FCC Zero Rating Report Called Sloppy, Misleading
The FCC Wireless Bureau's recent report on zero rating is “sloppy, misleading, and somehow manages to miss the point that anti-competitive practices typically restrict -- and don't expand -- output,” said telecom consultant Jonathan Lee in a blog post. “It…
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is only through a misleading application of the Commission's Open Internet Order that the [bureau] is able to make the focus of its analysis a ‘secondary’ market instead of the ‘primary market’ of mobile broadband Internet access -- the very market in which the FCC, in the Open Internet Order, said it would expect to see consumer benefits resulting from zero rated business plans!” The report said zero rated programs offered by AT&T and Verizon may be anticompetitive and raise net neutrality concerns (see 1701110070). The effect of sponsored data plans is “the availability of better consumer mobile broadband service -- with more online video, and not less,” Lee said. The report is "hopefully the last instance of Chairman Tom Wheeler's 'because-I-said-so' policy-making," Lee wrote. The FCC didn't comment Wednesday. Lee formerly worked for CompTel and has done work for AT&T.