Posted on 09/29/2012 9:08:53 AM PDT by BenLurkin
Gov. Jerry Brown announced Friday that he had signed a bill curbing regulatory oversight of phone calls made over the internet.
The Democratic governor said the legislation, which is backed by AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc., will encourage the growth of “innovative services that have become the hallmark of our state.”
Members of the California Public Utilities Commission said SB 1161 would prevent them from regulating any telephone services, because land-line phones now use technology that sends voice signals over the Internet.
Consumer advocates also opposed the bill, and said it would enable companies to skirt regulations that help low-income and disabled customers.
(Excerpt) Read more at losangeles.cbslocal.com ...
Still not as bad as the one about the polar bear attacking a woman with chicken legs.
Was he chucking them at her?
True.
It’s all very confusing...
Polar bear attacks drunken lady with chicken legs in Russia
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2937862/posts?page=3#3
I thought the analog POTS (plain old telephone system) is gone, no more local central office exchange, everything now digital telephone over IP?
LOL, you’re right it is very confusing.
Does anyone recall when the Democrats decided to regulate cable TV? I do ~ it was $19 a month when they voted to do that. Last time i looked it was $107 month.
Although it's amazing the CA legislature would vote to help people contain their own costs, they seem to have figured out that regulation increases phone bills!
Just don’t mess with my MagicJack! $19.95 a year! Calls to anywhere in US!
Broken clock.
POTS is converted to digital at the central office, so the internal phone system is entirely digital, with analog lines only left in place as a non-used backup. But the phone system and internet are now a sort of intertwined mesh.
Huh? Cable TV rates are unregulated in 50 states and the District of Columbia.
> Consumer advocates also opposed the bill, and said it would enable companies to skirt regulations that help low-income and disabled customers.
If you don’t PAY for it, then you don’t have any right to it. Back when there was no internet, I remember having to choose between food or phone. We ate and didn’t have a phone. If I needed to make a call, I had to go to a pay phone.
That left consumers with little leverage with their local cable operators who then jacked the prices up.
Now that we have satellite TV it's less of an issue, and the 5 fiber optic systems with lines running through my front yard suggest COX' days are numbered ~.
The FCC should have NO authority of any kind over local cable.
So, yeah, all the cable systems are regulated ~ directly or indirectly, due to federal intrusion into local matters.
The Democrats said this would cut the cost of cable but, as Republicans said, it will raise the cost as the cable providers will be able to segregate out all the local broadcast material to a local signal ghetto and clean pockets with a plethora of new much more costly 'packages'.
I switched to Vonage for my business phones over AT&T. Saving over $250 per month. AT&T tried to sabotage me but I’ll have the last laugh. I’m dropping my mobile phones from them as the contracts expire, too.
Yeap interwined mesh sort of. I was assigned at non .mil site island some underwater mesh communication cables got messed up we were isolated to the outside world ie telephone and data until wireless temporary backup were in placed.
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