Kansas Delays Municipal Broadband Ban 156
Mokurai writes with an update to a story from last week about legislation in Kansas that would have banned most municipal broadband, including the expansion of Google Fiber. Now, after the public backlash that erupted online, government officials have postponed the legislation's hearings, putting it on hold indefinitely. From the article:
"Senate Bill 304 would prohibit cities and counties from building public broadband networks. The Commerce Committee, which [Sen. Julia Lynn] chairs, was scheduled to have a hearing Tuesday, but Lynn released a statement that hearings have been postponed indefinitely. 'Based on the concerns I heard last week, I visited with industry representatives and they have agreed to spend some time gathering input before we move forward with a public hearing,' Lynn said in a statement. 'We'll revisit the topic when some of these initial concerns have been addressed.' Lynn elaborated while exiting a Senate Judiciary hearing. The senator said she has instructed 'the parties' involved with the bill to address the public’s concerns. The bill was introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist."
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Comcast_blackhat_01: "They've got a better product, we'd better lobby to have them kept out for no reason. We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph!"
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Interesting)
This is why I do not believe google fiber is the answer. They are not going into dense cities who are underserved. They are going into over served areas and trying to take the low hanging fruit.
Well, they're going into areas that are already served and putting the garbage existing providers (Comcast, Time Warner, etc) to shame.
They have to prove that this is workable and profitable before it can go everywhere.
Re: (Score:2)
You're telling me they won't put the pilot in a market telecoms won't touch with a ten foot pole? Evil!
Re: (Score:2)
Google isn't trying to get into the broadband game, as much as many of us would like that. They're trying to raise US broadband speeds overall in the cheapest way possible. And they're succeeding. Even a year ago Comcast and TW were acting like they were doing us a big favor giving us over 10.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Comcast is the only broadband provider in some of my very urban-one-of-the-largest-cities-in-the-US area.
Comcast paid well in concessions for other territories to ensure this, likely. The cable companies swap service areas like they are trading cards.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Say what you will about the big telcos that have buildings and pop's in the area. They won't provide broadband. Yes they're there and selling services to businesses. they won't touch broadband though. That would create competition. The only way to open up competition will be to encourage small business to come in and provide a better product. The telco's would rather spend money on lobbyists then put fiber in the ground.
Re: (Score:2)
Say what you will, but Comcast is the only broadband provider in some of my very urban-one-of-the-largest-cities-in-the-US area. Not the suburbs, but minutes from downtown. Verizon is building huge in the area, but not everywhere. ATT is building huge in the area, but not everywhere. So there is clear oppotunity for a third party to come in and compete and acutaly make life better for many people.
Then Comcast probably has a monopoly contract with the city disallowing any competition.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
When did Google become a charity again? At best their move into fiber is a highly capitalized risk venture, and your suggestion is they should "create markets" by providing incredibly expensive data runs to people the rest of the industry can't be bothered servicing because there's not enough of them to make a profit on.
Traditionally that kind of folly is a role for government, perhaps you should be lobbying them to create a public network to compete with the privates. /laugh
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
by providing incredibly expensive data runs to people the rest of the industry can't be bothered servicing because there's not enough of them to make a profit on.
I seem to recall that we paid the telcos and MSOs to do just that. They then pocketed the money, bought off the regulators, and told us with a straight face that further network upgrades are too expensive and we should all just rely on LTE or something.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason Comcast is the only broadband provider is because alllllll the telecomm companies have mutually agreed to divvy up everything so that they can all keep rates as high as possible without competition to drive costs down.
fixies~
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
The low hanging fruit is where the regulations allow them to deploy the most quickly to the largest number of customers.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Comcast_blackhat_01: "They've got a better product, we'd better lobby to have them kept out for no reason. We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph!"
It's not just that Google has a better product, but Google is playing by different rules. Being classified as an ISP in the US means that the FCC enforces rules which say that you can't mine your customers data. Now Google is coming along, saying their not an ISP, and can mine their customers data to subsidize the service.
Re: (Score:2)
It's not just that Google has a better product, but Google is playing by different rules.
[citation needed]
Being classified as an ISP in the US means that the FCC enforces rules which say that you can't mine your customers data.
[citation needed]
Now Google is coming along, saying their not an ISP,
[citation needed]
and can mine their customers data to subsidize the service.
[citation needed]
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Comcast_blackhat_01: "They've got a better product, we'd better lobby to have them kept out for no reason. We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph!"
People railed against it. This proves Kansas isn't at the forefront of ignorance people suggest. Good for the people of Kansas for holding their leaders to account. Education is alive and well in the Sunflower State, the legislators were taught a lesson.
Re: (Score:2)
That's how it is everywhere. Once someone figures out how they're getting screwed, they rail against it. Rural towns all over America are evaporating because the people there think pro-Big Ag business policies are good for them. At some point, they'll figure out that Junior moved to the big city because of those laws and not because of a bunch of marrying homersexwalls in San Francisco.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
As a non believer that actually lives in Kansas - I find my Christian neighbors to have more respect for my beliefs than the socialist leftists have. Tolerance needs to work in all directions.
In the end - I have the choice of 4 ISP providers in my town - setting up cartels would prevent that. Life is good here - we don't need bigots here - stay on the coasts.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Good (Score:5, Funny)
I didn't get a Harrumph out of that guy!!!
Re: (Score:2)
Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
'We'll revisit the topic when some of these initial concerns have been addressed.'
We're going to keep introducing this legislation until people stop watching and we can pass it (see also SOPA).
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
Did they pass SOPA when I wasn't looking?
They "distilled" it into TPP [wikipedia.org].
In a sudden burst of common sense, seems that that (the/some/idnk-what-percentage) Dems are opposing Obama on this one.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They're currently working on the 3rd or 4th (I lose count) attempt to pass a re-packaged SOPA.
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
And the cable companies will keep trying to buy politicians so that they can get this passed.
Fuck them.
Instead, get a law passed that allows the government to install the pipes and allow the homeowners to choose between ISPs that have leased those pipes from the local government.
Re: (Score:2)
Have the government lay literal pipes (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
Um, the government's been in "this system" since the Internet was born.
The question should have been whether or not the introduction of telecoms into "this system" and giving them defacto control over the market while allowing them to also be content providers in clear violation of antitrust laws was a good idea.
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that the introduction of ANY competition would make the system cheaper and higher quality.
The only thing preventing progress is collusion. Cox, Time Warner, Comcast, etc have agreed not to step on each others toes. Only 1 provider available in most markets means a functional monopoly.
I think the government would be hard pressed to provide something WORSE than the current offerings. Seriously, they'd have to make a valiant effort to fuck it up that badly. And even a marginally better solution would cause a pretty large exodus from the current companies. Forcing them to improve their product (or lower their prices)
Re: (Score:2)
I think the government would be hard pressed to provide something WORSE than the current offerings.
Haven't signed up for health insurance yet?
Re: (Score:2)
How about we wait until the end of open enrollment (March 31) before declaring it a complete bust.
Sure it's been a bit rocky thus far, but give it a few months to smooth out. Within a year we'll certainly see a net positive.
Re: (Score:3)
So... you're thinking the introduction of government into this system will make the system cheaper and higher quality?
Cheaper? Probably not, if the government in question plays the role of neutral utility who lays the pipes, then provides service for end users to consume as they see fit, and doesn't screw things up with subsidies.
Higher quality? As long as the government literally does nothing besides lay and maintain the fiber, and keep the NOC running with five-nines uptime and off-grid backup power (providing switch fabric between fibers so OTHER companies can provide the actual service), almost certainly it'll be bette
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
Except, by delaying, any planned projects will be rushed through to completion, and once cities and counties start putting in fiber and public wifi that cat's out of the bag.
The summary is a bit misleading, because this would not have blocked Google Fiber. It might have blocked Google supplying an upstream to municipal fiber at a very cheap rate, but even that isn't clear. Once the infrastructure is in place at public expense, its pretty hard mandate its sale or destruction or abandonment. Every city would have grounds to sue.
Cities provide water, sewer, roads, fire protection, and police. In some places, you will find examples of each such service being provided by private industry. Sometimes under contract, rarely in competition. There is scarcely room for competing roads, sewer, or water. Those are things that are natural monopolies.
I've got no problem if a city wants to provide municipal fiber, but I do have a problem when doing so blocks competition or decides what content may be carried.
Municipal fiber, like municipal roads and water, must serve all comers, and must collect revenue from all users via one means or another. (Most people realize that municipal fiber will either become the tragedy of the commons OR it will have to charge competitive rates just to maintain the plant.) Content provision should never be regulated by municipalities. (Too much risk of "won't somebody think of the children" demanding censorship).
Municipal fiber, done right, means more competition, not less. It opens the door for Road Runner, and Century Link, and Google to service what use to be an exclusive Comcast territory, because they can all use the same plant, just like their trucks all use the same street. Access fees, sure. Total throughput fees, sure.
However, I don't think the big broadband companies want to fight this too hard. After all, if the municipality does not provide the physical plant, those companies have to make a HUGE investment in neighborhood plant before they can collect a cent of revenue. Its only where they are already entrenched (see what I did there?) that these companies are looking to prevent municipal broadband.Trying to preserve their existing monopoly.
But I bet they are also doing the math, and realizing they can access more customers than they would lose, especially for TV, when sat dishes are dirt cheap.
Re: (Score:2)
But I bet they are also doing the math, and realizing they can access more customers than they would lose, especially for TV, when sat dishes are dirt cheap.
But being limited to 10 GB of data transfer per month (source: exede.com) after you've switched from cable to satellite isn't fun.
Re: (Score:2)
Well you bring up another good point.
Satellite is really only good for Television, and it makes a terrible internet access route.
But big cable companies like Comcast make their bread and butter selling TV access, its more lucrative than internet access.
Some think this is likely to be replaced by intenet tv. Others dispute this [qz.com].
But the prospect for internet TV, where every single viewing results in a separate TCP/IP feed, scares the hell out of cable companies because even if they manage to get some revenue
Multicast (Score:2)
But the prospect for internet TV, where every single viewing results in a separate TCP/IP feed
For any channel with more than a few viewers per neighborhood, that would be poor engineering compared to multicast. Only video on demand really needs an individual TCP stream per user.
Re: (Score:2)
Multicast?
Does ANYBODY use that? No, seriously, when was the last time you actually heard the term used in relation to TV over IP?
Admittedly it would be best for scheduled TV shows, but when you start talking about TV over IP getting free of the schedule
is sort of taken for granted. People want to watch what ever they want when ever they want without a single thought of the bandwidth that will take.
Individual TCP/IP streams is bad enough in you own house, its unsupportable for anything other than Google si
Re: (Score:2)
Multicast? Does ANYBODY use that?
Multicast over the public Internet is not used. Multicast over LANs, on the other hand, is used. The machines connected to the CMTS [wikipedia.org] (or whatever else DOCSIS calls its counterpart to a DSLAM) form a LAN of sorts.
No, seriously, when was the last time you actually heard the term used in relation to TV over IP?
Switched video [wikipedia.org] operates similarly in principle.
but when you start talking about TV over IP getting free of the schedule is sort of taken for granted.
In other words, video on demand, which the cable TV industry (or at least Comcast) trumpets as its key advantage over satellite TV. Caching the most popular VOD programs at each CMTS might help; the CMTS then doubles as a humongous DVR. But what's keepi
Re: (Score:2)
Here in the United Kingdom, BT Openreach now offer a multicast service to the vast majority of their exchanges as part of the wholesale products for ISP's.
Admittedly the reason behind this is the retail arm of BT offer a range of TV packages now, and they want to transition people to getting that over the internet connection rather than satellite/cable/DVB as that costs money that multicast would not.
Re: (Score:2)
However, I don't think the big broadband companies want to fight this too hard. After all, if the municipality does not provide the physical plant, those companies have to make a HUGE investment in neighborhood plant before they can collect a cent of revenue. Its only where they are already entrenched (see what I did there?) that these companies are looking to prevent municipal broadband.Trying to preserve their existing monopoly.
There have been too many cases where a provider has refused to serve an area, the people vote for municipal broadband, and then the very same provider sues to block it for your analysis to be correct.
Given the cost and quality of service reported where municipal broadband has been implemented, it is more likely the telcos want to block it everywhere so it doesn't become too obvious what a poor deal they are actually offering.
Re: (Score:2)
The cost and quality is far from convincing proof.
Have you used municipal broadband, such as WIFI for a tablet or something? Its not a bed of roses. You've got municipal employees trying to manage things they have no training for, on limited budgets, and no ability to control load.
Re: (Score:3)
WiFi (often free) is not the same as broadband. Sometimes broadband is provided over wireless. Based on reports, that is no bed of roses no matter who is providing it, mostly because of the tendency to skimp and not actually map the coverage to identify weak spots.
I have seen a fair number of success stories where I *WISH* I got that much for that little/month. Of course I'm sure not all are so successful, but then there are plenty of areas where a telco's deployment could also be described as a failure.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Like roads, City Fiber provides pathways. But not vehicles. You still have to buy your own car, (or take what ever your city offers in the way of public transport).
You still have to pay for content, to TV, Movies, and your bandwidth for Computer usage. I don't see cities getting into licensing negotiations with Studios, Disney, CBS, NBC for fees. I don't see them providing Email accounts. You will still choose who you are going to pay those TV royalties to, whether you stream or watch cable (fiber) TV.
M
Terrible wording in title (again) (Score:5, Informative)
They didn't delay the ban because there was never a ban in place, just like last week when public broadband expansion wasn't restricted.
There was a bill to do so. They tabled hearings on it because of public opinion. Learn the process and write intelligently about it.
Re: (Score:2)
How a redefinition acts as a ban (Score:2)
Terrible wording in TFA, too! (Score:3)
The bill was introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist.
Really? Since when do lobbyists have standing to introduce bills in the Kansas Senate?
Perhaps the bill was written by industry figures and proposed to a senator by this lobbyist. But it was the senator who introduced it. Stating HIS name, too, and clearly describing the process, might have some effect on this guy's chances for reelection.
We elect the greediest, most ill-informed... (Score:2)
...politicians. How the hell do we keep doing this?
I'm so sick of how apathetic people are.
If this happened in my state, I'd be writing letters everyday!
Not allowed to build infrastructure because it might put someone else out of business... Boo-fucking-hoo... We, as a country, have no obligation to support your flawed or failing business model...
Fucking fascist politicians... Those lobbyist presents must be wonderful, indeed! Especially seeing as how they're willing to sell out the constituents for them!
Re:We elect the greediest, most ill-informed... (Score:5, Insightful)
No one votes on issues anymore. Everyone has been conditioned to vote based on identity politics.
const "I am a (voting_block_01), therefore, I vote for (party_01)."
Re: (Score:2)
Replace congressman with simple if then else voting logic?
Re: (Score:3)
vote(ATT);
else
vote(COMCAST);
That sort of thing? That's what we have now.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
if MyPartyIsInPower()
{
ExpandGovernment();
}
else
{
ComplainAboutProposal();
Vote(random());
}
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Elections, sadly, have little to do with this. The ban was introduced by a lobbyist group representing big telecom companies. When the outcry emerged, the lobbyist group declared they'd rewrite the bill. Then, the lobbyist group called for the bill to be withdrawn. The legislators are mere middlemen doing what the lobbyists tell them to do. We could save money and get rid of the legislators entirely. Just let lobbyist groups hash out what the laws will be. (Not saying this will be better. Just that
Re: (Score:2)
well then, run for office.
I know, it will be [INSERT EXCUSE HERE] and besides you also have [INSERT EXCUSE HERE].
Freedom? (Score:2)
What sort of a country, whose politicians are always going on about how much they believe in freedom, would even countenance introducing such legislation?
Re: (Score:2)
One with a tremendous amount of hypocrites? And I'm not even pretending that's just the US, humans have a slight tendency towards hypocrisy.
Re: (Score:3)
Ones that had an interest it keeping rural internet access viable. Internet access is ONLY profitable in city centers. Telco monopolies in these areas are why people in rural areas even have phone service, let alone internet. The telco is required to provide service to any existing home in the area so they spread out the cost. If cities continue to allow competition into the only part of the market that's profitable and not put the same requirements on these new ISPs as the telcos, then the telcos will fail
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The majority of ISPs are in fact telcos. All of the Non-telco ISPs buy their backbones from Telcos. The telephone companies of this country are the only reason the internet exists as it is. And yes indeed the telcos are required to provide rural Internet. Not in all places, it's up to the local governments. Usually it's measured in a percentage of customers served, or based on distance from the nearest remote.
In some counties the phone company is required to have a working phone in every home with the abili
Re:Freedom? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
That's not entirely true, I live in a state that is mostly rural, w/ a very unforgiving topography. There is at least one local telco that is working on providing wireless access in as many places as they can erect towers through grant money they received. They are offering better bandwidth for less than DSL which is what I currently have. There's no cable where I live; it's too cost prohibitive to string the poles.
Re: (Score:2)
The company I work for got some of those subsidies. We had huge projects revolving around satisfying the huge regulatory overhead they brought with them. The problem is, it's insainly expensive to do rural broadband. You've got 50 people living on the side of a mountain, so the feds come in and want you to give them internet. That means getting a remote to within 30,000 feet of every single one of them. Now you've got to lay fiber to the remote site, using easments you haven't touched in 50 years... pissed
Re: (Score:2)
Telco monopolies in these areas are why people in rural areas even have phone service, let alone internet.
No, that's the Universal Service Fund [wikipedia.org] you're thinking of.
Of course, it would help if the telcos would actually use that money for expanding access, and not lobbying Congress/increasing shareholder profits.
Source: I deal with those shady fuckers (telcos) all day, every day.
Re: (Score:2)
Ones that had an interest it keeping rural internet access viable. Internet access is ONLY profitable in city centers.
Not exactly...
Tillamook County, OR only has around 25,000 souls living in it, yet CenturyLink and Charter are currently fighting tooth-and-nail for their business. Let me put this into perspective: the county's biggest income centers are beef, cheese [tillamook.com], some seafood, and a handful of tourist beach towns ( mostly visited by folks from Portland - 80+ miles away, but a metro area holding approx. 3 million residents).
CL was there first (riding the DSL lines), but cannot seem to give more than 6mb/sec (if you're l
Re: (Score:2)
Then we should eliminate crop subsidies so people who live out in the country can afford the true cost of their Internet.
I wouldn't mind paying a little more for vegetables if it means less tax money is needed to subsidize farmers.
Come on Common Carrier! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Sign the petition about it:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/restore-net-neutrality-directing-fcc-classify-internet-providers-common-carriers/5CWS1M4P
At least it helps it get more noticed.
Translation (Score:3)
"putting it on hold indefinitely"
Let me translate: "We're putting it on hold until the uproar dies down."
visited with industry representatives (Score:2)
well then screw you. The people want community broadband, listen to them. Industry experts are going to tell you that they have the best way an d it will only work if they control it; which is BS.
Re evaluate munni broadband (Score:5, Informative)
It is now time for all the states who put up barriers to or outright banned municipal broadband to look at the results and see if it serves the public interest. It does not. Everywhere these bills pass the incumbent cable companies immediately shut down investment because they no longer have to provide modern service.
Washington state has such a law. Before it was enacted some municipalities were already started and so were grandfathered in. That is why you can have had gigabit fiber Internet to the home in Ephrata, WA (pop 8,000) for 14 years now, and Microsoft is building vast data centers out that way. It is also why you can't get gigabit fiber to your home in Seattle Metro area installed today, which enjoys a global peering point and is home to Microsoft, Amazon and a bunch of other big tech companies whose employees could really benefit from the service, and has 600 times the population density. This even though the cost of the equipment has come down by a factor of 100 in that 14 years.
This is just wrong.
Re: (Score:2)
5GB/month = $25/month
25GB/month = $100/month
100GB/month = $300/month
It turns out that local political hacks arent good at setting up and running a broadband network.
Re: (Score:2)
It turns out that local political hacks arent good at setting up and running a broadband network.
It's a co-op, not a municipal network. It's certainly possible that the people that control the municipality also control the co-op, since rural areas have a tendency to have Boss Hogs, but it's by no means a given. This is certainly an example of co-op directors making some incredibly poor choices. Whether or not the members can hold a vote and fix the problem depends on the bylaws of the co-op (and their own motivation to do something about the situation). Neither of those things has anything to do wi
Re: (Score:2)
Citizens Unite? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Citizens Unite? (Score:4, Insightful)
The bill was introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist.
What do you expect? Who let this asshat in the door?
Re:Citizens Unite? (Score:4, Informative)
This is the USA. Corporate interests own the legislatures.
The bill was introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist.
What do you expect? Who let this asshat in the door?
What do you think corporate funding of campaigns are going to result it? These corps aren't stupid, they're in it for returns. A congresscritter pet better earn it's keep or it's off the payroll.
Thank Citizens United and rollback of campaign finance reform (won't anyone thing of those $$?)
Just a Temporary Setback for Telecom/Cable (Score:2)
Entrenched players buying politicians (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It happens so often it's surprising legislators don't put out a price list for laws that favour your business.
Why limit the upside? Value-based pricing FTW [1]. On the other hand, in competitive legislative markets, there may indeed be such a menu, it's just not for public consumption. What do you think the golf courses, resort stays and cruises are for? Private meeting rooms to divvy up public resources for pennies on the dollar.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V... [wikipedia.org]
A Law written by Lobbyists is shelved !! (Score:2)
The real issue here is that this entire legislative package was written by the Telcos lobby group, and then pushed into the house. At what pint did we let the politicians off the hook for thinking for themselves, and just taking a corporate payoff. Democracy is destroyed when you let these scumbags corporate thugs write the laws. The only reason this got stopped is the publicity. How often is our democracy stolen by these thieves.
I live in a Fiberhood in KC... (Score:2)
The Kansas legislature is made up almost entirely of rapid Tea Party half-wits that are taking money from the ILECs or anybody else with money to buy them off. The ONLY reason this was postponed was due
Re: (Score:2)
Honestly, ANYONE who gets in the door to challenge KC regulations crushes Comcast; even without a 1 gig pipe. They had a monopoly in my neighborhood and as soon as it was lifted, practically everyone on my street switched within the first few weeks/months to Uverse.
Red States (Score:2)
They HATE government regulations...until they're conspiring with Big Business to suppress competition. Interesting note, yesterday one of the silliest laws in the history of our country was repealed. It banned Southwest Airlines from flying outside of Texas from Dallas-Fort Worth. The law was passed to suppress Southwest Airlines when they first started out and protect existing airlines.
http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2014/02/03/southwest-airlines-to-offer-nonstop-routes-from-dallas-to-15-cities/ [foxnews.com]
Very encouraging (Score:2)
People are starting to get into the habit of speaking up and speaking out. They are taking action and it may start to become increasingly fashionable to do so. (In fact, I would urge for people to make it increasingly fashionable to do so.) The 80s was a period of what many thought was a renaissance but was actually a backward step for US and human culture. This whole "looking out for #1" thing really did a number on people. The sophisticated and respected wisdom of urban dwellers such as those found i
Not shocked at all (Score:2)
Koch brothers, creationism in the classroom... So glad i got out in the 90s. My home state is nothing but a source of shame on an almost daily basis.
Re: (Score:2)
Limiting how broadband can grow is monumentally stupid. This is a great way to make small towns unlivable and discourage business outside of established city centers where rents are cheaper and small companies can thrive.
One of major divisions in the country right now isn't liberals vs business, it's big business vs. small business. This is anti-small business to the max. All business requires good Internet these days, and bills like this just make sure that good service is in a limited area and at much
Re: (Score:2)
Markets are generally better at providing many things as there can be competition and people have a choice. If a seller provides a bad product people have other choices. Cable services are a natural monopoly where normal market mechanisms do not work all that well due to the lack of options. This makes a public owned solution better as the public has a means to control it for their purposes via an elective process.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh they can compete. They don't WANT to compete. Competition lowers their profits. They STILL measure success in growth. That makes them more like a voracious bacteria than business people operating in a financial ecosystem.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I don't think municipal fiber is any harder to do than highways, which many states seem to do reasonably well, although not all do equally well.
I've worked as an IT vendor wiith state and local governments across the country, and there's good people working in most of them, although some states government workers are so reviled that the proportion of strong workers is disastrously low. Some governments are better at getting things done than others. The think that government agencies don't do well at
Re: (Score:2)
The government at all levels have been resisting the category of "utility" for internet providers. That category shift is long over-due as everything connects to and through the internet. It is presently more of a utility than the telephone companies are given that many people have given up on land lines long ago. But then issues like rates, quality of service, neutrality and more come to the forefront and no one (read: internet providers) wants that.
But ask yourself what defines a public utility? Then
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I know. Some things need multiple attempts. Just look at how many times they tried the Federal Reserve scam before it worked? Or how many times they tried to get aspartame past the FDA?