"Power struggle pits utility, BellSouth"

The Picayune notices something is going on across basin. The story is generic and, for an initial overview, not bad.

Some parts they get right in Power struggle pits utility, BellSouth:

"The skirmish in Lafayette is part of a larger battle being waged nationwide between the nation's biggest phone and cable companies that traditionally have dominated the telecommunications market and power utilities."

Other parts they get not so right. But those are the sorts of things most reporters new to the story gets wrong.

The reporter apparently mistakenly understands deregulation--which has been the real project of the last 10 years--as a way of "breaking down the barriers that for decades prevented power, telephone and cable monopolies from competing against each other." That may have been the intent of some but it didn't happen. Competition has just barely begun with Verizon's FIOS and has little to do, unfortunately, with deregulation and everything to do with the cable and telephone monopolies converging on a single digital network architecture centered on fiber optics. The author further misunderstands "breaking down of barriers" as being the same as 'Dismantling monopolies" In truth not all of the deregulation has lead to increased competition (Ask Eatel or ATT). Much of the FCC decisions have, in fact, strengthened the monopolies' ability to prevent competition over their own ever more secure monopoly networks in the vain hope that each move to return monopoly control of their networks would finally lead to enough confidence to induce competition.

No, the convergence on a single network model doesn't change the monopoly nature of either of their network enterprises. It just means that as they converge the battle over which will die and which will live on as a single monopoly has to begin. And at the end the competition which was structurally inevitable as a result of convergence will vanish and this time we'll be left with only one natural monopoly instead of two. But with no remaining effective regulation.

Technology cannot save us from elementary economics, as Powell at the FCC (and certain local dullards) so fervently hope. Even Business Week has begun to understand that in natural monopoly situations regulation is necessary.

Or public ownership. The LUS model. There will be a few communities that won't end up at the mercy of whichever private telecom survives the battle to come. And those will be places that own their own infrastructure. That's where the real story is.

"Getting Real At The FCC"

You have to suspect that something is happening out in this country when the editorials at venerable (and notably conservative) newspapers like the USAToday and Business Week start to notice that the telecom monopolies are bad for America and bad for business. (The local chamber might take note.) In the latest instance Business Week inks: "Commentary: Getting Real At The FCC."

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) which regulates telecommunications in the United States and is charged with making sure that natural monopolies that dominate that realm act in the best interest of the country and its people. Business Week believes that under outgoing chairman Powell the balance has swung too far towards the monopolists at the expense of the competition that funds both growth and fair pricing.

"as the agency wrestles with the issues raised by these dazzling [new technological] developments, its new chairman must avoid the trap into which Powell fell: He came to hold an unshakable belief that technological advances would sweep aside the necessity for regulation."

This sort of ideological idealism is simply at odds with conditions in the real world and Business Week recognizes it.

The commentary moves through media consolidation, universal service issues, digital TV spectrum, and forcing the Cablecos' (and the Bells should be included) to not discriminate against services carried over IP that compete with services they offer (such as VOIP Quality of Service Issues). The conclusion: there's still a lot of need for regulation. It's very gratifying to see that at least one national reporter has done his homework. The final sentence serves as well to end this post as it does to end the commentary:

Maybe one day, a sufficient number of new technologies will compete vigorously enough with one another that the FCC will be free to step aside. But for now, the regulatory hand is still needed to ensure a smooth transition to that future.

Lafayette Chamber Declines to Oppose Self-Reliance

The Lafayette Chamber of Commerce has issued a new position paper, Public vs. Private Sector Investmen (PDF), that joins its earlier Broadband Position Statement (Word doc) to flesh out previously unknown category of public position statements: The "We are gratified to announce that we do not condemn that which we should endorse."

It comes in 5 clauses marked by roman numerals for which, even though they are not in Latin, translation into standard English may prove useful and efficient:

1. Private is good.
2. Public support of private companies is good provided that the benefit is of the sort that can be measured, that outside people think its worthwhile, and the company can make good money.
3. It's ok to give money to private companies and it is ok for public entities to partner with private ones.
4. If private companies won't do it then the people can do it for themselves.

Between this document and the Broadband document the good news is that the Chamber is taking the stalwart position that it will not actively and as a matter of principle oppose Lafayette's Fiber For the Future Initiative.

What it does not exemplify is community spirit, rational self-interest, or leadership.

Community Spirit: Building a true broadband network is the development opportunity of a lifetime--or several. There is no single investment in ourselves more likely to propel Lafayette and her people from game players in the middle of the pack to clear and proud leaders. A cheap, high-quality telecom sector can serve to equalize opportunity between this community's haves and have nots. It's sad that community spirit alone is not enough to move the chamber.

Rational Self-interest: The people in the community that are most likely to benefit first and most directly are local business (new and not yet formed) that will get cheap bandwidth on our version of information super highway that will equal the resources available to the worlds largest corporations at a tiny fraction of the cost. It is our businesses (as opposed to Atlanta's) that are bearing the brunt of what MIke correctly calls the "Incumbent Bandwidth Tax:" that additional cost that locals pay for being in Lafayette that their competitors, headquartered in places where big broadband is available less expensively, do not pay. It's sad that the "leadership" cannot see what the benefit of cheap fiber to every corner of this town could mean for local businesses.

Leadership: I do not believe that many, no most, of the chamber membership doesn't get this--or couldn't be easily lead to see what is so clear and so much a part of their business life. The failure is at the leadership level where there appears to be an unwillingness to risk power and position in pursuit of what is right for the community in the face of the few, who ideologically or through personal ties and ambitions, are committed to the cause of corporations that do not care about Lafayette or her people. The problem here is that while folks may believe that they are preserving power and position for later use the truth is that influence unexercised atrophies. Use it or lose it. Exercise makes not only muscles stronger. The chamber may emerge from this without offending any fraction of it membership only to discover that the community no longer believes it can count on the chamber for leadership that puts the community first. Leadership is a precious commodity in any community; it is sad to see it squandered on mere personal self-interest.

All that said, there is a part of me that is gratified for anything I can get from this quarter and the assurance that LUS and the City will not be blindsided by Picard's Chamber is substantial comfort.

And that is the saddest comment of all.

Has BellSouth Been Helping Spy on Your Email?

Friday's a good day for catching up on things. One very interesting development on the national scene recently has been the scandal over warrantless spying on Americans by the current administration and whether or not it could be justified.

That may have sounded a little familiar to readers that recall local fiber disputes. During the fiber referendum one of the sillier things that opponents brought up was a baseless fear that the local government would spy on you. The retort at the time was that LCG wasn't the level of govt. to worry about--that Joey showed no interest but the feds certainly had. Recent developments have proven that retort pretty insightful--and have implicated our phone companies. From O'Reilly:

All the warrantless wiretapping we've recently heard about required help from the telephone companies and Internet service providers. These companies knew they were not only aiding the government in breaking the law, but were themselves violating terms of service for their customers--and in the case of telephone companies, also breaking the law. One law mentioned at the public form (and submitted years ago by the forum's moderator, Congressman Ed Markey) forbids cell phone companies from revealing the location of cell phone users--except with a court warrant.

In fact, the NSA wiretapping scandal represents one of the largest conspiracies in recent years: a conspiracy between telephone companies and the government to defraud Americans out of our Fourth Amendment rights.

What didn't occur to any at the time of the referendum, but is now clear, was that in order for the Federales to spy on you they would need at least the tacit assistance of the Bells who own and maintain the big trunk lines headed across the country and overseas. What's come out recently, in dribs and drabs is that "tacit" wasn't needed: the Bells are willing to hand you over without qualm--or warrant. Mostly this has come to light through two avenues. First universities, over whose servers and trunks internet based traffic escapes the Bell networks, have put up the resistance that the Bells didn't citing old-fashioned, academic things like "illegal," "warrantless," and "the freedom of speech." The universities have been given, point blank, the old childhood excuse: "Everybody does it." Being a tad more mature, the universities aren't buying that schoolboy excuse. The second avenue, of course, has been the recent scandal that caused a few reporters to go back to those odd, underreported remarks by universities.

The administration has said that surveillance has been limited. Unfortunately, given the technologies involved, that's simply not possible. The decentralized nature of the internet, nonserial flow of packets, and the inclusion of encrypted data makes massive data mining--winnowing through all those packets the only practical way to pull coherent data out of the net. You have to look at 'em all to get to the ones you want. Targeted warrants are pretty hard to execute in the real world. There is just too much to examine. The easiest way to make the flow more manageable is to cut back what you examine--to, for instance, all of the data flowing out of the country. To do that efficiently the best bet is to have access to the Bell switches routing traffic outbound. They know where that data is coming from and so federal agents wouldn't, for instance, try and puzzle out encrypted data from the banks or calls originating and terminating overseas. Stories have made it clear that international traffic originating or terminating in the US is what is being spied upon without warrant. From an article in the Chicago Tribune:

The decentralized nature of the Internet and the multiplicity of ways to communicate further complicate the task of wholesale eavesdropping, said Daniel Berninger, a communications analyst with Tier 1 Research.

By focusing on traffic that leaves the country, government agents can tap into optical fiber lines that are buried on the oceans and on radio signals bounced off satellites in space, Berninger said.

This provides some identifiable "choke points" where communications enter and leave the country, he said, providing an easier task than trying to randomly monitor domestic traffic that flows on the Internet in all directions around the country, he said...

Looking at data such as which phone numbers are called from which numbers can provide a lot of useful information, said Paul Bradley, a consultant with Apollo Data Technologies LLC, a Chicago-based data mining software firm.

The revelation that the Bells handed over your privacy without a murmur merely give us another reason to favor having local people, answerable to local concerns is preferable to the current setup in which the corporations are effectively accountable to no one but a few buddy-buddy federal bureaucrats. Most certainly they feel no necessity to respect their customers.

If it makes life a little easier for the big corporation to give the feds warrantless, baseless access to your phone and DSL switches, well why not? Who, that the phone companies care about, cares? Surely not the FCC. Just about the only people in this country who can effect your bottom line are in the federal government. Why not please 'em?

I say we are better off trusting local institutions; especially municipalities that have to operate under the glare of Open Access laws. After all, public universities is where this story first started to surface. As the O'Reilly article points out:

One might argue that the pressure would have been even stronger if ISPs and phone companies were smaller, but size obviously hasn't helped them put up any resistance. Believe me, if we had an industry of scrappy Mom-and-Pop providers like in the 80s and 90s, word about this civil liberties horror would have come out sooner.

The Chamber's Silence on the LUS Project — Hoisted on their own Picard?

The Independent's cover story last week was on the leadership transition taking place at the Greater Lafayette Chamber of Commerce.

But, Tyrone Picard taking the helm of the Chamber has significant implications for the ability of the organization to take a position on the LUS fiber project. The Chamber may pride itself in taking a leadership role on important issues in this community but, as an employee of Acadiana Ambulance, it will be interesting to see whether the interests of Picard's employer will trump the community interest in getting the LUS fiber project built.

What's Acadian Ambulance got to do with the LUS project? Well, Acadian Ambulance is a major customer of BellSouth's and Acadian's Richard Zuchslag is rumored to hold a substantial number of shares of BellSouth stock, and to have long pined for a seat on BellSouth's board.

Zuchslag surrounded himself with BellSouth higher-ups at his DC Mardi Gras Ball reign, according to these photographs from The Advertiser. Guess it's just a coincidence that about the only photo without a BellSouth rep in it was the one with Mayor-President Joey Durel!

Now, because Picard serves as corporate counsel for Acadian, BellSouth has, in effect, a proxy seat on the Chamber's board — even though BellSouth is no longer a member of the Lafayette Chamber.

If the Chamber couldn't bring itself to address the LUS issue when Gary McGoffin was heading the group last year, it's difficult to imagine how they'll muster the leadership to come forward on this issue this year with a staunch BellSouth ally leading the group.

The Chamber's silence on this issue is deafening.

The LUS fiber project is the single most important economic development initiative to be introduced into this community in at least 50 years (since the Oil Center) and quite possibly 100 (since LUS it self was created in the late 19th century).

Every day that Cox and BellSouth are allowed to continue their duopoly, Lafayette businesses and consumers pay more for bandwidth than their counterparts in larger cities in the service areas of either company. This is the bandwidth tax that Lafayette pays as the cost of subservience to the corporate interests in Atlanta.

The LUS project will bring direct economic benefits to EVERY business in Lafayette by driving down the cost of bandwidth. Once the LUS project is built out, businesses in Lafayette will pay less for more bandwidth than either Cox or BellSouth make available for their best customers anywhere in their respective service areas. How can this be? Well, LUS is going to make 100 megabits per second network capacity available to every business and residential customer. Neither BellSouth nor Cox can deliver that capacity now any where in Louisiana and, likely only in a handful of places in the entire operation of either company.

What this means is that the LUS fiber project will give incredible competitive advantage in the form of lower operating costs to any company that relies on the Internet to connect to suppliers and customers. In other words, it will be cheaper for any company that plans to be successful in the 21st Century (that is, depend on the flow of information between customers and suppliers) to do business in Lafayette than just about any other place in the country.

And, still the Chamber remains silent.

A few weeks ago, I found a quote from a famous American that, if you substitute "organization" for "man," applies here. Here's the quote:

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in times of comfort and convenience, but where he stands in times of challenge and controversy."*

Now is a time of controversy in Lafayette. The Chamber would have us believe that they are leaders in this community. Leaders take stances.

Where does the Chamber stand on the LUS fiber project?

Will the Chamber have the courage to standup for the small and medium size businesses in this community who will be prime beneficiaries of the LUS project? Or are they hoisted on their own Picard?**


* Rev. Martin Luther King
** OK, it's a pun on "Hoisted on their own Petard."

DC BS BS*

Truth is not only the first casualty in war, it is apparently also the first casualty when telecom execs talk to Louisiana business and political leaders.

The Lafayette Daily Advertiser carried a story in Saturday's paper on the economic development lunch that is part of the annual Louisiana Mardi Gras function in our nation's capitol.

While The Advertiser included only a few quotes from BellSouth Chairman Duane Ackerman in its story, let's analyze them to determine if the BS in BellSouth does, in fact, flow from the top.

Paragraph one:

WASHINGTON - BellSouth Chairman Duane Ackerman urged Louisiana's leaders Friday to avoid ignoring the state's established businesses in a push to attract new companies to the state.

While there is no quote here, if The Advertiser's Gannett reporter accurately captured the flavor of Ackerman's speech, it's safe to say that "the state's established businesses" would include things like incumbent telephone companies — even struggling Regional Bell Operating Companies. Ackerman, whose company is writhing under a market assault in Louisiana by Cox, didn't plead for help, but one can imagine that there's some behind-closed-door whining going on to state government officials that Lil' Ole BellSouth might be in a hell of a jam if the State of Louisiana decided to actually demand state-of-the-art services from its telecom vendors.

Paragraph two:

Speaking at an economic development lunch as part of the 58th annual Louisiana Mardi Gras in Washington, Ackerman said the state stands at a crucial point in its development as it seeks the right balance between tradition and transformation in working to build a strong future for state residents.

Ah, "the right balance between tradition and transformation"! Damned! I think Duane is actually pleading for state leaders to continue to allow BellSouth to levy what amounts to a bandwidth tax on Louisiana businesses and consumers. That "tax," in the form of high bandwidth charges over old infrastructure is being used to fund BellSouth service upgrades in other states and ventures such as paying for the company's share of the Cingular buyout of AT&T Wireless. In essence, Ackerman is saying 'stick with us and we'll keep you in the minor leagues.' Sounds like the recipe for mediocrity one might expect from one who rose through the ranks of a bureaucracy. Good advice for corporate ladder-climbers. Bad advice for states looking to shake their economic doldrums.

Paragraph three:

Ackerman called on the state's business, civic and elected leaders to take a new look at the old rules that govern existing businesses and to help eliminate regulation where customers have choices and where costs outweigh benefits.

Absolute HYPOCRISY!!! Recall, dear readers, that it was Ackerman's BellSouth that ran to the Louisiana Legislature seeking to prevent municipalities like Lafayette from getting into the telecommunications business. That was a blatant attempt to stifle competition. In the Orwellian parlance of corporate America, the bill came out being called the Municipal Fair Competition Act, after much strenuous lobbying on behalf of Lafayette and other municipalities, but the intent was to stifle competition.

This is consistent with BellSouth's long struggle to prevent consumers in Louisiana and other states in its service area since passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. BellSouth resisted orders to open its network to competitors, refused to pay money owed CLECs who were hosting Internet Service Providers, and is today refusing to invest in advanced DSL technology because DSL runs over copper elements of its network and doing so would require BellSouth to give competitors access to that portion of their network.

So, the notion of BellSouth as a defender of the rights of choice for consumers is laughable. About the only people who believe that are their local partners in opposition to progress, DULL. But, no one with any knowledge of the telecommunications industry believes it.

Paragraph four:

Ackerman used the communications industry as an example of a situation where technology has outpaced policy and where regulation is hurting.

This is clearly wrong. The Bells have won the right to exclude competitors from their new network infrastructure investments, specifically, fiber. Now, if Ackerman is saying that requiring the Bells to keep their copper networks open to competitors, he's asking to kill the v very competition he was praising (hypocritically, of course) a paragraph earlier. See, what Ackerman and his RBOC cohorts have been fighting for since the passage of the past nine years is for a return of their monopoly status, albeit under the name of "competition." That is, they want to require any potential competitor to be required to build their own networks fresh out of the box. The Bells, it must be noted, built those copper networks when they in fact operated as regulated monopolies. Since the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, this mantra of the Bells to keep competitors off their networks has taken on the air of the guy who was born on third base and claimed to have it a triple.

Paragraph five:

"That disconnect between policy and reality has very real consequences for communities in Louisiana and around the nation," he said. "In an area of rapid technological change, can government really meet the needs of consumers better than private industry?"

Oh, Jeez! Does this guy have no shame? Uh, NO! The fact is that technology is evolving rapidly, but the one constant over the past decade has been the fact that fiber optics have been recognized as the infrastructure of choice, the infrastructure that will not become obsolete. Look at where BellSouth and the other RBOCs and telecom companies in other countries are putting their infrastructure dollars in the communities and projects they most value: fiber optic lines.

What has happened with BellSouth is that technology has outstripped its wallet. If BellSouth had spent as much money on technology as it's spent on lawyers and lobbyists over the past nine years, they'd have better technology in the field. But, BellSouth is a monopolist at heart. It's never been about delivering value to customers. It's all about responding to the corporate vision.

The United States ranks 14th in the world in broadband network penetration. The RBOCs and the cable companies have had control over their corporate investment decisions during the past nine years when that slide has taken place. Rather than invest in new technology, the phone companies invested in buying other phone companies. Rather than deploy new networks, the phone companies spent their time and effort in the courts fighting regulations designed to enhance competition. Rather than innovate, the phone companies preferred to litigate. As a result, cable companies like Cox are poised to eat the lunch of companies like BellSouth because they have been investing in their infrastructure.

The notion that municipal entry is a significant concern to BellSouth is a reflection on just how poorly the company has managed its infrastructure investments. BellSouth's real threat in Louisiana is Cox. The fact that BellSouth chooses not to invest in new infrastructure here explains both why Cox will become the dominant provider of voice, data and video in South Louisiana, but also why municipalities like Lafayette feel compelled to make their own investments in fiber optic networks — essentially, if they don't do it, no one else will.

Paragraph six:

Commending the state for providing tax incentives to new businesses, Ackerman asked that Louisiana not lose sight of the companies that are already there.

Translation: "Even though we're not investing any significant dollars here, don't forget that we've contributed to many political campaigns in the past and — if you roll over and do what we want — we might make some more contributions in the future." Shameful!

Paragraph seven:

"Give all companies incentives to invest," he said. "And, most fundamentally, let us trust the marketplace. That trust has made this country the most prosperous and technologically advanced on the planet."

The incentives Ackerman wants is to either regulate or legislate competition out of the marketplace. Either one will do.

"[T]rust the marketplace"??!!!?? Don't do what we do, do what we say. Ignore that monopolist behind the curtain. The record declares emphatically that BellSouth has NEVER trusted the marketplace. In fact, whenever given the opportunity to trust the market, BellSouth has refused to do so, and instead has resorted to lawsuits to resist being forced to do so.

Well, it's Washington. It's Mardi Gras. The truth, apparently, was not invited.

•* District of Columbia BellSouth Bullshit.

Austin Envy Reversed? The New Tech/Music Center Emerges

It has become habitual for folks around the country to envy Austin as a bastion of clean, enlightened, info-age development with a really exciting ethnic music scene. Baton Rouge, in particular, has a bad case of Austin Envy with multiple visits to the city to study their successes over the years. A "young" reform group even calls itself "Austin 6." (A decisions which seems surpassingly strange on only short reflection.) But it seems that some in Austin might have caught a case of Lafayette envy. Read on.

It's welcome to see, even in the midst of ongoing obstructionism, that out of state companies are begining to make their decisions based on Lafayette's potential and its anticipated fiber-optic infrastructure. The Advocate notes that Austin-based Ninjaneering is making a move into Lafayette that UL and the city hope will become the basis for a thriving computer gaming industry in the city. The company has inked a contract with UL that will offer opportunities--while they are in Lafayette--to UL students. With fiber coming in there is no reason that those students will ever need to leave. The bandwidth will be here to move the required enourmous files around with ease. In fact the bandneck bottleneck won't be in Lafayette or on the nation's fiber backbone. It will be in Austin. (You like good music? Why not move to Lafayette?)

Part of the attraction of Lafayette is the plan of the Lafayette Utilities System to install a fiber-optic network, Zuzolo said.

'It interests us greatly,' he said of the plan. 'Lafayette is going to have the network and the pipeline for content. We have to make sure that, where ever we go, we have the infrastructure.'

.....The fact that LUS, which is owned by the people, is laying the fiber is "huge" for Lafayette, Zuzolo said.

"It's a great asset for the community, and it fits well with the goals we have, in helping business develop around the game industry," Zuzolo said.

It's great for folks outside our community to see the potential of what we are doing here--and sensible for them to move in to begin to take advantage of it.

To return the favor it's worthwhile to explicitly notice the power and potential of computer gaming. The Advocate story does a good job of that but the basic point could stand a little sharpening for our readership: Computer gaming is already, in terms of consumer dollars spent bigger than movies and music combined. Computer gaming has driven the computer industry, hardware and software for the last several generations of chipsets, operating systems, networking architectures, and graphics rendering engines. What NASA's space program was to technology in the 70's, producing everything from teflon to the technology behind areodynamic cars, gaming has proven to be for the digital age.Quite simply to be on the cutting edge of gaming technology is to be on the cutting edge of digital technology. It is where all the most advanced work comes together.

Make no mistake, this is not about "just games." It's about being out in front...which is exactly where we want to be.

Quick Update 2:30--MY BAD--The Advertiser also has a good article on this story: "Game maker courts UL," and I missed it on my first pass through the paper and Jordan Hernandez and the Advertiser deserve credit. It fills out the tale by noting the relationship to the new undergraduate curriculum in video game design and development and by linking in ATIC and LONI. The best pull qoute is the closing paragraph:

"Expanding is a distinct possibility. We'd love to open a Ninjaneering Lafayette. We'd really like for the students to have somewhere here that they can practice what they're learning and certainly the last thing you want is for the students to go to Boston or New York or San Francisco to find work," he said. "Ideally, you'd want students interested in it getting their education here, making games here and then breaking into entrepreneurship and starting a game design company here."

That's the whole point. Always has been.

The Lucky Cowboy Chronicles: Loneliness, Learning & Lafayette

The Advertiser runs today a nifty personality piece (or perhaps I should say a nifty dual personality piece --read the story) whose hook is the plan of Firefly Digital's Mike Spears to take some time off to feed his adventurous side by walking the Appalachian Trail.

Of most interest to me, though was the educational framework that wraps around the event. The plan is for this to be a connected solitary adventure. As Spears walks those lonely trails folks will, for instance, be able to monitor his heartbeat from the (really cool) Lucky Cowboy site. (One can imagine one day's Burning Question: "Is Lucky Cowboy up to making it over the saddle tomorrow? Today's vitals indicate.....LC addresses the issue in tonight's blog entry.) As much fun as that is, and as much use as I can imagine classroom teacher's making of the adventure, the fuller story includes the backend content developers of the website, Academy of Information Technology at Carencro High School:

Becnel and academy co-director Joel Hilbun will form a team of students to research, write and implement the Appalachian Trail content for the Web site. Students will compete for positions of student CEO, managing editor, graphic designers and more, Becnel said.

The Academy, from a quick look at its website, appears to go considerably beyond just being a schoolish way to get a leg up on IT work. After putting on my old "Professor of Educational Theory and Technology" hat I have to say that it looks like they've got a good handle on what I believe will prove to be the upcoming next round of crucial educational issues: project-based, activity-oriented education based on students developing useful solutions real problems.

(Wouldn't it be something if Lafayette Parish could get a reputation for being ahead of the curve with progressive projects like LUS' fiber optic telecom utility, an aggressive program of of lowering class sizes, and the Carencro Tech Academy's advanced curriculum all building (and contributing to each other) at the same time?)

The project will be the seed for a larger Appalachian Trail Encyclopedia with a permanent home on the Appalachian Trails Website. What the students do will have a real use and a long life. It's hard to get more useful than that.

This has got to be a great model for what we all want to see result from the gumbo of Acadiana's ethnicities, the arts, technology, bandwidth, and education. Geaux!

Fabulous snakeoil: Durel in the Snakepit

First found over at Doug's (from the Indpendent) but too fabulous not to get maximum circulation:



Ok people, which one is BellSouth and which one Cox? Votes? (Now there is something that demands a vote.)

"Wolf in the Bayou" - BellSouth and Lafayette continue feud

Whew! Broadband Reports, the largest national broadband information clearing house has a discussion string going that is focused on BellSouth's little betrayal here in Lafayette. Apparently it is isn't only folks down here who get hot about incumbent deceit.

Also, a very healthy representation of locals is spending time blasting BellSouth. Perhaps some have heard of Durel's call to let BellSouth know how "furious" they are even if the media chose not report that call. Or, more likely, they don't need to be told to be furious.

Call BellSouth. Let Williams know how little you like what Oliver and the company he represents are doing.

(337) 261-2800
John.C.Williams@BELLSOUTH.COM

Does anyone know if EATEL is accepting new applications for service? How to? (VOIP stories?)

Blowback—Dailies Cover City's Anger

The Advertiser in "Officials lash out against suit" and the Advocate in "Durel decries BellSouth suit" report on yesterday's press conference. (Our take on the event was posted yesterday.)

The long and the short of it is that both articles report press conference pretty accurately. (I don't recollect the mention of Fiber411 that the Advertiser refers to—once the tone became clear I was listening to see if they'd diffuse their focus by hitting the petitioners; I was impressed that the kept their laser-like focus on BellSouth.)

The Advocate's version reports a bit more about the consequences of the delay the suit will entail and some interesting bits from the subsequent council meetings but both articles deserve review.


Lagniappe: I am happy to have that new little bit of Cajun French from Huval's presentation yesterday to use in this situation: gourmandise--the overtones of gluttony (a deadly sin) are particularly pleasing for use in our food-happy region.

BellSouth Louisiana: Suit to Defend Bandwidth Tax A Desperate Act of Doomed Company

The anger that Mayor-President Joey Durel (and probably Terry Huval) feels as a result of BellSouth's 'friend of the DULL' suit over the issue of which law sets the petition rules on the LUS project is palpable.

BellSouth is talking sweet one day and suing the next.

The company has a profound personality disorder and it has manifested itself in a number of ways in the LUS fiber issue. Rather than attribute its sometimes bizarre behavior to malice, I prefer to read it as sporadic psychosis induced by a series of unpleasant and untenable choices the company is being forced to make these days, particularly in Louisiana. This once-mighty monopolist is on the ropes in Louisiana and its leaders know it. Making matters worse, there's just nothing they can do about it.

To understand what is happening, we need to look a bit beyond Lafayette out into Louisiana as a whole. BellSouth is in deep trouble here. They are in trouble primarily because Cox has bought and grown itself a very large footprint across much of South Louisiana. Cox is offering voice, data and video over networks that they have spent many pretty pennies to upgrade. Cox's networks may be near state of the cable art — so, nowhere near what LUS will offer in terms of robustness — but they are significantly better than what BellSouth has in the ground in South Louisiana.

Now, back in the halcyon days of their so-called alliance with Cox in opposition to the LUS project — way back in the late summer of 2004 — BellSouth spokesmen were making strange gurgling noises about what wonderful things the company would be able to do with upgraded formulas of DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) technology. 'It's gonna get a lot faster and we'll be able to run video over it,' they said — or words to that effect.

Well, they're absolutely correct, there have been some technological innovations on the horizon in DSL technology which might, in fact, let a phone company run some video over those lines.

But, there's a HUGE problem with this entire scenario. That is, the 'last mile' (actually, up to about 15,000 feet) of a DSL connection can run over copper. Why is that a problem: Well, the FCC has ruled that Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs) have to let Competitive Local Exchange Carriers (CLECs) have access to their copper infrastructure — which the RBOCs (like BellSouth) detest. There was a good bit of RBOC crowing among last year when the FCC said RBOCs could exclude competitors over new fiber networks. If only the Michael Powell-led FCC had locked CLECs out of the copper lines, it would have been a perfect RBOC world.

So, while there may, in fact, be technology coming down the pike that could theoretically enable RBOCs like BellSouth to ramp up their DSL capacity to the point where they might actually be able to run a few channels of pre-HDTV video over that copper infrastructure, their rigid opposition to the idea of letting competitors have access to the copper that enhanced DSL would run over will prevent them from allowing themselves to deploy this technology.

Why is this critical? Well, it seems that the BellSouth Louisiana crowd can't convince the corporate types in Atlanta that investing in new infrastructure here makes business sense. That's understandable due to the rather large shoe Cox has lodged firmly on the larynx of BellSouth Louisiana by way of its Triple Play over its newer infrastructure.

See, the 'Louisiana Logic' out of Atlanta is that BellSouth can't justifying any significant new infrastructure dollars here until it has some idea of what the bottom of its share of this state's market looks like. That is, why invest significant new dollars here when we don't know if we're going to end up with 60 percent marketshare, or 20 percent market share. Cox is fervently committed to helping BellSouth find that market bottom just as quickly as it can via new services over its (comparatively) enhanced network.

So, cut off from the capital it would take to build out new fiber infrastructure, deploying DSL-enhancing technology would look to be the cost-effective way of enhancing BellSouth's service offerings here. Except, that because it runs over copper infrastructure — read that "open to competitors" — the gang back in Atlanta won't even allow those much smaller amounts of money to be spent here.

So, BellSouth Louisiana is doomed. It can't get the money it needs to build a world-class network that would let it fend off Cox and any other competitors. But, the corporation's virulent anti-competitive, monopolist DNA won't let it invest in the technology which might at least enable it to cling to a few points of market share with its copper.

The talks with LUS may well have been some form of exquisite torture BellSouth inflicted on itself, knowing full well that Atlanta would never let the company buy access over the LUS network for the same reason they don't want any competitor to access their network: it's all about being a monopolist and that's all about not sharing.

Filing the lawsuit over the DULL petitions is an act of desperation. Cut off from big infrastructure bucks by Atlanta and cut off from the technology that could make those old copper wires useful for a few more years by its corporate culture, BellSouth Louisiana has entered into what will likely be a precipitous decline.

It's already evident in some ways: A few months ago, BellSouth Louisiana's Bill Oliver was feigning chumminess with Cox Regional VP Gary Cassard. Today, he's feigning chumminess with the DULL crowd, seeking to defend his company's bandwidth tax on businesses and consumers by supporting handful of ideologues who worship the ground he walks on.

What a long strange trip this must have been!

"BellSouth's Earth Is Flat"

In Light Reading: BellSouth's Earth Is Flat.

...the real take-away from BellSouth's earnings call is that all is not cozy right now. After stripping away the one-time items in its report, growth for BellSouth’s core businesses has essentially remained flat over the last three years, which may be an early signal that competition from cable operators and CLECs is slowly starting to erode the RBOC's hold on its territories...

Longer term, analysts say the Bells will have to be successful in offering video services to compete.

“They’re going to need between 15 to 20 percent video penetration, and I don’t think they’re going to get that with a bundled satellite deal,” McCourt says.

Translation: BellSouth needs fiber for IP video and they need it now.

(They'd have been wise to have used LUS' fiber--but blew that one. If I were a smart analyst I'd read the tea leaves of the astonishing decision to forfeit its best chance to test advanced services in its footprint as a clear sign that management doesn't understand what is necessary to survive. And issue an immediate "sell" rating. Full disclosure: I carry no telecom in my portfolio. :-) )

PS, don't miss the comment. Hilarious. I think.

Taking a stand against La Gourmandise—Greed, Simple Greed.

The tag team of Joey Durel and Terry Huval fired back at BellSouth today. They were visibly distressed by what they regarded as a betrayal by BellSouth. Time and again during the formal presentation before the cameras and then later fielding questions from the reporters they let it be known that they had reached the conclusion that this time and on at least two separate previous occasions the city had talked with BellSouth in good faith only to have the corporation turn around and speak out of the other side of its mouth.

The most dramatic phrase of the evening was Terry Huval's cajun characterization of the problem with the incumbent: "it's an issue of la gourmandise-which means greed." Strong words. But it was apparent that our leaders have decided that strong words are justified.

The mayor issued a dramatic call for the citizens to "take a stand" and "let BellSouth know you are furious about this."

The city appears absolutely confident about the law and frustrated at the time and money that working through the lawsuit is likely to entail. They claimed that, had they not had to deal with BellSouth obstructionism in the legislature and the current lawsuit, that they would have been looking at begining construction in six months--and without the added costs the delay's have entailed. The lawsuit was seen as an attack on and "an affront to the people of Lafayette."

The new regime with the incumbents is that they'll talk to them--but they want any proposals in writing first, so that they know they aren't wasting their time.

The language used has moved dramatically toward frustrated remarks that BellSouth is an outsider, a large corporation from Atlanta, and that it "is not a citizen of this community --the people of Lafayette are citizens of this community." In discussion with the reporters Durel referred to "monopolistic practices" and Huval remarked that the point of battles like this was to make places like Lafayette an example and to "squish cities like Lafayette" like "ants."

It wasn't repeated tonight but the message was clear:

"Get out of our way, because we are not goint to stand down on this!"

Believe It or Not: You Decide

Well, everyone has been expecting a lawsuit since BellSouth and Cox failed to panic the public or intimidate the council. As it turns out the surprise little petition drive in the middle was just a pretext--something to give the big boys cover and standing when they trot out their first delaying lawsuit.

The Fiber411 boys won't care for that interpretation but here is what the public has to decide: Do you think that the crew from Fiber411 came up with this convoluted tactic--one that involves obscure state laws, arguing for a new interpretation of the law that one segment of the code should be newly defined as controlling another, that at least two laws written to control in special cases (both of which apply in this instance) should be ignored ( one that BellSoouth had written specifically to control this instance), and piously mouthing the clearly bogus idea that dedicated opponents to the plan have suddenly replaced concern for corporations with a set of democratic values that they clearly don't give a fig for. Do you believe that Fiber411 came up with that and that BellSouth standing on the sidelines, motivated by the pious concern for proper procedure in bond law that the Fiber411 guys "developed" stepped in to help out and clarify law? Or do you think a strategy like this much more likely the product of a phalanx of lawyers at BellSouth who knew that they needed some strategy, no matter how convoluted or weak to stop the sale of bonds which will lock the city into its plans legally, leaving BellSouth to only--gasp, horrors--compete.

I know what I think. I challenge the Fiber411 guys to tell us all just who suggested their legal strategy for starters. And just why they decided, at the moment when the bonds are being readied for approval, but when--even by the law they cite--they do not have the necessary city-parish signatures to halt it; why turn "your" petition in before you gather that last thousand--why unless someone has suggested that the time to do it is now, while the bonds can still be delayed. Who suggested that?

It is very hard (and I have been trying) not to smell a rat.

BellSouth Suit in the News

Media on BellSouth's lawsuit:

KATC
The Advertiser:Fiber battle heads to court
The Advocate: BellSouth sues utility on funding --(A fuller, more interesting, version is in the paper; I'll post an update if and when it appears This URL now points to the fuller version of the post, thanks are due the Advocate online staff.)

Pretty much everyone has a skeletal recounting of the involved legal rationale behind BellSouth's suit (one which Cox has joined). I have to say that the media has shown its smarts in mostly ignoring the transparent excuses and feeble justifications that BellSouth put forward in its publicity release in favor of an analysis of what the suit actually asks for and intends to do. Stop LUS.


Update: 10:42 am, I've gotten acknowledgement that the version of this story on the Advocate website is incomplete. We'll see if the online staff will get on the stick and fix it. Update 2: 11:50 pm The problem was due to the Baton Rouge and Lafayette versions of the story being slightly different, most likely due to there being a difference in the available space left for the story in each edition of the paper. Once that was straightened out the folks over at the Advocate were great about getting the fuller version online. Go take a look, the URL remains the same, but now you get the extra textural goodness described below--and more...

In the interim here is some of the missing text:

But City-Parish President Joey Durel said that recent statements by Oliver saying that recent statements by Oliver saying BellSouth would be willing to talk about partnering in LUS' project have proven "insincere." "This (a lawsuit) is not how you forge a partnership." Durel said.
....
Durel said he thinks the voters who elected him and the council did so because they trust their judgment.

"In my opinion, BellSouth is suing the people of Lafayette." Durel said. They're trying to dictate the direction of this community, rather than the elected officials."

BellSouth and Cox are burning bridges.

These corporate bureaucrats should be advised that this isn't some sort of corporate dance where its ok to manipulate and deceive your opponents for marginal advantage since you both understand that negotiations have nothing to do with character and everything to do with a game of incremental advantage. It may look like they are playing a corporate game here. But they are wrong. They are dealing with people who are earnestly trying to do good; such people care about honesty and character and are perfectly capable of refusing to negotiate with people, who in their judgment, lack the character to make negotiations meaningful.

We're looking at a conflict of cultures here. And BellSouth is wrong if they think they can't poison the well.

You can still get anti-BellSouth "Get Our Of Our Way." bumper sticker art at our ArtWorks page and Jon Fitzgerald still has some bumper stickers left from the first batch.

FLASH: BellSouth Sues

BellSouth has filed suit in support of the BellSouth/Fiber411 petioners. The language announcing it is as deliberately deceptive as the campaign to date has been.

But read it yourself: BellSouth PR release justifying suing LUS.

Digital Divide: Universal Service vs. Redlining

Quietly receding into the background of our Lafayette debate, because the issue is largely settled, is the fact that LUS has made clear that fiber-optic cable will run in front of every home in our community, no matter how poor or wealthy. That being settled, the conversation shifted to cost and LUS has made it abundantly clear that its pricing structure is, at least in part, designed to let folks purchase real broadband plus telephone and cable TV for the same price as they would have formerly paid for phone and cable alone. We are now moving on to issues of making access available through community centers and providing things like advanced ISP services and education.

Just how far ahead of the game we are is evidenced by legislation pending in Virginia (reported in the story: "Cable to Fight Bell Attempts to "Circumvent" Local Franchising Laws") which would (in the name of competition) allow the local Baby Bell to cherry-pick the wealthy areas and redline out the poorer areas. (See Mike on Redlining.) The mechanism is a proposed state law that wouldn effectively exempt the telecos from the standard contracts with local communities that require cablecos to provide universal service in order to use citizen-owned rights of way and poles. Interestingly, universal service is the only real issue. Fees, the complexity of public channel provision and other public service issues are conceeded. All we really want, says the telco is the right to not serve all the public. The cable companies, whose builds have always had to comply with universal service provisions, are adamantly opposed.

There's nothing in the legislation that would require Verizon or other phone companies to build out the entire community, [cable representative] Janucik said. "We don't believe that we should have the same build-out requirement as cable has," countered Hoewing. The reason, he said, was cable had the "luxury of time" and didn't face competition. "So they had to build out their network to an entire franchise area." Verizon, on the other hand, is facing a competitor, he said: "So we should be able to make the build-out economic and competitive." Having the same build-out requirements as cable "doesn't make any sense in today's environment," Hoewing added. He said Verizon isn't opposed to paying franchise fees and is prepared to meet public, educational and govt. access (PEG) requirements but should have flexibility to negotiate. "We should not have to just lock, stock and barrel accept everything that cable has had." The conditions and requirements should be the same irrespective of who provides the video service, said Janucik...

The cable representative in the story is coy about discussing the competitive disadvantage this law would put them in. But that is all this story is about. I am not nearly so coy and you can get my analysis on just this issue at an earlier post that responded to proposed federal regulation with similar intent: The Phone Company Sharks are Circling. As you go deeper into the article it becomes apparent that cable companies across the country are bracing for a blitzkrieg in teleco-dominated state legislatures where, as here in Louisiana, telecos have historically been hugely influential in any telecommunications legislation with well-established lobbyist relationships ready to hand. (They've invested in controlling the state regulatory processes, a layer of regulation that cable companies have not had to contend with. This is precisely why it was BellSouth and not Cox who wrote the original law intended to ban Lafayette's project.)

But spill no crocodile tears for the cableco's--when it was to their advantage vis-a-vis satellite companies they have no hesitation to do exactly the same: Buy state legislators to put their competitors at an unfair advantage.

So rest assured that the cable company's objection is strategic and not principled. Should states pass such "fair competition" acts cable companies will first get themselves exempted for future builds as well. (The proposed Virigina law apparently does so already.) They will then engage in a race with teleco's to snatch up rich districts and give them everything the can as cheaply as they can. (Expect special rates sold door to door in River Ranch, for instance.) And anticipate that poorer neighborhoods will languish and in cases where the finances of even maintaining the current system don't, block by block justify maintenance, to be actually abandoned. (Expect some areas of the northside to simply no longer have access to cable, much less advanced telecom right after our next hurricane.)

There is a huge storm brewing in the states with large implications for digital divide issues and as far as I know few are attending to it. This isn't a distant quarrel between the Bells and the Cablecos--it's about the continuing erosion of the very idea of universal service on any level with both Federal and state pressures coming to bear on the last bastion of that ideal: local franchising agreements.

If folks in the states don't get on this right now, only rare places like Lafayette with its own utility-based advanced telecom system, will have equitable access. We're doing the right thing here in Lafayette. The nation could listen and learn.

"After telecom's long, hot summer, cooler heads could prevail"

First the good news: We have an "editorial" (actually an analytical piece since no actual judgment is ever passed about what would be preferable) from the Advertiser which appears to be premised on the assumption that LUS could do the job it has asked to do and that private companies might be wise to let LUS do it.

Now the bad news: The Advertisers' Bill Decker, who has had plenty of time to educate himself since his unreasoning initial attack on the very idea (a rant which had something to do with socialism and five year plans) remains a fount of misinformation even as he clearly tries to be even handed.

The basic point of the essay is that Cox and BellSouth might be wise to reach an agreement with the city and LUS; that's true--and obvious as we have noted in these pages since the beginning. It acknowledges that LUS success would lead to economic development and that LUS' plan might well help in bridging the divide between the haves and the have nots on this issue. It's a good thing to see the business editor of the paper recognize these fundamental truths.

Now a list of misinformation:

• The basic idea that the conflict has been like a mob war with both sides "going to the mat."
• Honestly, only one side went to the mat. BellSouth and Cox. LUS set up a defensive perimeter and reacted to attack but never went after the incumbents with anything like the vicious attack we saw from Cox and BellSouth. There is a difference and to ignore for the sake of a cheap metaphor does the community a disservice.
  


• Putting forward the idea at this late stage that the plan is unwise and somehow "immoral" for not putting the interests of huge, out-of-state monopoly corporations ahead of the interests of Lafayette.
  
  • Say what? A funny sort of morality you have there sir.
    
  
  
• That investors might prefer a public infrastructure-only role for LUS and that such a role would be less risky than reaping retail profit.
  
  • One shouldn't have to point out to a business editor that its wholesale telecom, that has been risky in the last decade and last-mile retail that has bee profitable. A business plan that hands profit over to active competitors, as Decker is implying is just this side of irrational. That's the sort of mistake that investors notices. Its' sort of obvious. (Please note that even the Mayor of Provo, which is building a structurally divided system, acknowledges that Lafayette's plan is the stronger.)
    
  
  
• Decker tells the people of the parish that Cox will makeup loses in the city by raising rates on the parish.
  
  • This is a damnable lie and Becker cannot have the job he has and believe it. Does anyone seriously think that Cox, the dominant cable company across the south will have any need to ameliorate losses in the city by overcharging a few in our little parish? Especially since it would make certain that LUS, for political reasons alone, will compete there as well? Never in a million years.
    
  
  

Week(s) in Review

Regular readers of Lafayette Pro Fiber:

What follows is a summary of the last two weeks of the fiber debate in Lafayette. It is something I do occasionally (meaning less often than I should) on Timshel. For those of you who may not know Timshel it's the Acadiana region's premeire politcal blog and a great read. (If you can endure the pro Saints, anti Tiger proclivities Ricky shows. I try never to criticize a man's religion, but...)

Ricky gave me my start in blogging when he asked if I'd do some guest posts on fiber following convoluted remarks I had made in the comments. Consequently the folks over there have some background in the fiber issue and I still try and go over and catch them up even while I attend to LPF.

This post was a little different, it's less news and more interpretation. So I thought folks here might be interested even though you've already seen all the bits. Let me know if this sort of thing is interesting..... (This one covers two weeks. It appeared first on Timshel Saturday.)
--------------------

It's been an eventful couple of weeks since I've last checked in with a summary post; apologies for the absence. Lafayette's fight to be allowed to invest in itself with a state of the art phone/data/cable utility has been beset by what has mostly turned out to be confusion.

Here's the executive overview: The tide is rising. I sense one of those tipping points coming where suddenly all those folks who have been guarded about the project and a shockingly high percentage of those who'd been clearly dismissive of the possibility discover that they've been ardent supporters all along.

That's a good thing and is both natural and necessary. But it's hard for those weary pro-fiber partisan smiles not to be a little wry.

Here's a little tale that illustrates how the last two weeks have gone:

When last we visited on these pages BellSouth's Williams had issued each truck in his service fleet a copy of the anti-fiber petition to tote around town with them while they service the public. (Apparently the workers didn't necessarily greet that with enthusiasm.) What was most noticeable about William's support was that nothing visible came of it. No announcements about numbers of signatures gathered by blue and white trucks and no further supportive comments from BellSouth headquarters. Word then leaks out that Williams has talked to his employees again, and that the memo's instructions this time is that they are not to circulate the petition on company time. Finally we are treated to the spectacle of BellSouth's William's disingenuously declaring that he has always been for bringing "Lafayette forward in the world of technology" in the midst of "overtures" by both incumbents.

So what happened to produce that strange little trajectory?

That's the right question. And the short answer is that by the end of the recent two week period the balance between profit and loss had shifted, the cost of support had risen and the likelihood of eventual success had fallen. Cold calculation...and perhaps that the word has come down from corporate central that bad national publicity at this moment is too costly.

[open timeout for background]

Monopolist generally are amazingly immune to public opinion except when a regulatory commission is meeting. And right now BellSouth has some things before the Federal Communications Commission that are critical in the Baby Bell's real and inevitable battle with cable. A battle which realistically rates much higher in BellSouth's priority than publicly resisting our city's right of self-determination. With the resignation of remarkably pro-corporate Chairman Powell from the FCC imminent, it is in BellSouth's interest to get while the getting is still good. BellSouth and the other Baby Bells would dearly love to be exempted from what is required of their opponents, the cablecos; that they reach a franchise agreement with local communities like Lafayette before they are allowed to run cable TV. The FCC apparently believes they could step in and define cable TV offered by the telecos into a category they control. This would do considerably more than "save" the teleco's the annoyance of having to deal with all those little guys and pay some local folks for the use of their poles and rights of way. Much more crucial, it would exempt them from the standard clause in such contracts that they offer service to all citizens equally. Universal Service. They'd much rather cherry pick just the rich districts, keep their capital cost down, and drive the cablecos out of the most profitable parts of each local market. That is where the long term advantage lies.

And having a lot of publicity in the national press about how you are keeping a little municipality in colorful Cajun country down hands their opponents on the FCC valuable ammunition which is targeted right at the heart of the issue of local control. BellSouth can't want that.

[close timeout for background]


The events: National: Negativity

The biggest single event was a national blockbuster: USAToday endorsed Lafayette's plan in an editorial that followed up an analytical piece that indicted the baby bells for pursuing a plan to regain monopoly status. In the story and the editorial Lafayette's role was symbolic. We played the part (quite well, thank you) of the small town determined to control its own destiny lead by a fiery and idealistic mayor. BellSouth plays the symbolic role for the Telcos: the grey behemoth the whose monopoly ambitions are expressed in its attempt to keep even such wholesome competition as Lafayette's at bay. I don't mean to demean the battle here by saying that USAToday made it symbolic. Quite the contrary. Symbolism is most powerful when it is the simple truth. And the mythic story taking shape here, regardless of the details, is fundamentally true.

Other national events are less momentous. But in their narrow areas, no less important, and no less a danger to the story the private incumbents would like to see told.

A continuing series of negative stories about supine state legislatures giving away the store to the telecom industry emerged following the passage of a law in Pennsylvania intended to outlaw all municipal participation in broadband. Lobbyists in Pennsylvanida made the egregious political mistake of handing local sovereignty over to corporations and that tactic, finally, drew some media attention. (In Pennsylvania these days a community has to ask permission of any corporations that might want to provide telecom services and if they say they do then allow them to try. Sometime. Maybe.)

Intel, a behemoth itself, came out endorsing the idea that there is a legitimate role for municipals in the provision of broadband services. It clearly understands that if broadband is to expand rapidly local governments must not be written out of the competition by state laws.

A string on Lafayette's battle on Slashdot resolved, as much as such things can resolve, into slashing expression of technorati contempt for the incumbent providers of broadband and a defense of municipalities right to break free.

The Consumer's Union, the venerable gray lady of smart consumerism, launched a surprisingly activist website, hearusnow, devoted as much to rallying opposition to the developing monopolist practices of incumbent providers of telecommunications as to smart consumption of their products.

Ministers called SBC's plan, and by association BellSouth's very similar one, to roll out fiber to the (wealthy) curbs redlining. Since that is uncomfortably close to the truth, having it pointed out wasn't all that welcome. Especially while regulations are pending before the FCC which would allow them to do just that.

A meme emerged with some force in the media that incumbent providers in the United States are not doing their job as US rankings in broadband penetration continue in free fall and as those Americans with the limited broadband the incumbents provide discover that faster service is available for less in countries we once disdained as "second" or "third world."

Yes, BellSouth might well have thought that right now wasn't the time to confirm criticism of the ways it handles local broadband competitors by helping fix a local petition drive that appears doomed to failure anyway.

The events: Local: Confusion

The news wasn't good locally either.

The petitioners, by accepting BellSouth's aid, made BellSouth a target and lent credibility to the suspicion that they were doing work that the incumbents desired but had failed to accomplish themselves.

News broke (on LPF) that Cox had made "overtures" to the city. After a week the mainstream media picked it up. Even the hint of a possibility of an alliance between Cox and LUS had to make BellSouth very, very nervous. The current alliance between Cox and BellSouth is both unstable and unequal with BellSouth the weaker network in Lafayette.

Doubt mounted as to the legality of petition as it became more apparent that petitioners were simply looking for the easy rather than the legal path.

Bellsouth found itself allied to a group that couldn't shoot straight. They called press conferences to bemoan the fact that they were going to be prevented (by what would have been their own oversight) from presenting their petition before a deadline. The city-parish had to tell them that they were mistaken and they could present...but that it was the wrong petition, one which didn't apply to the type of bonds issued. So they issued another press release saying the drive was back on in full force. And later they asked for the city to halt progress on LUS' project while they tried to clear up legal questions. The mess did not reflect well on BellSouth.

The petitioners attracted some pretty telling criticisms as the administration used every opportunity to insist that a signature on the petition did signify opposition to the project regardless of what the petitioners said. They hit hard on the idea that it would hand decision-making power over to bureaucrats in Atlanta. And the obvious point was that this was all poor sportsmanship by folks who understood neither the technical nor legal frameworks they were dealing with.

That turned into a lot words, regardless of my attempt to focus the narrative on BellSouth's little turnaround. Still, the point is clear: BellSouth had its reasons for abandoning its open support of the petition. Both locally and nationally the leadership can't be happy with the way the battle has shaped up to date.

But the collapse of open incumbent opposition, even if it proves temporary, is a huge opportunity. Let's hope LUS is in position to take advantage of any fleeting goodwill at the PSC where BellSouth is rumored to be trying build roadblocks into LUS' regulatory regime.

Xserve cluster born in Louisiana

Here's something that is little more than a tidbit but still...it expresses something particularly Lousiana. The story is about a new cluster computer over at LSU. (A cluster computer is a type of super computer built with standard computer boxes, in this case Mac XServes.)

What makes it particularly Louisianaish is the use it'll be devoted to:

Nemeaux is the only cluster of its kind devoted to computational arts research. It will open new avenues of expression and creativity for artists, musicians and researchers at LSU.

"Nemeaux provides a platform for scientists and artists to explore new possibilities," said Stephen David Beck, director of the Laboratory for Creative Arts & Technologies, a division of CCT, and professor of composition and computer music.

Researchers in LCAT will benefit from Nemeaux's ability to link art and technology for future creative and research projects. Among the intended uses of the computer cluster are video composition and animation rendering, which translates a set of computer data and virtual objects into a full visual representation of those objects. Nemeaux will also serve as a powerful research tool for the computational aspects of music, film, video and art.

There is something right about Louisiana having "the only cluster of its kind devoted to computational arts research."

Now if we could only get one for Lafayette's students.

"Mass panic clogs BellSouth phone system"

I occasionally get really irritated at the sorts of nonsense that people assume is true just because it is ideologically correct. No doubt my irritation level is high because Lafayette has had to deal with incumbents and their agents who regularly and mistakenly mislead the community into regarding BellSouth and Cox as if they were "free enterprise" corporations rather than the monopolists that they have been and remain. There is and can be no "free enterprise" alternative to a public fiber-optic network for Lafayette. The coming monopoly will either be owned by the citizens and thus oriented toward serving us or owned by traditional monopolists and dedicated to extracting the maximum amount of profit from its advantage. And that excess profit will be sent off to Atlanta.

Every day we see stories that are explicable only as the malign effects of allowing monopolies to pretend they are like mom and pop hardware stores and retreating from the rational alternatives of public ownership or rational regulation.

A large part of why that happens is that our media doesn't seem to be able to distinguish between an actual story and the one the incumbents tell them and so report to the citizens of an area a story which comes close to fabrication but evokes no concerned response because it is comfortably ideologically correct.

The following story from North Carolina illustrates the point well. Go take a look at the story it is short and simple. Then return here for a review of the problems that it illustrates.

-------go on, take a look, the rest really won't make good sense unless you do---

Raw version of this story: Usage spike in North Carolina caused the wireline phone system to crash.

Ideologically correct version of this story: BellSouth and its competitors phone systems overloaded because the people panicked during a snow emergency. Unhappily the public service commission says it just isn't economically feasible to make it more reliable. (This is what the paper unreflectively reports.)

Rational version: BellSouth's phone system (which leases lines to other carriers) crashed during a usage spike due to an event that is unusual but hardly extraordinary and well within the reasonable service parameters for system design. Data show that capacity peaked out at 1.7 times normal usage. Officals at the state utilities commission, charged with regulating the monopoly landline's service standards, evaded discussing service issues, referring instead to cost factors over which they have no authority.

Analytical version: It is clear that regulatory oversight is out to lunch in North Carolina when a low-grade public excitement can bring down the basic telecommunications system. An exciting snow on North Carolina's beach's is unusual but certainly did not excite panic. These guys have hurricanes, for goodness sake. These citizens either have to learn to regulate their local monoplies so that basic services are reliable enough to count on during real emergencies (which this was not) or decide to make their essential services into utilities that will have service as its first priority rather than the current system of taking monopoly system income and investing it out-system merely to increase its stock price. (BellSouth could easily afford to upgrade its antiquated system with fiber throughout--if it weren't investing for highest return in other, non-wireline pursuits, many of which --like its enormous loser in Central and South American wireless were huge losers.)

We're doing the right thing here in Lafayette. The nation could listen and learn.

DULL Petitions for Bandwidth Tax

As John blogged earlier, the DULL (Delusional United Luddites of Lafayette) have filed a random petition with the Lafayette Parish Clerk of Court. In the press reports, they repeat the lie that they are not opposed to the LUS fiber to the premises plan — apparently, with straight faces. I'm not going to dignify the stories by providing links to them.

Well, on the back cover page of the January 10, 2005, edition of New Orleans CityBusiness I found what they are petitioning for: the right to be ripped-off!

A bit of a review is required by way of explanation.

LUS is proposing to bring to every home and small business in Lafayette a very fat connection to the Internet. The smallest connection ever mentioned was 24 megabits per second. 100 megabits per second is just as easily done as 24 megabits. And, a gigabit of intra-city connectivity is not out of the question, nor off the table.

LUS promises to do this at a significant discount to whatever services are offered by the incumbent carriers Cox and BellSouth. LUS also promises to continue regularly adjusting prices downward on a path to deliver "more bandwidth for less" to consumers and businesses here throughout the life of the project.

Now, despite their protestations, the DULL crowd is against this. Maybe not against this trend, but they are dead set against LUS delivering these benefits to Lafayette consumers and businesses. The fact that neither Cox nor BellSouth have indicated they would deliver similar infrastructure with a similar intent (and, in fact, have flatly declared that they would not) matters not to the DULL.

So, clearly, DULL is about ideology, not facts.

No, rather than allow the benefits of massively cheaper bandwidth make their way to Lafayette consumers and businesses, the DULL would have us gasping through the bandwidth reeds that the respective boards of Cox and BellSouth determine we should have.

Which brings us to the back page of New Orleans City Business.

It is a full-page ad for Cox Business Services. The headline reads: "No One's Ever Complained That Their Internet Service Was Too Fast." That is followed by a photo of a mouse leaving skid marks on a mouse pad; followed by the subhead: "Think Faster. Think Smarter. Think Bigger."

Cox then proceeds to make a pitch for Cox Business Internet: "1.5 Mbps/384Kbps service for only $89 per month and get free installation.*" The asterisk refers readers to six-plus lines of fine print at the bottom of the ad which inform them that this is a special rate that won't last past February 28, and that free installation only comes at the cost of a three-year contract, otherwise it could run as high as $249. There is also: "Rates and bandwidth options vary and are subject to change. Services not available in all areas. Other restrictions apply."

You know the drill.

Cox Business Services in "Greater Louisiana" offers the same package as they do in New Orleans. I'm not sure if the rates are the same and they don't provide any information on rates on that page or on the PDF which you download from that page.

So, in the name of ideological purity, the DULL would impose a bandwidth tax on every business in Lafayette because THEY would prefer that businesses in Lafayette wait until Cox and/or BellSouth decides that they will spend the money to bring fiber to every home and business in the city — if ever.

That is, the DULL would deny small businesses in Lafayette access to the kind of bandwidth that Cox doesn't even offer it's largest business customers. The DULL would do this because they oppose the concept of LUS providing services for philosophical reasons. The DULL may walk the streets as business people, but their brains live in ivory towers far removed from the real world.

What is particularly insulting about their opposition to the LUS plan is that the proceeds from the DULL Bandwidth Tax would not go to the benefit of the community but would instead go directly into the coffers of Cox and BellSouth! That is, the higher bandwidth costs which businesses would continue to pay if LUS is prevented from building their network and delivering their services would be money taken from those businesses and shipped off to Atlanta.

That this is the preferred course of events for the DULL is proof positive that they do not have the interests of this community at heart and that they do not have the interests of their fellow business people at heart. All they are about is garnering attention, defending the corporate interests of BellSouth and Cox, and demonstrating just how pristine are the ivory towers in which their thought processes are locked.

Petition Goes to Registrar Despite Doubts

Executive Summary:

"'Honestly, we're not sure how it will work,' Supple said. 'This is the only thing we know to do"

Honestly, that's all you need to know.
------------
The saga of the petitioners who couldn't get it right goes on. Both the Advocate and the Advertiser runs stories on the petitioners submitting their document to the registrar for signature validation.

These guys continue to look for the absolutely easiest way out. Having started with a law that, upon reflection seems unlikely to produce a valid petition, they up the wishful thinking quotient by hopefully asserting that only need to get enough signatures to meet the number required from city voters--a number smaller than the city-parish signatories. Trouble is, as all who attended the council meetings will recall, is that the council had to go through a series of double votes of both city and city-parish members to make sure that the parish, under whose authority the bonds were issued would be legally obliged, as well as the city, which had formal control of LUS. No one doubt the city-parish is the issuing authority. But the silliness doesn't end there. Since they collected signatures from city-parish citizens all along (and none of their petition locales were, in fact, inside the city limits) it must be that they had another interpretation in mind when they began collect signatures? Look for a large number of invalid signatures under their interpretation. At some point you don't need to be a lawyer to recognize how poorly this whole project was conceived. And they expect the people to trust their judgment about LUS and fiber? Really now.

The Advocate has the better story, as we've come to expect. Go there first.

Move on to the Advertiser if you're interested in quotes from two signatories who work for BellSouth or it's subsidiaries. (Neither paper reports the number of signatures gained for the petition during that window between Williams issuing the petition to his employees to carry around the city while they worked and his memo demanding that they not work on it during company time. --The petitioners aren't the only ones having trouble getting it straight.)

At the Advertiser you'll also be able to review the Advertiser's first take on the now week and a half old story that Cox is in talks with the city on this issue. Maybe next week they'll notice that BellSouth has also been down to city hall.

Court Rejects BellSouth Complaint Against City's Internet Service

Competition springs up and whaddaya do? Sue 'em. If you're BellSouth. Trouble is, it doesn't always work.

BellSouth lost again Tuesday in its fight to stop the city of Laurinburg and a Fayetteville company from providing high-speed Internet access in Laurinburg.

A state Court of Appeals panel unanimously rejected BellSouth's claim that Laurinburg and Schoollink Inc. use the city's fiber-optic network to illegally compete against private industry.

Check it out in: Court Rejects BellSouth Complaint Against City's Internet Service.

It's a trend.

"Durel, Cox discuss fiber optics"

One of the dailies catches up to the local weekly (though trailing your friends here at LPF by a week) in Durel, Cox discuss fiber optics. Mostly this story repeats, with some interesting quotes, information and interpretation our readers will already be familiar with from our own report and the Independent's. But there is a nugget worth pondering in regards to the incumbent hopes of joining the wining side:

"That window (of opportunity) starts closing every day to the day we sell the bonds," Durel said.

And, indeed that is the limit for all opponents of the project. When the bonds are sold the train will have left the station.

Indeed, it's my sense that the train has already pulled out. The odor that drifts over the battlefield is one of retreat and dissarry on the part of the incumbents. Some Cox managers appear to still be out of the loop as colleagues go around them to City Hall. Williams of BellSouth asks his employees not to circulate a petition that he had earlier issued them; abandoning the Fiber411 partisans in the field with a petition weapon that's firing blanks. Williams has even begun ardently declaring that he was always been for bringing "Lafayette forward in the world of technology."

My guess is that within a week our cautious majority will have turned into an all but unanimous chorus of support. And that it will be hard to find anyone who ever had any doubts.

Bumper Stickers

Here's something that is a little fun: A few knockoffs of our bumber sticker got printed locally and we're happy to see some of them making their way onto cars. The more the merrier. You can download your own at our ArtWorks page.

Jon Fitzgerald, local fiber partisan, produced the current crop via the subscription method. If you'd like some get in touch with him. He says let him know. He's got plenty left.

Update 1/21/05: My error! If you 've tried to get in touch with Jon by email and the link didn't work it was my error. I used the wrong domain (.com instead of .net) in the mailto link which provided a well-formed address that goes nowhere. Apologies to all those who eager desires were frustrated :-).

It is fixed now.

"The Home Stretch"

The Times has come out with a very interesting personality piece on our fiber controversy, if you don't try too hard to read it as an accurate recounting of the news story but instead look at it as a kaleidoscope of various ways to look at the issue.

The story, as I understand it, started out as an interview-based overview of the contending partisans (and not LUS/LCG). But with the emergence of a series of petition missteps, it looks as if it were incompletely converted into a news story.

What's missing are the perspectives and words of Huval and Durel, both articulate men with a distinctive point of view and an original voice. But what you get is interesting enough in its own right: the voices of those who are passionate about the project, both pro and con.

You'll get some definite opinions from Doug Menefee, Neal Breakfield, Mike Stagg and me. Not all partisans on either side fully agree and you'll get a taste of that, too. All in all, it's well worth reading. Nobody will really like this version, but it should inform us all about the way folks are thinking.

BellSouth Backs Down

There was one throw-away line in this week's Independent fiber-optic story that deserves its own post:

As the LUS initiative draws nearer to becoming reality, the two private providers are scaling back any opposition to the project people may associate with their company. Local BellSouth representative John Williams says the company recently sent out a memo requesting that their employees no longer take company time to solicit signatures for a petition to hold a public vote on the LUS issue. Cox employees have not participated in the petition. (emphasis mine)

More evidence, were more needed, that most opponents are beginning to get realistic about about Lafayette's determination to do this thing. Would that our sputtering band of petitioners, now abandoned by their only large public supporter, do the same.

Someone's hearing our message:

"...get out of our way, because we are not going to back down on this."

Strange Fiber Bedfellows?

The Independent's Nathan Stubbs covers, for the first time in the mainstream media, a story we broke here last Thursday: the news that the incumbents have begun to make "overtures" to LUS and the city. That story, Cracks in the Axis of Evil? Is Cox Seeking a Place at LUS Table? Cox Makes "Overtures" was based on news that Joey Durel had mentioned such talks at a Rotary breakfast, a fact later confirmed by Durel via blackberry and email.
Here's the heart of the Ind's story:

Riding high on favorable coverage the fiber initiative received in two recent USA Today articles (including an endorsement of the plan), Durel says some of the top executives with the two national companies may now be ready to talk about ways they can work with Lafayette Consolidated Government.

"Anyone that wants to come talk to us has got to put an extremely sincere and serious offer on the table," he says. "Otherwise it will only be a five-minute conversation.'

Apparently BellSouth, ever arrogant, suggested that Lafayette could trek to Atlanta to talk about it. Partisans will be pleased to note Durel's response:

"Our attitude is basically, tell Atlanta to come to us. We're here,"

Some disarray in Cox's ranks seems likely. While Durel continues to say Cox has made the trek to city hall, Cox's local representative, Cassard, is unaware of any visit. The rumor mill has it that Cox's exTCA staff and much of the personnel associated with the early stages of the battle (For instance, the infamous TJ Crawdad (1) (2)) are gone, leaving Cassard virtually the only local or regional representative of the old regime. Possibly he is no longer in the loop.

While I personally remain reserved about handing these guys any of the income that LUS will need to secure the network I'd love to see how they might bring new revenue to the table. Remember, they had a chance to be participants and chose to trash our community, now they come as beggars to the feast.

Reservations aside, there is no question but that this is major news. Even if nothing comes of it, it is now apparent that the talks are at least feelers--and it can only mean that the big boys are bracing for LUS' success. And, like good businessmen everywhere, trying to figure out how they can profit from the new reality.

The Dailies Cover the Petition Fiasco

The Dailies covered the strange story of the dead man walking petition this morning. It's a story we've told and retold on these pages so I'll just let them tell it this time.

On the Validity of the Petition

Advertiser:

A petition being circulated calling for a vote on the LUS fiber optic project is not valid, LUS Director Terry Huval told the City-Parish Council on Tuesday.

Advocate:

... it's not clear whether the petition is valid in the first place.

The administration has contended all along that, if a group wants to call for a vote of the people, it should follow petition and referendum procedures in the city-parish charter, which requires signatures of 15 percent of registered voters.

Fiber 411 is seeking signatures under the authority of a state statute dealing with public improvement bonds, which requires signatures from only 5 percent of the turnout from the last election.

But LUS is issuing the $125 million in bonds using a different state statute -- one that regulates revenue bonds and that contains no provisions for a petition.

In effect, the Fiber 411 petition may not be anymore than a representation of public opinion -- not a legally binding document.

On the Honesty of the Petition's Presentation

Advertiser:

City-Parish President Joey Durel again Tuesday encouraged residents not to sign the petition unless they oppose the fiber project. Some individuals circulating the petition are falsely telling residents that signing the petition does not indicate opposition to the fiber plan, he said.

"They are completely against the project," Durel said. "If you sign the petition, realize you are against the project."

Advocate:

Durel said the group is using "false pretenses" by telling people a signature on the petition indicates only a desire to vote.

"While they're telling you that they are not for or against it, they are not being honest," Durel said. "They are completely against it."

On Why the Petition Just Doesn't Make Sense

Advocate:

Councilman Louis Benjamin said there's a lot of misinformation circulating about the LUS project.

"The bottom line is very simple," Benjamin said. "If I own the company that I'm doing business with, then naturally it's going to be a cheaper product."

LUS is owned by its customers and overseen by the Lafayette Public Utility Authority -- made up of the councilmen whose districts are primarily inside the city limits.

Consumers Union telecom project: hearusnow.org

The fight here in Lafayette is a part of the larger story of a telecom industry gone increasingly awry. The citizens of Lafayette are not the only Americans to have reason to distrust companies like Cox and BellSouth.

A sign of how serious the problem has become is that Consumers Union, nonprofit publisher of the ad-free Consumer Reports, has launched a new project, hearusnow.org, aimed at helping consumers understand their choices--and more significantly, helping them learn how to fight for a fairer economic balance between consumers and the increasingly powerful telecom giants.

This is a model site, well designed, easy to navigate, and above all rich in useful information. Such sites are hard to review--they are too rich for a simple review to do them justice. One way to help readers of this blog to get a sense of its power is to link down to some good content from the top in hopes of introducing the site instead of "telling about" it.

In that spirit try this:

Head on over to hearusnow.org take a look around, get a sense of the breadth of telecom issues covered (from Internet & Broadband, to TV, Radio & Cable to Digital Content on the navigation bar). Not issue but activity oriented? Try Get Heard, Get Involved, and Get Help sections. Got a sense of the choices?

Click on Internet & Broadband and admire the interface consistency for a moment. Then try the story from the center aisle: Issue Alert :: It's Only Fair: All Americans Should Have Access to the Internet. Give it a read; its worth it. Here's a teaser from down it the story:

The primary cause of the digital divide is that consumers pay inflated prices for the basic services needed to connect to the high-speed Internet. In fact, U.S. consumers pay more than consumers in other parts of the world for broadband, and generally experience lower service quality (in the form of slower speeds). For example, Americans pay ten to twenty times as much as consumers in Korea and Japan for broadband, and the U.S. has fallen from third to thirteenth in the world in the percentage of citizens with broadband service.

The telecom giants in our country aren't tending to their job. What we've noticed locally is true across this country: we are being charged far too much for far too little. It can be done a lot better. If the teleco's won't do a good job we can do it for ourselves.

Run on down the bottom of the page and take a look a the nifty graphs. One may surprise those among us who haven't been doing the research: Drawn from a federal study with an obscenly obscure name it demonstrates something that the cablecos would just as soon you didn't know: that contrary to their propoganda satellite TV has not proved to be an effective restraint on the steadily increasing charges of monopoly cable companies like Cox. (This little fact is lying around anywhere the research can be found; this is far from the only study.) Nope, monopoly pricing really does flow from cable's monopoly coax network, just like your economics teacher would have insisted.

Outraged? I don't blame you. Me too. Scroll back up to the top of the page and click on "Get Involved" in the right hand column. There's lots of neat things to do on that page but let's say you are attracted to "Share Your Story" because you're miffed about incumbent disinfo in Lafayette. Et voila: there you are--in a place where you can tell the world Lafayette's story.

Neat eh? That is one of many routes you can take. It is a rich site.

Lagniappe: thought that was all, eh? No. Any site so comprehensive couldn't miss Lafayette's story. Consumer Union thinks we have a point too: "BellSouth puts pressure on small town."

"Durel: Fiber 411 Contradicts Themselves"

KATC runs a story based on yet another Fiber411 press conference and Lafayette's quick response team of Durel and Huval.

The latest strange ploy of the anti-fiber petitioners is to ask the council to "put the plan on hold until legal issues are settled." Comme Ca? Say what? So these guys, based on their wishful-thinking "research," get way out ahead of themselves and are begining to realize that they've collected signatures on a petition that is simply invalid want the council to stop the train while they figure out what they should be doing.

That's just nuts. In the real world, if you make a mistake of this magnitude, make it in public, and make it in the face of consistently good advice from your opponents, then you admit your error and see if you can fix it. You don't ask for a time out while you figure out the game.

It might even be nice if they would admit that they were wrong, acknowledge that nearly everyone told them so, and grant that maybe their reflexive distrust of government caused them to ignore good advice from public officials.

I'll be looking for a press conference like that.

The KATC article: Durel: Fiber 411 Contradicts Themselves (Look for the video.)

Doug's' "Open Letter to Residents of Lafayette Parish"

Doug Menefee has issued his personal endorsement of Lafayette's Fiber to the Home initiative. Doug, long a supporter of the project, has projected a low-key public demeanor. This higher profile endorsement is very welcome.

In a broadcast email and in post on his blog, "Open Letter to Residents of Lafayette Parish" Doug rebukes the anti-fiber petitioners for misleading the public about the meaning of the petition and makes clear his support for LUS' project as a practical necessity.

Doug has recently issued a 7 point "Advocates of a Fiber to the Home network need to be heard" call to action that is also well worth your consideration.

Go Doug!

(I'd love to see more of such personal endorsements! It's part of what is needed.)

Bristol Expands, again "Nearly broadband to Russell and Tazewell"

Tempted to believe that malarky that no municipal telecom utility has ever succeeded? Don't be. Bristol's telecom, beset by its own incumbents opens a second rollout of services beyond its original Bristol footprint--so says an article in the local paper.

Sounds like failure? Not to me.

This is simply an extension of Bristol's continuing success as documented in Mike's Fact Check article: Blowing the Whistle Over Bristol. That's well worth a short review if you are tempted to believe the misinformation put forward by local petitioners. That story contains the following quote from an earlier article in the Bristol paper:

"A year after it became one of the few public utilities in the country offering full telecommunications services, Bristol Virginia Utilities is beating its business plan and reaching its goals more quickly than expected."

If anyone wanted to know the truth about Bristol and other municipal success its been available right here at LafayetteProFiber since August. No one should be repeating the lie that telecom utilities never succeed to the people of Lafyette. I've directed two of the anti-fiber petitioners to this article (and Billy Ray's Interview) since this began. Victims of their own rigidity they seemed honestly astounded that the line fed them by the incumbents had ever been challenged and wanted to know of "even one" Example. It's not even hard.

Do the research.

baltimoresun.com - The new digital democracy

Sunday's Baltimore Sun contained an excellent article on the revolution that we are all part of -- even if we're not always aware of it.

The emphasis is on the impact that the digitization of communications tools — from blogs to digital movie cameras to Apple's GarageBand — is lowering barriers to participation in all form of media and creative arts.

Here's a couple of paragraphs that give a flavor of the article:

Those who study changes like these - changes that transform societies - believe it may be decades, even a century, before we are able to truly understand the time we are living in and the impact of the changes that the digital revolution is spawning.

"I don't think we're capable of grasping the significance," says [Andrew] Nachison of the Media Center, which studies the intersection of the media, technology and society. "We get caught up in the day-to-day minutiae. It misses the bigger deal that's going on."

He doesn't believe the digital age will make life universally better. The same tools that allow for freer communication and unfettered connection can also be used for less lofty purposes. At the low end of this spectrum, for instance, the ubiquity of camera phones has led some gyms to ban them for fear that members would be photographed in various states of undress in locker rooms. Of greater concern are more fundamental issues, such how to weed fact from fiction in the flood of information now available online.

"Individuals and organizations which seek to distribute disinformation and misinformation have new tools at their disposal," Nachison says, "and that means everything from corporate disinformation to government propaganda has a new means of distribution."

Still, Nachison is optimistic about what the digital revolution will mean.

"The empowerment of individuals to share information is ultimately going to be a democratizing force around the world. Or, to put it another way, [it will be] a means of disrupting any institution which attempts to repress or control freedom, whether that is a corporation or a government."

Check out the entire article. It's thought provoking says a lot for a newspaper feature.

You Call that Coverage? Endorsements, take 4

Correction 1/17/05 11:45. I was wrong--though I missed it on in the print version and online on the date it was originally published--apparently the Advertiser did print more than a single line acknowledging the remarkable endorsement of its chain's flagship as I discovered during a recent search of their site during an archiving sweep. I've corrected the story below; old text is struck through and new text is dark red.

Ok, Let's get real folks. There come a point when generally lackadaisical local coverage degenerates into something less wholesome. As a loyal reader of LPF you know that Lafayette's fiber fight has been making national news. Perhaps the most significant event in last week's recent train of encouraging news (1,2, 3,4) is the endorsement of Lafayette's position by the nation's largest circulation newspaper: USAToday.

National endorsement of a small city's local issue is, my friends, NEWS. It is even more NEWS if part and parcel of that endorsement is an analysis that of one of the nation's largest megacorps is trying to reassert monopoly power across a range of activities and that its abuse of power in Lafayette is simply the clearest indication of its national intent.

Trust me, this is a BIG DEAL. When was the last time you saw a media outlet condemn a major advertiser (excuse me, I meant corporation) on the grounds of economic misconduct--actually when did we last hear a megacorp condemned for anything in major media outlets? Bhopal? Halliburton? (Halliburton, hmmn, what was that local connection again?) It takes a lot to get today's media, almost uniformly owned by megacorps to condemn one.

Long windup, I know, but here is the pitch:

What the heck is going on when the Lafayette Daily Advertiser can only manage this one sentence remark buried at the end of a story about the anti-fiber petition:

"Tuesday, USA Today published an editorial supporting Lafayette's fiber plan and a counter view by BellSouth Louisiana president William Oliver."

That's all. The ultimate keep it quiet, non-offensive, he said, she said, enough-so-that-nobody can-say-we-ignored-it non-coverage.

The best the Advertiser can do is a short, he said, she said report clearly designed to be inconspicuous and inoffensive. It is close to the least coverage of a truly signficant story that I can imagine.

This would be more nearly understandable, if no less inexcusable, if they were toeing some corporate line. But, The Advertiser is a Gannett newspaper. USAToday is the chain's flagship; the crown jewel of the empire. No, the Advertiser could reprint the editorial (and even give a little appropriate background about the rarity of the action and the article that it references) without any fear of blowback from corporate central.

Neither can they claim that posting an "outside" editorial would somehow compromise their distinctively local nature. Recall the obscene little advertorial that they published not all that long ago on the op ed page of the paper Which cheerfully sold all sorts of falsehoods about municipal broadband networks. That author wrote under the colors of one of the nations most notorious right-wing research-for-hire groups, the Heartland Institute; so an editor wary about outside influences might have chosen not to air the product of such a partisan institution. Even more incredible, a quick google of the author's name pulls up the fact that he owns "Expert Editorial," a company which produces editorials for hire. Hello? Any Connection? Who paid for this 'expert editorial?' Did it occur to anyone that an editorial with such dubious antecedents might be, well, dishonest? And printing it unwise?

However we interpret that affair, it is clear that the editorial staff is not adverse to running outside opinions on this flash-point issue. It is also clear that Gannett headquarters would have no objection. Finally, hell, this is actual NEWS.

Why haven't we seen better coverage of this important story? The people of Lafayette should be able to read this critical document in their own newspaper. I'd not even mind if the Advertiser felt it necessary to run BellSouth's (non)rebuttal at its side.

The coverage problem has reached the point of denying the people of Lafayette access to a major story on our situation. That needs to stop.

U.S. DOD deploying FTTB* in Iraq

Count this as yet another affirmation that fiber is, indeed, the infrastructure of the future. The Department of Defense is building a fiber network linking U.S. military bases in Iraq and a number of other Middle East/South Asia countries.

* Fiber To The Bunker

"Attack of the conservative "think" tanks on muni broadband"

Muniwireless has a worth-reading post on the sorts of 'think tanks' that have plauged us here in Lafayette. It specifically takes on the lie that no municipalities have been successful with Municipal Broadband that is sold by various research-for-hire PR businesses disguising themselves in the trappings of academic endeavors.

We've had to deal with these sorts here in Lafayette since the early days. This site's launch was timed to allow us to respond to the "Academic" Broadband Forum. In that forum the members of the panel were faux academicians of this stripe. More recently the Advertiser printed an advertorial written under the colors of the Heartland Institute and whose author owns a business aptly called "Expert Editorials" which repeated many of the same lies about municipal success. A Heartland Institute "research report was recently cited over at fiber411. Part of the problem with this stuff is that it fits right into the wishful thinking of some folks who want to believe things that simply are not true and gives them "cover" making claims that anyone who knows the field knows are simply not true.

I am a recovering academician myself and take personal offense at the way dishonest research devalues the work of people who actually value the truth.

On the more gratifying side of things, the article cites, and qoutes from at length, LafayetteProFiber's interview with Jim Baller concerning incumbent disinformation campaigns. It's nice to be appreciated.

Doing the Research

The two stories from this morning (Advocate, Advertiser) on the back and forth petition mess project the strange spectacle of the petitioners complaining that they had so messed up their petition drive that they could no longer hope to succeed being countered by the city-parish and LUS saying that they could still run a petition drive if they wanted to, was really pretty astounding when you think about it.

And really there should be a lesson in this for us as the observers of the situation. Whatever virtues the anti-fiber petitioners might have, doing the research is not one of them.

Let's go through it slowly: first the petition drive sponsors decided to go forward on the basis of the wrong law; likely had they admitted to themselves that this was the wrong law and faced squarely the daunting task of getting 15% of the voters to agree with a specific ordinance requiring LUS to not offer services over the network LUS builds they'd would have know they'd never succeed.

So they did the research. And discovered a happier truth.

Trouble was that it wasn't true. Reality, finally, intruded.

When that happened the response wasn't particularly pretty. They called a press conference to complain that, somehow, the city was responsible for their wishful thinking.

But, and this is the strange twist in the tale, the response from the city (albeit reluctantly) was no, they had it wrong again, they could still, if they were willing to abide by the rules that had been open to them all along, go ahead.

But this morning at least one of them was out in a parking lot getting signatures on the old, useless petition. It doesn't conform to the law and all the signatures to date are simply not valid. What funds such behavior? Wishful thinking. They appear unable to let go of what they believe ought to be true in favor of what is true.

The take home message in all this is that guys are prone to believing what they wish were true and that the "research" they do doesn't lead them to new conclusions (as real research must) but only confirms what they previously believed. A briefcase or folder full of papers doesn't constitute research unless the reader was open to being persuaded by the truth. The great weakness in these guy's positions is that they are not open to being shown they are wrong.

But that weakness is also their greatest strenghth. They are true believers. They are sincere.
They can share that conviction with assurance and say things that just aren't true with confidence.

But eventually they (and we) will find out that the stories they are telling really aren't true regardless of the faux research the believe they have done. Wireless will not cure all our bandwidth ills. LUS is not some stalinist boogie man. Fiber is not even beginning to become obsolete. The incumbent monopolists will not play fair if the petitioners hand them a referendum. In modern political/PR campaigns it isn't truth that wins but bankrolls. That they may sincerely believe these lies does not make them less the lie. Reality will intrude. The danger actually lies in believing them. What is most encouraging about the current debate, the continued delusions of these guys aside, is that, astonishingly, we've reached the point where no one is seriously arguing that LUS should not build and maintain a fiber-optic network regardless of incumbent distress. We (and, to give proper credit, they) agree that it must happen sooner rather than later and that LUS should do it. We are down to arguing the details of the business plan and whether it is wise to encourage a train wreck in order to get a plan that agrees with the ideology of a small minority.

There is a reality out there—a political, economic, and technological reality that will not go away just because it is inconvenient for some beliefs. The petitioners would do us all, but most of all themselves, a favor if they'd realize that.

Reality Check: Fiber411's Plaint

In a letter to the public over at Fiber411 Tim Supple goes over the top in a disjointed and internally inconsistent plaint that he be allowed to walk Lafayette into the brutal mugging that a referendum fight would surely be.

It should be clear to all that in the real world BellSouth and Cox have not restrained themselves to a respectful or truthful argument and that there is no reason to expect that to change. Give them the platform of a referendum, the platform that they have been angling for from day one and everyone in the real world knows that they would take advantage of their huge financial advantage and relative lack of legal restraint to do to Lafayette what the incumbents have done everywhere: flood the media, a significant part of which they own, with as sickening flow of misinformation. (BellSouth's proposed state law and Cox's campaign both focused largely on making a referendum happen.)

Their whole purpose would be to defeat LUS in such a way that a public infrastructure could never be built.

Don't be deceived. If the petitioners were to succeed the consequence would be that they would never get their declared aim: to build a public fiber optic system that conforms to their idea of an ideologically correct business plan.

What follows is a partial rebuttal of the points made. My points are inset in green.

---------------------

To Lafayette City Parish Government and Citizens of Lafayette:

Who is Fiber411.com? We are citizens asking for the right to vote on the $125,000,000 bond issue proposed by LUS. Nothing more. We are not bad losers, poor sports, Bell South stooges or supporters of a Cox monopoly.

Fiber411.com is a small group of citizens that started with the belief that the present LUS Fiber to the Home Initiative is not the best plan for Lafayette. We are 100% for a fiber optic network in Lafayette. We are for LUS building the infrastructure that the will bring competition to Bell South and Cox. We do not support Bell South, COX or LUS domination of our market.

Prove it: refuse the help of those who do not share either your goals or your values. It is abundantly obvious that support from BellSouth and Cox is support with an intent to kill LUS project. Demand they open their systems. Don't allow BellSouth or Cox to spend money supporting you. Denounce any use of paid time by "volunteers."

We are for an open network that will allow the owners of LUS (the citizens) access to the all of the competitive service providers throughout the world. We oppose LUS and/or the City Parish Government being both the competitor and the regulators in the retail market for telephone, Internet and cable TV.

You claim to be for LUS being the builder and owner of the network but want open competition in the retail market. There are two ways to that goal. You can try and wreck the ongoing process in hopes of starting it over --blithely ignoring the reality of incumbent power-- or you can say plainly to LUS what you think would be better, prove yourself worth by working hard to get the network in place, and mount a fight for a more open system when outsiders aren't a factor and the very existence of the network isn't at risk. A petition at that point could make good sense. If Cox or your ally BellSouth gets the fiber network because of your tantrum your dream will never have any possibility of being realized. Focus on the reality of the situation! If this is indeed what you want then accepting help from the incumbents is allowing them to use you to their ends.

We believe that the present LUS Fiber to the Home Initiative is a bad business plan that requires the citizens of Lafayette to take unnecessary risk

Actually it is you who wants LUS to take the bigger risk. A rental plan where the owner shares the revenue with the service provider 1) makes the owner reliant on the competence of others, 2) will always be a weaker business plan because it means sharing the income that could be yours with folks that don't have your gumption and haven't taken the risk to build the infrastructure required. This is precisely why BellSouth and Cox will continue to pursue their strong business plan of gathering all the profit for their owners. Why should LUS tie one hand behind them when the other guy is punching away?

and in the end will result in higher utility rates, increased taxes and limited consumer choice to new technology.

This is merely ideological. You believe it to be true only because of an unreasoning hostility towards government. In the real world what has happened is that LUS following exactly this path has resulted in generally lower utility rates than private regional competitors. It also meant lower taxes since "fees for service " substitute for otherwise necessary city tax income. And we see no evidence that LUS who has continually rebuilt the electricity plant has shown poor judgment in the new technologies it chose in those realms. LUS has arguably outperformed and inarguably at least equaled the performance of its private competitors in each of these realms. To look at history and see anything else is to be blinded by ideology.

But all of that is a debate for another day in a public forum, which allows facts, ideas and opinions to be presented to the public for their consideration.

No, it is not a "debate for another day." Arguing the actual issues instead of giving in to the pretense that stopping the plan is not your real purpose is what we should be doing. You don't want to have a vote because you'd like to "think" about it some more. No, honestly now, you want a vote because you've already thought about it and intend to stop the plan. You believe it unwise. This mealy-mouth nonsense doesn't play well and it makes it look like you are willing to say stuff like this just to avoid dealing with the fact that if the people were to actually vote on the issue right now you'd lose and damn few people would sign your petition. But you apparently hope that with a little initial finessing of the truth about your final aim and the subsequent dollars of outsiders in a referendum you can turn that around. Should this ever come to a vote the issue the incumbents make of it will have nothing to do with "open systems" and everything to do with trying to make people believe it is just too scary for anyone but big brother from Atlanta to do. And that the children of Lafayette should be grateful to wait their turn. That is exactly the tack they took in the first months and there is no reason to think they won't again. Did you miss all that?

All Fiber411.com is asking for is the right of the citizens to vote on the present LUS plan.

(See above.)

We attended the city council meeting and were only given 3 minutes

This is an outrageous lie. Sorry. But it is. Neal, Bill, talk to this guy. Tell him not to say things that anyone who was there knows is as far from the truth as is conceivable. For the record: Neal and Bill both talked for a very long time; multiple times. And were treated with complete respect by the council. They'll both confirm that. They just didn't convince the council. It isn't that they didn't make the argument but that they lost it that galls.

to compete with the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent by LUS to sell this plan to its citizens and the city council. At these meetings we asked the city council for the right to vote and they refused. If you are one of the council members that told us that you voted for the LUS plan because you had not heard objections from your constituents, we are objecting now.

To this end, we are circulating a petition, which asks the city council to give the citizens of Lafayette the right to express their opinion by referendum. We are getting great response from both those who are in favor of the LUS plan and those who are opposed to the LUS plan. The most often quoted phrase is "Well of course the citizens should have the right to vote".

Ahem, remember Evelyn?

The statute the government is trying to use,

Hey, wait, "the government" isn't trying to use anything. YOU are trying to use a law that you were warned was not appropriate. (I know this for a fact. I did some of the warning. Ask Bill. Or read the blog.) Your research was bad. That is not the fault of the city-parish. It is your fault. (In my judgment this isn't the first poor research; it's just the first you've had to really deal with.)

would require us "to submit the proposal to the Council which shall specify within 30 days the form of petition for circulation". It would then require that the petitioners gather 18,978 signatures on or before January 24, 2005. In the last election only 42,000 people in Lafayette Parish voted. If that is this government's idea of "government by the people, for the people and of the people", then we have much bigger problem than LUS fiber initiative and we can all agree that the city government has defeated the right of the citizens to vote.

Really now, be fair. the rules were in place long before this issue arose. You are losing and want to change the rules in the middle of the game. That's not how it works. You play the game out. Then, if you still think it unfair, you fix the game. This part does sound like someone is being a poor sport. Of course you don't mention the real figure you'd have to meet: you'd have to get 15% of the voters. That is all. If the town was angry and ready to overturn the decisions of people they voted in to do just this sort of work getting 15% would be no problem. But, I suspect, you know that speaking plainly would make it visible that you represent a very a small minority whose only hope is to get the big boys in from out of town to scare us all into submission. You may think that harsh. It is; I admit. But in the real world that sort of campaign will be the inevitable result of any election that allows Cox and BellSouth to pour money into defeating LUS. And defeating LUS today will only result in either Cox or BellSouth extending their current monopoly networks. And foreclosing an open system forever.

The city council has the power to call for a vote of the people. We are asking our government: "Do you think we should have the right to vote" and we ask our government to respond. Quoting the statutes you have selected,

I interrupt for a reality check. The city has not, cannot "select" any statue. They have merely pointed out which are the controling parts of the code. YOU chose the wrong one because it called for numbers so small that you might actually succeed. The city did nothing to you. You let a little wishful thinking carry you away and are now lashing out at the city for your mistake. Get over it.

which make it virtually impossible for citizens to file a petition for referendum with its government, is not an answer. It's up to you. It's either yes or no.

Again 15% isn't an impossible number if it were more than a very small minority that wanted to stop this project. If the people were up in arms it would be easy. They are not. Referenda shouldn't be easy. We have a representative government. We elect people to do this work. When we don't like what they do we fire them.

To our government we suggest that you trust your citizens. To our fellow citizens we suggest that you trust your instincts.

No, be honest, what you are really suggesting is that we all trust BellSouth and Cox to play fair during a referendum and that we overturn the decisions made by the men we elected to do the job because their decisions don't suit your ideology. We are being asked to trust that you really want LUS to succeed when your actions say otherwise. It's reality check time for you all and a opportunity to sit back and look at things as they really are and make a better choice about how to achieve your declared ends. I suggest you use that opportunity. Or permantly forfeit your credibility.

In the meantime, we hope the citizens of Lafayette will support this petition and call your city councilman to express your support for a vote by the citizens.

We here at Lafayette Pro Fiber suggest that you call, write, and visit our representatives to let them know of your support for LUS and our city showing a little self-reliance. We don't need to wait on the whims of Atlanta. We can do it for ourselves-and do it better and cheaper too.

Tim Supple
Citizen
www.fiber411.com

John St. Julien
Lafayetteprofiber.com

Fiber Foes Read Law, Panic!

The level of discernible panic in the comments from the members of DULL (Delusional United Luddites of Lafayette) in this story from the Saturday Advocate is matched only by the discernible level of serenity on the part of Mayor-President Joey Durel.

Apparently, someone read the Home Rule Charter to the DULL crowd and panic ensued. It turns out that by ignoring the Charter (the governing law on local petitions for referenda), the DULL crowd has painted itself in a corner. The 15 percent of registered voters needed to get the Consolidated Government Council to call a referendum requires a lot more signatures than the DULL crowd thought. Then there is the process of getting an item placed on the Council agenda.

By the time these guys get around to getting to the Council, LUS will likely have gone to the State Bond Commission to sell the bonds that will be used to finance the fiber to the premises network buildout. At that point, a petition would be formally moot.

There's an old adage that comes to mind when reading this story:

"Lack of preparation on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part."

In a blog entry at DULL HQ, the fiber foes — in what must now be considered to be an official tactic — resorted to disinformation again.

Specifically, the blog entry says that opponents of the plan were "only given three minutes" to speak against the plan.

As a person who attended the final public comment meeting of the Consolidated Government Council meeting on this issue, I can say without fear of contradiction, that the council gave opponents of the plan plenty of time to make their case for not proceeding with the project — much to the chagrin of supporters.

Their interpretation of the relative merits and capabilities of fiber and wireless infrastructure was as wrong on that night as their interpretation of the prevailing law has proven this week.

One guesses now that their only option now is to turn to preferred option of their monopolistic, closed-network advocate benefactors at BS (BellSouth) — the lawsuit. I thought free market absolutists were against frivolous lawsuits? Who said irony was dead?! Guess we could blame this on the pernicious influence of their monopolist partners. Proof yet again (as if it was needed!) that momma was right — we should be careful how we choose our friends.

Is ignorance of the law recognized the basis for a legal remedy? We may well find out.

¡Petition Derailed!

I'll tell you what I know, which isn't much. You might get more detail over at Doug's.

Apparently the Fiber411 guys have decided that what folks have been telling them all along is true: the petition method they are attempting isn't valid. Details from my informants are confused and not particularly consistent.

Here's what appears to be going on: Fiber411 called a press conference to announce: OOoops wrong ordinance. And also to ask supporters to call the council. The consolodated government called a conference to say. Yep-those guys messed up. And to say that the Home Rule Charter Rules.

More as I get reliable info. Hey folks, some of you reading this know more than I do. Use the comments!

Cracks in the Axis of Evil? Is Cox Seeking a Place at LUS Table? Cox Makes "Overtures"

Just the facts folks:

There are indications that the unnatural alliance between Cox and BellSouth in opposition to the LUS fiber to the premises plan has begun to shatter.

While BellSouth has rushed to join the petition effort to force a referendum on the LUS fiber plan, erstwhile ally Cox has been conspicuous by its absence and its silence.

Well, it turns out the Cox has been talking, but not with the Fiber 411 crowd. No, Cox has been talking with Mayor-President Joey Durel about dropping its opposition to the LUS plan.

First confirmation of Cox-CG talks came in the form of a phone call from fiber foe Bill LeBlanc to John St. Julien on Thursday morning. In the call, LeBlanc revealed that he'd talked to a Rotary Club president who had chaired a breakfast yesterday (Wednesday) where Durel made reference such talks.

Lafayette Pro Fiber queried Durel by email asking if such a statement had been made. In a response from his Blackberry, Durel confirmed that Cox had, indeed, made "overtures" to him about the possibility of the company dropping its opposition to the LUS plan.

In a follow-up email, Durel remarked that there was no offer, that nothing had been put on the table, and that, given the history of Cox's efforts to derail the project to date, he wasn't sure that it was anything more than a tactic.

However, Durel said that he wants Cox to know that the door is open to further, substantive talks about advancing the fiber project.

---
My.

We'll hold our usual editorializing (except for the title) until the picture clarifies. But this should be very interesting.

?

Durel on Talk Radio

I rousted myself to listen to coffee with the mayor on KPEL this morning hoping to hear something to confirm or deny rumours that have been floating about.

Didn't get that but did get to hear Durel flogging the fiber issue yet again. In between calls about police directing traffic at schools, a mysterious black Toyota Seqouia, and something about a referree Durel kept hitting away at the fiber issue. He is uncompromising in drawing the contrast between big corporations and local control. He's dead center on target with that one. Almost all the other issues are anchored in that one in some way.

No one in Atlanta, no matter how rich and powerful, should be trying to tell us what to do. Period.

But the emotional highlight of the morning was Evelyn, a little ole lady of 87 (we heard the age several times), who called in with a complaint about the fiber petitioners. According to Miz Evelyn she had been taken advantage of by a sweet young couple with two children who reminded her of her all her grandneices and nephews. As she recounts it she thought that by signing the petion she was somehow supporting Lafayette (and that nice young couple). But, with a little prompting from Durel, she said that she'd told them that she wanted to buy those bonds for the grandchildren and that she liked progress. She only discovered the truth about the petition when she watched Durel on Television. She was most apologetic and wanted her name off.

The local color, the accent, the patient mayor, the wonderful, courtly older lady were more fun than should be allowed before I'd had my coffee.

The BellSouth/Fiber411 petitioners take the odd stand that someone like Miz Evelyn, who really, really wants the progress the fiber build would represent, should be singing the petition because it is "only" about a vote on bonds. That's just not true and they absolutely have to know it. It is about stopping those bonds from being issued. It is about arranging for our city to be mugged by wealthy corporate outsiders with a demonstrated propensity to lie. Its about flooding our community with mean-spirited insinuations about the trustworthyness of our elected leadership; insinuations funded by corporate masters who don't give a fig for Lafayette or, indeed, anything but the lucre they can make off us.

If the guys at Fiber411 who designed this petition want to be believed about their more substantial positions (as few as I think they are) they simply have to stop claiming that their aim is anything other than it is. This little ole lady won't be the last piece of bad publicity that they get on this score.

Endorsements, take 3: "Intel to back broadband role for cities"

Cnet previews Intel's new broadband policy in Intel to back broadband role for cities | CNET News.com It's not exactly an endorsement of Lafayette's project; I know, but to have Intel of all heavies come out and demand a role for government in the provision of broadband services is most definitely good news for for our little baby.

(Neal Breakfield and Bill LeBlanc, petitioners who seem to place unnatural stock in the holding forth of Intel executives: take note: The new song book is being issued.)

So we've got an endorsement from USAToday, a rousing "go to it" from the technorati at Slashdot, and support for municipal builds from Intel.

Who'd have thought it? The tide is running strong. What could possibly be next? Maybe Gates will endorse open source.

Two Stories on the Proposed Mugging

Both The Advocate and The Advertiser produce stories on yesterday's press conference—the same press conference LPF's Mike Stagg covered early this morning in the Fiber Foes: The Gang that Couldn't Talk Straight.

Taken together the lead paragraphs pretty much convey the points that Durel and Huval were making:

From the Advertiser's story:

"Signing a petition being circulated by BellSouth employees is a vote against the proposed LUS fiber optics project, city officials said Tuesday."

From the Advocate's story:

"Should the petition circulating in Lafayette succeed in forcing a vote on Lafayette Utilities System's plan to offer telecommunications services, private companies would begin a 'dirty, mud-slinging campaign,'"

To which the Advertiser adds:

"Large telecommunications companies elsewhere have used the same tactic to kill municipal fiber projects, Huval said, citing the Tri-Cities area of Illinois. Telecommunications companies spent more than $2 million to narrowly kill that area's fiber initiative, while citizens supporting the fiber project could only spend about $3,500."

That's pretty much the take-home message. These guys fight dirty. They've already demonstrated their willingness to lie and mislead the public in this city. (Recall push-polls, tantrums over not getting their way with the Chamber Forum, and the inaptly named "Academic" Broadband forum. Not to mention cynically turning their employees into paid political lobbyists just this week. Don't get me started.)

Lafayette Pro Fiber recognizes the wisdom of avoiding a vote on this matter. We covered the latest battle in the tri-cities pretty extensively (even calling for donations) while it was ongoing and the points made by Durel and Huval echo our reasons for championing that story: We in Lafayette need to recognize what we are up against. And what we are facing is an unyielding monopolist willing to say anything and do almost anything to squash competition. This isn't the sort of fair fight where people stand on a level playing field and slug it out with facts, let the best man win style. Nope. It will be a lot more like getting mugged by a gang of thugs. The petitioners are trying to convince us to walk into the dark alley with smiles and an aw shucks plea to just explore it. But we, and our elected representatives, have talked to the neighborhood watch people over in the tri-cities and know that's not a good idea. BellSouth and the petitioners are leading us into a mugging. And they have to know it.

The Advocate carries some nice tidbits concerning the validity of the petition. While the article doesn't make it clear Durel's remarks were only offered in response to direct questioning by Blanchard--it wasn't part of what was formally announced. Durel made it clear that he continues to believe that (as Act 736 requires) the process the city-parish charter defines for referendum is the required path in this case. My own guess is that the city-parish is cheerfully lying in wait for BellSouth's petition. They're hoping that the opponents, who have been increasingly revealed as much weaker than they'd like you to believe (Luke's Body shop turns out to be the other big supporter) will exhaust themselves on a petition that has no hope of being certified and hence no chance of being put before the council. This pretty much fits in with the demonstrably clever strategies pursued by LUS up until today. Somebody over there is a master tactician.

Fiber Foes: The gang that couldn't talk straight

Consolidated Government and LUS began speaking truth to cowards on Tuesday afternoon.

Citing public statements and a national op-ed piece by the president of BellSouth Louisiana, Mayor-President Joey Durel and LUS Director Terry Huval all but called BellSouth and their Fiber 411 lackeys liars for their pronounced inability to honestly declare their true intentions with their petition which calls for a referendum on the LUS plan to construct a fiber to the home project in Lafayette.

In a Tuesday afternoon press conference at City Hall, Durel and Huval said what Bill Oliver of BellSouth could not bring himself to write in his op-ed piece in Tuesday's USAToday, namely that BellSouth has actively opposed the LUS plan since its inception and the company's support of the referendum petition started by Fiber 411 is but the latest and most overt form of that opposition.

Huval and Durel said the purpose of the petition is to put the LUS project at play in an arena where BellSouth and Cox can leverage their substantial economic muscle into a massive disinformation campaign around the fiber issue. They both cited the successful effort led by Comcast and SBC to defeat a fiber to the premises initiative in the Tri-Cities area of Illinois last year.

Lafayette's Quislings at Fiber 411 also cannot bring themselves to admit the nature of their gambit. Having allied themselves openly with BellSouth ('ignore that monopolist behind the petition'), the boys at DULL (Delusional United Luddites of Lafayette) have the temerity to say that signing the petition does not indicate opposition to the LUS plan.

Huval and Durel are calling BellSouth and their pawns out on this and, in their press conference, tried to make it clear to citizens that anyone who considers signing the petition should do so only if they intend to kill the LUS plan.

That BellSouth has become openly involved in the opposition should come as no surprise -- Christmas came wrapped in a Fiber 411 box for Bill Oliver and his local lobbying legacy John Williams. But, as Huval and Durel declared Tuesday, it is difficult to imagine that local citizens would be willing to leave the economic future of this community in the hands of corporate decision makers in Atlanta.

There are, according to Huval and Durel, two certainties at this point: 1) the attempt to force a referendum on the LUS plan is an attempt to kill it; and 2) if LUS doesn't build this infrastructure no one else will — not Cox and not BellSouth.

BS and DULL can try to deny it. They can try to spin it. They can torture the English language in ways that would make Bill Clinton proud. But, when you get right down to it, Durel and Huval are exactly right. The petition effort is their attempt to kill this project.

Recent developments are consistent with the pattern that has become well-established throughout this fray: the opposition to this project has been consistently hobbled by the lack of credibility of the various players in its ranks. This inability to own up to the intent of the petition is but the latest manifestation of this credibility gap.

There appears to be no reason to expect a change in this situation anytime soon.

"Slashdot | Getting Broadband To The Bayou"

Hey, if you want to know what the nerdiest people on the planet think of LUS' fiber optic plan take a look at "Getting Broadband To The Bayou"on Slashdot. Its so nerdy that it even categorizes and rates each post. (Look for 5-insightful). Really. No joke. Go look.

Slashdot is the nerd home par excellance. It gets a huge traffic of the technically sophisticated. Getting mentioned on slashdot is a sure way for to generate so much traffic that it brigs your server down. There is even a verb form: "getting slashdotted" as in: "Oh, yeah, we were down yesterday, we got slashdotted" It is considered the very coolest excuse for losing service.

Getting covered on slashdot is the techie equivalent of getting a cover story coverage in USAToday.

Wow, that's two wowsers in a week.


Yo, petition guys, here's a chance to find out what technically sophisticated people think. Read it and weep.

(original link found over at Doug's)

Update, 7:12 am 1/12/05: Folks new to slashdot might well find the sheer quantity of posting over there overwhelming--and that same quantity might make it hard to read the "sense of the crowd." Here is a shortcut that uses the slashdot rating system. It is a version of the page that returns only the very highest rated comments; lets call it: "Only the best of Getting Broadband to the Bayou." (I do think it makes it clear what the "technorati" think of Lafayette's municipal broadband on the one hand and the incumbent providers on the other.)

"Breaking Free of Cable's Stranglehold"

The New York Times story "Breaking Free of Cable's Stranglehold:" opens with these scene-setting remarks:

"Cable television companies are not among the exhibitors here at the Consumer Electronics Show. But their influence is everywhere, as equipment makers seek to work with - or bypass - the cable industry's bottleneck control over the way most Americans watch TV."

This is a subtle story with a smple but not immediately obvious moral: The cable companies don't only want monopoly control over their own network. They want to extend that control as far into the home as they can.

They'd like to sell you the only Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) that work with their networks. They'd like to make sure that you rent their TV guide and don't use the widely available free ones. They want to make sure that any interaction that you have with your TV makes them a little extra profit. The tool? The ubiquitous digital settop box. They want to make sure that all these funcions are only available if you rent their (expensive goes without saying) proprietary settop box. In fact, if they have their way--and some electronics makers are beig seduced, they'd like to get their claws embedded in the TV itself. So you might buy a Panasonic/Time-Warner TV and could get some advanced services without renting that expensive box. But only as long as you lived in the Time-Warner footprint.

The FCC has tried to control this unhealthy extension of monopoly-based control by requiring the cablecos to support inexpensive card-based devices that could be programed to directly interface between a TV set and external services provide by 3rd party machines, the cablecos, and internet-based services.

The New York Times story that this entry links to focuses on the backend of this story: the delaying tactics the cable companys use to keep card-based technology at bay, the danger that delay it presents to particular 3rd party electronics companies and the other electronic companies that are cutting deals outside this neutral technology to gain access to the markets captured by the cablecos.

It is, I know, an obscure story. And it may not visibly effect you today. But it is a piece of the worsening story of consolidating monopoly control of the telcommunications sphere. The cabelcos and the telecos that control their monopoly networks want us all to believe that, somehow, that monopoly goes away if satellites and wireless technologies provide some services that that are similar to those that they provide. It most emphatically does not. We need to learn to deal more honestly with the fact of monopoly power in portions of our economy and to deal with the consequences.

This problem will only get worse when the different kinds of wired monopolies owned by cable and telecom companies (whose technology can almost be matched in capacity in narrow market segments by other technologies like satellite or wireless) collapse into one mighty fiber-optic network. The days of separate teleco and cableco networks are numbered. In the end there will be only one in any region. That network will have an unchallangeable advantage in capacity. All other technologies will have to depend upon it for the necessary backbone to maintain their narrow market segments. They will have to cut deals ceding control of their services to the master of the network much as some electronic companies feel compelled to do today.

No, this little story from a CES show is the canary in the mine. It alerts or should alert us to the subtle but real ways that monopolies reach out into their surround and control the bottlenecks that they create. The pattern that is emerging that makes independent DVRs produced by many competing companies a breed endangered not by competition or superior technology but by the determination of the owners of monoply networks to own the market segment is an auger of the future.

If we can't find the courage to effectively regulate or transform into citizen-owned utilities these huge monopolies then our last best hope is to shield ourselves by developing small, locally-owned networks that can isolate us from the malign effects of the monopoly networks.

In the end, that might well be the greatest service that citizen-owned networks like the one LUS is fighting to develop could deliver.

From the Archives: What a Local Endorsement Looks Like

USAToday's endorsement awakened my longing to see more local endorsements. Aside from the Independent's supportive talk (which hasn't quite gotten full-throated) we don't have the sorts of endorsements that you would expect.

That hasn't always been the case. There was an earlier fiber fight in Lafayette and if LUS hadn't won that one we'd not likely be seeing a FTTH plan in Lafayette today.

In that fight we saw visionary courage from at least one Lafayette institution: Zydetech. Back then Zydetech, a semi-independent offshoot of the chamber, whole-heartedly endorsed fiber. And in no uncertain terms either:

'Zydetech officially announced its endorsement today for the Lafayette Utility System's plan for utilizing its existing fiber optic cable network to open up more telecommunications offerings for Lafayette.'

'Zydetech members believe that by making the citys' fiber network available Lafayette will have a leg up on other communities in the race for connectivity."

Doug Menefee, then president, closed out the two page endorsement saying:

"Tuesday, August 22 will be remembered as a watershed moment in the forward progress of Lafayette. The time is now to build on the foundation already in place in order to secure our techno-future in the new millennium."

I don't see anything in that statement that wouldn't apply equally today. Where is the old Zydetech? I can't imagine why we've yet to see a similar statement in this round.

Liberate Announces Agreement for Sale of North American Business to Double C Technologies, A Joint Venture of Comcast and Cox

Well, it looks like the folks at Cox have found yet another thing they'd prefer to spend money on instead of deploying fiber to the premises in Lafayette!

This once again makes the case in favor of the LUS fiber project and its importance to our community.

To wit: Fiber to the premises technology is the essential infrastructure of the information age (look at where the cable and phone companies are putting their infrastructure dollars — fiber to the premises); neither BellSouth nor Cox have deemed Lafayette to be worthy of being on the receiving end of their forward-looking infrastructure investments (that's going into larger markets, if it's happening at all); and, finally, ONLY LUS has declared it's willingness to bring this essential economic infrastructure into Lafayette now — when it can make a significant difference in the economic prospects of our community.

Those who argue that we should let the private sector do it are really saying "it should not be done" because the private sector companies have no intention of building a fiber to the premises plant in this city in the foreseeable future.

What the delusional petitioners are really saying is that Lafayette will be better off if we agree to forfeit the economic advantage that the LUS fiber to the premises project would bring us.

That's right! We'd rather be slow than grow! Or, Lafayette: As Good as Atlanta Will Let Us Be!

Luddites of Lafayette Unite! You have nothing to lose but your prospects!

In fact, from this day forward, as a form of shorthand, I will refer to that coalition of Luddites and BellSouth apparachiks pushing the petition to stop the LUS project as "Delusional United Luddites of Lafayette" (DULL).

USATODAY Double Feature - "Competition should be fair"

As a counterpoint to USAToday's endorsement of Lafayette's right to self-determination (blogged earlier) the paper allows William A. Oliver, president of BellSouth Louisiana, the space for a rebuttal.

Mr. Oliver, unfortunately, doesn't really attempt a rebuttal. After all, he isn't planning to provide fiber to the home in Lafayette any time soon and he can't just own up to being afraid that a Lafayette with LUS providing a telecom utility won't be much less lucrative for his company.

So instead of any rebuttal of substantial points of the newspaper's editorial he weakly and rather incredibly resorts to claiming that he doesn't actually want to stop us. I know that seems just too obviously a lie to possibly be what he says. But that is what he says, and I quote:

"It has never been BellSouth's intention to derail this project."

To which I can only say BS--and that I can now see why BellSouth's initials are BS.

This is the sort of contemptuous lie that assumes that his readers are so stupid that they can be swayed merely by his pious claim to "fair competition" sanctity. BS.

It's BS to say that the law that BellSouth tried to get passed in the Louisiana Legislature wasn't intended to stop LUS from even thinking about such a project by making it impossible to even fund a study of the issue.

It's BS to say that the fake "Academic" forum they helped sponsor that featured bought and paid for "expert witnesses," the fourm that simply lied about the history of municipal successes in this area was intended to do anything but stop the project.

It's BS to be paying legions of your lobbyists to use the regulatory power of the PSC to impose conditions on your opponent that you claim should not be applied to your provision of the same service isn't intended to do anything but stop the project.

And today, on the very day that the executives of BS try turn their loyal local employees into a paid political arm of the corporation. On the very day that their trucks roll all over Lafayette charged with getting signatures on a dubiously legal petition from folks who they visit on service calls. On today of all days it should be apparent that it is BullShit to claim that BellSouth is not trying to stop LUS. They are. And if they had a grain of honor they'd own up to it.

The sort of mindset that allows Oliver to write an essay like this is contemptuous of the truth. For these guys: no quarter. The incumbents have behaved and continue to behave dishonorably. They deserve our contempt and nothing more. I invite you to join me in that condemnation.

USATODAY Double Feature - "Internet quest gets squashed"

The USToday largess continues! Words you never thought you'd hear: USAToday ENDORSES Lafayette's cause. But its true. They do so pointedly saying:

Lafayette, like dozens of other cities unwilling to wait for telecommunications giants such as Bell South to install broadband pipelines, decided to build its own. That should have been the end of the story. Why shouldn't citizens be able to use their own resources to help themselves?

The editorial goes on to review the case, easily dismissing specious incumbent arguments that we already have broadband we need by pointing out that what is being offered is slower, more expensive, than our alternative and is not available to all our citizens, as LUS' will be. And to drive the point home they let their national readership know that BellSouth and Cox are simply refusing to provide the services they are trying to prevent the city from building.

As Durel said in the article that inspired for this endorsement: They need to get out of our way!

The story closes with this endorsement of Lafayette's basic position:

Louisiana regulators are busy reviewing the case. But for Lafayette to lose, there are a couple of things the regulators will have to ignore: fairness and common sense.

Lafayette has every reason to enthused about this. It's rare to get such explicit encouragement from a national outlet. The paper is absolutely right, of course; the argument is simple and compelling: The big out of town corporations refuse to provide what we need; so we are doing it for oursleves. There's nothing unfair about that, contrary to the incumbent propoganda, and nothing offensive. Doing for ourselves is just good common sense.


A little Lagniappe: You know, if this is so clear to the folks who work for Gannett way across the country, you'd think that the local Gannett newspapers could see what is right in front of their faces. Where are our local endorsements? We can no longer put it off on corporate timidity. No, the lack of vision and courage is in downtown Lafayette.

A Talk With A BellSouth Field Worker

Talk to the BellSouth workers. And the Cox ones for that matter. In my experience they are good folks; and while they've been feed a line by their employers they are local people who talk sense if you scratch the surface just a little.

Coming back from the doctor's this morning I saw a BellSouth truck pulled up on a side street. I had earlier resolved to talk to one of the guys in the trucks to see what they thought about being "allowed" to carry it around it so I took the opportunity to ask.

He was a local guy (our accent is clear) and I opened by asking him if he was carrying "that petition" around in his truck. What followed was a good conversation that reconfirmed my feelings that they guys who do the work are good folks and that BellSouth has really stepped out of bounds by setting its local employees to the task of tending its political messes.

After a little back and forth he told me had put his "copy of the petition in the shredder" and wasn't intending to ask any of his neighbors to sign the thing. He didn't feel like that was his job. And, he made it clear, in part he felt that way because he didn't really trust his company's motives: he thought that "they were all about the money." He didn't like the way that when you called up with trouble on your phone that you didn't get local people like you used to. Instead you got someone in Birmingham or Nicaragua. He was a good enough member of the Communications Workers of American to know that BellSouth's policies weren't always good for him or his fellas.

I dont' want to misrepresent him. He was also a company loyalist who had been with the Bell through decades of changes. He thinks LUS overcharges. He is proud of his and his colleagues technical expertise in splicing cables and such and thinks LUS is currently taking advantage of their expertise. He has no sympathy for competitors like EATEL and AT&T who he believes are renting lines below cost and making BellSouth maintain them at below cost prices. He doesn't really trust the city to act any differently from his own company and believes that working and poorer parts of town won't get service soon from LUS either. You get the drift. He's proud of his work. He thinks he and his fellows do a better job than those other guys. He's earned his pride. It's guys like him that have kept the services I've enjoyed so clear all these years.

So he's proud of his work and his company; at the same time he resents being asked to carry around a petition on a local political issue for out of state bosses he doesn't particularly trust.

We ended up shaking hands and exchanging names. I recommend you repeat my little experiment. I think you'll enjoy it and find out that the official line is not necessarily the position of the guys on the line. And you'll have the opportunity to let these guys know, that like them, its the BellSouth executives you don't trust, not the people who actually do the work.

Ministers Denounce SBC Internet-Cable TV Push as 'Digital Redlining'

The ministerial group mentioned in the story linked to in the headline for this post gets to the heart of the corporatist approach to infrastructure buildouts: It perpetuates and magnifies divisions in communities.

In the views of Cox and BellSouth, Louisiana is not ready for fiber to the home technology; and, if Louisiana is not ready, then Lafayette is not ready. Once Lafayette is deemed ready (at some point a decade or so into the future and probably after Baton Rouge and Jefferson Parish) not all of Lafayette will be deemed ready; it will be certain sections of Lafayette.

This is the essence of the digital divide.

Critics (i.e., petitioners) of the LUS plan are, apparently, threatened by the prospect of all citizens -- regardless of class -- having access to advanced network services.

That is the true beauty of the LUS plan: it is for ALL of us!

Cox "Triple Play" Ploy Shows Why LUS Will Succeed

Back in the day, when Cox Regional VP Gary Cassard was barnstorming the parish touting his company's prowess and the woe that awaited LUS (and its ratepayers) if our municipally-owned utility built its fiber network and began offering services, Cassard told anyone who would listen that Cox had a trump card that would lay waste to the best laid plans of LUS.

The trump card? The Cox "Triple Play" — voice, data and video for about $85 per month.

Being a Cox customer for about a year, I have looked forward with some anticipation to the unveiling of Cox's telephone service, which finally rolled out in the last quarter of 2004. At my house, we have all four tiers of the Cox digital cable service (plus the HBO package) and high-speed Internet. The monthly bill runs right at $130. Fairly steep, but it represents a significant improvement over what we were paying when I had a BellSouth DSL line and Dish Network satellite service. Dish was cheaper than Cox, but BellSouth was sticking me something awful for the DSL line.

So, when the Cox phone service rolled out, we decided to check it out. A friend of my wife had told her that she (the friend) had received discounts on the cable and Internet service when they signed up for the phone service.

So, between Christmas and New Year's, I made the call to make the phone service switch from AT&T to Cox.

There are three tiers of Cox phone service. The deluxe (my name for it) is about $55 per month, but you get pretty much unlimited calling in North America. The second tier (let's call it "middlin'") offers 1,000 minutes of calling anywhere in North America for $39.99. The basic phone service, which provides unlimited calling in Lafayette Parish is $12.95 per month.

I asked about the discounts I'd heard might be available. I was told that because we are digital cable and high-speed Internet customers, I could knock off $10 whole dollars off the deluxe and middlin' prices, but that the basic was locked in at $12.95.

I asked about Mr. Cassard's promise of the $85 Triple Play. What followed was an explanation of why Cox and BellSouth have so little credibility with the general public here — there was, as usual, some fine print in Cassard's promise.

Yes, I could get that Triple Play package for $85 per month, but I'd have to ratchet down to basic cable and basic Internet. On the other hand, I would get the deluxe phone package! Woo-Hoo!

So, I could get the Triple Play at the touted $85 per month rate, but only if I was willing to give up the things that (in the view of those in my household) make the current costs worthwhile.

On the other hand, if I want to add the deluxe telephone service to my package (a telephone package designed for people without national calling plans on their cell phones) my bill would actually be about $185.

Not in my lifetime, thank you!

We're going to go with the basic phone package ($12.95 per month), which will bring our bill up to about $144 per month.

Now, LUS has premised their projections on what percentage of market share they can win on the idea of eventually winning about half of the cable, telephone and Internet customer base in its service area.

LUS will offer a triple play package, too. Their package (based on comments made by LUS head Terry Huval and consultant Doug Dawson before the Parish Council and other public meetings) will consist of a basic cable package of about 85 channels (the Cox website won't show my the channel list of the Basic Cable package here), telephone (probably packaged somewhat similarly to the tiers now offered by Cox) and high-speed Internet (at a minimum speed of about six times faster than Cox's high-speed service) and do that for 20 percent less than the incumbent.

Well, this package is going to hold powerful appeal for Internet users in Lafayette, particularly those (like me) currently using 'high-speed' services. I think the Internet package offered by LUS will draw a higher percentage of Internet users to its service than was represented in the LUS market survey conducted last spring.

As I recall, Internet usage was important to something like 40 percent of those surveyed. But, as a person who knows a fair number of Internet users, I believe LUS will attract a very high percentage of those who rated Internet access as important to them.

I think many of these people probably have some form of high-speed Internet access now — either DSL or cable modem-based service. Those are premium services for both Cox and BellSouth. In fact, the only way to get Cox high-speed Internet is to have digital cable service.

So, based on that, my guess is that a large percentage of the early adopters of LUS's offerings (I am convinced that this system will be built) will consist of former premium services customers of Cox and BellSouth.

This is significant for a number of reasons. First, it indicates just the kind of threat that the LUS plan presents to Cox (BellSouth is hardly worth mentioning on this because they can't offer Triple Play now and probably will not be able to do so for at least five years). These high-speed Internet customers are the best customers Cox has in Lafayette. Cox's digital cable package runs about $70 per month. Cox High-Speed Internet runs about $40 per month. So, these Cox High-Speed Internet customers are paying a minimum of $100 per month for their service. Add Cox basic telephone ($12.95 per month) and the Internet-heavy, phone-basic Cox Triple Play package comes to about $115.

LUS says it will beat market prices by 20 percent. So, pricing of a competitive LUS package would be about $92 per month.

So, a prospective Internet savvy LUS customer could get about five times the bandwidth for $23 per month less than they are currently paying for a high-speed Internet package from Cox.

The significance of this is that a high percentage of first adopters of LUS will not be looking for savings compared against the Cox basic package or whatever jack-leg phone and satellite gig BellSouth can patch together in the next 24 months. Instead, they'll be switching to get the LUS version of REALLY High-Speed Internet and be getting discounts based on the premium service packages currently being offered by Cox.

These bandwidth hungry early adopters will mean higher revenues per customer for LUS than customers who are primarily interested in cable or telephone. And, these higher per customer revenues will put the LUS project on the fast track to fiscal stability.

Those opposing this plan don't want us to understand this. But, of course, they have not wanted any accurate information about LUS's prospects to see the light of day.

Menefee's Guest Column

Doug Menefee, fellow fiber blogger and the chamber's go to tech guy, has a guest editorial in today's Advertiser. It basically sings the praises of Mayor Durel. Fiber, our favorite topic, is a surprisingly minor note in the song. It's lauditory tone sets a sets off some sort of reflex in me, making me want to point out that there were at least some misteps. —The aborted moves to rename Lousiana and to cut meals on wheels come to mind. But, you know, both of those were things Durel was willing to back off of. Knowing when to fold 'em is a the trait of a good leader as well.

No, all in all, Doug is right on this one. We've been awfully lucky in Joey Durel. Certainly there'd be no fiber initiative without him and his upstanding style has been a pleasure to watch.

(I tried waiting for the online version of this essay but, oddly, there hasn't been one.)

Anti-Anti-Fiber Artwork; Bumpers and Buttons

I've posted a collection of Anti-Anti-Fiber artwork to an "ArtWork" page on the Lafayette Pro Fiber Website. What started as one of those joking moments where friends try to outdo each other in suggesting outlandish ideas for responding to an offense has matured into something quite passable; even if I do say so myself.

The offense we were joking about was the Fiber411/BellSouth Anti Fiber petition. The most nearly reasonable of our ideas was the old mainstay of bumper stickers and buttons. The set posted here is downloadable as PDF and have been set up to fit on traditional sizes of bumper sticker and button blanks.

This series takes its inspiration from Joey Durel's immortal words in reference to the incumbent's obstructionism: "But they have to get out of our way, because we are not going to stand down on this." Words destined for history books. :-)

Its all mostly for fun—but we're serious too.

Here is the eye candy. Link back to the ArtWork page for the downloads.

Eye on The Prize: Digital Divide Call for Participation

Eye on the Prize folks, with today's distractions I don't want to lose track of what is really important and digital divide issues are perhaps the most important of the outstanding fiber issues for Lafayette's future.

Almost a week ago I foolishly followed the Advertiser in burying a call to participate in a digital divide committee in a story about the anti-fiber petition.

Here is the relevant text disinterred from that story:

Meanwhile, LUS is proceeding with the fiber plan. A committee of residents is being formed to address the digital divide, the gap that separates residents familiar with computers and the Internet and those who are not, Huval said.

Walter Guillory, Lafayette Housing Authority executive director, will head the committee. After Jan. 1, Huval said interested people will meet to discuss how to address four aspects of the digital divide: Explaining what the Internet can do for those unfamiliar with it, training on use of the Internet, offering the Internet at a reasonable price, and offering computers or other equipment to access the Internet.

The committee will help develop a plan to be presented to the council when LUS officials ask the council to issue bonds for the fiber network, Huval said.

Anyone interested in serving on the digital divide committee should call Abigail Ransonet at LUS, 291-8947.

I know that lots of folks have expressed an interest in participating in these decisions. Certainly many that appeared at the council in support of fiber were in part motivated by the possibilities for addressing the digital divide that the project provides. (This is one of those things a private entity would never bother to address; it's only when we are doing things for ourselves that it's a possible issue.)

I urge interested readers to call and offer their services. There is little more important that you could do with your time.

The Petition Debate: Neal, Mike, and John Mix It Up

Promoted from the comments to the earlier post "Back and Up; Welcome Back and Welcome!" in which I welcomed Fiber411's new site to blogosphere and the Lafayette fiber debate. A debate over Fiber411's petition drive ensued, a debate which might have a special poigniancy now that it appears that BellSouth, and not the two original petitioners will be the major player.

(begin material from the comments)

Neal Breakfield:

Lafayette Utilites System has served this city well for over 100 years and is probably the City's single most valuable asset aside from the strong, friendly community and unique Cajun culture. We firmly believe that.

LUS wants to enter into the telecommunications industry to compete against the incumbent service providers: Cox Communications and Bellsouth Communications, two of the largest telecommunications comapnies in the Southeast. This is a HUGE increase in the size and scope of government due to the logistics of the undertaking, the dollar amount (~$120 Million), the number of constituents affected, the risk involved... we could go on and on. Let's just say that NOBODY should underestimate or trivialize the impact that this will have on the community whether it succeeds or fails.

Having established the importance of the issue and the fact that that it WILL have a tremendous impact on the citizens in general and on business and industry alike, we feel that it would be a gross violation of the trust of the citizens if such a project were to go forward without voter approval.

Mayor Durel and many of the City-Parish Council members have publicly taken the position that we elected them to make decisons on our behalf, so they will decide this matter for us. They have all been publicly addressed with the concern that this matter is too large and too risky to be left to a simple majority council vote. Almost all of them have flatly refused to even discuss the matter of a public vote. One Council member (Marc Mouton) even said, "absolutely not" when asked if there would be a vote.

Since the Council and the Administration have chosen to ignore and impune our concerns, we have chosen to present the matter ourselves to the community to give the people a chance to voice their opinion.

In the coming weeks we will be circulating a petition to call for a public vote to approve or disapprove of the sale of public bonds to finance the project. PLEASE REALIZE THAT SIGNING THE PETITION IS NOT SIGNIFYING THAT YOU ARE AGAINST THE FIBER OPTIC PROJECT. Your signature merely means that you believe as we do that the matter is simply so important that it MUST have the input of the people direclty.

We hope that during the course of our efforts and through this web site a public discussion involving ALL parties will allow the public to be educated about the advantages and disadvantages of the project and then make an informed decision. The merits and specifics of the project will be covered on another discussion topic. We would like this thread to be confined to the matter of a public vote to keep the dialogue coherent. This web site is big enough for any and all related matters to be discussed in due course.

And remember, keep it nice and civil. This is a vey controversial topic, so the debate can get a little heated from time to time, but in the end we are all neighbors.

Thanks and best regards,

Neal Breakfield

Mike Stagg:

Neal Blakefield,

Your position that signing the petition does not constitute opposition to the LUS fiber project is delusional!

What you and your cohorts are asking is for a change of venue that gives the advantage of the debate to Cox, BellSouth and their out-of-state-puppets-posing-as-experts.

As you may or may not know, local governments cannot wage political campaigns in support of election issues. As we saw this summer, Cox has the ability and the willingness to run a virtually unlimited number commercials on its system at no cost to itself. BellSouth is likely to follow the example set by other RBOCs in similar situations and pour big dollars into a campaign designed to sway voters' minds.

So, what your petition asks for for Consolidated Government to be forced to willingly walk into an ambush. In some quarters that would be considered suicide; but, in your book, it's a fair fight.

This failure to comprehend the implications of your actions and recommendations is consistent with ideologically-driven behavior in which that facts just will not be allowed to stand in the way of what the ideologue percieves to be a good argument.

The ideological nature of your criticism of the LUS plan is evident by your willingness to choose to leave the economic future of this city in the hands of Atlanta-based decision-makers whose interest in Lafayette suddenly became acute when LUS announced its intentions.

You and your partners are, in fact, pawns of Cox and BellSouth made all the more valuable to them by the fact that you emerged on your own.

And, thank you, too, for telling us how to conduct the debate. I can't speak for John, but I refuse to be civil with people whose theories crowd out the room in their minds for unpleasantries like facts. To paraphrase Barry Goldwater, derision in response to bullshit is no vice.

You want a debate? Bring it on! You want to set the terms of the argument? Dream on!

John St. Julien:

Hi Neal,

Nice post, kindly put... but mostly wrong or at least confusing (to me, anyway--see my "whaddya want" posts).

Just to walk through..

I'm thrilled to see that you recognize the value to and the role of LUS in Lafayette's development and current prosperity. Back then they entered the most demanding technical field of their day and for 100 years have successfully competed against the largest private regional providers of electricity. I'm confused as to why you would think this new challenge shouldn't have exactly the same outcome.

You say LUS wants to "enter into the telecommunications industry to compete against the incumbent service providers." This just isn't true in a strict sense. They want to provide a telecommunications infrastructure that no one else will provide _to the people of Lafayette_. I don't think I'm picking nits here--the difference in motivation is the difference between being arrogant (as you cast them) and having a service orientation--which I contend is the natural attitude of a good local utility. Which is what LUS is by your own admission.

Surely you recognize that we do elect representatives to represent us? It isn't suspicious for them to want to do their job. They approved a much larger bond issue for LUS just a few weeks earlier as a routine matter. As to your feelings of being ignored and impugned: I watched those meetings and no one one the council or the administration "impugned" you or Bill. Really, that's not fair. You got a lot of support for your effort there and even some scolding of the audience by the council when your claims raised murmurs of disbelief in the techy quarters of the audience. (At times, I confess, some of those murmurs were mine). You got a fair and, in the eyes of many, more than fair, hearing. You just weren't as convincing as the advocates. Really this isn't the sort of claim you should be making.

The problem with a vote is, as I am sure you must realize, that if this issue would go to a vote the incumbents would have a radically unfair advantage. (Mike's response has more detail) They've been willing to lie and treat us like children in order to make a little extra money. I get the feeling that some people feel that when a corporation lies, tries to make people fearful, uncertain and doubtful about things which objectively are simply factual that it is somehow ok because they are pursuing profit. It's "expected." I think that attitude is poisonous and wrong. Lying is worse when its done under the cover of some sort of righteous excuse. On that: no quarter. The incumbents have behaved dishonorably. They deserve our contempt and nothing more. I invite you to join me in that condemnation.

I have to join Mike in saying that I think it disingenuous of you to claim that a signature on your petition has any other effect than to position the signatory as an accomplice in stopping LUS' fiber optic project. That is the effect it would have. That is the effect you want it to have. Neither you nor Bill (the only two public faces on the project) would vote for the current plan. You want to halt it. Don't deceive signatories that this is some sort of earnest good government petition. The fact of the matter is that LUS is your only chance of getting an open network. And the only time is now. Block it now and another, private, monopolist that you can never hope to control will take it over. If you really want a structurally separated system built and maintained by LUS your only hope, ever, is to back LUS now and fight for that later. Be honest with yourself and others. That all caps plea is dishonest, even if you didn't realize it before you took the position. Maybe your idealism or ideology leads you to believe there ought to be another choice. But this is the real world and there is not.

You can't hope to try and limit the discussion during a debate to some faux issue of a public vote alone. I won't do it and no honest partisan would for the reasons outlined in the paragraph above. You have to take responsibility for the consequences of your actions. Folks like Mike and I do that regularly. Might we wish there was a fantasy world in which different patterns were possible? Sure. I've got lots of candidates for happy fantasies. I even struggle to realize some of them. But I recognize, and act, in the real world. The biggest reason to refuse to sign the petition is that it dishonestly pretends that it will not have the effect of damaging the fiber project. It will. I hate the idea because I am utterly convinced the project will succeed and bring more benefit to my home than almost any I can imagine. No, limiting the debate is not acceptable.

I suppose I am willing to be civil, if you count the above as civil. (I do.) But I think a little anger and absolutely straight talking is healthy. I'll happily get less than civil if I become convinced that you or the group you represent is being dishonest with the people of Lafayette. (My current take is that you are not there...yet. But that the temptation for a true believer is great.)

---My "So Whaddaya Want?" posts are largely inspired by your and Bill's positions. I've had some good, long talks with Bill and look forward to more. I'd be curious as to how you'd or he would respond to those posts.

(end comments material)

Ok, that's the current state of the debate. I'd love to hear from folks in the comments. What do you think?

"BellSouth to join petition drive"

Well it's official; the fiber411 petition drive has finally taken shape: as a tool of the incumbents.

"BellSouth employees are circulating a petition with the aim of bringing Lafayette Utilities System's planned telecommunications venture to a vote."

"Williams said BellSouth is allowing its employees to carry the petition with them at work."

This no doubt "rescues" what had begun to look like a pitiful attempt to put together a petition based on the wrong law by a group whose big push was to have been to have their petition join the anti anti-smoking one at two local body shops. On the tenth. Maybe. Premised on the wrong law and accomplishing nothing but the opposite of what the two front men claimed to desire the petition seemed destined for a slow and quiet death.

No more. As of today it becomes a creature of BellSouth.

This strategy of "allowing" your employees to carry the petition is transparent and typical of the sort of casual duplicity that the incumbents have pursued since the day one of this battle. If you were an employee of a big corporation in little ole Lafayette would you really believe it smart not to carry such a petition? Don't you think there will be implied, but well-understood, quotas for these guys to meet. No, make no mistake about it: BellSouth has turned its entire workforce into a paid petition army. That they are willing to use their people in this way, knowing as they do that some--perhaps many of the more technically sophisticated--must in their hearts think BellSouth is in the wrong on this one confirms Lafayette's conclusion that these guys are simply without honor. All that matters to them is lucre. And it is all that ever has.

Trust me, BellSouth is not acting out of a pious hope to help the people of Lafayette. BellSouth is imposing on its employees because and only because it hopes to derail Lafayette's project. LeBlanc and Breakfield must be realistic enough to know that. The position that this is only about giving the people a chance to vote is transparent. That plea gathered about 10 members on a thin website one of my informants revealed yesterday. And some of those are clearly pro fiber. NO, the petition as of today becomes only about trying to find a way to toss a roadblock in the way of LUS, and the incumbents have demonstrated once again that they are willing to use any tool.

Since LeBlanc seems determined to go through with a petition that has dubious legal basis the number needed will be small enough that this paid army will amass it in short order, I have no doubt. I also have no doubt that the legal eagles at the incumbents realize it has no basis. But hey, they can sue! They can pop up a little fear, uncertainty, and doubt. They can delay and try and get a complaisant court to issue a restraining order until the thing is appealed. And appealed again.

I hope all that fails. In a fair world that is what would happen. But what you can do is register your complaints. Let BellSouth know what you think of this sort of tactic. Let their employees know when you see them. And let Williams and the central office know as well.

John Williams
Regional Manager, Acadiana
BellSouth
(337) 491-6850 (337) 261-2800 (Updated by a helpful reader! Thanks!)
John.C.Williams@BELLSOUTH.COM

"Municipals, incumbents battle over fiber to home"

Lightwave has a pretty extensive report on Municipal fiber battles with a primary focus on Lafayette.

The story is notable for recounting the history of the conflict and for carrying a nice set of quotes from Frank Ledoux at LUS.

A sample quote:

Meanwhile, the experiences of Lafayette, LA, illustrate how heated the battles between utilities and incumbents can get. Lafayette Utilities System (LUS) went public with plans for a $100-million FTTH network last April. Three-quarters of the community’s citizens have said they will take services if those services are affordable, reports Frank Ledoux, engineering and power production manager of LUS.

While he admits that the municipality “expected prohibitive legislation from the incumbents,” Ledoux claims that Lafayette was forced to “go to war with Cox [Communications].” The cable operator launched a multimedia “scare campaign,” as Ledoux calls it, which included radio advertisements, TV spots, and full-page ads in the local newspapers.

There's more. Enjoy yourself.

Carnival, et en français: Carnaval! with King Cakes

Today, January 6th, is epiphany, the first day of Carnaval! We are due a little break from the seriousness of the last few weeks here and Carnival is the perfect excuse.

In addition, with all the national attention visitation at Lafayette Pro Fiber by folks outside Acadiana has been very high. So that's an excuse to provide a little local color for our visitors as well.

Welcome all, Bienvenue!

Lafayette is not only the current epicenter of the local broadband battle but is also just a plain great place to live.

Folks are generally aware of the unique French, Acadian, and Creole communities of our area. And the German, Southern, American Indian, Vietnamese and Italian enclaves should not be overlooked. I know of no place with a richer gumbo of long-established, rural as well as urban, communities living side by side, participating in, and adopting each other's traditions. The famous (and not so famous) musical and culinary mixtures that characterize our region are widely appreciated.

But while we may brag on the joie de vivre that characterize our region, its hard for folks living away from here to get a sense of what that means--much less participate.

Carnival, Mardi Gras, has a host of joyful traditions but the one that is most conspicuous in the daily lives of South Louisiana is the omnipresence of King Cakes during the season. The bakeries turn out huge quantities of the ring of sweet dough and garish colored icing that are the only real constants of pastry. If you walk into an office for any reason during the day expect to see the traditional pot of coffee joined by a king cake, a plastic knife and a pile of little paper napkins. Parties throughout the season may also offer more sophisticated fare but a King Cake is de rigeur. There are even, traditionally, king cake parties--little semi-formal gatherings whose main excuse is the king cake and a little socializing. At those gatherings the big event is choosing who is to have the next party (and buy the next King Cake.) And that is accomplished by waiting for someone to find the "baby" embedded somewhere in the pastry. King Cakes used to come from the bakery with a little plastic baby hidden inside. Today lawsuit-consciousness has lead to packaging the little plastic baby in sanitary wrappings and forcing the customer to embed it in discretely in dough. Some particularly sensitive bakeries even offer 2 babies, in brown and pink, for their diverse patrons. We always use both. And the first to find a baby has to have the next party.

If you think I must be overemphasizing the importance of the King Cake be aware that our daily paper here ran, on this the first day of epiphany, a front page center story with a three column color photo and an interior sidebar entitled: Cakes King of Carnival Culinary Celebrations. Take a look; in it you will find discreet hints of the passionate debates over what a real King Cake is and what a good one should be. (And these are most definitely not the same argument.)

Parades and Carnival Balls are nice, no doubt, but don't confuse the MTV version of Carnival with the real thing.

If you want you can even get a real (or good) King Cake from an authentic Lafayette baker. But if you get one you have to use the baby.

All 337 numbers:

• Anjo's Bakery, 1507 Kaliste Saloom, 989-1977.
• Keller's Bakery, 1012 Jefferson St., 235-1568
• Meche's Donut King, 306 E. Willow St., 232-3782, 205 Rue Louis XIV, 993-1058, 402 Guilbeau Rd., 981-4918.
• Poupart's Bakery Inc., 1902 W. Pinhook Rd., 232-7921.
• Southside Bakery Inc., 2801 Johnston St., 233-8636.

Local readers can weigh in with comments on which are best, or most authentic and why. I may be a bit of a firebrand about fiber. But I know what real conflict is and I am not going there. :-)

Lassiz le bon ton roulez!

DISINFORMATION ALERT: RED: SEVERE!

Threat Advisory Alert

From your:
Lafayette Pro Fiber Disinformation Alert System

The Disinformation Alert Level is reset to Red: Severe

The Disinformation Alert level has been raised to Red: Severe in response to a major disinformation breakout at Fiber411.com. All concerned citizens are urged review the Citizen Guidance documentation for threat levels Red: Severe and below.

You can learn about the general design of the system on our Threats System page and arm yourself to actively resist disinformation by carefully studying and following the guidelines contained in our Citizen Advisory on Citizen Guidance on the ProFiber Disformation Advisory System

Citizens are cautioned that the information terrorists at the incumbents may see this as providing an opening to reopen a sneak campaign of deceit. Vigilance!

Durel reacts to USAToday Attention for Lafayette

In a sidebar to the larger "Bells dig in to dominate" story Durel comments on the positive attention Lafayette is gettting and what it could mean for us all. He keeps a level head about it all though:

While the attention is nice for the city, the real benefit is that the fiber initiative is happening, Durel said.

"Some may call it luck that we're getting this attention, but luck is just when opportunity and preparation meet," he said. "If we weren't doing this, nobody outside of Lafayette would have read about us, but now the whole world is."

These sorts of national kudos are good for civic morale: Lafayette is about to embark on an ambitious journey. What me most need is the sense that we can do it; that those that would stop us are acting unfairly, and that our community is willing to stand up to those who'd keep us down. Stories like this feed the fever. Good for us.

In The Advertiser: Bells dig in to dominate high-speed Internet realm

Local readers get easy access to the original story from USAToday. Great; it is something every citizen should read; it's very direct in its reporting on BellSouth's anti-competitive strategies. However, I am moved to note that it would have been nice to get this kind of analysis from the local Gannett paper. My guess is that they'd think it too partisan; hey, newsflash, the truth ain't partisan. From the Advertiser:

"Editor's note: The following story, originally appearing in Tuesday's edition of USA Today, called broad attention to Lafayette's fiber controversy. USA Today and The Daily Advertiser are both owned by Gannett Co. Inc"

We've worked this one pretty hard in these pages so I won't comment a fifth time. Yes, there really are 4 others. I am officially appalled. But the story is that rich. Go get it.

(It'd be nice if the story weren't buried on the back page of the B section. In USAToday's national paper the story got the cover story status. You'd think it would be considered a tad more important locally.)

So Whaddaya Want? An Open Network? (2)

Installment (2) examining the strange contradictions that fiber's opponents get themselves wound up in.

Lately we've been hearing that it makes sense to be both an advocate of an open networks systems architecture and an opponent of LUS. Actually, nothing could make less sense.

Here is one undeniable fact:

Neither BellSouth nor Cox will ever build an open system.

BellSouth and Cox have been nothing if not consistent on this score. Nobody even bothers to ask them to build an open system.

If doubt were possible, witness the ongoing fight the telecos are winning to reestablish monopoly control of their wire into the home. (Remember when AT&T and EATEL were offering great, competitive prices on leased lines? No more.) The Bells opened their system to competition in trade for the right to enter long distance service. Once they got what they wanted they decided to change the game. BellSouth wants all that monopoly profit for itself. The tool that it is using to get it? Threatening not to build a fiber network. Again. (The recent story in USAToday touting Lafayette is a good place to start on the Bells' anti-competitive strategies.)

If doubt were possible witness the battle to the wire the cablecos have waged to maintain their monopoly status and extend it to new telecom services. The story of the Brand X case is only the most recent expression of the strange contortions that define the telecom services offered by cable companies as something, anything, else. (For a salty review of the history see "Brand X")

It's not just their history, as decisive as I find that evidence, it is also simple and pure logic: These big corporations are in business first and foremost to benefit their owners. They are not (sorry, pie-in-the-sky free enterprise hopefuls) in business to serve customers except as is serves their owner's interests. Faced with a choice between taking all the profit off their monopoly ownership of their networks and sharing it with some folks who will undercut their price or attack their business plan they will never, not ever, choose to allow competition onto their networks. And they would be offended if you would suggest that they should.

No, for reasons historical and structural the BellSouths and the Coxs of this world will never, ever, willingly open their networks to any competition and allow one scintilla of profit that they could skim to be shared with another company.

Honestly, I am not saying that they should think differently. The problem with private ownership in monopoly situations is that what works great in competitive situations--self-interested owners competing to best serve the customers--falls apart when there is no alternative provider. Self-interested monopolists charge as much as they can without bring down regulatory wrath. Really, I understand that it is only logical given the structure of their ownership. That is the game they were set up to play.

But, you know, it is not the only game in town.

There is the utility model.

Utilities grow up in natural monopoly situations as an alternative to regulation. (And the coming fiber network will a natural monopoly, make no mistake) Regulation can be problematic, as the regulators too often end up creatures of the regulated. Still it is better than allowing a monopoly totally free rein, as economic history decisively demonstrates. But arguably the utility model, the essence of which is that the owner and the customer are the same, is a much more reliable and natural way to eliminate the problems of high cost and poor service that unregulated monopolies inevitably entail. The nubbin of this argument can be stated simply: You have no motivation to monopolize yourself. You don't have a reason to overcharge yourself. You want to give yourself good service.

The private corporation exists to profit its owner. The utility exists to serve its citizens. It really is that simple.

Which brings us to another undeniable fact:

LUS might conceivably go the open network route.

It is possible to imagine that a utility might go the open network route--all that would be required would be for its owner/citizens to believe that they would benefit more by having such a utility.

In fact the history is clear: some utilities (unlike private entities) have chose to go that route either out of belief or (disturbingly often) because the incumbents have forced a business model on local government that the same incumbents would never, ever, consider for themselves. LUS has already committed itself to providing wholesale bandwidth to entrepreneurs. (It hasn't said it will allow anyone to compete with the core services it offers--anymore than BellSouth or Cox has. From a business plan/safety of the owners investment point of view it doesn't make sense.) But it has already gone further than the incumbents in allowing others offering new services onto its network. If what you want an open network for is to develop exciting new services LUS (and no one else) will sell you bandwidth. If what you want is to make a bundle off of already established and profitable business models. Sorry, LUS won't subsidize that--they've got the net to pay off, the council to satisfy, and a raft of critics who, in yet another contradiction, both want LUS to go for the safest possible business model (not recognizing that is a closed network) and to go with a business model that gives away potential profit to renters instead of its owners (an open network).

All you have to do in the future to open LUS' system to competition up and down the line is to make a case for it before the council. Make the case that the citizens would benefit more from the competition than the city would from the in lieu of tax income that it would displace. You could run on such a platform for council or mayor.

We really could, pretty easily, decide to do that. It is not only conceivable; it seems likely the issue will arise.

What is not conceivable is that we could ever convince Cox or BellSouth, should they own the monopoly fiber optic network, to ever consider opening their system just because it would benefit the citizens of Lafayette.

No, there are some things you just have to do for yourself. We used to call it self-reliance and it was considered a virtue. Now we have folks who apparently want us to believe that depending on guys in Atlanta to tell us what we should want is a virtue. I'm too old-fashioned to go for that.

You say you want an open network; one with full structural separation?

There is only one rational position to take if you believe:

1. if you recognize that a fiber optic network will be as much a natural monopoly as the roads or any water system ever was.
   
2. that Cox and Bell South will never, ever, open their network to competition.
   
3. that LUS just might further open their network, if the citizens see more benefit to that route once they balance it against the costs to the city.
   

No, Make those hard choices; face reality: if you want an open network, and if you want the benefits you believe an open network can bring you really don't have any rational choice but LUS.

Resolve those contradictions!

A Blast From the Past

Some days it seems the blogging is easy. Today is one of those days. A link in the nifty isenberg.com blog (referenced below) leads to an old Times of Acadiana article from May 29th of 2002 (Get Wired In The Hub City) which trumpets the success of LUS initial fiber project--a fiber optic loop that will be part of the backbone of the coming fiber to the home build.

Its fun to read that success story and to catch the names of folks still participating in the latest fiber stories.

Steve Creeden, for instance, is now working for LUS and a key player in their video plans, was then a long-time cable employee and said of LUS' competition then that: "decreased prices because of competition or increased efficiency were "very unlikely." Cox is still saying that but Creeden is singing a different tune these days.

By contrast, singing the same tune and sounding prescient, our own Mike Stagg is quoted as saying:

...LUS should be praised for its vision and deployment of the project, but that "they haven't had the courage or the vision to deliver world-class last-mile solutions.

"They're not delivering what the loop holds," he says. "If LUS wants to offer something truly earth-shattering, they will deliver a fiber to the building solution," which, he says, would be a "truly useful tool for community and economic development."

The story closes with a little open-ended speculation:

So, What's Next?

The loop is lit. It is making a difference for local companies and their customers. Even though not every citizen who is paying for it can use it, the consensus is that the loop is plugging Lafayette into a new realm of possibilities. What those will be have yet to be seen.

We're seeing today what was next then. But the same question is worthwhile now: What's Next? Regional Fiber? WiFi? The story is hardly over.

National Attention for the Battle of Lafayette

Big blogger isen.blog covers the battle of Lafayette in uncompromising terms.

He's a man with a reasoning style that gladdens my heart: He's a reality-based reasoner. A binary decision tree sorta guy. You want to see tight reasoning? Follow out his little hierarchical tree.

Starting with the question: "Should a government, especially a government "of, by and for the people," have the right to say what sectors of its community should be served?" At one end of one branch you get regulation or an LUS-like initiative. The other branch is simply anti-democratic, with government of, by and for the people turned over to corporations.

Get a taste...Spicy stuff.

Oh yeah, he gives us a link. And one to those other guys....

International Attention for the Battle of Lafayette

The famed wireless blog and information center MuniWireless.com, written out of Amsterdam, posts a long entry endorsing Lafayette's FTTH Project in a post called
Battle of Lafayette, Louisiana: the People vs Incumbents.

He works through the (ir)rational opposition to LUS dispelling misconceptions with sweeping strokes. Try it, you'll like it.

A nice tidbit from the center of the article:

Here's my problem with the BellSouths of the world. They are acting like the state monopoly that KPN (formerly known as the Dutch PTT) used to be. They do not want competition. They want protection from competition. They are true anti-capitalists. Shouldn't that make fiscal conservatives see red? Isn't that what communism/socialism was about?

Nice, very nice, to get a view from across the pond.

So Whaddaya Want? Fiber? (1)

One of the most interesting things about this whole fiber to the home fight has been the strange contradictions that opponents get themselves wound up in.

The first, and most obvious, is the strange idea that it makes sense to be both an advocate of Lafayette getting fiber to the home (FTTH) technology and an opponent of LUS.

Here is one of the most fundamental truths of the debate:

Only LUS will build a FTTH network in the foreseeable future.

BellSouth and Cox have been nothing if not consistent on this score. They say they aren't going to do it. And then grandly announce we don't need fiber: ignorant rubes that we are we ought to want something they call "services"—by which they mean something that they can separate from the bitstream and charge us through the nose for. (The paternalism that assumes we are foolish enough to accept this transparent substitution is offensive. I know what I want and I don't need some Atlanta-bound executive from Tyler, Texas telling me that what I need to do is to pledge allegiance to his outdated profit centers.)

There is only one rational position to take if you believe

1. that fiber to the home is the inevitable path of the future (Note that all the incumbents think so and have been investing in a fiber future for the last decade--no serious analyst in the business doubts this. The bandwidth demands of the future cannot be handled by anything less--certainly not by fantasies of wireless clouds covering municipalities which, in truth, can only be provisioned by fiber.)
2. that fiber to the home, as the signature technology of the still-emerging information technology, is the key to future economic development, keeping our kids in Acadiana, and preserving our unique way of life. Getting fiber on Cox and BellSouth's schedule just means that Lafayette would fall further behind the large urban centers, our children will continue to migrate to more dynamic centers, and that the national media will continue to wash out what we most value about living in the south and Acadiana. Getting a powerful FTTH system in place first is our best chance for pursuing these goals. Waiting on the private companies to see enough profit in us just means that we will be way back in the pack....again.

No, if you want fiber, and if you want what fiber can bring you really don't have any rational choice but LUS.

Resolve those contradictions!

Back and Up; Welcome Back and Welcome!

Well, the local fiber-related blogger ecology has taken a swing up. Welcome back and welcome!

Welcome Back!
Doug Menefee and his Fiber To The Home blog is back after a long absence. There's always good stuff over there. He promises a shift in focus on the blog to be less fiber and Lafayette centric but the first new posts are just like the last. :-) It wil be interesting to watch the site evolve.

Welcome!
Fiber411 turned from a placeholder into a site sometime in the last day. Message boards, private spaces, polls, the works. And, of course, it is filled with the worst sort of misinformation. While you hate to see that sort of stuff get any exposure it'll be nice to have something concrete to refer to when we rebut some of this stuff.

Conspicuously missing are references to the sort of technical mistakes they made when addressing the council. I suspect that they don't want to offer those up for public review and comment. Also AWOL is the petition itself and any discussion of their obvious legal confusions. Maybe it will fill out later.

National Online Discussion Group Discusses USAToday Article

Broadband Reports, cited occasionally on these pages as national clearing house for broadband information on municipal broadband issues is hosting a spirited debate centering on Tuesday's USAToday article. Give it a look at "BellSouth Vs. Lafayette Fiber, Mayor to bell: 'Get out of our way'"

It's a fun read.

USATODAY on Lafayette's Fiber Optic Broadband

The much ballyhooed article Mayor Durel let slip would be coming out has finally hit the stands in USAToday.

It was pushed out of the paper last week at the last minute by Tsunami news but is the cover story of the money section today. Nice placement in the nation's largest circulation daily.

Go get the official version at USAToday: Bells dig in to dominate high-speed Internet realm

The story wasn't pulled back quickly enough to keep it from ciruclating online last week and we ended up with three different blog entries inspired by the article. You can review them at: Lafayette, poster child for municipal broadband, Reflections: Lafayette isn't small, it's central, and "Bells dig in to dominate high-speed Internet realm Consumers could pay if giants squash rivals like tiny Lafayette, La."

"Petition's Validity Questioned"

"A petition attempting to block Lafayette Utilities System from borrowing money to build a telecommunications network may not be valid."

An Advocate article on the petition drive digs down to get at the story behind the laws which (might) authorize the anti-(retail business plan) fiber petition. The long and the short of it is that there is every reason to believe that the approach chosen by the petitioners is simply not valid under state law. The law which their petition assumes is not the law under which the bonds were authorized. That law, dealing with "revenue" bonds, has no provision for petition. The city is confident that any petition challenge would have to be brought under the provisions of its home rule charter. The recent state law dealing with municipal telecom issues—which was designed to be controlling state legislation on such issues—spends a lot of time dealing with referendum issues and specifically defers to a city's home rule charter where available.

As readers of recent posts will recall I am not surprised to learn that the petition groups research on this issue (they are going to ask their attorney about this) is off-base. In fact large parts of the "research" that they have publicly cited has been similarly off-base. If they are truly opposed to LUS' project (and, oddly, I am not honestly sure that the two who are the public face of the project really are) they need to take a deep breath and get their act together.

Anyway, go to the story, which is a nice counterpoise to yesterday's Advertiser "coverage" and read it for yourself. There are some juicy details buried in those paragraphs.

update 9:45, a little lagniappe: A little reflection after a second reading leads to a small smile on my part. Apparently the only way to get a definitive opinion on which law governs a valid petition drive is for the city-parish to petition the state for an opinion. The petitioners can't do it for themselves. If they proceed on the current path LUS can pull the rug out from under them whenever they want. They can try to go forward under a cloud of uncertainty or take the certainly legal but likely impossible path provided for in the home rule charter.

They'd better get good not just passionate legal council.

Huval Story in PDF

I promised to try and get the Independent story, "Huval Hitting the Right Notes," online and the folks over at the Indpendent were very kind about giving me a pdf file of the story. Just to remind folks: this is the "person of the year story" that emphasizes the contrast and the convergence between Huval's life as head of the utility and his avocation as a musician.

The story is nicely laid out...the initial two pages are a laid out on facing pages so the PDF file doesn't quite do it justice. Fool around with your reader and see if you can't line 'em up side by side.

The cover (huge, 4 megs)

The story (large, 1 meg)

"Sour Grapes" Petition Drive Story in the Advertiser

The Advertiser is at it again. There is a strong strain of sensationalism that peeks out all too often and the latest article on fiber, Petition on fiber plan wired for success, is an example. We get a headline, a lead in to the story that makes a casual reader think that the petition is taking off and is on solid ground. A closer reading makes it clear that neither the petitioners nor the author of the story really understand the basics well enough to say what is possible. The story is at least premature. And the headline downright misleading.

That doesn't mean that there isn't real fiber news in the story. If you wade down into it you find the actual news oddly wedged in between bits of petition confusion.

The real news is that the city is going to the public for input on the digital divide issue and a committee is forming under the leadership of Walter Guillory. This is far and away the most important fiber issue of the day and the outcome of the work of that committee will be potentially as important as the construction of the network itself for Lafayette's future.

On the petition drive itself what you find is that the same kind of confusion that the organizers showed in city council meetings. It isn't clear what portion of the law applies to this case and, since more than one part of the code addresses it, what provides controlling authority. It pretty clear that they aren't sure and the Advertiser is reduced to listing all the possibilities. What do they need? 5%, 25%, or 15%? No one knows, not the author of the piece nor the supporters of the petition. The state legal eagle says: "normally, the city-parish charter would dictate how to place an item on the public ballot." That is what everyone has been assuming right along. But this fact is so buried and deemphasized that you could read this article twice and not really understand that what the state lawyer thinks is most likely on first blush is that Fiber411 will have to go with the procedures set out in Lafayette's home rule charter—a much more formidable task than they have been advertising.

It isn't just that they are confused about the numbers. They sort of petition they put together will vary with which part of the legal code they are trying to satisfy. The paper refers the reader to their website where you are supposed to be able to find more on the petition, but where, in fact, you cannot.

To go before the public this uncertain of what it is you are trying to accomplish (are they against fiber, bonds, or the business plan?), so uncertain about how to accomplish "it" (5, 15, or 25%) and so uncertain about how to phrase the petition itself (we haven't seen one since they don't really know what conditions they have to satisfy) is embarrassing—and could have been predicted based on the quality of research that they brought before the council. There they put before the council material that either did not apply to the Lafayette case or was built on corporate press releases or was just plain wrong (the wireless claims in particular showed a deep misunderstanding of how wireless bandwidth is provisioned). It finally got so bad that the more technically adept in the audience finally begin to set up a murmur in the back of the room that consisted mostly of amazed disbelief. It got loud enough to upset the councilman who voted against LUS's plan and who asked the crowd to be quiet. It would be nice if they'd gotten their act together before they went public--and even nicer if the Advertiser could tell that they haven't done the work to warrant the sort of promotional coverage they received.