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from: Toward Freedom

I Want My Community TV: Public Access Television Faces Threats

Written by Megan Tady
Tuesday, 30 October 2007

Imagine you know a thief is going to pilfer your television in the middle of the night? Most likely, you would take action to stop it – lock your doors, hide your TV, or in one last ditch effort for revenge, at least hide your remote. Imagine you knew that in the broadest of daylight, corporations and government were going to pinch not your television, but the only TV channels that give you, the citizen, a voice and a hand in local programming? Well grab your bat, because there’s someone at your door.

from: madison.com

Some support for cable competition bill eroding
By MARK PITSCH, Wisconsin State Journal

Some union support for a controversial cable competition bill is eroding over worries it will kill off public access channels and fail to generate the jobs supporters promise.

The concerns emerged this week as AB 207 vaulted onto the fast track for approval after lying dormant since May while lawmakers worked out a new, two-year state budget.

from: Courant.com

AT & T Wins In Court; TV Service To Continue

By MARK PETERS

Courant Staff Writer

November 1, 2007

A Hartford Superior Court judge ruled Wednesday that AT&T can resume signing up customers for its TV service, possibly ending the battle over how to regulate the company's alternative to cable television.

from: The Capital Times

Smoke and mirrors?

As cable deregulation picks up steam in the Legislature, critics say AT&T has a long track record of broken promises

Judith Davidoff — 10/31/2007 10:05 am

It was the early 1990s, the nascent days of the Internet, and Vice President Al Gore was talking everywhere about an "information superhighway" that would link homes, businesses and medical centers with fiber optic cables capable of high speed data transmission.

Note: Absurd. At&T was given immense giveaways in the state franchise - in granting tax credits, Gov. Blunt is merely paying back the campaign donations he received from AT&T with tax-payer dollars. Meanwhile, PEG enters are closing down in parts of Missouri . . .

from: Branson Agent

From: Tennessean

Should AT&T Be Able to Receive a Statewide Video Franchise?

October 25, 2007

Should AT&T be allowed to rewrite Tennessee law? No.

Here’s one reason, based on legislation AT&T offered this year, legislation in other states and reports from other states: Many Tennessee cities and towns have at least one public, educational or governmental (PEG) access channel. There are thousands of PEG channels across America. Very nearly every version of AT&T legislation offered or passed in other states does violence to those channels.

from: SY-R.com

AT&T wins statewide franchise

By TIM LANDIS
BUSINESS EDITOR

Published Tuesday, October 30, 2007

A barely one-page finding from an administrative law judge could mean new consumer choices in cable and video early next year in Illinois — or, at least, that is how supporters of a cable-reform law hope it works out.

from: Gotham Gazette's TechNewsletter

Censored by Verizon

When NARAL Pro-Choice America applied to Verizon Wireless for a code so it could send text messages to Verizon subscribers who wanted to receive them, the organization never expected that the wireless provider would deny its request. AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint, which share almost the entire U.S. market with Verizon, had shown no hesitation signing NARAL up for the five-digit "short code."

from: Penn Live

More choices for viewers
Statewide cable franchise law would meet high-tech potential
Saturday, October 27, 2007

Verizon's opening of a regional video hub in Harrisburg paves the way for local consumers to have a choice of cable television providers. But only after franchise agreements have been negotiated with individual municipalities.

from: Hartford Business

EDITORIAL
Scrambled Signals

10/29/07

It’s always enlightening to see who owns what. Jay Leno owns several dozen fancy cars. Rupert Murdoch is about to own the Wall Street Journal. And AT&T, it seems, owns Connecticut’s top elected officials.

AT&T wants to make a bundle of money on a service that delivers television via the Internet, all over AT&T’s existing copper phone lines. The service is called U-verse. It’s supposed to be a competitive product to existing cable television.