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Federal Telecommunications Act of 1996   Rating: (2.6 / 10)    Views: 577

Submitted By: hiskeyd on 10/28/2006. (  |  Share  |  Clikk It! )   

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Federal Telecommunications Act of 1996


Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996
 The Act mainly deregulated, but also created new regulations. Congress forced local telephone companies to share their lines with competitors at regulated rates if "the failure to provide access to such network elements would impair the ability of the telecommunications carrier seeking access to provide the services that it seeks to offer." (Section 251(3)(2)(B)) A new group of telephone companies, "Competitive Local Exchange Carriers" (CLECs), grew to compete with the incumbents (not "ILECs" or Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers).

Most media ownership regulations were thrown out by the Act, and independents were bought up. The Act was claimed to foster competition, but instead it led to historic industry consolidation, reducing the number of major media companies from around 80 in 1986, to 5 in 2005.

"In truth, the bill promised the worst of both worlds:", wrote communications scholar Robert McChesney in The Problem of the Media, "more concentrated ownership over communications with less possibility for regulation in the public interest. Accordingly, both the cable and the telecommunication industries have become significantly more concentrated since 1996 and customer complaints about lousy service have hit all-time highs. Cable industry rates for consumers have also shot up, increasing some 50 percent between 1996 and 2003." (p. 53)

Title V of the 1996 Act is the Communications Decency Act, aimed at regulating Internet indecency and obscenity, but was ruled unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court as violating the First Amendment. Portions of Title V remain, including the Good Samaritan Act, which protects ISPs from liability for third party content on their services, and legal definitions of the Internet.

The US Congress is currently considering legislation that would essentially replace the Telecommunications Act of 1996.[1][2][3


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