US needs more broadband competition, expert says

So, we could use a little more competition. US broadband consumers have limited choices and prices could fall if there were more competition. John Windhausen, president of Telepoly, a telecom consulting firm, says other countries with higher speeds and lower prices have generally taken a different route than the US, which has generally relied on the marketplace to determine the cost and quality of broadband. Japan, for example, has mandated that its incumbent telecom carriers roll out fiber-based broadband service, and many countries in Europe require incumbent broadband carriers to share their lines with multiple competitors. The European line-sharing approach is modeled after the U.S. Telecommunications Act of 1996, but that approach was later abandoned by the Federal Communications Commission in favor of the network operator being the lone broadband provider. The Telecom Act has been "a huge success -- in France," Windhausen said.