On Om Malik's Blog I found this story today. The FCC changed the rules today governing local phone companies like Verizon and SBC. Previously they were legally bound to allow other companies such as Speakeasy and Covad to lease the lines and provide competing service. After today's ruling the local companies are allowed to bar the other companies. That means that potentially one day Verizon just cuts off all the Speakeasy lines and makes you switch to Verizon.
The reasoning for this ruling was to level the playing field with cable internet providers. The cable companies were not required to share their lines and allow competing providers. The FCC decided to take away the requirement from the phone companies as a result. I am not one for regulation usually but in this case it may make things really bad for the consumer.
I think the end game here is that there will only be two internet providers in any give area. In my area that would mean either Verzion DSL or FIOS and the alternative of Comcast cable modem. Right now the competition is intense between them and the other guys help, but once it is only them it may change. Also there are services that neither offer which I would sorely miss such as allowing hosting and static IPs without outrageous fees.
It just seems the FCC is rolling back all the things that enabled all of the great competition to begin. Hopefully it isn't a huge mistake.
Speakeasy says the FCC ruling will not impact them. http://www.speakeasy.net/press/pr/pr080805.php
Man I hope they are right. I've put a lot of clients on Speakeasy.