The Last Train - Episode 564 of the Community Broadband Bits Podcast

Speaker 1 (00:00):
<Silence>

Jonathan Chambers (00:07):
Don't rob them of their chance, because as I said before, this is the last chance, last boat, last train. This is it. Don't steal that from them.

Christopher Mitchell (00:18):
Welcome to another episode of the Community Broadband Bits podcast. I'm Christopher Mitchell from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, where I'm back in St. Paul, Minnesota, and I slept in my own bed for the first time in like five nights after a wonderful Tribal Broadband Bootcamp. I'm here with one of my favorite guests, John Chambers, a partner at Conexon. What could be better? How you doing, John?

Jonathan Chambers (00:41):
Doing all right, Chris. It's always good to be with you.

Christopher Mitchell (00:43):
I don't think I, I told you this, but after we did the first w first bootcamp, I think it was after the first one you and I were talking, you were like, you know, what are you, what are you doing here? Like, you should be, you should be talking about fiber. 'cause The first one was a Tribal wireless bootcamp, and now we call 'em tribal broadband bootcamps. We cover a lot of fiber and wireless. And there was a part of me that was just thinking how there's no way to really get into this. We're talking about these, these areas that are very small, and, and you were right. There's Tribes doing great fiber networks. There's Tribes doing great wireless networks. We make sure that people are exposed to both. And, and so what we did was we spoke to more folks. We brought in you know, people that had worked with fiber for a long time.

(01:25):
And and I'm happy to say that you were right, and we've, some of the Tribes we worked with went on to then go on and get some of the, the money from the federal government to build fiber networks that they might not have otherwise done, because they also thought it was too difficult to just jump into. And none of 'em, none of 'em are taking it easy. But I just wanna say that I was glad that you challenged me, and I'm glad that we you know, sort of dug a little bit deeper to give a, a more comprehensive look at options on the table.

Jonathan Chambers (01:52):
Well, you know what I really think, though,

Christopher Mitchell (01:56):
<Laugh>,

Jonathan Chambers (01:58):
If you're a community in an area that, that is eligible, because they're unserved and underserved locations eligible for the Coming BEAD program, there is more than enough BEAD money to build a fiber network to every single unserved and underserved home business or other broadband serviceable location in the country, more than enough money. And the, the most appropriate use of public money is to invest in long-term infrastructure. I won't say fiber upfront, I'll say long-term infrastructure, 30 year infrastructure, 40 year infrastructure. The biggest mistake in the public broadband programs over the past 10 to 15 years has been short-term fix after short-term fix, which of course means no fix because the speeds that are set out as the qualifying, you know, eligible area, this phony shibboleth, the things need to be technology neutral. Who wants neutral? I want the best technology. Me personally, I want the best.

(03:16):
And so does every person I know. So invest not in something that is out of date before the money is spent. Invest in something that will be around for 30 years and still usable during the 30 years. And there is only one transmission medium that meets that particular criterion. And that is a fiber optic transmission. That that's it. That, that there's no second. And to the, to the extent people do run this, this national scam that fixed wireless is somehow a, a even a, a second best or a third best or, or a good enough, or, or we can do it, we can build fixed wireless because you can't build fiber here. To me, that's wrong on so many accounts. But I'll just mention one. And, and yours and my old friend, Doug Dawson mentioned this a month or so ago in one of his posts when he talked about the lack of capacity of, of certain types of networks. And he was referring to wireless, and he was referring to satellite, which also uses spectrum. The lack of capacity to deliver to all of the locations in a geographic area, the requi requisite level of service.

Christopher Mitchell (04:49):
Yeah. That's what we're here today to talk about.

Jonathan Chambers (04:51):
Yeah. So in other words, if you look at the national broadband map, lots of people have complained about lots of different things than the national broadband map. I I tend not to complain about the map itself, the way I thought of the national broadband map since the beginning. And as you may know, it was around at the beginning it's data. And the F C C should release all the data and should, as part of its release of data, should, if it's not going to use its own expertise about network technologies or spectrum or capacity or anything that they wanna talk about, then they should allow other experts to weigh in on which types of technology are really capable of delivering services throughout geographic areas. And that, I mean, one thing very specifically the F C C has already done, its counting and reported to N T I A as to the number of unserved, meaning lacking 25 megabits per second down three megabits per second up service to every single location in the entire United States, which they consider to be broadband serviceable.

(06:23):
And in doing so, they relied the F C C relied upon the reporting by Internet Service Providers. I don't take the position as some do that, that, that an Internet service provider self-reporting is going to be inherently false or overstating the case. I take a slightly different position, which is since the Internet Service Providers don't just report their maximum advertised speed, but they also report the type of technology they use, that you can take that second piece of information in order to determine the first mm-hmm. <Affirmative> not the advertised speed, but the actual speed. And since it is interpreted by the reporting community, those who are submitting their broadband forms back to the F C C as to where they make service available, it is interpreted that if they can make service available to anyone, that's the maximum advertised speed that is upon offer. If they can make service to anyone, then anywhere that they can make service to, to anyone is considered served, served by whatever service offering they have.

(07:51):
Here's an old notion, decades old notion from the telecommunications industry and other industries, a carrier of last resort obligation, Kohler, most people who listened to your, your podcast probably know what what Kohler is about. So just in, in brief, in the past, and it was a state obligation, not a federal obligation, nothing that the F C C worked worked with, but it, it, it, it typically meant for the telephone industry that there was a single provider of telephone service who had that obligation last resort, meaning they had to make service available to anyone that requested it in their service territory. So I would take that notion and extend it just in one step. Because if you were a telephone company, if you were an electric utility within your service territory, and you were told you have to make service available, then you did and you had to make service available. These are monopolies, but not just to one location. You had to make service available to every single location. And the requisite service that you were required to make available had to be available to everyone, right? Everyone At the same time, if you ask a fixed wireless company that's reporting that they have service over some hundreds of miles of geography, and they report that they can make say, a hundred megabit per second down, 20 megabit per second up speeds available. That's their reporting.

(09:34):
Guess what happens under the federal programs, the BEAD program, suddenly that area is ineligible for service. If you ask that fixed wireless company, okay, there's a, a a thousand, 5,000, some number of, of locations, broadband, serviceable locations in the geographic area where you're reporting can you make service a hundred megabits per second down, 20 megabits per second up available upon request. This is the fccs requirement. Somebody requests it. It basically means if you're a wire line carrier, you can do a service drop and make service available. If you're a wireless carrier, it means fix wireless. You can send a crew out and put an antenna on the house and, and receive the service. And you make service available to every single location and have them subscribe to your a hundred megabit per second down 20 megabit per second of service. Everyone, every location, not one, not 10%, not, not 20%.

(10:37):
Everyone can you do that. The answer is invariably no, don't have the capacity. Now, they might say, well, I could, if I were given the time to build more fiber deeper into the area, put up additional antennas, maybe get additional spectrum, I could, because after all, you could build fiber along roads and put antennas up at each mailbox and offer wireless, if that's what you're calling it. That's not the question in the maps. And it shouldn't be the question under BEAD. And it shouldn't be the thing that disqualifies large parts of rural America from being eligible for BEAD. The question has to be today, as of the date of the reporting, the maps that we're relying upon in order to determine eligibility, can you today make service available to every single location? Because when I build a fiber network, if you ask me where we report service availability, can we make service available to, to a hundred percent of the locations?

(11:40):
My answer is yes. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, that's the only question that needs to be asked now by N T I A and by the states in order to determine the most important missing ingredient in the BEAD program, which is what is eligible for funding. 'cause The maps, according to the national broadband map, are deficient in this one respect. It's a wish by most of the reporting entities that they could make service available. It's not an actuality. And, and if you're gonna exclude areas from eligibility because of the reporting of a bunch of fixed wireless companies, you are doing the greatest disservice to rural America since, oh, guess what? Since the last disservice, since the R D O program or the one before that, the Connect America Fund program or the one before that.

Christopher Mitchell (12:36):
Alright, at some point, I gotta get a word in here, <laugh>.

Jonathan Chambers (12:38):
Yeah, yeah, go ahead. And you talk for a while and I'll listen to your dul sit tone.

Christopher Mitchell (12:44):
So yeah, I think that you've, you've touched on just about everything we wanted to touch on, but I wanted to go a little bit deeper on a couple of those things. One is you know, I, I will say that I have a little bit of a thin skin on some of this, in part 'cause some of my listeners and people that I respect you know, there are fixed wireless providers that go out of their way. It's to engineer networks in which they can do it. And this is not a categorical problem. Now, there are small wireless companies that engage in this, and the F C C lets them get away with it. But the thing that kind of shocks me is and I think Doug Dawson covered this, is that it's the big you know, the big mobile companies that are dabbling in fixed wireless who seem to have the greatest impact, where they might only be able to serve like one or 2% or 3% of an area.

(13:33):
And so there might be a hundred homes, and they're saying, we could serve any, any three of these a hundred homes. So we're gonna take them all out of eligibility knowing that they cannot serve even, even half of those homes or, or 25% of those homes with the speeds they're claiming, and the F C C lets them get away with it. That, that to me is, it, is, it's a difference of scale than what I've sort of gotten used to in terms of this scam of we can serve some, so let's disqualify all from funding,

Jonathan Chambers (14:02):
Right? So I think it's, it's a solvable problem by state broadband offices. And again, I'll, you know, throw a lifeline out to N T I A to do something right for a change and, and say, before, or in reviewing state broadband programs, N T I A can make it very clear that the maps for eligibility that they, they use, and of course the states can use their own maps, but if they're going to use the federal maps, and they should advise the states about how to use the federal maps and how to use their own maps. But if they're going to use the federal maps, then they're permitted to ask this one question of any type of network that's been built, which is capacity constrained. And before everybody says, oh, everybody's capacity constrained, because I've seen that, no, that's not true. It just isn't true.

(15:05):
Spectrum based networks are more capacity constrained or particularly capacity constrained. And so if you were to look at a map and say, oh, well, this area has these two wireless providers both claiming service, so it's ineligible, both claiming a hundred down, 20 up. Let's say one of them is, oh, just to make up a company T-mobile, and let's say somebody asked T-Mobile. So can you, one question to put to T-Mobile, can you make the requisite broadband service, meaning it will be considered served, available to every single location in your reported area here? Can you or can you not? It's just a yes or no question, every single one. If the answer is no, then good, thank you for that. You're advertising it properly. We're not criticizing you for your grand promotion that you're, you know, the largest wireless provider in the history of the globe.

(16:09):
We're not saying that. We're just saying thank you for telling us that you cannot provide service to every single fixed location. And so therefore, we're not counting that as served. Now, let me ask the second one, and maybe the second one says, well, I, I, I can, but in a tighter area. I, I can, but only, only if you, you know, shrink the, the propagation characteristics of where I've got antennas into a, I don't know how they would answer specifically, but I think the question needs to be asked, because otherwise you are consigning rural areas without real broadband service available to everyone to miss this boat, the BEAD boat, and you know, this BEAD boat, it's the last boat get on this boat. There aren't any more boats coming. There will always be some funds that the F C C spends since, since the F C C announced its Connect America Fund program starting in 2011.

(17:19):
So we're now going on a dozen years. There have been tens and tens of billions of dollars. There will have been over a hundred billion dollars spent on rural broadband through Connect America Fund one Connect America Fund two, the Connect America Fund, auction Two Auction, the R D O F auction, the ACAM one, the A CAM two, the new A CAM thing, and a CAM stands for, you know, connect America model, the CARES Act, the <laugh>, the American Rescue Plan Act, first part, the American Rescue Plan Act second part, and now BEAD. If you missed all those boats, get on the BEAD boat, man, <laugh> last boat. But don't, don't keep people off. Don't say, no, you don't get on this boat because you already have service.

Christopher Mitchell (18:21):
You and I are both disenchanted with the F C C across different administrations. This isn't a matter of like, oh, it's not my person in charge, so I'm angry at it. This just, to me, seems like this specifically lack of sophistication in dealing with who is eligible. It really, for me, it challenges the idea that that, that it is possible to have an expert agency. Like the whole point of an expert agency is to get things like this, right, to take it seriously. And for the life of me, I just, I don't understand why they, like, I get, I get the mapping, there's all kinds of different reasons that they keep screwing it up and not wanting to take it seriously. But like, to me, this just is puzzling as to how they could be so juvenile about who's eligible for funding.

Jonathan Chambers (19:08):
A long, long time ago, when I was a congressional staff, the Republican staff director of the Senate Commerce Committee, the F C C was one of the federal agencies that committee oversaw. I became quite familiar with the F C C that, that committee still today, that committee's job is to oversee quite a few federal agencies. And the F C C is one of the most significant of them. And I worked in the private industry where my job took me to the F C C. Frequently I worked at the F C C I was in the, you know, senior executive service. And given the title Chief of the Office of Strategic Planning and Policy Analysis, I worked with some of the smartest people I've ever known as a fellow named Evan Quell, who, who created the entire concept of spectrum auctions and, and implemented that at the F C C, brought in, not just brought in tens of billions of dollars to the, to the public by auctioning off spectrum.

(20:20):
Instead of giving the spectrum away, which had been the, the past practice, I worked with a fellow named Henning Schultz, who was the inventor, co-inventor of session initiation protocol. The, the voice protocol over which, you know, most voice traffic runs today. Brilliant people, really hardworking people. Now, I don't know, I mean, historically the F C C was seen as an agency that was captured by its industry, the telecom industry, the telephone industry back in the day. And there's still an awful lot of good people there. And there's still an awful lot of hardworking people. Washington's broken in general, and the F C C is an agency that is just broken as well. You can't have an agency that's so tied to political constraints that they can go for, you know, years as a two, two can't vote, can't adopt new orders. I don't know if the answer is something like off com in the, in the uk in which it's a, a professional staff and then, and an administrator, a single person.

(21:44):
The F C C is a creation of congress. It's not part, it's, so, it's not an executive branch agency. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> and Congress did that intentionally so that Congress, you know, had some authority over the F C C. So I doubt Congress will ever let the executive branch set up a a that that is take on the roles that the F C C today does. The important roles, the, the, the management of the commercial side of Spectrum, N T I A manages the, the government non-commercial side, or, you know, the regulation has become pretty light. Not much regulation of broadband, not much regulation of voice. In fact, it's kind of silly to regulate voice these days. I was down in Florida a couple of months ago at a, at an annual meeting of an electric co-op, Escambia River Electric Cooperative. I flew down to Alabama, drove down to Florida.

(22:51):
The meeting was held in a high school gymnasium. I've been to a bunch of co-op annual meetings. You get different sizes, different turnout. This one, the, the gymnasium was packed. I was there to describe our process for building a fiber network. 'cause We had come to an agreement with the electric cooperative there, that we would build a fiber network to all of their members. And we connect on Connect on connect. Our I S P would be a service provider. So I was there to tell them what services to expect, the pricing, how long it would take, what they could see, what could they expect to see. After I was done speaking, a woman came up to me and said thanked me, first of all, said that she had a heart condition. Her heart condition is such that her heart beats at 25 beats per minute. She told me. So she lives in fear of, of heart failure. And she told me that she lives in a rural area and loves living there. Wouldn't, wouldn't move her husband lives excuse me, her husband works in the Gulf on one of the oil rigs. And so he's gone a lot. And so she's alone a lot.

(24:16):
She told me that the copper network that serves her house is so degraded that, that she can't get decent Internet access. And, and oftentimes, especially when it rains, she can't even make a phone call.

Christopher Mitchell (24:30):
This brings us back to the carrier of last resort because it wasn't just a matter of building out, it was a matter of certain maintenance standards. And and they got money to help make sure they could do that. There's a whole bargain. And many of states, including Florida specifically, chose to remove that requirement overseeing that carrier of last resort obligation. So helpful knowledge for where you might be going here.

Jonathan Chambers (24:55):
Yes. So the thing she lives in fear of is that she has, she doesn't live anywhere near any healthcare facilities because everyone who lives in rural America knows that healthcare facilities have basically packed up and gone. Nobody thinks they can make a buck out of it. She lives in fear that she's gonna have to make a nine one one call and the copper network won't carry her nine one one call and she'll be alone and she'll never make it. So she came to me to thank me that we were gonna build a fiber network, including to her home. And then she said words that will live with me for the rest of my life, which is, she said, I heard about your wife. She said, I know there's nothing. She said, I know there's nothing I can say, but let me at least tell you that you may have lost your wife. You're going to save my life. So thank you.

(26:02):
As you just pointed out, Chris, somebody else has been paid, given subsidies for decades to keep that copper network, maintain that copper network paid as recently as last year, probably still getting a subsidy. I'm not gonna mention which of the carriers. Anybody can guess which of the carriers. It's an old bell system. You know, nobody could complain to the F C C and point that out and have expect the F C C or a state Public Service Commission to do anything about it. What BEAD is being spent on. This gets to my point about every location. Here's my one sort of plea to the fixed wireless industry. And I spent a good part of my career working in the wireless industry, so I know a little bit don't put people like that woman in a position where her area wouldn't be eligible for funding. So she can't get a network built. We don't need BEAD to build to her. But there are a lot of women and men and families, older people who are in that same position in rural America, don't rob them of their chance, because as I said before, this is the last chance, last boat, last train. This is it. Don't steal that from them. Fess up to the capability of your network, God's sake. What do you think you're getting out of it by claiming that you can do something that you can't. I, I have this problem and I get all, you know, self-righteous

Christopher Mitchell (27:52):
<Laugh>,

Jonathan Chambers (27:53):
But I'll wear that. I spend my days, I still get on airplanes. I still travel to rural America. I still out and meet people. I meet them where they are, where they live, where they work, where they congregate. I hear their stories. Don't take from them. There's been enough taken from them already. And if I were a state broadband officer, if I were at the N T I A or if I were back in my old job, I would stand up for them. I'm not there anymore. I'm here and all I can do is, you know, build my little networks and talk to people like you and hope that some people will do the right thing sometimes.

Christopher Mitchell (28:40):
Well, this, this leads to a final point, which, you know, it's hard to, it's hard to follow that, and, and knowing also that there's hundreds, thousands of people that you've, your networks have already rescued from the, the rot from the, the copper rot and that sort of a thing. Stories you'll never know. You know, I, I do think people who are working in this space, it can become easy to forget that this is life or death. I mean, this isn't just, it isn't even necessarily an individual calling 9 1 1. These networks are carrying all the first responders traffic in, in a lot of cases. So this is serious business and we need to take it seriously. But it, it does strike me that the, this test, a reason that I could imagine the Federal Communications Commission not wanting to employ it is because it then starts to get to the point where then you have to ask questions about the cable companies and whether they can deliver 100/20 simultaneously to everywhere that they claim.

(29:41):
And now this is not the same problem of scale. DOCSIS three, 3.1 can get the job done. DOCSIS four almost certainly will be able to, from what I can tell. At the same time, you know, I, I see Charter Spectrum out there telling the F C C, it can deliver a hundred megabits by 20 megabits to every single customer that they have in California and telling the C P U C with a different breath that no, they shouldn't have a standard of requiring 20 megabits up to every customer. 'cause They can't do that <laugh>. And so you know, you know, you know about cable plant and, and some, some listeners will, some listeners won't. It's variable. And, and there's different factors. But when you get into this question at, at a certain point, I think the F c's willing to, to piss off the wisps, I don't know if the F c's willing to piss off the cable companies. And so I, in fact, I assume that's why we have a 100 by 20 megabit definition. The 20 is there for the cable companies to, to sneak under it, is my impression. So does that, does that strike you as, as accurate, or how do you react to that?

Jonathan Chambers (30:42):
Well, look, I, I started in broadband with the cable industry in the early nineties, mid nineties when, when broadband first was a thing. I mean, cable invented broadband, not the telecom industry. I'm reluctant to to say that cable doesn't deliver broadband because cable has defined broadband for decades. It isn't as good as fiber. There's no doubt about that. What, what you're starting to see, of course, in urban areas is a lot of fiber construction to compete with cable. What you're starting to see in rural areas by electric cooperatives and, and, and other, you know, new companies is, is fiber builds. Because if you're investing today, you'd invest in fiber and that competes with cable. I'm reluctant to say that cable can't deliver a hundred down 20 up everywhere, even though they can't

Christopher Mitchell (31:43):
<Laugh>,

Jonathan Chambers (31:44):
I'm not reluctant to know what the capability is, but to use that as a way to dismiss cable as a, a service provider, a a a a transmission medium that's delivering a service that meets the standard of broadband. I don't like the approach of saying served unserved. That's never been historically what the Federal Communications Commission did. And, and it isn't the test set out by Congress in the 1996 act. That test was high cost, where it is high cost. And that high cost notion continues to this day. It's something that N T I A and the F C C still pursue high cost. Where is a subsidy required? You can follow that by saying, well, since somebody built here already, maybe the subsidy isn't required, but the Connect America cost model, the alternative Connect America cost model, those are all high cost models to say where the subsidies should go based on density, terrain, cost to building networks.

(32:56):
That's what that's about. I've always thought that was a better approach in a high cost area. There should be some ongoing support and, and, and the rest of it mean use the BEAD money the best we can, but there will be at some point the need for some ongoing support, which is what the F C C really has done over the many years for high cost areas and get away from this notion. 'cause Here's the problem with the served unserved. I am old enough to remember, oh yeah, it was only a half a dozen years ago when four one was considered served 10 years ago, four one, then ten one, then 25 3, and now 120, a hundred down, 20 up. All that occurred in the last decade. The F C C has has something in the order of a 12 different definitions of speed speed's. The wrong thing speed's the wrong thing.

(33:57):
I don't even like the asymmetry way of designating speed. That's a technology specific indication for all the people that are high and mighty about technological neutrality. The speed a hundred down 20 up, as you point out, is a technology specific speed. You don't go to somebody that builds a fiber optic network and say, Hey, you're capable of a hundred down, 20 up. Is that what you deliver? Then don't even know what you're, what, what, what are you talking about? There's a two way network. We don't devote a lesser portion of our spectrum. Cable uses spectrum to the upstream than we do to the downstream. So it's technology specific. A as you're saying

Christopher Mitchell (34:45):
For people who aren't as familiar, you build a network and it's capable of delivering a more than a gigabit to the home. And then if someone's paying less, then you're picking a, a number using software to throttle down their capacity. And so it, you could be like, oh yeah, we're actually a 78 by 46 and a half network. Like you can do whatever you wanted to at that point.

Jonathan Chambers (35:07):
We build x g spon networks. You know, the X stands for 10, GE stands for gigabit. Yeah. Stands for symmetrical.

Christopher Mitchell (35:16):
Is that what the X is for? I never put that together. I should've known that <laugh>

Jonathan Chambers (35:21):
Capable of 10 today, X G s bond, 10 gigabits per second symmetrical to every location. The highest tier we sell is two gigabits per second. And we don't throttle down, we throttle it up a little bit so people actually get two gigabits per second. 'cause You can deliver more, right? I, you know, today I don't see the need of deliv offering five gigabits or 10 gigabits, your computers, your devices, all that. They can't use that anyway. But two, here's the the point that should anybody, that's a state representative, congressman, senator, anybody who, who represents a rural area, here's the only thing I'd like 'em to know. When they're trying to think of what's good enough for rural America. For two thirds of our customers subscribe to services of a gigabit or higher, a third of our customers subscribed to two gigabits per second symmetrical service.

(36:23):
Two people are spending their own hard earned money for two gigabits per second service. Don't tell me about a hundred down 20 up. You offer them two gigabit per second. Guess what they subscribe to? So a hundred down, 20 up is not broadband. To me, multi gigabit, that's broadband. So, no, I don't think cable at all delivers what is available now in large parts of the country. That goes back to the test that was set out by Congress in 1996, which is still a better test than anyone that's been written, which is that rural areas should have services that are reasonably comparable to the service available in urban America. What is available in urban America today is multi gigabit symmetrical speeds. That's what the Universal Service program should be paying for. Why? Because that is, back to your earlier point, that's a long-term investment in a network. Not today, not yesterday. If you think you can go out there and build a hundred down, 20 up and sell rural America, you know what? I want you to compete with me. That's who I like to compete against. I love to compete against people who are delivering a hundred down 20 up, because we'll eat their lunch.

Christopher Mitchell (37:50):
Well, John I appreciate your time today. You know, I, I did see your dog poke his nose up against that that window behind you. So I don't know if you have a walk in your future, but I, I appreciate the conversation.

Jonathan Chambers (38:03):
Our dog's name is Bubbles, and he is a delight.

Christopher Mitchell (38:07):
<Laugh>, he looked delightful. I I'll look forward to catching up again with you soon. I hope maybe I'll run into you at one of these events and we can do another live interview. But thanks for jumping on the Zoom with me today.

Jonathan Chambers (38:20):
Thanks, man. Good to see you, Chris. As always,

Ry Marcattilio (38:22):
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