Brian, I do agree it is regrettable that the majority of WISPs do not report, and that there is a sort of "reap what you sow" sort of effect. The WISP industry is too often its own worst enemy. I would disagree about the comment regarding vendors though. Not only is it not our responsibility to brow beat WISP customers (and we have no means to compel them anyway) to fulfill their obligation to file 477, most vendors (Aperto excluded as a rare exception) are not based in the US. You cannot expect vendors to monitor the requirements imposed on their customers in all the regulatory domains around the world. We can and do try to pay attention to all the regs and rules as they pertain to us, and that burden is large enough.
In any event, vendors are no more responsible for WISPs filing their 477s than car manufacturers are responsible for drivers keeping their drivers licenses current. As individuals, some of us have beaten the 477 drum to death though; I know I did years ago when the obligation first arose and again when it was made mandatory for all broadband providers, regardless of numbers of customers (a move by the FCC I think intended to try to capture the cumulative numbers of small WISPs, for WISPs ultimate benefit and so the FCC could justify creating rules in our favor). Patrick Leary Aperto Networks 813.426.4230 mobile -----Original Message----- From: wireless-boun...@wispa.org [mailto:wireless-boun...@wispa.org] On Behalf Of Brian Webster Sent: Monday, February 15, 2010 10:37 AM To: WISPA List; memb...@wispa. org; WISPA Board; Motorla List Beehive Subject: [WISPA] WISP's are killing themselves!!!! - New FCC form 477 reportis out, not looking good for Fixed Wireless Importance: High The latest FCC report on form 477 broadband data is out (http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-296239A1.pdf). While I don't see a whole lot of useful data in it, I do see where WISP's are killing themselves and the industry, why? a.. In the periods prior to the December 2008 report, fixed wireless has shown a steady increase in subscribers. The last reporting period the number of subscribers dropped from 808,000 to 488,000!!! That's a 39.6% drop in the actual data that had been previously reported. Know I know that most of the problem is the fact they now require census tract reporting rather than zip codes, but dropping like this does not help the industry as a whole. b.. Because of the low number of reported subscribers, the reporting by technology portions of the report does not even earn fixed wireless a spot on the charts in it's own category. It's lumped in with the 1.4% total of all other technologies compared to the rest of the broadband industry. Hell Satellite has their own category with .9%. c.. The total number of fixed wireless providers reporting is 617. That means there are a huge number of WISP's not filing form 477 and those that didn't report must have a large number of subscribers. The previous period where fixed wireless had 808,000 subscribers had only 505 WISP's report! Matt Larsen and the WISP directory have around 1,800 WISP's registered. I've heard other estimates between 2,000 and over 4,000. Only 617 fixed wireless operators reporting is not helping the cause at all. d.. The National broadband plan is being formulated as we speak, looking at those statistics it appears the WISP industry is in a serious decline and that as a total percentage of broadband provided to consumers nationally, they make no significant difference. If you were a government policy maker, would you even pay attention to WISP's. I certainly would not. They have to make decisions based on data and that benefit the majority of the country. WISP's have thumbed their noses at providing this data for years. I think it is really going to bite them in the butt now. Fiber to the home is coming liking it or not. USF reform is coming like it or not. USF reform is going to subsidize broadband to the very markets wireless serves more economically today. Removing that advantage is going to put the WISP industry in serious trouble. The manufacturers are killing themselves as well. In their quest to just sell radios, they have missed the importance of keeping the industry healthy. If the WISP's cannot compete and/or show that they are a significant option to the overall broadband infrastructure in the US, how will they continue to sell product. If anyone knows the true number of WISP's out there it is the manufacturers. They should be leading the charge with groups like WISPA to make sure ALL WISP's stand up and get counted. How hard would it be to stuff each shipment with educational material on the importance of filing form 477? The current FCC is very open minded but the results of this type of report force them to make decisions that benefit the most people. 488,000 is a very small portion of over 129 million homes. All I can say is ouch........ Thank You, Brian Webster ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -------- WISPA Wants You! Join today! http://signup.wispa.org/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -------- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wants You! Join today! http://signup.wispa.org/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
