ISP-Planet's Blog: Access

Check it out and let us know what you think of it.

by Alex Goldman ISP-Planet Managing Editor [August 3, 2007]

ISP-Planet serves the independent ISP industry, thousands of companies ranging in size from neighborhood providers to top 10 ISPs like EarthLink. All of them must compete with the entrenched monopolies of the phone and cable companies—companies whose monopoly profits are sufficient to take them into new lines of business and to buy out their competitors.

With the playing field leveled against them, ISP entrepreneurs are always running uphill. The ILECs try to cut off or degrade service, obtain ISPs' customer lists, and offer service at a retail price that's below wholesale.

In spite of all of this, the ISP industry survives, and it's our job to help. ISPs do two things that the big companies fail to do: they provide real customer service, and they innovate.

We are the internet
Thus, ISP-Planet is about the internet, about how it's changing and how it's staying the same. It's about new technology. It's about politics.

Much of what we cover happens fast, at internet speed. Some of what we cover is about what would be possible in the future instead of what's happening now. It's not, strictly speaking, news, because it hasn't happened yet.

The blog launches
Now we have a blog of our own, ISP-Planet's Access blog.

A blog allows us to guess about the future.

A blog also allows us to talk about other blogs. Just as the ISP business is changing, so, too, journalism is changing. Nobody goes to one site for all their news the way that people used to read the newspaper. We cannot expect readers to go to ISP-Planet for all their ISP news.

We already have a blogroll that lists other sites that ISP readers might find interesting.

The blog allows me to point to breaking news as it happens.

So take a look at the blog. Leave comments or use the ISP-Planet feedback button to talk to us about ISP-Planet or the Access blog. Or you could even write us a letter, but that's so last century.

Excerpts
We've been posting to the blog since April.

Our first two posts were on issues that will be important to ISPs for many years to come.

In The Burden of Gag Orders (April 5, 2007), we wrote about what happens to an ISP owner when the FBI issues a poorly-conceived subpoena, retracts the subpoena, but still refuses to allow the ISP owner to talk about it.

In VoIP Wiretaps (April 6, 2007), we wrote about our concerns about CALEA. All too often, well-meaning legislation harms the cause it purports to help. ISPs have been helping law enforcement for years. But CALEA is hastily conceived. In the long run, ISPs and LEAs (Law Enforcement Agencies) will learn how to help each other. In the short term, CALEA drives up costs without guaranteeing any benefits.

We hope to remain relevant, but in order to remain relevant, we will ask for your help. Provide feedback, read the blog, let us know what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong.

— End