The ESL is here! Almost.

The FCC has announced the new proposed Eligible Services List. The actual list isn't attached to the announcement, but ought to be around on Monday. But the announcement does describe the changes coming:

1. Centrex is now basic telephone service.
2. Clarifies the use of the Internet for distance learning and video conferencing.
3. Clarifies that calendaring can be considered an "ancillary" part of an email service.
4. Clarifies Web hosting.
5. "Failover" has apparently been added to "redundant" as unfundable.

My instacomments:

1. It's about time.
2. Ho hum. They keep clarifying, and some company comes along and thinks it's outsmarted the regulations, and they clarify again.
3. It's about time that someone realized that it's hard to get email without calendaring.
4. I'll believe it when I see it. These regulations have been getting somewhat less vague over the last 3 years, but they still confuse most applicants and service providers.
5. I understand the need to keep districts from buying two of everything, but the rules really should acknowledge that sometimes, failover/redundancy is good network engineering. An applicant's best friend: "load balancing."

I'm sure I'll have more to say when I see the actual list.