[WISPA] To Break the Law or Not to Break the Law...That is the Question

[John Scrivner]

I think we seem to have a little bit of twisting of thoughts and words 
that needs to get put to rest. First, I do not PROMOTE regulation in 
stating my position that I think we need to all fill out the FCC Form 
477 which is mandated by the FCC to track broadband subscriber counts in 
the United States and is the law. This form was partly created because 
of WISPs telling the FCC for years that there were thousands of us out 
there and that we needed to be represented in the FCC. This was there 
way of tracking who they were, how they were serving broadband and how 
many customers they serve. This was there way of acknowledging you guys. 
The United States has a keen interest in seeing the access to broadband 
being delivered to all residents and businesses as it is seen as vital 
infrastructure by most government authorities. This is a fact and will 
not change nor will their intentions of being part of the process. I 
have never once ever seen or heard anything to demonstrate that by 
filling out this form that you have done anything other than provide to 
the FCC information that they need to demonstrate that broadband is in 
fact being delivered. Whether you fill out this form or not it would 
take the FCC only about a week to shut every single one of you down if 
they had that as their agenda. They do not. They could trump up an 
argument that wireless was a national security threat or something and 
turn you off. Despite the fact that our industry (namely the broadband 
industry) is being heavily watched and manipulated in all levels of 
government I do not see one thing negative in us simply filling out the 
form which at least gives us some credibility that we need some 
representation as an industry. The idea that it is best for our industry 
to ignore this rule by the FCC and also limit the recognized impact of 
our industry by not sending in this information is bad for WISPs. How 
can it possibly be good for us? We are talking about the idea that 
ignoring the FCC rules is someway good? Give me a break!  It shows us as 
being negative to government (which is going to be involved whether you 
like it or not) and it also shows to regulators that we apparently are 
NOT serving broadband. This is the very story we have been trying to 
tell for years. Once we have a vehicle to allow this to be told we seem 
to now have people on here saying it is evil. This is so 
counter-productive to our mission here guys. How is it that sending in 
comments on FCC rulemakings, visiting the FCC or anything else like that 
is ok but telling the FCC how many broadband subscribers we serve is 
bad? If we want to make this a dividing issue we can but how silly is 
that guys? I do not think asking our peers to follow the law of the land 
is too much to ask. If you guys want to get some changes made to this 
reporting system then let's have that debate but make no mistake, the 
law says you have to do it and this is not some place where you guys get 
to say "I am going to break the law and here is why". That is precisely 
where the line is drawn. You can say what you do not like about the laws 
but you do not get to promote that you break the law or that others 
should break the law. This is the line in the sand.
Scriv

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