The FCC Sets the Ground Rules For Shutting Down The Phone System — And Sets the Stage For Universal Broadband.

Harold Feld, who writes on his own section of of a multi-person website called Tales of the Sausage Factory is one of my heroes. He's one of the very, very few who even attempt to write about complex telecom policy issues, not only from deep knowledge and historical perspective, but he strives to make his writing understandable to the average techie who wants to try to understand the regulatory issues of US telecommunications.

It's little known that legacy "Plain Old Telephone Service" (POTS) in the US is in the process of being retired... obsoleted... "sunset". The mechanics of that transition, as he explains well here, especially the regulatory mechanics, of how that happens, is of critical importance. As its being phased out, the telcos want to milk its dying corpse for federal subsidies and preserve their historic rights of way and other privileges, while doing very little to help transition the service, people, and business who remain dependent on POTS.

Thankfully, people like Harold are watching. Thanks Harold!

The "sunset" of POTS is, of course, tremendously influential to the BWIA industry and the WISP industry, as BWIA Service Providers and WISPs, and the suppliers to those industries, will be part of the transition to new technologies, infrastructure, and services. Thus, this is a subject that will be covered regularly in the BWIA News Newsletter and the WISP News Newsletter.

Here’s the funny thing about the world. The two Orders the FCC will vote on tomorrow (Thursday, July 14) probably have more impact on the future of our communications infrastructure than the Title II reclassification of broadband. But like most momentous things in technology, no one notices because they are technical and everyone’s eyes glaze over.

In particular, no one notices the sleep inducing and incredibly vaguely named item “Technology Transitions,” we are talking about the conclusion of a 4 year proceeding on how to shut down the legacy phone system and move all our national communications platforms to a mix of digital platforms.

http://www.wetmachine.com/tales-of-the-sausage-factory/the-fcc-sets-the-ground-rules-for-shutting-down-the-phone-system-and-sets-the-stage-for-universal-broadband/