CAF, Rural Broadband, UNE, Cloud, Google, WOW

One again a collection of news tidbits about CAF, Rural Broadband, UNE, Cloud, Google, WOW!

WideOpenWeb (WOW!) is a MSO that overbuilds. WOW admits that everyone offers the same bundle. In many cases, it comes down to service. If you have a culture of service - like Rackspace does - then it isn't customer service, but customer experience that will pay dividends. WOW talked about that at an expo.

Nice points made by Schmidt in Europe about Google. Apparently, GOOG worries more about Amazon than Bing.

"The next Google won’t do what Google does, just as Google didn’t do what AOL did." - Schmidt

Revealed: ISPs Already Violating Net Neutrality To Block Encryption And Make Everyone Less Safe Online. An interesting read.

I don't know how many people know of TDS but it is an ILEC in the northern mid US. It also has a decent sized CLEC. TDS went on a buying spree for data center and cloud services. TDS is also the majority owner of US Cellular. TDS is a long standing COMPTEL member and has sat on its board for years. TDS launched cloud backup for $5.95 per month!!

Want Your Business to Thrive? Join a Peer Group! Mentioned here are Vistage, EO and HTG.

A LinkedIn discussion: "Is cloud becoming a commodity? We say no, not necessarily. We should be talking about how not all clouds are created equal. There are still large margins in IaaS." No more than web hosting did. I think the messaging in almost anything telecom and IT is for the masses so gets so watered down that it all sounds the same. Plus marketing is constantly using buzz words to get SEO out of their press releases, which results in a release that says nothing. So they all sound the same. When they decide to start branding, it all won't be a commodity.

Windstream spoke with Wireline Competition Bureau staff on October 6, 2014, to ask the FCC to reiterate that an ILEC carrier is not relieved of its obligation to provide DS1 or DS3 UNE loops when it transitions from TDM-based to IP-based technologies or avails itself of the copper retirement procedures. Windstream emphasized the continued importance of UNEs for competitive communications services used by entities with lower bandwidth needs, which include small businesses as well as smaller sites of multi-location business, government, and nonprofit entities. Windstream also provided data on its spending for DS1 connectivity used for customer last-mile access. [NECA]

John Deere makes the case for Rural Broadband.

AT&T has big data on rural wireline that it shared with the FCC for CAF (Connect America Fund) II project. Interesting read.