Jim Wagner

As digital subscriber line deployment in the U.S. continues its stall in competition against cable for broadband customer popularity, one organization has recently wrapped up a conference to standardize one of the many problems facing the beleaguered broadband industry. The DSL Forum, a rare conglomeration of incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs), competitive LECs (CLECs), modem […]

3Com announced the rollout of their voice and data gateway service offering Monday, expanding on its current product line of routers using digital subscriber line (DSL) technology. The OfficeConnect gateway service, available worldwide, lets businesses as small as the small office, home office (SOHO) to the multi-facility corporations, and Internet service providers (ISPs) bundle their […]

The chairman of the committee that recently drew up a report with recommended changes for individual representation at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) defended the paper’s position Friday. ICANN, the Internet governing authority on the popular U.S. root domain server, which hosts the .com, .net and .org to name a few, […]

Japanese manufacturing giant Hitachi Ltd., executives announced plans for a $1 billion overhaul and plans to cut 14,700 employees from the rolls, officials announced Friday. The job cuts, which reflect only 4.3 percent of the company’s total work force, was blamed on continued downturn in the semiconductor and high-tech markets in the U.S., which have […]

Troubled long-haul optical fiber carrier Metromedia Fiber Network Inc. got a much-needed boost with its announced $235 million in vendor financing, officials said Thursday. The carrier, which has seen its stock value plummet from a 52-week high of more than $40 per share to today’s value of 69 cents, has been one of many high-tech […]

Coming soon to a retail outfit near you: digital subscriber line (DSL) Internet service from a satellite TV company. DIRECTV Broadband Inc., a subsidiary of Hughes Electronics Corp., announced Wednesday it has penned an agreement with Circuit City to market DIRECTV DSL at $49.99 a month. Hoping to lure customers away from the competition, the […]

Popular nationwide cable Internet service provider (ISP) Excite@Home has a bone to pick with one of its creditors, which officials say will put the company out of business if a settlement isn’t reached over term conditions that come due Friday. On Monday, the company announced it was disputing the fact it is likely in breach […]

RSA Security, Inc. , has come out with its own security software package for cable modem makers, officials announced Tuesday. The BSAFE broadband cryptographic software, designed especially for DOCSIS 1.1 (Data Over Cable Service Interface Specifications), is the latest in an emerging crop of security measures for the broadband modem industry, an industry considered by […]

Covad Communications Group, Inc., announced Wednesday it plans to cash in its bonds through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy debt restructuring filing in mid-August, which would free the company from $1.4 billion in debt and leave the company with $250 million in cash. Officials said a majority block of bondholders agreed to convert their bonds for […]

Less than six months after putting a price on free Internet service, the self-styled “Defenders of the Free World” announced Wednesday night more restrictions on its service and laid off 66 employees. NetZero, Inc., a highly-popular free Internet service provider (ISP) with more than 3.4 million active users, dropped its monthly cap from 40 hours […]

Consumer advocates are calling on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to take a closer look at the business relationships of an Internet service provider (ISP) recently selected to participate in AOL Time Warner’s open access project. One of the conditions to regulator approval of the $109 billion merger of the largest ISP in the world […]

Bluelight.com, the Internet service arm of retailing giant KMart only recently brought back to the fold, is yet again changing its monthly access strategy in an effort to reach profitability. That’s means the almost seven million people who registered for 12 hours of free Internet access a month at the popular free ISP are going […]