> The more things change, the more they stay the same: This year's U.S. wired telecom report by Research and Markets finds about 3,000 companies operating with a combined annual revenue of about $280 billion, with the 50 largest companies--including AT&T(NYSE: T), Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL)--generating 90 percent of revenue. The study includes local service carriers, long-distance carriers, pay phone operators, pre-paid card providers, and telecom resellers. News release.
> UK-based ISP BE Broadband is taking on BT (NYSE: BT) in the residential wireline space, offering a basic landline for $15 a month. BE is owned by mobile operator O2, which in turn is owned by Telefonica, which...well, you get the picture. Story.
> Vertical Systems Group has placed Orange Business Systems at the top of its Mid-2010 Global Provider Leaderboard in the Business Ethernet services category. News release.
> Managed IP services provider MegaPath is talkin' about VoIP at ITEXPO West on Wednesday, Oct. 6: Executive VP of Sales & Marketing in a session titled "Putting the Quality Back Into Voice." News release.
> The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) is lining up speakers for its May 2011 event in Dallas. Dr. Pieter Poll, CTO, Qwest (NYSE: Q), and Dov Zimring, Project Director, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Alternate Access Team are confirmed as keynotes. News release.
> The West Virginia communities of Fayetteville, Terra Alta and West Union now have high-speed Internet after Frontier (NYSE: FTR) completed installation of DSL-based equipment at the company's switching facilities in the area. Residential subscribers will get up to 6 Mbps speeds. News release.
> Brazil's government is moving ahead with its Plano Nacional de Banda Larga (PNBL)--its national broadband plan--to spur expansion of the country's broadband networks, but the "aggressive" initiative will probably fall short of its goal to reach 40 million households by 2014, says a Pyramid Research report. News release.
> Surewest's (Nasdaq: SURW) board of directors has authorized an addition of one million shares to its stock repurchase program. The amount previously available was just 253,000 shares. News release.
And finally... the Washington Post profiles the U.S. Cyber Command in a business section feature. Story (sub. req.)