Comment Re:No last mile unbundling? (Score 3, Insightful) 379
What you're seeing is the typical conservative notion that deregulation promotes investment, which deliberately draws attention away from the fact that the reason the US broadband infrastructure leaves so much to be desired is not because of a lack of investment but because there is nothing enforceable in place which requires them to spend the money they already receive on the necessary upgrades. Government subsidies, your monthly rates; only the barest minimum of any of that goes toward upgrades which are deemed absolutely necessary, while the rest accounts for billions of dollars in profits.
Regarding last mile bundling, one of the arguments against it is that more competition would stifle innovation. That might hold water except that the only "innovation" these companies are investing in are new and better ways to curb your bandwidth consumption. Thankfully for the millions who simply have no choice of provider because of location, fiber has already been invented. Don't worry folks -- as soon as we guarantee that no competition is ever able to enter your area, your ISP will be at your door the next morning to run high speed fiber straight into your home!
People are getting confused because it appears to be a win for net neutrality on the surface. Really now, do you think a former telecoms lobbyist would put that on the table if service providers didn't have something to gain from it? It's simply being used as a bargaining chip here to win people over into supporting the very reason our infrastructure is a global embarrassment. A decade from now, when you are paying $120/mo for 10down/1.5up Super Premium High-Speed Internet Turbo Boost Plus, they'll expect you to smile and be happy with your "open internet." To remind those with poor short-term memories, deregulation is what led to the whole Comcast BitTorrent debacle in the late 2000s; what a great win for net neutrality that turned out to be.
Rest assured that "no rate regulation, no tariffs, no last-mile unbundling" will only benefit the bottom line of service providers. This is a compromise, one that wants you to accept long-term mediocrity for a temporary victory. How satisfied will you be when there's nothing left but the good graces of monopolistic corporations to stop your rates from skyrocketing and nowhere else to turn when they finally do?