The U-Verse Doesn't Apparently Include Your Town

FCC asked to probe AT&T treatment of public access channels
by Nate Anderson
Ars Technica
02/02/09

Link to full article here.

Municipalities around the country aren't pleased with AT&T's U-Verse IPTV service, which won't put their public access and government TV programming on actual "channels." FCC complaints have been filed and the Illinois attorney general is now involved.

PEG channels—public, educational, and government programming that generally takes the form of city council meetings and plays from the local middle school—are being treated as second-class citizens on AT&T's new U-Verse IPTV system, according to a new complaint to the FCC. Anger over AT&T's PEG handling has been buildling for some at the local level, but late last week it went national.

The FCC is now being asked to step in where state regulators so far have not to "rule in no uncertain terms" that the U-Verse PEG situation is "in violation of the Act and Commission rules and policies."

Everyone agrees on what's happening here, just not on whether it's a "feature" or a "bug." Instead of providing each PEG channel with an actual "channel" that subscribers can simply punch into a remote or surf past on accident, AT&T has bundled all the PEG channels from a broad area and dumped them onto channel 99. Users who want to see that city council meeting need to visit channel 99, click "OK," download a small app (from eight seconds to one minute), choose their community from a list of local towns, then choose a particular PEG channel from that community.

Link to full article here.