An Important Announcement about Rural TeleCommentary

Every year I attend the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting in Omaha, in part for the shopping and in part for the unrivaled wisdom given by Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger. One of the lessons from the 2011 meeting that really hit home with me was, “The secret to success in a field is learning all you can about it.” I don’t remember if Charlie or Warren said this, but year-after-year formal education and continual personal growth through learning are always emphasized by both distinguished gentlemen of wealth and success. I have always placed the highest possible value on education, and as my graduate coursework came to an end I still wanted to find ways to develop expertise in specific areas of the telecommunications industry. In a way, my telecommunications graduate program was only the beginning of my journey to becoming an expert in telecommunications policy, economics, business and engineering. The University of Colorado ITP program helped me figure out which areas of the industry that I desired to learn more about.  

Launching Rural TeleCommentary was my secret to learning all I could about the rural telecommunications industry, with the anticipation that this website would help me achieve success. At the beginning of the year, my definition of success was definitely finding a job where I could do what I love, which is analyzing, learning and writing about the rural telecommunications industry. I’m delighted to report that my efforts paid off and I have achieved this particular goal.

Unfortunately, success often requires personal sacrifice. In order to focus all my attention on my new job, I will no longer be posting regularly on Rural TeleCommentary.   

Now for the good news—you needn’t travel far to continue reading my perspectives about the rural telecommunications industry. As a full time analyst for JSI Capital Advisors, I will be writing about regulatory issues and a wide range of other topics that are both similar to what I have covered on Rural TeleCommentary and completely new to me. I am honored to join a wonderful team of telecom experts at JSI Capital Advisors, and I believe that this is probably the best possible job opportunity that I could have ever asked for! I also except to become even more involved with the rural telecommunications providers that I love so dearly. 

My regular readers probably are aware that I have been writing part-time for JSI Capital Advisors for a few months, primarily about USF Reform. I hope that you will follow me to a different URL and continue enjoying and learning from my articles as well as those written by my colleagues, who offer a wealth of information and analysis on telecom financial activity, mergers and deals, the wireless industry, cutting-edge technology, and many other exciting topics. We are all experts in different aspects of the telecommunications industry and together I think we make a very strong team. 

JSI Capital Advisors publishes 3 blogs- The ILEC Advisor (where my articles are featured), The Deal Advisor and Phone Numbers; as well as The Daily Monitor which includes news and press releases from across the industry in addition to our original content (you can subscribe to Daily Monitor e-mails for free!).  We also have a couple of interesting forums on LinkedIn- The USF Forum and The Deal Advisor; and JSI Capital Advisors is on Twitter @JSI_Capital. 

I plan to leave the content on Rural TeleCommentary for the near future to serve as a resource for anyone interested in learning about the rural telecom industry. I will continue to update USF Reform Headquarters with links to interesting articles about this important proceeding. I may, from time-to-time, post an update here if something extraordinary happens in my life pertaining to the rural telecom industry, and when I finally start working on my master’s thesis (I know, I should be working on it now, but I’ve hit some roadblocks at the moment…)—I’ve had a number of readers generously offer assistance with that project and inquire about how it is progressing. To answer that question, right now I am 1) waiting for the USF reform final rules, and 2) still looking for an advisor at my school.  

I still encourage readers to contact me with questions or interesting rural telecom industry news—I will always be looking for things to write about! 

I sincerely want to thank everyone who has ever read this website and encouraged me in any way this past year and since the beginning, even before Rural TeleCommentary was launched. I never ever anticipated that I would get almost 13,000 readers in just 10 months. There are so many amazing people in the rural telecom industry and I hope everyone stays optimistic even in these difficult times. This is a group of people that I am very proud to be a part of, and I am looking forward to the wonderful opportunities that lie ahead at JSI Capital Advisors. 

Cassandra Heyne

ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

P.S. You can still follow me on Twitter @RuralTelComment if you miss me!

An Open Letter to the FCC: USF Reform Poses a Critical Threat to Rural America

Dear FCC Commissioners and Staff:

With a decision on Universal Service Fund reform drawing near, I want to take a moment to share my feelings on this highly important issue in a public forum, with hopes that my message will be heard by a diverse audience in addition to its intended recipients: telecom regulators at the FCC. I have been involved in the rural telecommunications industry my entire life, as I come from a family-owned rural telecom business (Walnut Communications) that has been operating in rural Iowa for nearly 100 years. I have been a student of telecommunications for five years, and I have spent the last six months almost exclusively focused on USF reform—I have read nearly every filing in this proceeding, attended conferences, lobbied Congressional offices, written dozens of articles analyzing different aspects of the reforms, talked to various stakeholders about the potential impacts, and I intend to do my Master's thesis on the outcomes of the reforms on the RLEC industry once the rules are finalized. I am extremely pleased with how vocal the RLEC industry has been about the critical threats that the Commission's USF proposals, as described in the February 9, 2011 NPRM, pose to these small, independent, cooperative and family-owned businesses—businesses which are each unique and important to their rural communities as employers, carriers of last resort and contributors to local economies. Although I am proud of my colleagues in the RLEC industry for their extremely hard work in this proceeding, I am scared for them as well.

Against all odds in the early 1900s, my great-great uncle, my great-grandfather, and a group of farmers built the foundation for Walnut Telephone Company. It was truly a community effort, for famers and volunteers offered assistance, equipment and even their own wagons to help build the phone lines miles outside of town. Over the years, the company faced great adversity, survived the Great Depression, and even earned the respect of AT&T during a time when AT&T stopped at nothing to squash competition, including destroying farmers' telephone equipment and ripping out lines. Now, Walnut Telecommunications faces its greatest challenge yet—surviving the directives of the National Broadband Plan. I care very much for my family's business and the rural area that I came from, and I cannot ignore four generations of ancestors who have poured their lives into providing telecommunications in a very small community in Iowa—a community that has little growth, an aging demographic, few high-income residents or large businesses. Despite these demographic and geographic challenges, Walnut Communications has historically been a leader in advanced telecom technologies, installing the first digital switch in Iowa, offering the first cellular service in Iowa, upgrading all customers to DSL in the 1990s, and most recently, deploying high-speed Fiber-to-the-Home to rural homes and businesses.

Walnut Communications and hundreds of other RLECs have been able to make these groundbreaking investments and provide advanced telecommunications services at rates reasonably comparable to urban Americans because of the financial stability that the current rate-of-return and USF facilitate. USF enables these companies to take risks on technologies and secure private capital for critical investments in broadband infrastructure, despite being located in economically challenged and sparsely populated high-cost regions. Yet, the FCC contends that RLECs are wasteful, inefficient, and apparently not worthy of ongoing USF subsidies to continue providing telephone and broadband service in rural areas. In my analysis of the USF reform proceeding, I have personally found very little evidence to suggest that RLECs are in any way wasteful and inefficient—sure, there are likely a few "bad actors" in the industry, but the bad actions of the few should not be used to penalize the RLEC industry as a whole. Large companies like AT&T, Verizon and Windstream echo the FCC's accusations against RLECs, but provide no evidence to suggest that they are actually willing to provide service in extremely rural high-cost, low-return areas. If these companies wanted to serve rural areas, they could have done it already with their billions of dollars in revenue—but they haven't, because of the fundamental economic principles of investor-owned public companies, where low-return investments are scrapped in favor of higher return ventures. The RLEC industry is not a high profit game; RLECs provide outstanding service to their rural communities because they care about the communities. 100 years ago, AT&T did not want to provide service in extremely rural areas, and today, they still don't. RLECs were established to help prevent an urban-rural divide in telephone service, and yet here we are 100 years later facing the same problem with broadband service.

I do believe that USF should be modernized for a broadband era—there are certainly aspects of USF, and Intercarrier Compensation in particular, which are in dire need of modernization and simplification. However, there is no need for the FCC to achieve USF reform by causing irreparable harm to thousands of companies, and there is absolutely no excuse for the FCC to create broadband black holes in rural areas by excluding RLECs from future USF support for broadband. I strongly urge the FCC to look at alternative plans submitted by Hargray Telephone Company, the Rural Associations (NTCA, NECA, OPASTCO and WTA), and the Federal State Joint Board on Universal Service. Each of these alternative plans include compromises, meet the FCC's four objectives for USF reform, will keep the RLEC industry viable in the long term, and will help increase broadband deployment in rural areas. Of the proposed USF reforms in the NPRM and the National Broadband Plan, I am most concerned with proposals to cap the High Cost Fund (there is no need if contributions are expanded), reverse auctions (which are unproven, untested and would favor large carriers), and eventually eliminating rate-of-return (why fix what's not broken?). I deeply fear that these three actions together would sign the death certificate for the RLEC industry.

I am also particularly concerned with FCC sentiments that RLECs should consolidate—there is no evidence to support the argument that consolidation would yield positive impacts on rural broadband deployment and adoption. Rather, it is an ignorant conclusion based on "bigger is better" attitudes. Bigger is not always better, especially in rural areas, where small, locally-owned businesses are actually important. Just because every sector of the information and telecommunications industry is moving towards consolidation—and borderline monopolization—does not mean that it is the best outcome for everyone. Rural cultures value small local businesses, and forcing consolidation in the industry will result in a devastating loss to many vibrant rural communities. Furthermore, actions that force RLECs to consolidate (or worse, go out of business) will result in thousands of lost jobs and opportunities for rural Americans.

I felt that comments by Warinner, Gesinger and Associates best described this situation, and specifically reflect my own personal feelings about possibly moving back to a rural community after leaving rural America at a young age to receive a world class education in a major city. They explain, "The FCC would limit a small rural company's ability to attract personnel with advanced degrees, by limiting their corporate expenses or capping the amounts they can recover. Limiting or eliminating these expenses would put an immense strain on a company's ability to attract and keep qualified employees for a specialized industry. In fact, it could be counter-productive because many of the students in rural areas that go to urban colleges and universities would lose the opportunity that the telephone company would provide in offering a job that allows the individual to work in the rural area from which they came or a rural area that provides the benefits of living in a small close-knit community" (at pg. 21-22). As America slowly begins to emerge from the worst economic crisis in decades, the government should not be preventing any small business from attracting, hiring, and paying skilled workers—workers who could help revitalize rural economies and cultures, contribute to local tax revenue, and start families of their own in rural communities; which in turn will help revitalize rural schools and businesses, and possibly even help change the urban world's perspective of rural America. I highly recommend a recent study by Wichita State University Center for Economic Development and Business Research, which describes how the FCC's USF proposals would impact Kansas RLECs. The outcome is not good—between 2012 and 2016 Kansas RLECs could lose a total of $143m in USF funding, 367 direct and indirect jobs would be lost, and the state would lose around $5m in combined income, property and sales tax revenue. This study is a perfect example of why the FCC needs to look at the "bigger picture" before hastily implementing USF reforms based on a shaky foundation and unsubstantiated conclusions. It isn't just the rural telecom industry that will suffer, it is ancillary businesses, equipment vendors, state and local governments; and most of all—rural communities. In addition to the Kansas RLEC study, there are dozens of comments and ex parte filings that demonstrate the financial impact of the FCC's reforms on RLECs, and some filings even include letters from community schools, hospitals, businesses and public safety entities who all provide testimony about the benefit of RLECs and broadband to their local communities—benefits that will undoubtedly disappear if RLECs disappear as a result of USF reforms.

FCC, please take seriously the overwhelming amount of evidence that your USF proposals will harm RLECs and rural communities as you move forward with the final rules. There is no reason to change the game so dramatically that companies will actually go out of business as a result of overly aggressive and intrusive government actions, especially when there are very reasonable alternative proposals available. I fully recognize that every USF stakeholder will have to make some compromise and sacrifices going forward in order to transition USF into the broadband era. However, sacrificing entire companies will not achieve the end goal of deploying broadband to 100% of the country—it will have the exact opposite effect. RLECs have been leaders in providing broadband to rural Americans since before broadband was even considered an important service, and there is no reason to take funding away from these companies in order to give it to companies that will not serve extremely rural areas simply because their investors won't profit from it. Ensuring that all Americans have access to, and utilize, high-speed broadband is an extremely admirable vision, but the path to achieve this lofty goal should not be hastily planned or build upon an unstable foundation. There is simply too much at stake—from the viability of small businesses to the opportunities for extremely rural Americans to participate in the global Internet ecosystem—to implement rules without considering the full spectrum of short and long term outcomes for each stakeholder. RLECs have depicted a bleak future as a result of the proposed reforms, and I sincerely hope that the FCC can conceptualize and implement an alternative suite of USF reforms where RLECs have a bright and profitable future, and where all rural Americans have access to broadband.

Respectfully submitted,

Cassandra Heyne, Rural TeleCommentary

ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Celebrating 6 Months of Rural TeleCommentary

Life has taught me that it is important to celebrate and acknowledge personal and professional accomplishments and milestones, and I think that Rural TeleCommentary's success in just 6 short months definitely deserves recognition! At the end of last year, I was facing a somewhat uncertain future. I had just ended a very rewarding internship and I was on the verge of completing my coursework for my telecommunications Master's degree at University of Colorado. I knew I was facing the very daunting task of starting and completing my thesis in a reasonable period of time, and I was hesitant to look for a "serious" job with that responsibility looming over me. I've dedicated 10 years of my life to my higher education, and I do not want to become one of those people who pour years of time and hundreds of thousands of dollars into an education only to get swept up by a lucrative career before completing a thesis. Anyway, the challenge that I faced at the end of 2010 was finding a way to keep myself involved in the telecommunications industry where I could focus on things that interested me, at my own pace and on my own schedule, but still have time to finish my degree and keep one eye on my future career. At first, I wasn't sure about blogging. I didn't think people really took bloggers seriously. I didn't think I would get very many readers since I haven't had years of professional experience to build up my name and credibility. However, there seemed to be virtually no risks, or cost, to starting a blog. Additionally, there seemed to be a lack of blogs focused entirely on rural telecommunications policy issues (although I have found some good ones since I launched Rural TeleCommentary). My writing style and personal philosophy is very detail-oriented and highly analytic, and I really felt that the rural telecommunications industry could benefit from my unique perspective coming from a small family owned rural telecom provider combined with my extensive education in telecom business, economics, engineering and policy. As a result, Rural TeleCommentary:
Perspectives on the Rural Telecommunications Industry was born on December 30, 2010, with my first official post on January 12, 2011.

In the first two months, I focused primarily on building up a nice array of content. I did not have many readers—primarily just previous co-workers and a small group of select individuals who I counted on for feedback and testing out ideas. In January and February, I only had about 100 page views each month. I purposely delayed promoting the blog until I had about 10 posts, because once I started promoting, I wanted new readers to see that I was taking the blog seriously and capable of writing consistently on a wide variety of pertinent topics. In March, I started sending e-mails to individuals at rural telecommunications associations, law firms and consulting firms, as I intended these people to be my primary audience. I received quite a bit of positive feedback, and I was even featured in a blog post on Connected Planet, which I thought was really cool. I got a great opportunity to promote my blog at the NTCA Legislative and Policy Conference in March, where I passed out letters describing my blog to NTCA members and the Iowa Congressional staff that we visited during the conference. By the end of March, my page views per month had grown to over 300.

In terms of readership, April was definitely my biggest growth month. I attended a conference on Smart Grid Policy where I gained some new readers, and I got two big breaks with the AT&T/T-Mobile merger and USF Reform comments. At the beginning of this project, I knew I wanted to make comment analysis a major component of my blog, and the USF reform proceeding was definitely the best opportunity I could have asked for to showcase my critical analysis skills on an issue that is of the utmost importance to the rural telecom industry. Another big growth opportunity came in April as a result of joining Twitter to share my articles and "micro-blog" about issues that arise on a daily basis but may not warrant an entire blog post. Twitter was a slow process at first. I found that it was hard to gain followers, and you have to do a lot more than just follow people and re-tweet to get noticed on Twitter. I found that it was important to respond to tweets with meaningful commentary, not just "I agree" or "nice" or whatever. However, that can be difficult to do in only 140 characters. Anyway, I am very happy with my decision to join Twitter and now it has become an important part of my blogging process and a critical resource for most of the telecommunications news that I read on a daily basis. Twitter has helped me learn about companies, websites, blogs, and people that I possibly would not have known about otherwise, and for that I am thankful. As a result of my ongoing blog promotion activities and joining Twitter, I had over 1,000 page views in the month of April.

The growth continued in May and June. I was extremely focused on USF Reform issues in these months, which certainly helped me gain a lot of readers. I have been very impressed with the number of Google searches on USF Reform where readers are directed to Rural TeleCommentary. I'm glad that so many people are trying to learn about this issue, and I hope my analysis has been helpful. I have received quite a bit of positive feedback from readers about how helpful my USF comment summaries have been, so I am pleased to know that all the work has been valuable to other people. In mid-May, I ramped up my presence on LinkedIn. Prior to the LinkedIn IPO, I never really found that site to be very useful and I couldn't figure out how to take advantage of it properly. Anyway, since mid-May, I have managed to increase my connections from 4 to almost 180 and my efforts on LinkedIn helped me land a job as a blogger for JSI Capital Advisors. So yes, LinkedIn is a very valuable social network and I am extremely happy that I gave it a shot after years of finding it pretty uninviting. On the other hand, Facebook has not been a very valuable source of readership for Rural TeleCommentary. I have only gotten about 30 page views from Facebook since I started the blog, and I post links to every article I write. I don't really find this surprising, as my Facebook community consists primarily of people that I haven't talked to in over 5 years and a large number of people that I don't even know why I'm "friends" with—I think this is a pretty common sentiment about Facebook as people are starting to realize that there are better networks for professional activities. Anyway, I don't think many of my Facebook friends care very much about the rural telecom industry, but I will continue to post links to my articles there anyway because there is nothing to lose by doing so. Between Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, social networking has without a doubt become as big of a component of Rural TeleCommentary as the blog itself, and I am still learning the best ways to take advantage of social networking to increase readership.

As of the beginning of July, I now have over 5,700 page views, far beyond what I ever expected to receive by this point. When I started Rural TeleCommentary, I honestly thought I would be lucky if I got 20 readers a month. Although I can't tell by the Google Statistics what percentage of readers are "dedicated" versus what percentage are just stopping by, I can determine that I have a nice number of dedicated readers, which I hope continues to grow. As much as it kills me to say this, I owe a lot to the Google monster for directing traffic to my blog. However, it is up to the end user to actually click on my links, so I'm clearly doing something right. Also, the highest number of readers sourced from Google searches have searched for the phrase "rural telecommentary," followed by "Cassandra Heyne" (which definitely creeps me out). Other popular Google searches include "USF Reform," "arbitrage rural telecom," "AT&T-Mobile," "small rural carriers" and "telecom smart grid." My most popular post by far has been Smart Grid Synergies for Rural Electric Co-ops and Telecom Providers, largely due to a rush of traffic from France over the last few weeks. My most popular USF Reform post is the comment summaries from the price cap carriers, followed by the reply comments by rural telecom organizations. My posts on the AT&T/T-Mobile merger have been very popular, not surprisingly.

What has been surprising is the continuous number of international readers that come to Rural TeleCommentary. So far, readers have come from over 60 countries. A couple of months ago I posted that I planned to include more articles on international telecom policy, and unfortunately I have not had as much time to dedicate to this task as I originally anticipated. However, I still plan to post on international issues from time to time—I'm working on something right now on Pakistan's USF system thanks to a reader telling me that their system has been successful. The following chart shows my page views as of July 4 from the top 10 countries—as I mentioned above, there has been a large influx of traffic from France recently specifically for my Smart Grid Synergies article. 

So, what have I learned so far in this project? First, aggressive promotion is very, very important. If you want readers, you can't just sit back and expect them to come to you. I was very nervous at first to send strangers e-mails and hand letters to people and bring up my blog in basically any conversation, but over time I think I have become more confident as I continue to get positive feedback. I know it is very challenging to try to take up time in someone's day, and most people are already overwhelmed by e-mails, articles and other news. I tend to write long articles, and I realize that I am dealing with limited attention spans and competing with a bombardment of content from all over the web; however, I feel that most of the topics I write about warrant considerable detail and high-level analysis, which is what helps my blog stand out from the crowd. So, the second lesson is that it is important to offer a fresh perspective on popular topics. Everyone in the rural telecom industry knows that the FCC's USF reforms are scary, and everyone everywhere knows that the AT&T/T-Mobile merger is a disaster in the making—I try to go deeper than the prevailing opinions and offer interesting analysis from my unique perspective on the industry. Thirdly, time management is really important and an ongoing challenge especially now that I have two blogs to write for—I try to stick to a strict schedule where some days I work on articles for JSI and some days I work on articles for Rural TeleCommentary. I've had to shelve some ideas to focus on more pressing matters, and I definitely cannot write about every single topic that interests me or I would literally not have time to sleep, ever. Lastly, I have learned that blogging is indeed a very fun and rewarding process, but it definitely requires dedication and commitment. I think I have been lucky that I have not encountered any significant challenges yet in terms of harsh criticism, and even critics of my perspectives have generally offered polite and constructive feedback. I am an avid reader of fashion and beauty blogs, and I know those bloggers get some extremely harsh criticism sometimes (why someone would make hurtful, mean comments about nail polish, I have no idea; but it goes to show that in an anonymous Internet environment, some people have no boundaries or common courtesy). Passions definitely run high about most of the issues covered on Rural TeleCommentary, so I'm thankful that I haven't encountered too much negativity yet—hopefully I won't in the future. The only aspect of blogging that I have been disappointed with it the lack of comments on my posts. However, since I started using Twitter, I have definitely engaged in conversations and debates related to my blog content, so I suppose that fulfills one of my initial goals of active reader participation. I also know from my own experience as a blog reader that people rarely comment on blogs in general. There are blogs that I have read every day for years and never commented on, so I have definitely learned that a lack of comments does not necessarily mean that people don't care. Also, I get a fairly steady stream of e-mail responses which indicates that some people simply aren't comfortable posting their thoughts in a public forum.

What's next for Rural TeleCommentary? Hopefully, there will many more months of increasing readership and interesting articles. I am trying very hard to post 2 articles per week on both Rural TeleCommentary and the JSI blog, but this can be a pretty aggressive goal especially when the articles involve reading hundreds of pages of regulatory filings! I am hoping to flex my engineering muscles a little in the near future. I haven't had much of a chance to write about technical issues, and I feel like I should before I forget everything I learned in my engineering classes. I could also use some practice with technical writing. I'm hoping to write some articles on rural LTE and FTTH, and I definitely have some ideas stored away on these topics. I will continue to do comment summaries on select proceedings, and there will definitely be no shortage of articles on USF reform as the rulemaking draws near and after the rules are released—indeed, that is where the real work will begin (and when I will finally have to write my thesis).

I want to personally thank each and every person who has read even one post on Rural TeleCommentary, and I especially want to thank those of you who have shared my blog with your colleagues and have continuously read my articles since the very beginning. I welcome any and all feedback about how to improve this blog for the benefit of my readers, so please do not hesitate to contact me with suggestions.

Cassandra Heyne

ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Trying to Overcome Dark Forces in the Rural Telecom Industry

Minnesota rural telecom cooperatives attempt merger for the second time, and other news from this week.

This week has been quite interesting for me—there have been numerous articles and events which have caught my attention and kept me constantly thinking about how exactly the rural telecom industry is going to overcome the monumental challenges ahead with USF Reform, the National Broadband Plan, Net Neutrality, the AT&T-T-Mobile merger, and basically the list goes on for a while… Additionally, several media outlets have published interesting stories on the impact of broadband (or lack thereof) in rural areas. From my perspective, two things are clear: rural America needs broadband now, and barriers must be reduced so that rural telecom providers can provide said broadband in rural areas. Regulatory and financial barriers are not the only thorns for rural telecom providers right now, as we will see in the following story about two rural telecom cooperatives in MN who tried twice, and failed twice, to merge in order to have a better chance at navigating the perilous regulatory waters ahead.

Earlier this week, Blandin on Broadband and the Willmar, MN West Central Tribune reported on a proposed merger between Farmers Mutual Telephone Company (Bellingham, MN, 1.037 access lines) and Federated Telephone (Chokio, MN, 2,350 access lines). The two cooperatives hoped to create a merged cooperative called Advanced Communications in Rural America. According to the West Central Tribune and both cooperatives' General Manager Kevin Beyer, the company's bylaws called for members to vote in person, and the cooperatives failed to obtain a supermajority in favor of the merger in the first vote last November. The cooperatives then changed their bylaws to allow voting by mail-in ballot, in hopes that this would help them achieve the supermajority needed to approve the merger. Unfortunately, the results of Thursday's vote were strikingly similar to the previous vote: Federated Telephone Company members voted 90% in favor of approval in both votes, but only 57.5% of Farmers Mutual members approved the vote in the second round (a decrease from 59% approval obtained in the November vote).

I had a brief conversation with Kevin Beyer, where he expressed disappointment about the result. He said he had hoped the merger would create a stronger cooperative—a cooperative that would be better positioned to overcome the troubling regulatory challenges that the rural telecom industry knows all too well right now. I asked why the merger was not approved, and apparently there was a group of members who strongly opposed the merger who managed to sway enough power to prevent it from happening. However, Beyer added that this group of members never really explained their reasons for opposition, which leads me to the assumption that this is a bad case of small town politics interfering with a potentially valuable business decision, which could have passed benefits along to the community. According to the West Central Tribune, the opponents even placed radio advertisements, but they did not identify themselves.

What is interesting is that the two cooperatives share a general manager and switching and network facilities. My co-writer at JSI Capital Advisors, Richelle Elberg, shared that "the cooperatives had advertised that they could have saved $200,000 per year in expenses and that the uncertainty surrounding Universal Service Funding and other competitive concerns made the merger an important strategic move." Furthermore, no jobs would be lost and both cooperatives' head offices would remain open (JSI Capital Advisors article here).

So what went wrong? I suppose we will never know for sure, but I suspect the opposing members simply do not understand the telecommunications industry well enough to make an informed decision. This tends to be one of the pitfalls of rural cooperatives, where each customer is a voting member with power to drive major decisions. Something tells me that the opposing members did not sit down and read the FCC's 300 page NPRM on USF Reform, nor did they attend an NTCA or OPASTCO legislative conference and lobby Congress on rural telecom issues (but I could be wrong, who knows). However, the general manager and board members possibly did do these things to some extent, which led them to the conclusion that merging is the only way to strengthen the company to face these challenges. The fact that the opposing members did not identify themselves or offer an explanation for their opposition is a real red flag for me, and I can only speculate that small town politics killed this deal.

If you would have asked me a year ago about how I felt about small rural companies merging in order to try to reduce the negative impact of the National Broadband Plan, I would have probably gotten really defensive and angry—in fact, that actually happened at least once. However, my feelings about rural telecom consolidation are starting to change, and I now believe that if the conditions and motivation are right, some of the extremely small RLECs should certainly consider merging (I will most likely write about this topic in greater detail in the near future). It seems as though Federated and Farmers Mutual would have been a great match, and this merger could have possibly paved the way for other small rural cooperatives to take the plunge. Beyer told me that he does not see another vote in the future, and the two cooperatives will just have to do their best to survive. I wish them the best of luck.

Meanwhile, rural Americans are clamoring for broadband. There was a truly excellent two-part series this week on one of my favorite rural blogs, Daily Yonder, by Karl Stauber. Part 1, "Finding a New Rural America," takes a hard look at the disparity between "Old Rural," which is dominated by declining populations and last-century single-economy mentality, and "New Rural," which focuses on innovation, opportunity and a high quality of life. Stauber describes the duality, "Old Rural is often about very limited connectivity between urban and rural. New Rural is intentionally about broad connectivity.  New Rural is about helping regional efforts to build diverse, evolving competitive advantage that grows the amount and distribution of wealth." Part 2, "To Live or Die in Rural America," discusses the challenge that rural America faces in an increasingly urban-centric political environment. Stauber insists that new policies are necessary to ensure that rural communities, economies and cultures survive and thrive. Broadband is the key to the survival of rural communities, and Stauber comments:

"Rural communities have a double disadvantage in making high-speed access universally available.  The population in many rural areas tends to be older, poorer and less educated—all predictors of low utilization of the Internet, thus challenging the economics of traditional utility models. 

In addition, rural areas are often lumped in with urban areas when geography and bandwidth are allocated.  Most companies see more opportunity to make a return on their investment in higher density urban areas, leaving rural parts of their service areas with minimal or little access.

Federal policy should require that Internet access in rural areas be developed at the same rate as adjacent metropolitan regions or that rural utility cooperatives should be given priority when bidding occurs that includes rural regions."

I highly recommend reading Stauber's series if you have not done so already, if anything to gain a better understanding about rural areas in general.

What needs to happen in order for rural telecom providers to overcome the myriad challenges and negative forces facing the industry is facing? Unfortunately, I do not have all the answers to that question, but having good rural leaders and allies in Congress and at the FCC would definitely be a great start. Earlier this week, OPASTCO issues a press release recommending Brian Hendricks, Chief Counsel for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, to take former Commissioner Baker's empty seat at the FCC. Naturally, I was curious about this individual, and I did a little investigating and he seemed like a great rural ally as he comes from rural Texas. I had no idea on Wednesday when I read the press release that I would actually end up meeting Mr. Hendricks on Thursday! Several distinguished faculty members from my school, University of Colorado, hosted a reception at the DC Disney headquarters to honor three students who were chosen to intern at the FCC and Senate. It turns out that Mr. Hendricks is a big fan of my graduate program at CU, and one of the interns (also a classmate of mine) happens to be working at his office for the summer. Anyway, when he introduced himself I was so excited and I actually said "are you the same Brian Hendricks that OPASTCO recommended for the FCC position?" I ended up having a really wonderful conversation with him, and I can say with certainty that he would make a fantastic FCC commissioner and I sincerely hope he is seriously considering the job. We discussed the importance of an interdisciplinary telecommunications education for telecom professionals, and of course we talked about USF Reform. He fears that the FCC's USF Reforms are misguided and hasty, and he shares practically all of my concerns about the finer points in the reforms. I am so honored to have had the opportunity to talk to him, and he is definitely my top "person of interest" in rural telecom right now.

In other news this week, I had an informal meeting with a member of the FCC where we discussed FCC administrative procedures and I learned about the Wireline Competition Bureau and the Pricing Policy Division—as it was an informal meeting, we could not discuss things like USF Reform or the AT&T merger, but it was still a terrific opportunity for me to learn more about the FCC process. I was encouraged to get involved with filing comments and attending ex parte meetings in the future. Additionally, the Iowa Telecommunications Association hosted a Rural Telecom Forum on June 6, which I did not attend, but heard from attendees that it was a great event. Iowa farmers and Rep. Tom Latham (R-Fourth District) discussed the importance of broadband for Iowa's agricultural economy, and there is a video clip from the Forum here: http://www.whotv.com/news/agriculture/. To see the video, go to the "Afternoon Agribusiness Report (6/7/11)" clip under the video box, and the Rural Telecom Forum coverage is a few minutes in after the farm report.

I hope to complete my reply comment summaries this weekend, and I also added a new feature, "USF Reform Headquarters" at the top of the page where you can go to get the latest news on USF Reform, as well as a comprehensive list of all the blog posts I have written on the subject for both Rural TeleCommentary and JSI Capital Advisors Blog.

Have a great weekend!

Cassandra Heyne

ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

An Exciting New Venture for Rural TeleCommentary at JSI Capital Advisors Blog

I am thrilled to announce that I will be joining the JSI Capital Advisors Blog team to write about USF and telecom regulatory issues! I am very excited about this new opportunity! There will be no shortage of USF Reform drama, controversy and excitement in the following months, and I am proud to be representing the rural telecom industry in yet another forum.

A LinkedIn Success Story

A few weeks ago when the LinkedIn IPO swept Wall Street and the tech industry by storm, I was a little skeptical and initially thought "oh great, another tech bubble." I've been a LinkedIn member for over 3 years and had only managed to accumulate a total of 4 connections—two of which were my father. I was actually required to join LinkedIn for a Technology Entrepreneurship Leadership and Management class a few years ago, where the professor hoped the students would utilize it to increase professional contacts. Anyway, I was never really able to figure out how to use LinkedIn to my advantage, largely due to the fact that I did not have direct contact with many of the people in the telecom industry that I wanted to "connect with" on LinkedIn, and I wasn't entirely sure if it was good business etiquette to just randomly send connection requests to strangers. After the IPO madness, I decided to give LinkedIn another shot. Thanks to the creepy yet powerful Google Gmail sync option, everyone I have ever e-mailed from ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com (who is also a LinkedIn member) was almost instantly added as a potential connection, which I thought was really cool. Google privacy invasion issues aside, this was definitely one time I was happy that the Google elephant never forgets.

As many of you may know, I've been on a path of aggressive self-promotion for Rural TeleCommentary over the last few months. I'm very pleased with the success I've had with Twitter so far, and I figured I should at least try to take advantage of LinkedIn to reach a wider audience of readers for Rural TeleCommentary. So, I updated my profile, downloaded the mobile app, and got to work on building my connections and joining groups. One of the groups that immediately caught my eye was the USF Forum, managed by Bill King of JSI Capital Advisors. This forum contains discussions on many of the topics I have been addressing on Rural TeleCommentary, so I jumped at the chance to contribute to the forum. Since then, I have managed to boost my LinkedIn connections from 4 to almost 70 in less than two weeks (including some very high-profile names), and I've definitely had success in bringing new readers to Rural TeleCommentary.

In addition to gaining new readers for Rural TeleCommentary and the wonderful opportunity to write for JSI, I also caught the attention of the FCC, and I have been invited to meet informally with someone from the Pricing Policy Division of the Wireline Competition Bureau tomorrow on Monday! I cannot tell you how exciting this is for me! I hope the FCC member will be open to letting me write about our meeting on Rural TeleCommentary. I am definitely going to ask a lot of questions and do my best to communicate RLEC concerns about USF reform.

So the moral of this story is: LinkedIn definitely proved that its inflated stock value may be appropriate because it certainly brought me some amazing opportunities in just 2 weeks of aggressive use! I will not underestimate the power of social media anymore—you may remember that I had reservations about using Twitter at first too, but now I love it and use it as a primary source for daily telecom news and views because I can get articles and reports from a very wide spectrum of the industry in one spot without having to individually check dozens of websites each day. I have definitely learned that if you want to increase your visibility for your career or personal projects, you really have to just GO FOR IT with social networking. I "went for it," and I am extremely pleased with the results so far!

Look for my first article on the JSI Capital Advisors Blog ("The Monitor") sometime next week! I will be writing approximately 2-3 articles per week for JSI and hopefully keep up my goal of 2 articles per week on Rural TeleCommentary as well. Additionally, I will be initiating and participating in thought-provoking discussions and debates on the LinkedIn USF Forum, so please join that group if you have not done so yet! I look forward to "seeing" you there! I am hoping that my involvement with JSI and the USF Forum will provide me with insightful information for my Master's Thesis, which is finally starting to accelerate a little. My advisor at CU is pushing me to look at the USF Reform question from a perspective where I may not be happy with my conclusions—for example, the conclusion that RLECs should consolidate in order to remain viable competitors to large carriers. It is sure to be a challenging project, this is for sure!

It has definitely been a great week!

Cassandra Heyne

ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Rural TeleCommentary is Looking Forward to Summer, New Features Coming Soon!

As much as I want to continue reading and writing about the USF comments, I have to take a short break from blogging for the next 2 weeks in order to focus on my studies and travel to Omaha for the Berkshire Hathaway 2011 Annual Meeting. However, I will be back with a vengeance come May 2 or so, and I will definitely resume summarizing the USF comments from the price cap carriers as well as take a closer look at the Rural Association Plan proposed by NTCA, OPASTCO, WTA, etc. I believe the FCC is also holding a USF workshop soon like the one they had for ICC, which I will certainly watch and report on once I have some time.

I have some exciting ideas planned for new features on Rural TeleCommentary, including an International Telecom Policy Spotlight. I have been so amazed at all the readers I have been getting from all around the world, I never expected to have such an international audience--it has inspired me to keep learning about international telecom policies. For this feature, I am planning to highlight telecommunications policies in specific countries that are either focused on rural issues or just plain interesting. I think it will be valuable and interesting for my American audience to learn about international telecom policies, and it will be very educational for me to dig deeper into some of the topics I see on the news or have studied in the past. I took an international telecom policy and business class last year and I really loved it--each week we had to pick a country and write about a recent telecom development in that country. I'm already planning to write about the plight of reverse auctions in India and Chile, the European decision on Net Neutrality, and rural broadband initiatives in Sweden, Japan, South Korea and many other countries. If you have any suggestions, please leave a comment or e-mail me! 

I will also continue writing about rural telecom/electric cooperative Smart Grid Business Opportunities, including an overview of the paper that I should be working on right now! Naturally, I will be keeping a close eye on the AT&T-T-Mobile Merger, Net Neutrality, Intercarrier Compensation, and Universal Service Reform so I can bring you the rural telecom industry perspective on these hot issues.

I'm looking forward to an exciting summer for Rural TeleCommentary! I don't think I am taking any classes (I anticipate that this spring is my last semester of classes--ever--unless I decide to take more "for fun"), so aside from working on my thesis project I should have plenty of time to dedicate to this website.

Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Rural TeleCommentary is NOW on TWITTER!

Click Here to Follow Rural TeleCommentary on Twitter! (@RuralTelComment)

Things move fast in the tech industry so I didn't see any point in holding off the inevitable for a few more weeks or months. I signed up for Twitter yesterday and so far I really like it. I am finding it to be very useful to get industry news from a wide variety of sources, and I think it will help me simplify my social networking a little. Hopefully, it will help me bring in some new readers to Rural TeleCommentary. I've been following a number of associations, news outlets, etc. on Facebook for awhile now, but I'm going to transition to using Twitter exclusively for "professional" social networking and Facebook exclusively for entertainment. Plus, I don't think my Facebook friends really qualify as a target audience for articles on ICC arbitrage and whatnot.

On Twitter, I plan to:

• Announce and post links to new blog articles (great for my readers who do not get direct e-mails from me)
• Post links to interesting and applicable articles and news about the rural telecom industry
• Provide colorful commentary about telecom topics, in 140 words or less. 

If you do not have a personal Twitter account, please notify your company's "social media liaison" about @RuralTelComment!

Please follow RuralTeleCommentary on Twitter, I'm lonely over there right now! 

Have a great weekend!
Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Should Rural TeleCommentary Join Twitter?

As a 20-something young adult whose BlackBerry is actually starting to fuse to the skin on hand and who has usually been considered an "early adopter" of technology and applications for many years, it is with some embarrassment that I admit that I do not use Twitter nor have I ever really even checked it out. However, I have been mulling over starting a Twitter feed for Rural TeleCommentary, to complement the blog itself (not substitute or compete with it). You may have noticed from some of my previous posts, I really like to write...a lot...sometimes too much even (at least according to a handfull of graduate school professors who live and die by enforcing page limits to projects). I am well aware that readers' attention spans for things like blogs and online news are very short, but with my highly specialized subject matter and educated audience, I have faith in my readers to spend an entire 15-20 minutes reading a whole article of 3-5 paragraphs without being dazzled midway through by something shiny and distracting on the Internet. Thus, Twitter has never really appealed to me because I usually have a lot more to say than can fit in 140 characters. So, if I start a Twitter feed, it will be primarily to alert followers of new blog posts as well as to quickly communicate important telecom news or recommend other articles, books, blogs, etc. I am also interested in establishing more two-way communication with my readers, which Twitter may (or may not--I honestly don't know) help facilitate.

I opened a poll which can be found under the headline banner and above my bio to the right of the screen. The question is: Would You Follow Rural TeleCommentary on Twitter? Please take a second (literally, it will take one second) to vote. The poll will be open for 2 months, during which I will study the idea further and try to figure out if it is worthy of my time or not. According to the ever-reliable Wikipedia, 40% of Twitter posts are "pointless babble," which is primarily why I have never invested much effort into this platform for social, educational, professional or entertainment purposes. But--I'm hoping to change my attitude towards it because clearly Twitter is becoming an important (and necessary) tool for businesses and news sources especially. It might be fun, and it might be a good learning experience for me, but I am hesitant to start it unless I actually have committed readers lined up in advance--so please vote!

If any of my readers have experience with Twitter that they would like to share--please share it! If you have any ideas about how I could take advantage of Twitter for the benefit of my audience, please share that as well!

Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Edit 4/3/2011: I removed the Twitter poll because it was causing anomalies in my traffic statistics (not a big deal, but it was bothering me). If you have an opinion about Rural TeleCommentary joining Twitter, please leave a comment or e-mail me. I still plan to consider the possibilities and make a decision in a couple of months.

Rural TeleCommentary Goes Public with Exciting Results!

When I sent out e-mails to the rural telecommunications industry yesterday announcing Rural TeleCommentary, I had no idea that within 24 hours a major telecom news website would be writing about my blog and my post about the National Broadband Map in particular!!! Needless to say, I nearly screamed with delight when I was scrolling through Facebook on my Blackberry earlier and came across a headline from Connected Planet that sounded vaguely familiar:

Newly Minted Law School Grad Questions Accuracy of National Broadband Map, by Joan Engebretson

When I saw my name in the article, I think I really did scream with excitement! Engebretson is an independent telecom writer on Connected Planet who I respect greatly. I follow her articles and blog posts on Connected Planet and I always look forward to what she has to say about the rural telecom industry.  She also writes about how FCC decisions and other events impact the rural telecom industry specifically, and we all know that the rural voice is often not heard at all on major news outlets--making her voice quite valuable to me and many others. I am extremely grateful and excited about being featured on one of the best and most reliable news sources for the telecommunications industry! I feel very honored and I hope that this publicity will help attract even more readers to Rural TeleCommentary!

Thank you to everyone else who has e-mailed me and visited Rural TeleCommentary since yesterday! I am really excited about having a larger audience and it will definitely motivate me to keep writing about important issues in the rural telecommunications industry! I will be attended the NTCA Legislative Conference next week, which I am really looking forward to. I have not attended this conference in 7 or 8 years (OK, now I feel old), and I am excited about going back with the additional knowledge and insight I have gained about the telecom industry in the last few years. It is sure to be a valuable experience that will hopefully make an impact on some of the upcoming and troubling government decisions in the industry.

Welcome to all my new readers, and thank you for the great feedback!
Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

New Reader? Welcome to Rural Telecommentary!

Time for Rural TeleCommentary to go public! 

Well, Rural TeleCommentary has been moving right along in the cyber world for about two months now, and so far I am quite pleased with it. I have finally decided that it is time to start expanding my readership beyond a very small group of family and past co-workers (thank you all so much for your support so far, your suggestions have been very helpful and I really appreciate when people leave comments on my posts too!).  However, the time has come to bring in more readers from the rural telecom industry. For the last few weeks I've been working on compiling a list of names of people from rural telecom associations, law firms, consulting firms, and state associations--all of whom I respect greatly for the work that they do to preserve and advocate the rural telecom industry. So, I will be sending e-mails to these select individuals (if you are a new reader and reading this post right now, then you are probably a recipient of this email). So, for my new readers, I have prepared some information that you may find useful to understand the meaning of this project.

"So, what is Rural TeleCommentary anyway?"
Rural TeleCommentary is a project I started back in January where I write about interesting and important current events in the telecommunications industry, and I analyze how the event (such as an NPRM or a new technology) will impact rural telecommunications providers.  I am also hoping to do a series of comment summaries on the USF Reform proceeding, and I just started writing a series about business opportunities for rural utility co-ops and rural telecom providers to collaborate to reach smart grid and broadband deployment goals. These are just a few examples, but if you scroll down you will see articles on a variety of other topics including Federal funding for broadband, digital piracy, the National Broadband Map, and a book review of a truly outstanding book on the telecommunications industry. Some of my topics will be extensions from classes I am taking, and others are reviews of conferences I attend. If you would like to read my first official post, you can learn more about me, my credentials, and my goals for Rural TeleCommentary. You can jump there right now!

"I like it! Do I need to do anything other than just check in and read it every so often?"
You can read and enjoy this blog in any way that works best for you, but I may offer a few suggestions regarding reader participation. Of course, you are in no way obligated to participate but increased participation will certainly make it more interesting and beneficial for everyone!

• I would love for new readers to introduce themselves in the comments section of this post so I can get a better idea of who my audience is, which will help me pick topics that might be particularly interesting to my readers. 
• Do you have a Google account? Gmail? Already a blogger yourself? If you have a Google account, you can click on the "follow" icon on the right side of the screen below my profile and archive. My feelings won't be hurt if you don't--I'm pretty sure the "follow" feature is just a popularity contest anyway. If you have a Google blog too, there is presumably some way we can link to each others blogs. 
• I really, really encourage you to leave comments on my posts. One of my goals for this project is to engage in lively debates and intellectual conversations on the topics I write about. If you are an expert in a topic I have written about, please share your knowledge with us as well.

"How do I know when you post a new article?"
The fastest way for you to find out when I post new articles is to get on my e-mail list. I send an e-mail alert as soon as I post an article. If you want to be on my e-mail list, just send me an e-mail with your preferred e-mail address and you will be added to the list. I do not want to unintentionally spam anyone, so this is why I am requesting an opt-in e-mail list option. I write articles approximately once per week, so you will not be bombarded with e-mails, I promise!

Alternatively, I've been posting links to new articles on my Facebook. You are more than welcome to "friend" me on Facebook and then you will be informed when a new article is posted.

Otherwise, you can just bookmark the website and check in whenever you want.Or not. It is totally up to you!

"I like it but... I have a few suggestions for how you could improve the site."
Great!! All feedback is really appreciated. This is a learning experience for me, so feedback is really a necessary part of the process. I am also open to taking suggestions for things to write about. 

I think that about covers the basics. I invite you to scroll through my articles and I hope you enjoy Rural TeleCommentary!

Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

Must-Read: The Master Switch is a Masterpiece of Independent Spirit

Book Review
The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires, by Tim Wu

I am innately attracted to almost any book that has the phrase "The Rise and Fall of..." or the word "Empire" in the title, so naturally I was pretty excited about The Master Switch from the beginning. I also love reading detailed and multifaceted histories about virtually anything, from caviar to countries to Chanel No. 5. Basically, this book was right up my alley, being about the history of all different sectors of the telecommunications industry, especially the independent and entrepreneurial spirit that drove most telecom sectors from humble beginnings in garage workshops or on remote mountain top antennas to multi-billion dollar titans of industry. These telecom sectors (content, transmission, entertainment, etc.) are so intertwined in our lives today that we can hardly even imagine the days when cable TV and the Internet were no more than fringe ideas struggling to gain support from an industry and regulatory regime that strongly favors entrenched incumbents and monopolies. The Master Switch details plenty of dramatic rises and falls in telecommunications throughout the last century.

Being a history lover, I generally like any book about the great tales of trial and tribulation that occurred during the first 100 years of the telecommunications industry. What makes this book really special in my opinion is that it is literally an anthem of independent telecom entrepreneurs and innovators. Credit is rightly given to rural telecom pioneers--the farmers who strung up barbed wire out in the middle of the Great Plains in order to communicate with each other--as well as independent filmmakers, early radio mavericks, the cable TV crusaders, and of course the Internet and computer start-up geniuses (including the individuals who now basically rule the information empire--yes, even those guys had humble beginnings). My favorite story in the book was about how AT&T used to go into rural areas and literally pull out all the equipment and wires instilled by the rural telephone companies and burn or destroy the equipment in the town square for all to see. It really made me think that not much has changed in the last 100 years in terms of rural phone companies vs. The Big Guys. Even if AT&T doesn't go pull out wires and burn equipment anymore, the big companies certainly put the rural companies through the wringer with other forms  of attrition including USF funding, access revenue, and exclusive contracts with handset manufacturers. Sometimes it seems like they might as well just start pulling out wires and burning expensive digital switches in the town square. I recently uncovered some interesting history about my family's company, Walnut Communications, and its various conflicts with AT&T back in the old days (circa 1915). As the story goes, Walnut farmers were installing lines to reach the surrounding farm community and at one junction the Walnut line had to cross paths with an AT&T transcontinental circuit. The men were unable to install the Walnut line below the AT&T line, so they decided to quickly  toss the line over top of the AT&T line--big mistake! This actually shorted out the AT&T transcontinental line momentarily. Apparently it did not take AT&T very long to realize where and how the problem was caused, and the next day AT&T representatives showed up in Walnut to question my great-great-uncle Andy Schuttloffel about this little incident. Fortunately, the AT&T representatives determined that the AT&T line was actually too low to begin with, even though the Walnut crew should never have tried to put a line over top the AT&T line. Walnut was given a stern warning to never attempt such a feat again, and my great-great-uncle was actually invited to tour the AT&T facilities in Omaha, NE, where they were kindly shown that if their transcontinental line was ever shorted for even one minute, the cost would be hundreds of thousands of dollars. Some years later, there was another situation involving blocked long distance calls, where my great-great-uncle actually went to Chicago in desperation to literally beg to an AT&T executive that the good people of Walnut Iowa deserve quality telephone service and the right to be able to make long distance calls to anywhere, anytime. Apparently the AT&T executive was impressed with Andy's courage and convictions, and the long distance issue was resolved peacefully.

Back to the book... In addition to a nice overview of the history of all sectors of telecommunications, The Master Switch also features many other interesting and not commonly known anecdotes about some of my favorite characters in US telecom history, such as Theodore Vail, David Sarnoff and poor Edwin Armstrong, Henry Tuttle of Hush-a-Phone infamy, Lee De Forest, Philo Farnsworth, Judge Green, Ted Turner, and many more lesser-known but equally important telecom pioneers and inventors of various technologies. I strongly believe that it is critically important to understand the past if you want to have any hope whatsoever to not only comprehend what is going on right now, but to take a wild stab in the dark at foreseeing the future. Thus, "illuminating the past to anticipate the future" is one of the central themes of this book. The author does an exceptional job of walking the reader through the entire scope of the telecom and information industries, chronologically from humble beginning through (in some cases) devastating destruction and eventual rebirth and stabilization. Along the way, the connections between different industries are clearly drawn, until more recently when these lines became increasingly blurry to the point that now an average person could probably not tell the difference between wireless, cable and landlinetelecom industry--spanning multiple decades and multiple dominant corporations/technologies/etc. The Cycle is the industry's transition from open to closed , and it "is powered by disruptive innovations that upend once thriving industries, bankrupt the dominant powers, and change the world." Disruptive innovation, also called the "Kronos Effect" in the book, is an ongoing bee in the bonnet of the dominant empire-rulers in telecom. The book describes how AT&T was literally terrified of the answering machine, and RCA really did not want FM radio to take hold. Cable TV, the Internet, wireless...all disruptive technologies at one point and all very much despised by incumbents and monopolists at first. Why prevent people from enjoying a new technology? Disruptive innovations cost the incumbents money and can be really annoying to get rid of or delay indefinitely. The Kronos Effect basically means that the dominate company will devour a potential challenger before the challenger even gets a chance to show its true colors. This has happened over and over and over in the telecom industry, and it probably won't stop any time soon. It really makes you wonder how many potentially "killer apps" and whatnot were squashed in infancy before most people even had a chance to realize their benefits.

In light of some recent significant telecom events like the FCC's contradictory actions of first regulating the Internet to keep it "free" and "open" and then allowing two of biggest and most powerful players to merge (Comcast-NBCU) which practically gives Comcast-NBCU a golden ticket to violate alleged net neutrality rules, this book can offer a lot of insight with an eye towards what will happen in the future. I don't see any end to mega media conglomerates and the Googleization of everything, but hopefully there will still be room in this infinite empire for the small company to flourish. The lesson seems to be that if a small/new company tries to ruffle too many feathers, it will be devoured by the dominant company--either through unfavorable regulations, by being bled dry with legal fees, or through competitive inequality. But what is the point (or fun) of owning a small business if you are just going to be content with the status quo and mediocrity and not at least try to ruffle some feathers?

Existential questions aside, this book made me feel really proud to be part of the independent telecom industry. There is a lot of rich history to learn and discover from the independents, the mavericks, the crusaders, the entrepreneurs and the industry outcasts. My favorite line from this book was a quote from Austrian political scientist Leopold Kohr,

"...Whenever something is wrong, something is too big."

With that, I strongly encourage everyone to read this book. You will definitely spend a lot of time contemplating the stories told in this book and envisioning how the future of the telecom industry will unfold.

Cassandra Heyne
ruraltelecommentary@gmail.com

About Rural TeleCommentary and The Author

For my first official post, I would like to share my goals and objectives of starting Rural TeleCommentary. Additionally, I will include some slightly humorous/scary anecdotes that have inspired me to try harder to make my voice--and the voice of the rural telecom industry--heard loud and clear in an industry where "the little guy" is very often overlooked, or completely disregarded. Next, I will talk briefly about my background in telecommunications, my education and my career goals; and conclude with a preview of what's to come on Rural TeleCommentary in the near future.

Why Rural TeleCommentary?  It is no surprise that there hundreds--if not thousands--of telecommunications news websites, newsletters, blogs, etc. that already exist on the wonderful World Wide Web, in addition to FCC releases, state commission proceedings, association white papers, and so on. I understand the challenge ahead for me to promote this blog as something that should be frequently checked and read by people in the rural telecommunications industry. This is why I want to try to offer editorial perspectives on FCC decisions rather than just "straight news." I hope to make critical analysis, debate and intellectual discussion a unique and active aspect of this blog. I also want to try to provide useful information, such as comment summaries for relevant proceedings, that people in the industry may find valuable and worth reading.

Now for the background anecdote... Several months ago I attended a telecommunications conference and a reception for a highly respected individual in the telecommunications industry (my former teacher, Dale Hatfield). I had the pleasure of talking to a number of FCC staffers at these events, both socially and in a conference setting. I was completely alarmed by some of the responses I received by FCC staffers when I said that I worked in the rural telecommunications industry. Some looked at me like I was crazy. One made a snide remake about how the rurals have so much money they don't even know what to do with it, hence USF is being wasted by some guy sitting in a barn on a pile of fiber rings. The next day, at the conference, I got into a debate about the future of the rural telecommunications industry, re: funding. Someone from the FCC actually asked me:

        "Do you think all the rural telephone companies should just merge?"

I was appalled. I wanted to say some pretty mean things, but in fear of being blacklisted from future events I calmly explained that the logistics of trying to merge hundreds of small independent companies all across the country is literally enough to make your head explode simply because all of the independents have vastly different corporate structures (cooperative, private owned, family owned, shareholders, etc.) and serve vastly different populations, geographic locations, and demographics. I don't even want to think of what that merger review process would be like, much less how would hundreds of small companies--many of which have existed for over 100 years--decide on a fair and equitable corporate governance structure? So if we make all the independent telephone companies merge, why not make all the independent public utilities merge, then make all the independent grocery stores and gas stations merge, then all the clothing stores, restaurants and movie theaters. While we are at it, how about we have just one big farm owned by one corporation and get rid of those pesky small farmers once and for all. Oh wait, we just became communists. It is a slippery slope, and I was really scared by the fact that someone representing our telecom regulator had actually contemplated the idea of making all independent telephone companies merge. Not only did this person seem completely clueless about the nature of the rural telecom industry, but another also added this little gem:

       "Aren't there only like 1 or 2 rural telephone companies left in the U.S.?"

Once again, I reserved my anger towards this hysterical question and responded by saying no, there are hundreds of independent phone companies that provide vital and state-of-the-art services to rural and remote communities across the country. These companies do some truly amazing things for their communities and at least deserve to be recognized as EXISTING. I do take it a little personal when someone tells me that my family's 95 year old company doesn't exist...and if it does exist, it should probably merge.

The moral of these stories is that although there is an abundance of information available about the rural telecommunications industry, the people who make and contribute to regulatory decisions may not know beans about the rural telecommunications industry. It is therefore up to the rural telecom advocates to make our voices heard. Hopefully, to an audience that is willing to listen.

Cassandra Heyne, Rural Telecom Advocate: I have literally been in the rural telecom industry my entire life. My family has owned and operated Walnut Communications in Walnut, Iowa (population 800) since 1915, and I spent many days during my childhood watching my grandfather do business at the phone company, listening to conversations between my grandfather and father about company strategies, and basically soaking in all kinds of valuable knowledge about how a small phone company operates. My grandfather, Clifford Heyne, is my inspiration to continue the family tradition in this industry. When I was young, he constantly encouraged me to take my education as far as possible and do anything I could dream of doing in telecommunications--law, engineering, management, consulting--anything! After achieving a B.A. in History from the George Washington University, I decided to pursue a Master's in Telecommunications with a focus on telecom policy, law and regulation. I was briefly in the (no longer existing) Telecommunications master's program at GWU prior to transferring to the renowned Interdisciplinary Telecommunications Program at the University of Colorado. Additionally, I earned a Master's in Legal Administration from the University of Denver Sturm College of Law.  Now I am finally on the cusp of completing my Telecommunications degree, once my Master's thesis is complete (more on this topic in a few weeks). I also recently completed a very interesting and valuable internship at a small telecom law firm in Washington DC, where I was able to sharpen my research and writing skills and get into the habit of critically analyzing every proceeding the FCC released during the last few months, and analyzing rulemakings, inquiries and orders from the perspective of independent telecom companies.Prior to this, I worked for a major rural telecommunications advocacy association, and (though sometimes I don't want to admit it) for a "Big 4" wireless company. So now with some extra free time on my hands, I thought it would be an interesting project for me to start a blog on rural telecommunications issues. This blog is partially for me, so I can have a portfolio of written and "published" work to present as I begin the great search for a permanent job in the next few months; and this blog is for my audience--however large or small it may be. I am completely open to feedback, comments, critique, corrections and ideas from my audience, and I hope to eventually have some interesting debates and discussions about telecom policy!

What's Next? Next week reply comments are due in the Mobility Fund proceeding, so I plan to write a very short review of the initial comments that were submitted last month and a more detailed summary of the replies. I was really impressed with some of the initial comments because many respondents came out against the evil proposal known as reverse auctions. I will also provide my own critique of reverse auctions and the Mobility Fund proposal. I would like to tackle my favorite topic of late, Net Neutrality, but I'm still trying to simmer down from my frustration with that whole situation so that article may be a few weeks away. I am also hoping to look closely at some of the technologies presented at CES last week, and do some quick reviews on some of the ones that may be exciting for rural telecom companies.

Readers: Please feel free to submit requests or ideas for how I can reach wider audience! Please feel free to pass this link along to your colleagues! 

ruraltelecommenatry@gmail.com

Until next time,
Cassandra