The good news is Burlington Telecom is "cash flow positive before debt service," a continuing turnaround since late 2009.
Freeps
BT does owe the city's taxpayers (who weren't aware they were floating the loan) $17 million and another $33.5 million to the bank. But, hey, what's a little debt service between friends.
by Art Woolf
Geoff quotes the Deputy Secretary of Energy, Daniel Poneman:
Historically, our government has supported emerging industries, from transcontinental railroads to aviation to the microchip.
As far as the transcontinental railroad goes, the subsidies, well, left much to be desired. All three of the transcontinental railroads that relied on government subsidies -- below market interest rates, free land, and loan forgiveness -- ended up failing due to wasteful spending, poor market conditions, and other factors. By contrast The Great Northern Railway, which received almost no subsidies, was built and operated more efficiently and did not go bankrupt. (Brief summary here.)
Moreover, as Nobel Prize laureate Robert Fogel showed more than four decades ago, the railroads were not instrumental in promoting U.S. economic growth in the 19th century.
I know a lot less about the early subsidies given to the airlines, but that subsidy involved awarding contracts for transporting mail. Not surprisingly, there were big scandals there as well.
What You (Do) Need To Know About The Google/Motorola-Mobility Tie-Up
by Daniel Foty
A bit over a week back, your humble correspondent found himself in the (wonderfully delightful) South African Airways lounge at the Johannesburg airport, wrapping things up before heading back to the northern hemisphere that evening. A South African colleague, who was also (conveniently) flying out that evening was there as well, and we were cleaning up the last odds and ends from the previous few days.
At some point, he wandered off to get a cup of coffee, and - upon his return - blithely asked, "Did I miss anything?" This allowed me to break the news that indeed he had - while he was off getting that coffee, news had arrived that Google was going to be acquiring Motorola Mobility.
It was evening in Joburg, but it was morning in California - so after some contacting and chatting, it quickly became clear what the game involved.
What makes this interesting for the more generalized spectator is that it opens a window into the sausage factory that exists at the confluence of technology, intellectual property, and global trade.
The Google move appears to be one of operating to a calculated risk - something we'll discuss below the fold.
By Daniel Foty
When you shoot yourself in the foot.... it's best to remove the bullet.
That's basically what's been done in Montgomery County, Maryland:
Council members in Montgomery County have voted to repeal the county's historic carbon dioxide emissions tax.
The tax was passed just last year, and was the first such tax passed on a county level in the United States. It affected just one power plant in Montgomery County: the Dickerson Generating Station.
But the company that owns the plant, Mirant Mid-Atlantic, claimed the tax was unconstitutional. A federal appeals court ruled in June that it amounted to a "punitive fee," and called for a trial to look further at the tax.
Hmm. Might any of the above have some more-local parallels?
But at least these folks know when to get out and not make it all worse (and more expensive):
"Defending bill 2910 is no longer legally feasible," [Council vice president Roger] Berliner said during a council meeting July 19. "Therefore it makes little sense for the county to continue to expend resources litigating this matter."
(Emphasis mine.)
Sense. What a concept.
Any takers in Montpelier?
Vermont is still working on statewide service. First step, identify the dead zones.
Chris Campbell with the Vermont Telecom Authority says his team traveled the state and put together a map identifying 97 corridors with no service, but now they need input from the public. They have added a link to the Telecom Authority's website for folks to report bad service areas, so they can prioritize new towers.
wcax
Our suggestion:
Prioritize faster, please. When everyone else is talking about their smart phones, we feel embarrassed and so uncool.
by Angelo Lynn
Vermont ratepayers are sitting in the bleachers in terms of the pending negotiations that will determine who will own Central Vermont Public Service, even though they have the most to win or lose in the transaction. But even fans in the bleachers have a voice that can be heard as long as Vermont businesses and residents pay attention to what’s going on at the plate.
At issue is the current Gaz-Metro offer to buy CVPS, which would give the combined company control over 70 percent of the Vermont market. The bid, made last Tuesday in a surprise offer, is a counter to the May 30 offer of $700 million made by Fortis, Inc., the $13 billion holding company from Newfoundland. Gaz-Metro, another giant Canadian energy company, made an offer of $702 million — a meaningless difference in the purchase price.
What’s different in this Gaz-Metro offer is the political conundrum it creates. This isn’t the first time around for Gaz-Metro. They had made a previous offer to buy CVPS, but lost out to Fortis, Inc. In the second offer, they hit many of the political buttons that Vermont politicians and regulators will find attractive, while also making it difficult for the CVPS board of directors to reject the offer as the best proposal for its shareholders.
by Tom Evslin
Reprise of last post: After a more than 100 year run, the end is nigh for plain old telephone service (POTS). Through most of recent history POTS was provided by monopolies, which were regulated at both the federal and state level. The new world is much more competitive; we can talk via cell phones, computers, traditional phones hooked to a variety of devices instead of the old phone line, and a plethora of new gadgets like tablets. Voice service no longer has to be vertically integrated. Skype and Vonage, for example, are "over the top" services which use whatever broadband network you happen to be connected to. Voice communication is just another application on the Internet. Even if we wanted to regulate competitive services the way we used to regulate monopolies, it's not at all clear we have that choice. How would US regulation apply to a phone service provider headquartered in Luxemburg with a staff in Estonia and with no network assets in the US (Skype prior to purchase by Microsoft)? Do you regulate the ISP who provides the network, the software company which enables a service, the virtual operator of a service, or all of the above? Who is responsible to whom for what?
by Tom Evslin
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 and state level. Then we began on the long road toward competition and deregulation. The result has been a splendid wave of innovation and a decline in communication costs so great that whole new industries have sprung up – the Internet, for example, cellular service, smart phones. Our culture has permanently changed and evolves at breakneck speed; even politicians' peccadillos have moved online.
So far, so good. However, we still have plain old landline telephone service (POTS) and the former monopolies still pretty much have a lock on providing copper-based POTS in their regions of influence. The opportunity –and problem – is that POTS is no longer the only way for people to talk to each other beyond shouting range. Almost all of us use mobile telephony to some extent instead of fixed POTS; many of us have completely abandoned POTS in favor of more convenient cellular service and/or cheaper voice over IP (VoIP). Cable companies provide voice service on their networks which compete with the phone service sold by the old phone monopolies. Companies which don't own networks at all, like Skype and Vonage, provide voice services over the networks of whatever Internet service providers (ISPs) the caller and callee are using – these are called "over the top" phone services.
Continue reading "Whom Do We Regulate when the Phone Monopolies Are Gone?" »
by Tom Evslin
Problem: How can Americans stay online for three weeks on a canal boat in Southern France?
One answer: MiFi from Xcom Global.
I usually spend much too much of my travel time trying to stay connected. WiFi boosters with monster antennas do let you sign onto distant hotspots – but they're a constant tinkering-when-you-should-be sightseeing opportunity if there ever was one. My Verizon MiFi hotspot and Mary's iPhone will work internationally – but the communication cost for staying online would be more than our airfare.
You can buy local USB modems in the countries you've traveled to along with prepaid usage on a cellular data network. If you do that and don't speak the native language, you should make sure the device is activated and working before you leave the phone store where you bought it. Trouble with the USB modem is that it only works with computers and only connects one of them at a time. Once I get connected, everyone else wants to use my computer. We're lined up for a keyboard when we should be in museums.
Continue reading "Keeping a Moving Boatload of Devices Online" »
when there is a monopoly. certainly. otherwise, let them compete and caveat emptor
by Tom Evslin
The Vermont Public Service Department is urging the Vermont Public Service Board (PSB) to regulate Voice over IP (VoIP) services offered by Comcast as it does POTS – Plain Old Phone Service. According to James Porter, telecommunications director for the Public Service Department as quoted on Vermont Public Radio, "from a regulatory perspective, as more and more consumers use the service, it becomes more and more important that their rights are guaranteed for that service." Comcast now provides the equivalent of more than 100,000 phone lines over its cable network in Vermont and trails only FairPoint in number of voice customers served in the state. FairPoint's competing service IS currently regulated by the PSB.
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