Policy Recommendations Today at fcc.gov/live

Should the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) end with a bang or a whimper? What, if anything, should the FCC do about the transition to IPv6 ? What are best practices for wireless tower siting?

These are some of the subjects on which the FCC's More...

Trotters in the Public Trough

Their salaries are grossly out of line; their retirement benefits are astronomical. We, the public, are paying to maintain their lifestyles while our own income goes down. Their influence on elections keep More...

Great News! There’s a Natural Gas Bubble

The New York Times lead story today is "Insiders Raise Alarm Amid a Rush for Natural Gas". This is wonderful news although the NYTimes doesn't think so. More...

Getting Less Than We Paid for from Efficiency Vermont

"It's good to get more than you pay for" (or something close to that) is the lead of a radio ad from Efficiency Vermont (EV) promoting the purchase of compact fluorescent lights (CFLs). We are urged to rush out and buy these bulb More...

The Demopublican Duopoly is Due for a Fall

"Americans have watched, with a growing sense of alarm and alienation, as first a Republican administration and then its Democratic successor have flouted public opinion by bailing out banks, nationalizing the auto industry, expanding war in Central Asia, throwing yet more good More...

Whom Do We Regulate when the Phone Monopolies Are Gone? – Universal Access

Reprise of last post: After a more than 100 year run, the end is nigh for plain old telep More...

Whom Do We Regulate when the Phone Monopolies Are Gone?

Once upon a time in a universe not very long ago phone service in the US was provided by regulated monopolies. AT&T was the big one and there were (and are) hundreds of small ILECs (Independent Local Exchange Carriers) around the country. These monopolies were regulated both at the federal an More...

CC’ing Will Get Your Friends Speared

Now that many of us are wise to phishing – email that purports to be from your bank, for example, and gets you to expose your password or download a virus, a new form of email attack has been developed. It's called spearing More...

Bad News for Investment Banks; Good News for the Rest of Us

"BRUSSELS—Support is building among senior European finance officials for a plan to press Greece's private-sector creditors into accepting a debt exchange that would result in delayed repayment to them, people familiar with the matter say.

"But that agg More...

Tweet the Pig

In 760 AD or thereabouts the fortress city in southern France now known as Carcassonne was under siege by the Franks. Food and water were running low; the Franks were expecting surrender any day. The Saracen lord of the place was dead; but his widow, Dame Carcas, had an idea. She convinced everyo More...