaign of demanding the identity associated with IP addresses without first filing a lawsuit (the end result of which was the RIAA's filing large lawsuits against multiple "john and jane does" in order to get the names). Verizon has also pushed back in the past when other big ISPs like AT&T seemed willing to act as copyright cops for the RIAA.

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Cable Companies Figuring Out Their Wireless Strategies: Add Value To The Core Offering

from the seems-smart dept

While the cable companies have long had trouble coming up with a good wireless strategy (including numerous false starts) it looks like some may be figuring this out, in setting up business models where the wireless acts as a free value-add that keeps customers tied to their core, profitable businesses. For example, the article discusses Cablevision:

As such, Moffett likes Cablevision's WiFi strategy because it serves as a value-added service for its customers, and it's cheap to roll out. Moreover, Cablevision is pitted against Verizon in New York, and Verizon can't match the free WiFi offering.

"Their model is to pay for the WiFi network by, well, giving it away," Moffett said. "The $300 million of capital spending required to build it, and the modest operating costs to run it, can be paid for with just a small uplift in market share--either gained or retained--in their wired broadband service. At an ARPU of $35 per month and 80 percent contribution margins for wired broadband, it would take only 160,000 incremental subscribers--just 3.6 percent share of their cable footprint--to earn a 10 percent return on investment."

This is interesting for a few reasons. First, it shows yet another case where a company realizes that even if the initial costs are huge, if the marginal costs are low, and the "free" product better ties customers to a scarce product, it can make sense to give the other product away. So, yes, once again, there can be a good ROI on a "free" product -- even one that costs $300 million to roll out.

Of course, what may be even more noteworthy is the comment about how "Verizon can't match the free WiFi offering." That's quite amusing, because, five years ago, Verizon started implementing a plan to... offer free WiFi to Verizon DSL customers in NY. And, the plan wasn't even that expensive, because it made use of all the Verizon telephone booths that were already installed. In fact, the plan was seen as a pretty big success, responsible for reducing customer churn in such a way that more than paid for the service (exactly as the analyst is predicting will happen with Cablevision's offering). Yet, the bigwigs at Verizon still decided to kill the program, because, for reasons that still escape us, some execs were worried that it would compete with Verizon Wireless' EV-DO cellular wireless offering. Wonder if they regret that decision now?

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FCC Just Couldn't Stop Voting

from the election-day-festivities dept

Well, it's election day and apparently the FCC commissioners liked voting so much they took votes on just about everything. Amazingly, it looks like they even made some good decisions. The big one, of course, and the one that will get the most press, is the unanimous vote to free up television "white space" spectrum. While the NAB made a last ditch effort to stop this, the FCC made the right call here. This spectrum can be put to much better use, which can have a huge impact on increasing innovation and wireless technologies. This is a big win. The FCC also approved Sprint and Clearwire's deal to set up a joint venture for their WiMax operations, as well as allowing Verizon to buy Alltel. Both of those deals make sense as well, so it's good to see them approved.

Other than that, the FCC said that it's going to start looking into the pricing policies of cable companies... and Verizon. Who's missing? FCC boss Kevin Martin's best friends over at AT&T. To be honest, while it's quite likely that the cable companies and the telcos (yes, including AT&T) are abusing their oligopoly position, the answer shouldn't be having the FCC act as a watchdog over pricing policies, but for a better system to be set up that encourages real competition. In the meantime, though, can someone explain why AT&T was left out of the bunch?

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Dear Verizon: I Haven't Been An MCI Customer In Four Years

from the customer-service dept

About five or six years ago, I had landline phone service from MCI. In the age before VoIP was common, MCI had a service called "The Neighborhood" which was like many VoIP services today, but without the VoIP part. Unlimited calls for a single flat rate and such advanced (at the time!) features as emailing you your voicemails. It wasn't a bad deal, and I used it for a year or two, until I was getting ready to move. VoIP services had become popular, so I transferred that phone line to a VoIP account and canceled the MCI service in 2004. And that was that. Or so I thought. In 2006, Verizon bought what was left of a scandal-ridden MCI, and as far as I knew, the MCI brand had pretty much gone away.

Yet, in the last couple of weeks, I've received a barrage of robocalls from MCI, letting me know that my credit card is expiring, and I need to log into mci.com to update the card. The call notes that my bill is automatically charged to this credit card and if I want to "continue enjoying this convenience" I need to update soon. The call is correct in that the credit card I used back when I had MCI expired this month, but is it that hard for Verizon (or whoever it is) to recognize that the very phone number they're calling me on hasn't been connected to MCI service in four years and that the company has not, in fact, billed me during that time? And, honestly, why did they hang onto my credit card info for so long? And, finally, why call me three times a day with no way for me to tell them to knock if off? I thought perhaps this was a new form of phishing, but the call directs you to log into mci.com itself, so it sounds like it's legit. Either way, it raises plenty of questions about MCI (and now Verizon's) data handling practices.

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Is Public Shame Enough To Keep ISPs From Doing Bad Stuff With Your Data?

from the not-if-no-one-knows-what's-going-on dept

While there has been a lot of attention paid recently to ISPs using clickstream tracking to provide targeted ads, it seems that many people are still focused on the activities of the ad companies, such as NebuAd, which garnered some attention from Congress for its offering. However, as we pointed out recently, many ISPs have been selling your clickstream data to others for years without people knowing about it. Now, with Congress threatening to put regulations in place, the various ISPs are scrambling to push back against that possibility.

For example, Broadband Reports points out that Verizon is claiming that the chance of a public shaming will keep the company honest. While it's certainly true that a public shaming is a risk, it's also true that the sale of clickstream data is usually kept entirely secret, which would preclude any sort of public shaming. Public shaming could work if the companies were upfront and honest with how they're using data. But, since they're not, it's difficult to see how that works as a self-regulating mechanism.

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Verizon Gets Smacked Down For Its VoIP Patent Suing Spree

from the so-much-for-whacking-cable-competitors dept

Verizon was one of the last players to the VoIP party. Cable companies had been offering VoIP for years, and then Vonage, AT&T and a variety of other startups really built the market before Verizon even bothered to enter the space with an overpriced, uninspiring "me too" product that the market made clear it didn't want. Yet, somehow, Verizon was able to get some patents on the technology, despite a ton of rather clear prior art that showed Verizon's patents should never have been granted.

So, with those patents, Verizon began suing -- and it started with the lame duck in the VoIP space: Vonage. The company has been struggling for a variety of reasons, and a bunch of patent holders swept in to sue the firm that actually made VoIP a viable product in the market. Vonage came under massive pressure from shareholders to get rid of these lawsuits, so it settled rather than deal with a lengthy court room battle.

Verizon interpreted this as a validation of its patents and set off to find others to sue. Its next target was Cox Cable for its digital telephony solution. The plan was clear. After beating Cox, it would turn its legal guns on the big boys like Comcast and Time Warner. Except, it appears the courts have tossed a wrench into those plans by siding with Cox in pointing out that the company doesn't violate Verizon's patents. While Verizon will most likely appeal, this should be seen as a pretty big win for Time Warner Cable and Comcast, who may not even have to defend themselves against Verizon's questionable patent claims at all.

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Plenty Of Broadband Providers Pretending They're Offering Fiber To The Home

from the false-advertising dept

Earlier this year, we wrote about Verizon suing Time Warner Cable over a misleading advertisement, where Time Warner Cable claims that Verizon is "catching up" to Time Warner Cable in offering fiber optics. This is misleading, at best. Verizon is installing fiber to the home with its FiOS service, providing significantly faster connections. What Time Warner Cable is claiming is that it uses fiber in its network, not to the home. It's true that TWC and plenty of other broadband providers have used hybrid fiber solutions at the network level for many years, but that's totally different than connecting all the way to the home with a fiber optic connection.

Now it turns out that TWC is hardly the only broadband provider doing this. Apparently lots of broadband providers are now running ads against Verizon where they claim that they've offered fiber for longer than Verizon. That's totally misleading. Having fiber somewhere in the network is not at all an equal comparison to running fiber all the way to the home. As Broadband Reports asks, it's difficult to see how these claims from others isn't false advertising. They're clearly implying that their fiber is the same thing as FiOS when that's not true at all.

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