CenturyLink Takes $3B In Subsidies For Building Out Rural Broadband 199
New submitter club77er writes with a link to a DSL Reports article outlining some hefty subsidies (about $3 billion, all told) that CenturyLink has signed up to receive, in exchange for expanding its coverage to areas considered underserved: According to the CenturyLink announcement, the telco will take $500 million a year for six years from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)'s Connect America Fund (CAF). In exchange, it will expand broadband to approximately 1.2 million rural households and businesses in 33 states. While the FCC now defines broadband as 25 Mbps down, these subsidies require that the deployed services be able to provide speeds of at least 10 Mbps down.
Funny story... (Score:5, Funny)
In January we got Broadband! A whopping 5Mbps. It was amazing. We loved it.
Then the FCC took away our Broadband. They changed the definition to 25Mbps so now we have a paltry 5Mbps! Horrible.
Not.
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The definition is relevant because the whole point of it was to determine who could collect public funds for installing internet access, yet these guys are getting public funding they don't deserve because they are not meeting the requirement.
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Sort of a corollary to this: if we're going to subsidize a broadband provider, why are we subsidizing the slowest provider, one that is locked in to an obsolete technology? It is as though Franklin Roosevelt had funded the Rural Oil Lamp Administration.
Subsidies are okay. Exclusivity is not. (Score:5, Insightful)
If they take our money to build the line, they are acting as an agent of the state (so, yes we can say the government put in the line) and they must lease it out at reasonable rates.
Re: Subsidies are okay. Exclusivity is not. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ha-ha, that's funny.
Why doesn't that apply for football stadiums that are built with taxpayer subsidies?
Re: Subsidies are okay. Exclusivity is not. (Score:2)
Right, no one complains about $100+ tickets at football stadiums - everyone's OK with it.
Uh-huh.
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Complaining means squat. If they are paying the price they must be okay with it. It is the only reason the tickets cost 100+. If people don't turn their backs, I can hardly be expected to take their complaints seriously.
I'm not mad about the subsidies (Score:3)
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I'm mad because in ten years they still won't have delivered, will have spent the bulk of the money on executive bonuses and won't get punished. Keep the subsidies, make em pay it back with interest if they're so much as a smidge off
Better yet, why not pay on delivery? Sure, you'll have to compensate them a little bit extra to cover interest for the roll-out period but "no cure, no pay" tends to get things done.
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They probably need the money to do the job. But they should have a tiered roll-out plan, and they should get the money in portions as the roll-out proceeds, not all at once. Maybe it is already planned that way, I don't know. Did not RTFA, am not new here
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Plausible, I suppose, until you consider they are who they are. Maybe CenturyLink will be different than the rest, we'll see.
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"they must lease it out at reasonable rates." Why? The government isn't mandated to charge reasonable rates for services.
The government is only permitted to pass laws for certain reasons, all of them are promoting welfare and serving the public interest, none of them are making a profit.
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I live in a crappylink served area (Score:3)
Century link will collect fed funds for shit service that is up to stated speeds.
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Here's a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead of giving Century Link 3 billion dollars to build the infrastructure and then have a monopoly where they can overcharge the customer, let's take that 3 billion and have the government build the infrastructure. Then we let any company who want so use it do so for a small fee. Then not only do we have infrastructure, but we also have competition and at least a small income from the lines, which is better for everyone.
Sadly out of mod points... (Score:2)
Sadly out of mod points... this deserves to be modded up.
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The state protected monopoly is a part of the cost. So they get $3B to install it then $50-$100/mo from hundreds of thousands of houses for decades. It may cost them more than $3B to install it.
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State-protected monopoly? Please, say it ain't so.
If there has to be a monopoly, it should be state-regulated, not protected. Like utilities (water, gas, electric, etc.)
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Why do you hate our economy? Ask yourself this: Which will increase the GDP more:
1) A few broadband connections whose total monthly price is $BIGNUM
2) A lot more broadband connections but at a lower total cost due to competition
Clearly if you want to maximize a mostly worthless financial measurement, you want few products at outrageous prices.
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Refreshing honesty.
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I lived there I sucked.
Where do you live now?
Re: Here's a better idea (Score:2)
We are heading towards $1B spent just to provide a website for people to sign up for healthcare coverage - and after several years it STILL isn't finished.
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Whether the government actually builds it or not has nothing to do with the OP's point, which is that the government should own it, and rent it out to companies. We can debate whether that's a good idea or not, but it has nothing to do with who builds it.
The military (a government entity, and rightly so) has plenty of contracts with private companies to build stuff. But the government (as the peoples' proxy) owns it once it is built.
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Because it'd be inefficient.
We should get them to set themselves on fire somewhere where the heat could be harnessed. Green energy is a goal of the current administration.
FiOS (Score:2)
I have fiber on the pole next to the house. Haven't meaured it, but going off a rough eye... 30 feet away from the house. When they were working on the line, I walked up to the Verizon lineman and asked him if it was fiber optic. He acknowledged it, then stated he wouldn't be able to tell me what it was for. GE has two facilities nearby, as well as Environmental One and SI's headquarters.
VZ still won't gives us FiOS here. I'm not bitter, really I'm not.
This should have been an open bid contract (Score:2)
I assure you some company would have agreed to do the build out with full fiber for much less.
Here someone might say "but century link has the franchise last mile contract in that area"... And to those people, I say the very notion of such franchises is why we have such shitty broadband in the first place. You give companies monopolies and shockingly they over charge and under serve. Anyone surprised by that is too ignorant to be involved in civic planning.
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But in reality what would have happened is some new company wins the bid, fails to deliver after the 6 years and files for bankruptcy. Somehow the $3 billion has all gone missing. That's the one thing a big corp like CentryLink has going for it, they have a lot more than this contract to lose if they take the money and run.
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Who says you need to give the whole thing to one company? That's silly.
Break it down into bits that smaller outfits can reasonably build out in a reasonable amount of time. You could break it down into 1 square mile zones. 10,000 square miles? 10,000 contracts. If the federal government can't handle issuing 10,000 contracts then they're more incompetent than most people realize.
Then put the smaller contracts up for general bid where they agree to build everything to a uniform interchangeable spec. Again, an
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That's the one thing a big corp like CentryLink has going for it, they have a lot more than this contract to lose if they take the money and run.
What? No they don't. We already paid billions for last mile internet which we didn't get, and nobody got in trouble.
Part Two (Score:3)
Looks like Quest^W Qwest^W CenturyLink is just going for Part Two of the original hit production: Broadband [newnetworks.com] Subsidy [pbs.org] Scam [huffingtonpost.com].
But don't worry if you're enjoying the show so far -- I have no doubt there will be a Part Three in 10 years or so.
Monthly bandwidth limits? (Score:2)
And what's the monthly data limit?
Broadband is 25 Mbps so why only 10? (Score:2)
Symmetric speeds or GTFO (Score:2)
Somebody esplain to me why the FCC doesn't mandate symmetric broadband speeds. I'd rather have that then gigabit.
Re:3 billion buildout 1.2 million served? (Score:5, Insightful)
Your region doesn't get math education subsidies, either, does it?
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I'm guessing it does!
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Re:3 billion buildout 1.2 million served? (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is the cost per item. This is more than just a subsidy, it's simply paying for getting the entire job done and if that were the case, why doesn't the government just contract that job out. These companies have gotten the same subsidies over and over again, even avoided taxes since the 90's for that exact promise.
There are a few facts:
- Even in rural areas, people tend to cluster together, you can easily get 100 houses/living spaces in a small area
- There is already fiber in lots of places with inhabitants due to regular phone lines or even DSL/ISDN (which even in rural areas no longer use switchboards or trunks, they are switched onto a packet line, generally fiber) and both lit and dark fiber strung in the past four decades. Even so, existing copper can in most cases easily maintain the speeds being requested.
- Most DSL/ISDN lines can be easily upgraded with software and minor hardware to comply with these requests.
- It is relatively cheap to tap a fiber from a pole even for a (very) long run. I once lived in such place, a 2.5 mile run from the nearest fiber on existing electric/phone poles would've cost me only $15k including installation, hardware and (I assume) profits for the installer and that was for a 1Gbps fiber.
- Single houses in the middle of nowhere will still not get anything because the company will not find them profitable
- These companies often only provide service 'to the pole' (not to the meter/modem/termination point as most people assume). Most/all utilities have this provision, even in a city, you might not notice unless you have to fix something (or if it's already buried) but when you do then you can go and climb the (live) pole yourself or hire someone to do it. The rest (a 20-200ft run depending on property layout) the customer still has to pay for during installation.
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My rural area does not have subdivisions, though there are some local concentrations of population. It happens that I have a Centurylink switch right next door, and for a few years they were my provider. Because of my living next to the switch, I got 10MHz, the fastest that DSL is capable of, but two to five miles away, the speed drops into the acoustic modem range. Beyond that, no Centurylink at all, even though everyone has its phone company wiring.
Now that a cable provider has come to town, the Centuryli
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The problem is the cost per item. This is more than just a subsidy, it's simply paying for getting the entire job done and if that were the case, why doesn't the government just contract that job out.
No matter what the Federal government does, someone will be dissatisfied with the result...
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It's $34 a month per subscriber. Probably not too bad considering the amount of network infrastructure they'll need to build and maintain.
I get exactly $2,500 (Score:3)
That works out to just over $2,000 per subscriber ($3B/1.2M subscribers)...
I get $2,500 per subscriber. (dc agrees with me.)
I consider an extra 25% as a bit more than "just over".
Re: I get exactly $2,500 (Score:2)
Really, because that 1.2M number is 100% accurate?
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Wait, let me see if I got this right. So we in the shape of the Federal government are actually paying for a bunch of home schoolers and flat earthers to crap all over the Internet more conveniently?
Can't we save some money and just provide connectivity to Breitbart and Red State and keep these people out of other comment sections?
Re:Running the numbers... (Score:5, Funny)
They tried that, but people kept stealing the wires out of the trailer park and selling it to buy meth and ammo.
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Bahahahahahahaha. You think they could run fiber for 2k per house??? You are talking existing properties here with existing roads, drainage, sewerage, water pipes, and electricity. Half of these wont be mapped correctly and you are expecting them to be able to trench in fiber and connect the houses for 2k per connection? You would struggle to get that sort of costing per house when you are building a subdivision and you amortise the earthworks cost across multiple services.
How much do you think it would
Re: Running the numbers... (Score:4, Informative)
They don't have to get the cost under $2K, that $2K/household is the SUBSIDY, it is designed to encourage the investment and speed up the return on investment for the cable company/ISP... Who will still charge every customer the same amount, with or without subsidy on their install.
Without this money, rural customers would be forced to pay the actual cost of their service...
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I've paid into this fund for over 70 line-years. Not sure what the rates were over that time (or how the inflation rate and other cost-of-money factors affected the value that was collected). If it had been at the current rate the dollar count would be maybe a quarter of one subscriber's subsidy. But the dollar has inflated by a factor of about ten over that period, so I expect I've paid in substantially more value than the average amount they'll be spending on one home's subsidy.
It will be interesting t
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You usually don't move into the countryside to get away from it all, then want it back. Well, most do, but they just moved back.
That's what bothers me... you move out to the country, you can get a really nice, big house and large piece of property for a lot less than you'd pay in or near a city. If you want broadband, use some of the money you saved moving out to the middle of nowhere to get it.
It reminds me of a local private airport... people move into the area because real estate is cheap (for obvious reasons), then they band together to demand the airport shut down because there's too much noise.
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That's what bothers me... you move out to the country, you can get a really nice, big house and large piece of property for a lot less than you'd pay in or near a city. If you want broadband, use some of the money you saved moving out to the middle of nowhere to get it.
Your tiny little view of the world from the pinprick through your blinders is pathetic and shortsighted. We had a program to extend POTS to rural customers because of the benefits to society. The benefits of extending the internet are even greater, but because you can't see any farther than the end of your nose, you're more concerned about your paltry share of this bit of cash than about far more egregious uses of your taxes... like bombing brown people for profit.
Of all the expenditures you could complain
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Your tiny little view of the world from the pinprick through your blinders is pathetic and shortsighted. We had a program to extend POTS to rural customers because of the benefits to society. The benefits of extending the internet are even greater, but because you can't see any farther than the end of your nose, you're more concerned about your paltry share of this bit of cash than about far more egregious uses of your taxes... like bombing brown people for profit.
Why? Why is it "even greater?" You really think getting people living in the middle of nowhere is one of the best places the government can spend our money? I don't.
Now, if you want to complain that this money is probably just going right down a toilet, or that nobody should receive subsidies for installing some slow-ass third-world internet connections, I'm right there with you. But having lived in both the city and country, I don't see why you would even be worried about whether we spend some money to bring modern communications to all citizens, unless you're in favor of it.
Because despite the views of the slashdot demographic, not having high speed internet is not the end of the world.
We in the country have to subsidize your roads in the city, since we drive more miles and pay more gas taxes, but the damage is really done by heavy trucks. Why don't you complain about that? Insist that you city dwellers pay your fair share of road taxes? Naturally, you're only concerned when you think you might be overpaying, not when you're underpaying. You don't care about fairness, you only care about yourself.
Not true - I think transportation infrastructure should be paid for ONLY through gasoline taxes, which means those big trucks doing the most damage are paying the most for the use of the roads. Electic and hybrids have changed th
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Why? Why is it "even greater?" You really think getting people living in the middle of nowhere is one of the best places the government can spend our money? I don't.
Do you really want there to only be one lifestyle available in the country? Don't you want there to be infrastructure available in remote regions of the nation so that you can enjoy it if you should have to go there? By the way, I'm literally walking distance from actual civilization, there's just artificial monopoly boundaries in the way of someone other than AT&T bringing fiber into my county, and thus some competition. It's a short hop.
Because despite the views of the slashdot demographic, not having high speed internet is not the end of the world.
It's part of modern society... in developed nations, anyhow.
I think transportation infrastructure should be paid for ONLY through gasoline taxes, which means those big trucks doing the most damage are paying the most for the use of the roads.
If yo
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I live on a sheep farm. You wear anything with wool in it? Ever eat a gyro?
Well guess what, I'm paying for your chosen lifestyle. You're welcome.
Right now I have a 1.2 mbps connection, but we're in the process of building our new larger farm, where I can't even get that. My choices are literally dialup or satellite. Satellite would work acceptably for the farm's needs. As long as we can communicate with the vets and buyers, which means piping high res images and videos around, and keeping our marketing goin
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I pay for my sweaters and gyros. Please explain how you paid for them?
Just because you have decided that you somehow pay for me, does not mean that I am now obliged to pay for your internet. You mind your business and I'll mind mine. I shall not refer to you as a douche or bumpkin. I shall refer to you as a whiner and grifter if you seek charity so impolitely.
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I don't care if they enjoy it or not, I am willing to pay the market price. But if they are subsidized I believe they should give me as a city dweller a discount on my food, seeing as my backyard is not suitable for farming, poor me.
The English have a saying "An old tax is no tax." The corollary is that on old subsidy is no subsidy. See the healthcare and education industries as examples of the outcome expected.
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I don't believe you are. You don't pay the market price for food, gas for your car, electricity, the mortgage on your house, health care, education. I don't know what you think the "market price" for something is, but you're not paying it for anything important in your life except maybe if you have to hire a lawyer, and everybody who hires a lawyer thinks they're getting raped.
I'm not at all sure that if you saw the "market" price for things you'd be very happy about
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Firstly, effectively calling me a liar marks you as a cad.
Secondly, you assert that pretty much everything I consume is heavily subsidized. To the point where I am getting a heck of a deal, receiving goods and services that exceed in value and cost what I pay for them. As I am an average joe, most of the country must be getting the same benefit. My question is, where the hell is all the money coming from to pay the difference?
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I'm not calling you a liar (or at least not an "effective" one). I'm saying you don't have a clue as to what the "market price" of anything would be.
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I don't understand, please help me. We are receiving subsidies, while at the same time paying for subsidies? Who is paying for food, gas for your car, electricity, the mortgage on your house, health care, education? You say all of us are paying. So we are paying and receiving at the same time? Sorry, it doesn't make sense to me.
BTW, you said that you don't believe that I am willing to pay the market price, when I stated that I am. That is calling me a liar. You have no basis for saying that.
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Yes. We all pay for the subsidies, but not everyone uses goods and services to the same extent. Think of it like health insurance. I've paid for health insurance all my adult life (more than 30 years) and have barely used it. So, I'm paying to subsidize people who need those services. It evens out the costs, so that someone who needs a heart transplant can get one and I'm partly paying for it eve
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Insurance is not the same as a subsidy, so medical expenses are out of this discussion. Let's take another example from your list. I pick a simple utility that everyone uses - electricity. You say it is subsidized. You say that we all are paying the subsidy.
Sorry, my brain asploded.
If you don't know the market price, how can you not believe me?
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I don't need to know the exact number of stars in the universe to know for sure that you don't know the exact number of stars in the universe.
This is simple. "Market price" is unknowable outside of a "free market" and a free market has never existed in human history. How can you say you are willing to pay a price that you cannot possibly know?
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Okay consider gasoline. What do think all the effort to achieve peace in the middle east and all the money lent or dolled out in foreign aide to evil regimes so they can militarize with our war machines is for?
It might be a little indirect but all the jet fighters and military equipment gets paid for quite often out of our treasury. One of the reasons for that is stabilize the region, so we can keep access to oil, cheap or not. If we just left things go (as I think we actually should over all) we would
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You're willing to say that you're willing to pay market price, but you don't know what market price is, so at best it's a meaningless assertion.
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Ah, maybe you don't realize that my education, training, career and experience mean that I know and understand the cost of many things, stripping out the externalities and input cost distortions, adding in profit and taxes. These are not mysterious and unfathomable.
The true, unfettered, market prices for most goods and services are significantly less than the current prices. Market distortions have raised prices, which distortions are compounded by "corrective" subsidies. Removing barriers to entry erected
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Do some research before posting.
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Ultimately economics wins though and the nation ends up bankrupt. Consider your demand side equation. You have just established people will pay 'anything' for certain things. Alright what is the real cost of producing that drug? Why does that single pill need to command a price of $1500? Simply because the market will bear it? Subsidies just enable supplies of inelastic services and goods to get an economic rent.
Sure you'd mortgage your house to pay for those drugs, trouble is you only probably have $1
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Not sure where you are getting your data. http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/... [nasdaq.com]
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Thoughts and prayers.
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Texas ranks in or near the bottom 20% in the nation in education and access to health care, and its poverty level puts in 46th (out of 50), in between Arkansas and Alabama. It has the highest uninsured rate in the nation. It leads all other states in the number of executions of innocent people. Texas has the highest percentage of children who don't have any access to health care.
http://educationblog.dallasnew... [dallasnews.com]
http://www.texasobserver.org/t... [texasobserver.org]
http://dfw [cbslocal.com]
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Who the fuck would want to? Anyhow, all we're doing is talking about them. If they're too stupid to see the difference, well, that seems to go with that territory, don' it?
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I used to do a lot of work down there, as did my father.
I bought him a shirt from T-shirt hell with the "Don't mess with Texas" logo on it. Below, it read: "It's not nice to pick on retards."
He loves wearing that shirt when he's doing deliveries down there.
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From the research i've done the poor state of internet service in most of Washington has less to do with greedy ISPs and more to do with really stupid laws and regulations that hamper or flat out prevent ISPs from installing/upgrading/maintaining the infrastructure needed to provide halfway decent internet access.
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Re: Centurylink Service (Score:2)
You don't understand, it is the people in the cities that are footing the bill for the rural subsidies.
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Not "promote commerce," there is no such clause in the U.S. constitution. Period. They regulate commerce with foreign nations and regulate interstate commerce (to the extent that they can't impose things like tariffs or duty taxes, or prevent the migration of people from state to state). A broader reading allows the federal government to create entities like the FCC so that broadcasters in one state cannot use the same airwaves as nearby broadcasters in other states and, also, regulate things like TV sig
This is why (Score:2)
How is this worth posting to slashdot? Rural phone subsidies have been around forever. They recently got expanded to broadband.
They've been collecting it for decades. They've been giving it to the companies and not getting service to customers.
JUST NOW we have a company agreeing to take the money and use it to ACTUALLY ROLL OUT BROADBAND INTERNET to the rural areas.
That sure as hell is "news for nerds, stuff that matters".
Especially for me:
- A my Nevada place I get dialup that can't make it past 28k most
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"If I couldd get decent internet for the cost of living in California for 10 months...
...I could work from the ranch, sell off the California townhouse, and live for a year on less than it costs to live in CA for a month.
"
Fixed that for you. I am not going to pay for your retirement internet when you can clearly afford to pay it yourself.
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Man complaining about "the Soviet Left Coast" plans to retire comfortably collecting Social Security, using Medicare and sucking off the government teat.
Not shocked.
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Man complaining about "the Soviet Left Coast" plans to retire comfortably collecting Social Security, using Medicare and sucking off the government teat.
Why not? These parasites sucked down OVER HALF MY PAY for DECADES. Then they'll pay me the social security pittance (and tax it) whether I want them to or not. I'll never get back the amount I paid (allegedly) "into the fund" on just THAT part of the money they took from me - assuming the whole thing doesn't go belly up before I do.
They might possibly e
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It's easy to snipe others for "sucking off the government teat" when you're young, healthy, and well-to-do. Try it when you're old, sick, unemployed or under-employed, and have been looted your whole working lifetime by that very government, to put milk into those teats for others to suck and ration you a few drops of your own back.
And don't dump on me for voting for it, either. I've voted against it since I was able to vote. (I was there for the founding of the libertarian movement - but didn't actually
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Did I call it or did I call it?
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No, you'll probably get back much more.
I love how the techbro libertarians exaggerate the amount of money "the parasites" have taken from them without ever acknowledging the benefits they have enjoyed, and the privilege they have gained from those benefits. They all believe they earned every cent from their natural talent and t
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I love how the techbro libertarians exaggerate the amount of money "the parasites" have taken from them without ever acknowledging the benefits they have enjoyed, and the privilege they have gained from those benefits. They all believe they earned every cent from their natural talent and the sweat of their own brow.
It doesn't matter how much "benefits" the ruling class chose to trickle down on us. We didn't get the choice to forgo the alleged benefits and keep the money - just as we didn't get to opt out o
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I see your problem. The benefits don't trickle down from the ruling class. They don't "trickle down" from anywhere. They are shared. If anything, in US late-stage capitalism, the benefits trickle UP to t
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Neither am I. I have a problem with Ungrounded Lightning's post, but that's not it. For most of my life I've been paying into SS and Medicare - I do not have a choice. For years I've offered that that government can keep what they've already taken from me if I can opt out, but now later in life they've already taken too much. I didn't ask them to do it, they just did it, and gave me no choice - so despite the fact I think SS is a travesty, having been forced to pay into it, it's not hypocritical to wan
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There are techbro libertarians around here who are still pissed that the federal government built the interstate highway system so that moochers can drive their cars across the country. So don't be surprised about this being late Sunday night Slashdot front page fodder.
Re: Yay! (Score:2)
No, it won't - this money is to build out the physical plant so that unserved neighborhoods get broadband service.
Think poor neighborhoods in cities Centurylink already serves, not farm country.
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That's a bit of a stretch.
Besides, most of the rural states consistently go Republican (and often have laws where all electors from the state vote the same why - hence why I don't bother voting for president in my heavily red state). The current administration has no need to pander to them; they're certainly not going to change enough votes to make a difference.
More likely, it's just like the rural electricity or phone subsidies; broadband is now considered as necessary as phone or electric service.
There's