Looks like Apple's not the only one drawing the ire of the FCC when it comes to Google Voice. AT&T filed a complaint with the FCC, forcing Google to explain why it was blocking a bunch of rural phone numbers from its Voice system. Google's answer? Because it's really expensive!

Telephone providers are common carriers, and they're required to provide access to some phone exchanges out in the middle of nowhere. That's extremely costly to do, compared to providing the same service in a large, dense city. Google was hoping to get around paying the additional costs, so they blocked some of these more expensive numbers. While still arguing that they shouldn't have to provide service, Google just told the FCC that it's now blocking "fewer than 100 numbers" in total.

[via Engadget]

There's been a long-raging debate as to just whether the US Government will enforce net neutrality - 2006 saw the Internet Non-Discrimination Act proposed, in 2007 the Department of Justice announced it wouldn't be legislating net neutrality and the ISPs have openly admitted they will actively manage traffic.

However, that may soon be at an end. According to the Wall Street Journal, the FCC is set to announce new rules on Monday that mean telcos "couldn't block or slow access to legal services or sites that are a drain on their networks or offered by rivals". Even more surprisingly, the rules will also apply to mobile providers - including AT&T who've taken steps to block bandwidth-hogging iPhone applications like SlingPlayer.

Unfortunately, it's highly likely that the telcos will fight any legislation that enforces net neutrality. In particular, mobile carriers (already scared stiff by the network demands of data-intensive devices like the iPhone) will be none-too-happy that their already-saturated networks could potentially be swamped.

With the likes of Google actively campaigning in favour of neutrality - and the Obama administration intending to push through this campaign promise - there's no shortage of people in favour of ensuring this series of tubes remains free and neutral. However, with plenty at stake and deep pockets to lobby any legislation, the service providers will no doubt stall, block and vocally oppose the FCC's announcements come Monday morning .

[Via WSJ]

After Apple decided not to allow Google's phone app, Google Voice, into its application store, the FCC opened an inquiry into Apple's reasons for rejecting Google Voice, and its notoriously inconsistent app store approval policies. Now, Apple has not only responded to the FCC's questions, but publicly released the response on its website. Here are some of the highlights:

• Apple claims it didn't reject Google Voice, but continues to study it. The semantic distinction between "rejected" and "not approved" doesn't offer much comfort to Google Voice users who would really like an easy way to use the service from their phones."
• The reason Google Voice hasn't been approved (yet?) is that "it appears to alter the iPhone's distinctive user experience by replacing the iPhone's core mobile telephone functionality and Apple user interface with its own user interface for telephone calls, text messaging and voicemail."
• AT&T was not at all involved in the decision not to approve Google Voice, Apple says: "Apple is acting alone and has not consulted with AT&T about whether or not to approve the Google Voice application. No contractual conditions or non-contractual understandings with AT&T have been a factor in Apple's decision-making process in this matter."

Although Google Voice isn't a voice-over-IP app, the FCC also asked Apple some questions about those. Apple answered that it does have an agreement with AT&T not to allow apps that can originate VOIP calls using AT&T's network. Apple also appears to be worried that the Google Voice app passed users' contacts from the iPhone's Address Book to Google's servers without alerting users, but I can't imagine too many people who would sign up for a service like Google voice would be worried about that.

The inquiry is still in its early stages, and it's too early to make a good prediction about what will happen. So far, I agree with Daring Fireball's read on the situation: Apple's decision seems to be all about its competitive relationship with Google and maintaining control over the phone experience on its own device.

The FCC sent inquiry letters to Apple, AT&T and Google as part of an investigation into the rejection of Google Voice from Apple's App Store. The rejection was one of the now-typical "duplicates the functionality of one of Apple's apps" affairs, and the FCC is pressing for details on how Apple's seemingly inconsistent approval process actually works. Was Apple moving at the behest of AT&T to get rid of an app that might cut into the phone company's profits? Our sister site, TUAW, has the details on the questions each player was asked.

For Apple: What are the actual rules for app approval? Why was Google Voice rejected? Have any VoIP apps been accepted to the store? (TUAW points out that this question seems misplaced, because Voice is not a VoIP application.) Was AT&T consulted on the decision to reject Google Voice?

For Google: Have other Google apps been accepted to Apple's store? What's the approval process for Google's own Android app store? Are there other ways Google Voice might work on the iPhone without the app?

For AT&T: Did AT&T have anything to do with the rejection of Google Voice? Are any VoIP applications running on AT&T's network? What role does AT&T have in approving 3G-enable applications?

The companies have until August 21 to respond to these questions, and the answers should be quite revealing. It's funny that it might take an FCC inquiry to get to the bottom of Apple's mysterious, fickle-seemingly app store policies. iPhone developers will be watching closely.

Welcome to Googleholic - your bi-weekly fix of everything Google!

This edition covers:

• Google reworks Adsense, again... and again
• Blogger users can use Blogger url as OpenID
• Google still bidding for the 700 Mhz spectrum in FCC auction

Google reworks Adsense, again... and again
Much commotion ensued after Google Adsense decided that publishers who send referrals from outside of North America, Latin America, or Japan would be retired. This in addition to announcing that several referral bonuses were to be discontinued made for quite a bit of a storm in the blogosphere. Google, hearing the outcry of the community, quickly made some amendments: as long as the referral is located within North America, Latin America, or Japan, it does not matter where the publisher is located. But still, no more bonuses.

Last week, news broke that Comcast may be paying a steep FCC fine to the tune of $1.77 trillion dollars for throttling peer-to-peer traffic such as BitTorrent. Yesterday, Comcast confirmed that it has received official word that it is under the investigation of the FCC, but an FCC spokesman would not confirm the letter, saying that "Enforcement Bureau communications of this type were not to be made public," according to Multichannel News.

If you had hopes that Comcast is going to be held responsible for even a fraction of that $1.77 trillion, think again. Although it made some ripples in the blogosphere, Comcast will most likely wiggle out of this one just fine. Apparently, FCC policies aren't exactly formal "rules" and as such are flexible when it comes to "network management."

So what does Comcast say? Naturally, that they are in accordance with FCC policies since "reasonable network management is necessary for the good of all customers." In other words, it's fine if we throttle your BitTorrent connection since it's for the good of all. Wonderful. They are probably going to resolve this all over a cup of coffee anyway. "Oh that neutrality thing? Yea, you know, peak times, things get busy, networks need to be managed - always have to keep in mind the common good, right?"

[via paidContent.org]

As Google and Verizon are locked in a tiff over the way 700 MHz radio spectrum is licensed by the Federal Communications Commission, it looks less and less likely that we're going to see the forthcoming Google Phone at wireless retail stores when it finally hits the market. Google contends that the licensee of the radio spectrum should be forced to sell "unlocked" devices, therefore permitting open applications on their network, a move which would certainly benefit Google and other powers whose bread and butter is mainly software.

Verizon, on the other hand, argues that they don't need to make unlocked phones available, since it's possible to get unlocked phones from other sources. Google's response? Big carrier retail sells 95% of the phones in North America, so arguably less than 5% of available phones are unlocked and open. Google, of course, isn't accustomed to having access to just 5% of the market these days. Nevertheless, the spectrum license reads as follows (quoted from Google's public policy blog):

"[Licensee] shall not deny, limit, or restrict the ability of their customers to use the devices and applications of their choice."

It's a clash of business models. Verizon makes money by selling applications they control. Google makes money by giving applications away and monetizing the mindshare they gain by doing so. Wireless is a wild frontier for somebody like Google, because the power brokers in the cellular industry don't want to compete with new players from other spaces, like a search engine company.

Bottom line, it doesn't look like the Google Phone is going to be on Verizon's store shelves, and something tells me Google isn't about to start a retail chain of its own.

If you happened to be in the offices of Vonage, Packet8, SunRocket, or any other VoIP provider today, you most likely were witness to some high-fives and knuckle-taps by their top executives. The reason for that is that the FCC has ruled/declared/said that VoIP providers should be treated the same as your friendly neighborhood telecom which, according to one FCC honcho, means that VoIP-ers will be able to get access to the local phone company's lines, especially those designated for long distance.

What does this all mean? Really not a whole lot at this point, but the fact that the FCC says that VoIP providers should be treated the same as other telecoms may induce more consumers to jump ship from their local phone provider and go VoIP. Chairman Kevin Martin says this will increase competition when it comes to the phone service market. However, we'll have to see a greater increase in consumers opting for broadband internet access before this decision will have some real impact to it.

So you've got that fancy new smartphone, and you've got an unlimited data plan from your wireless provider. What's the first thing you want to do? Install Skype for Windows Mobile and start making cheap international phone calls over your data connection without paying exorbitant service fees for international calls.

Okay, maybe that's not the first thing, but it's up there. Unfortunately, most mobile service providers include provisions in their end user agreements that prevent customers from using their data plans to make VoIP calls. Well, it looks like Skype is hoping to change that.

The company filed a petition with the FCC on Wednesday asking the commission to make wireless companies drop that restriction. Apparently back in the 60s, the FCC enacted rules allowing customers to hook pretty much any device up to their telephone as long as it didn't hurt the network. This was a reaction to the AT&T monopoly at the time. Nowadays, as telcos continue buying each other out, we're getting closer and closer to monopoly territory, making me think Skype's got a good case. That, and it'd be really cool if they win.

[via Engadget]