THE BOOK OF BROKEN PROMISES: $400 BILLION BROADBAND SCANDAL & FREE THE NET FOR ERIC LEE, AUNT ETHEL, ARNKUSH, AND THE TEAM Author: Bruce Kushnick, Executive Director New Networks Institute February, 2015 Cover Art: Ferrari Wall Paper1, Broken Skateboard by Pr0totyp2 Disclaimer: AT&T, Verizon and CenturyLink are the progeny of the original AT&T. The AT&T logo is the property of AT&T Inc. and the use has not been authorized, sponsored by, or endorsed by the trademark owner. The Verizon logo is the property of Verizon Communications, Inc, and the use has not been authorized, sponsored by, or endorsed by the trademark owner. The CenturyLink logo is the property of CenturyLink, and the use has not been authorized, sponsored by, or endorsed by the trademark owner. All rights reserved. This book has been prepared by New Networks Institute. All rights reserved. Reproduction or further distribution of this report without written authorization is prohibited by law. For additional copies or information please contact [email protected]. © 1997, 2004, 2015 New Networks Institute The Book of Broken Promises 1 What others have said about Bruce Kushnick’s research and previous books: 3 David Cay Johnston, Recipient of the Pulitzer Prize, Author of The Fine Print, 2012 “Kushnick’s estimate comes from his meticulous analysis of disclosure document filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulatory agencies… Kushnick’s estimate might significantly understate how much extra money people paid for an electronic highway they did not get. It seems very likely that Kushnick’s numbers are uncomfortably close to the truth.” Dr. Robert ("Bob") Metcalfe, co-inventor of Ethernet, and creator of “Metcalfe’s Law”. Foreword for The Unauthorized Bio of the Baby Bells, 1999. “The part of Kushnick's expose that angers me most is how the Bells have used the Information Superhighway to win concessions on how much money they can extract from their monopolies. Kushnick recounts extravagant Iway promises, shows them to be just a Bell ploy, and documents how they've not been kept. He tracks billions intended for I-way deployment to Bell executives, to their shareholders, and, of course, to almost all of your elected representatives in government.” Bill Moyers’ Emmy Nominated, The Net at Risk, 20064 “In The Net at Risk, telecom industry watchers Bruce Kushnick and Tom Allibone of Teletruth a consumer advocacy group which has published an e-book, $200 Billion Broadband Scandal, fault the telephone companies for not fulfilling the promises they made in the 1990s to provide fiber-optic connections to households. Had their grand plans been implemented, 86 million customers in the The Book of Broken Promises 2 United States would have received much faster service than is currently available.” Cover Story, Washington Technology, September 15th, 19945 “A telecom analyst's report should raise some eyebrows among those who want to build the forthcoming National Information Infrastructure (NII) and do business on solid, honest ground…If telecommunications analyst Bruce Kushnick is talking the truth (and we think he is), systems integrators, content providers, Internet service providers and just about anyone involved with building the forthcoming National Information Infrastructure had better read his report word by word.” Verizon spokesman Lee Gierczynski, The Bergen Record, March 25, 20146 "For nearly two decades, he has made the same, tired baseless allegations over and over again about Verizon and its predecessor companies — not only in New Jersey but in other states as well… His specious arguments are devoid of fact, relying on misinformation and myths to prop up his claims.” I, Cringley, PBS7 “The $200 Billion Rip-Off: Our broadband future was stolen.” Ed McFadden, Verizon Communications, July 2014 “I run media affairs for Verizon public policy, and was wondering which editor has some oversight of Bruce Kushnick. Who reviews his material before it is posted? In his latest, he makes several The Book of Broken Promises 3 inaccurate statements, the facts for which were publicly available and where he appears to be making an effort to misdirect your readers.” Front Page, The New York Times, November 19888 ''There will be a turf war over what services should be billed for and what services should be free,'' predicted Bruce Kushnick, an analyst…” The Book of Broken Promises 4 Table of Contents Introduction 9 Part I Broadband Scandal, 1991-2005 23 Chapter 1 Promises, Promises: The Future Is Always. Chapter 2 Why Do It? Benefits of the Superhighway — Justifying the Hype Chapter 3 Hollywood Calling — TELE-TV and Americast Chapter 4 Hollywood Calling, Part 2 Chapter 5 And the Promises? The Annual Reports Tell No Lies. Chapter 6 And the Promises? Video Dialtone Commitments Chapter 7 The Promises? Fiber Optic Upgrades, (and Sometimes Coaxial Cable) To-The-Home Were Promised. Chapter 8 And the Promises? Speed Matters: The Faster the Service — the More Stuff You Get, Faster Chapter 9 And the Promises? NOT DSL — SPEED and Coverage Are the Issues. Chapter 10 And the Promises? Channels Galore, Interactive Programming Chapter 11 And the Promises? Open to All Competition Chapter 12 Change State Regulations: Pitch Fiber Optics Chapter 13 Splat — The Retreat: What Happened with the Info Bahn? Chapter 14 Technology Didn't Work and It Was too Expensive: The Original Cost Models Were Cooked. Chapter 15 Follow the Money: The Regulations Chapter 16 Alternative Regulations: The I-Way Sleight of Hand Chapter 17 Fiber Optic Scandal Alternative Regulation, Round 2 Part II Act Against Nature: The Bells Married Their Siblings 138 Chapter 18 The SBC-Pacific Telesis-SNET-Ameritech Mergers Were the Death of State Fiber Optic Deployments. Chapter 19 Failure to Compete, Failure of the FCC to Enforce Merger Conditions The Book of Broken Promises 5 Table of Contents Chapter 20 The Verizon-Bell Atlantic-NYNEX-GTE Mergers Were the Death of State Fiber Optic Deployments: The “Con Job”. Chapter 21 Analysis of Verizon's Merger Conditions and "Truth in Speech" Statements Part III The Awakenings: 1996-2005 215 Chapter 22 How the Bells and the FCC Killed Broadband, Internet, Phone and Cable Competition. Chapter 23 The Last Merger: BellSouth: AT&T Cleans Up Loose Ends with Again More Broadband Promises. Chapter 24 The Rise of AT&T U-Verse and Verizon’s FiOS Part IV Alternative Paths Leading to the Same Conclusion 258 Chapter 25 The Other Path: The Rise and Fall of AT&T, 1894-2005 Chapter 26 Municipality Broadband and the ‘Barriers to Entry’ Chapter 27 US West, Renamed Qwest, Renamed CenturyLink, 1984-2014 Part V Deception is the Phone Companies’ Strongest Trait 290 Chapter 28 Fake Consumer Groups, Biased Research, Lots of Lobbyists, Paid-Off Politicians: Behind the Broadband Curtain Chapter 29 The Statewide Cable Franchise Attack — One More Broken Promise After Another Part VI Mob Bell: The Takeover: 2010-2014 327 Chapter 30 The National Broadband Plan - Or How to Raise Rates and Taxes. The Book of Broken Promises 6 Table of Contents Chapter 31 The Fall of AT&T U-Verse and Verizon’s FiOS — and Why there’s No Cable Competition in America. Chapter 32 The Perfect Man-Made Storm: The US End Game of Telecommunications.. Chapter 33 Debunking Myths — Line Losses; Everyone’s going Wireless-Only Part VII Overcharging America in the Name of Broadband 374 Chapter 34 Scorecard for America: AT&T’s U-Verse, Verizon’s FiOS and the Rest of the World Chapter 35 Comparing the US Broadband to the Rest of the World Statistics Chapter 36 Overcharging by the Numbers Chapter 37 $400 Billion in Overcharging: Broadband Scandal Chapter 38 Opportunity Costs: How Much Money Did Verizon and AT&T’s Failure to Deliver Fiber Optic Service Cost America? Chapter 39 Cooked Books? Broadband Scandal? Accounting Scandal. Chapter 40 Special Access: The ‘Secret’ Network and Excess Chapter 41 The Comcast and Time Warner Cable ‘Social Contract’ — on America. Chapter 42 How Many Times Are We Going to Pay for the Wiring of Schools? Part VIII Case Study of One State: New Jersey 475 Chapter 43 Case Study: Opportunity New Jersey — A Broadband Failure Part IX ` Net Neutrality Is Not the Issue 513 Chapter 44 The Net Neutrality Raucous Chapter 45 Fast Lane, Slow Lane, No Lane, End Game in Telecommunications. Chapter 46 Verizon FiOS is Based on an FTTP, Fiber-To-The-Premises, Title II, Common Carriage, Telecommunications Service. The Book of Broken Promises 7 Part X Time to Fix Communications — Say and Do Something 536 Chapter 47 Aunt Ethel’s Revenge: Break Up AT&T and Verizon… Again. Chapter 48 A Plan to Get to an Open, Affordable, Broadband Utility to Everyone. Appendix 1 List of Exhibits Endnotes The Book of Broken Promises 8 The Players: . at&t — Southwestern Bell (SBC), Pacific Telesis, Ameritech, BellSouth, SNET (formerly independent), and AT&T . Verizon — Bell Atlantic, NYNEX, GTE (formerly independent), and MCI . CenturyLink — formerly US West, then Qwest BEFORE AFTER The Book of Broken Promises 9 Introduction Imagine if you could say anything or do anything, with the odds of getting caught being almost nil. Even if you are apprehended, there would be little, if any, repercussions. Welcome to The Book of Broken Promises. There is a wire that goes into your home, school or office as everyone in America is entitled to phone service. This wire was put in as part of the state- based utility and most of them are controlled by what are now AT&T, Verizon and Centurylink. Starting in 1993, (though it varies by state) this copper wire was supposed to be replaced with a fiber optic wire — and the companies were able to change state laws to charge you to do this upgrade. (Fiber optics can handle much higher download and uploads speeds.) Instead, the companies pulled a bait- and-switch and used the old copper wires for a slow broadband service called ADSL.