FCC's Broadband Plan May Cost You Money 318
At ten minutes past midnight the FCC released their National Broadband Plan. Judging by the available coverage, few reporters spent the night poring over it. The BBC at least posted something in the morning hours, but it quotes Enderle, so that gives you some idea of its sourcing. Business Week notes the plan's cool (not to say frigid) reception among broadcasters. Dave Burstein of FastNet News did some real digging. His take as of 4:00 am Eastern time is that the plan will cost most Americans money, and won't provide much if any relief to the poor. We'll see many more details and nuances emerge over the day. Update: 03/16 19:53 GMT by KD : The FCC plan (PDF) is here.
Re:Wow, there's a shock! (Score:1, Interesting)
In the business of government, as long as the money passes through your hands, you win. It doesn't matter where the money comes from or where it goes -- what matters is that it passes through your hands. The more money passing through your hands, the more you stand to exploit it for personal gain.
You're not in the business of government, are you?
Re:Wow, there's a shock! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Governments never reduce costs (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't know why so many people - Republicans and Democrats and Independents - want the government to do more and spend more for us.
I'd like for someone to do more for us, but I can't seem to get Google (or Apple, or Lenovo, or...) to give a shit about what I want. Since I'd rather have something done than nothing, the government - sucky as it is - is the remaining option, with the all the delightful garbage that accompanies.
Re:Governments never reduce costs (Score:3, Interesting)
You forgot option 3 - do it yourself. In my city there are mostly-empty metal pipes running under the streets, so I'd start my own ISP and run the fiber through those pipes, thereby providing 100 Mbit/s service to any customer who wanted it (about 10 times faster than Comcast or Verzion).
Of course that assumes I care enough to create a corporation.
I don't.
I look around the world and I see that the U.S. average speed is about 1 Mbit/s behind the Russian Federation, but 1 Mbit/s ahead of the EU, 2 Mbit/s ahead of Australia or Canada, and 4 Mbit/s ahead of China. I think we're doing all right. If we were dead last then I'd worry, but compared to other continent-sized federations we are actually in second place. So I don't worry.
(source: speedtest.net)
Re:Socialist internetz (Score:5, Interesting)
I was home visiting my parents over the weekend. My mother is a high school teacher, and sat through Fox and Friends and an hour of "The Cost of Freedom" (the business 'news' block) because she heard a blurb they were going to be talking about 4-day school weeks. They sat and watched, getting rilled up about "obama-care" that entire time (while being pissed off that they get charged $500 a month for insurance for the two of them through my mother's plan. my dad is retired from being an airline captain and now substitute teaches).
I spent the entire time trying to point out that absolutely no information had been imparted, just some stereotypically attractive people talking about bullshit during f&f, and then a bunch of old, rich jews talking about how they'd be even richer if it weren't for obama. When they finally got to the topic she was waiting for, it was 3 minutes of yelling between a Lisa Loeb-wanna-be and some crotchety old bitch, then they moved on to the next thing. My mother felt ripped off, but did she go find actual information? No. Did she do any research as to how this might affect her professionally? No.
I also found my dad's Tea Party t-shirt... I'm not sure I want to go home anymore. And this is coming from a former Ron Paul supporter (I joined the Dems after I fled DC in 2007 and voted for Obama). But I'll be 26 in June and its about time I just grow up and get on with it. My parents used to think I was a crazy right-winger... then Obama comes along and suddenly everything is fucking commie plot and the John Birch Society is defending our freedom... god bless Sarah Palin. Screw that shit.