RE: FCC Charge for home Modems

[Bruce McFarling <brmcf@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I would feel more reassured if the reassurance came from
the FCC.  "Quietly working on" can mean working on as
a rider to a change in the rules to better accomodate
ISDN.  Then this reassurance could be offered in good
conscience by those working on other aspects of the
rule changes.
	One reason for this recurrant myth is that
the Bells do want this change.  They argue that
we modem users stay on line longer, and they should
recoup the cost of the additional network resources
required to accomodate us. Of course, if this
coincidentally provides a bigger base capacity to
look at when deciding how much 'extra' PANS
(pretty amaxing new technologies) adds to the
network cost of POTS (plain old telephone service),
this will *not* distress the Bells 8-)# since
it will permit more cross-subsidization of PANS
(say, movie on demand in competition with cable)
by POTS.  One reason it has never come to pass
is the furor raised by us.  So why not write?
It's good that your representatives know that
the myth can raise a furor, so they shy away
from the event itself!
	And to rescue this from being a parochially
US thread (!), how have the modem access charges
in place in many European countries (at least at
one time) evolved? Have they become a dead letter?
And how where does the generated revenues go?

Virtually,

Bruce McFarling, Knoxville
brmcf@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx