Anti-Muni Broadband Bills Country Wide 655
Ant writes "Broadband Reports says that 14 and possibly more states that have or will pass(ed) bills banning community-run broadband. Free Pass shows a map breakdown of the states while Tallahassee.com takes a look at a newly proposed bill in Florida, backed by Sprint, BellSouth, Verizon, and Comcast, designed to bog down the muni-development process."
That's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Aren't we naive....
Re:That's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is why the corporations are trying, in this case, to circumvent the local governments by using the state legislature to overrule them. The state level is where the interface between people and politicians start to break down. It's still possible to get elected by going door to door shaking hands and explaining how you plan to do your job. I personally know a state rep who does this and his party hates him for this. But the easier and these days more travelled route is to spend a lot of money on advertising.
Write your state reps (Score:3, Informative)
I'm in Illinois, on the danger list. Here's what I wrote to my State Senator. Feel free to use any part of this text if you wish.
Dear Senator Raoul:
I am writing to request
Re:That's funny (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't think local politics is exempt from this; most local politicians aspire to higher offices. Local governments are often corrupt and short sighted, at least in large cities, and will put a few quick bucks ahead of any sort of long term progress, as they'll have a higher statewide office by the time anything bad comes of it. If they can show the corporations how much they care (as they did in Houston, by making it policy to ignore any and all environmental violations by the oil refineries; now Houston has the most polluted air in the country) then they can get some help when they want that next level of political power.
It may be just my experiences with it, but government basically is run by corporations. IMO corporate donations to political parties should be banned outright. Politics should be the domain of the people, personal contributions to campaigns ONLY. Of course, this will never happen, and I'll let you figure out why.
Re:That's funny (Score:3, Insightful)
Change that to "corporations and politicians only have as much power as they are able to take" and you've got it.
Please don't do that (Score:3, Interesting)
Anti-americanism (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's funny (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:That's funny (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:That's funny (Score:3, Informative)
In Brighton here in the UK, the wireless scene is pretty thriving. We have a few little orgs that provide totally free access. The first, http://wireless.looseconnection.com/ provides access in various cafes and pubs, and another, http://www.piertopier.net/ provides access all along the main part of the beach(!). There's also a few more places providing some in public gardens etc.
It's all free and very well maintained.
And yes, bristol has a great free W network goin
Re:That's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
What you say? Almost most roads nowadays are government controlled. What else you say, most broadband carriers are using lines that government granted money for in the first place?
Re:That's funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's funny (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:That's funny (Score:4, Insightful)
Most of them are content to keep voice and internet seperate so the can bill us twice. There's little incentive to give consumers more bandwidth because then the internet may compete with cable television, a service that many ISPs provide for a seperate charge, read conflict-of-interest.
Many of us still pay $30/mo for DSL over 50+ year old copper wires that have been paid for thousands of times over.
The telcos have also been using consumer profits to run investment scams with airline and credit card companies that have nothing to do with telecommunications.
Remeber, one telco tried to buy Disney for $60 billion. Yeah, that's $60,000,000,000. So instead of investing money to give consumers more bandwidth the MBAs, who run the company are more interesting in investing on behalf of shareholders than customers.
So, though you make a good point about government involvement in internet access I think we need to see a lot of reforms before we entrust this to the current telcos.
Enumerated: (Score:3, Insightful)
Would that be the freedom to photograph bridges and subways without being harassed by police, or the freedom to enter the country without fingerprinting? Perhaps you meant the freedom to grow and ingest psychoactive plants? Lest I forget, the freedom that comes with puritanical views on sex?
Oh. You meant the freedom to make lots of mo
Re:That's funny (Score:3, Informative)
Even if that means killing all the Jews! How enlightened you are!
I'm not taking issue with the Europe vs. America stance, because I'm staying in the UK at the moment, and Blair is trying to force through new legislation that overturns the right to a trial. But you picked a bad example because most of Germany (which I must guess you are talking about) had no idea what was happening. Nor would they have been in favour of it. It was the exact opposite of the government doing what the people wanted.
Now ba
Re:you lose (Score:3, Informative)
When the argument revolves around the benevolence and socially progresssive thinking of Europeans, when a significant portion of recent history was dominated by actual Nazi Europeans (Germany) or de facto collaborators (France), Godwin's Law doesn't apply.
In other words, it's not a strawman argument when it actually is a man's suit stuffed with straw and tied to a pole.
Business kills (Score:3, Insightful)
If there was as much money in building and running "Community Clubs" I'd wager the big corps would try taking over the basketball courts and hockey rinks. All so the locals have more choice, you know.
Re:Business kills (Score:4, Informative)
Community Standards. (Score:5, Insightful)
I can imagine that in smaller communities and perhaps larger ones, that 'local decency groups' would force local elected officials to censor objectionable content. Since they would be you ISP it would be easy to administer community standards. I can imagine that political hacks in charge of the network creating 'routing problems' which block opposition candidates, or the local rumor mill. Heck the local police could check on your email, or see which sites you visit. While larger communities might have good separation, smaller ones might even have the police dispatcher as the overnight server support!
I think that these laws should be written to include 'fair access' in the same way that local telephone companies are starting to open their own access, sort of a carrot and stick approach.
this is nothing new (Score:5, Interesting)
there used to be "community tv" or basically a neighborhood TV antenna setup. the would all get together and buy one large tower and good antennas as well as equipment to send the signal to the homes. these were made illegal in most places by cable tv companies in the area or coming into that area.
I know, my father used to set these up for smaller communities.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:4, Informative)
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
I think what's going on is that we're fed up with the DSL/Cable duopoly, which is entirely understandable because they're doing a bad job with bad customer service at high prices. There are few companies I hate more passionately than Time Warner Cable. And, yes, I'm including Microsoft. But to then go running off to mommy and da....oops, I mean government officials...crying "Fix it! Fix it!" is a little short sighted.
Isn't what we really want just more competition? I guess I'd rather see government, whether local, state, or federal, offering various non-permanent subsidies to businesses that wanted to offer competing broadband capabilities. Perhaps only making those subsidies available in communities where current providers failed to meet certain service/price targets.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm actually a little surpised to see Slashdotters so eager for the goverment to jump into this. Do we REALLY think the Government can do this better/more efficiently than private business? Forever? 'Cause that's what it will be.
I don't think the differences are so significant as to be noteworthy, and the benefits for the community are great. I know it's trendy to believe "government is always bad", but it's not always true. I've worked in enough corporate environments to know how screwed up and inefficient they can be.
Isn't what we really want just more competition?
Sometimes. But competition isn't the end-all be-all. Sure, it works great. Most of the time. But not all of the time.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Informative)
I trust my local government that I can talk to anytime I feel like it more than I trust a company that most likely doesn't even have a local office let alone someone I can talk to at a whim.
& except for the case of Philly most community broadband is setup by small area not getting serviced by the big companies. Which is exactly where I am. I live in a town of 5000, 6000 if you include the farmers til halfway to the next group of towns. I can see my mayor at my local grocery store or bar... Or even a step further I can visit him at his home. Same with any of the city council members.
Want to talk to Verizon (who 'owns' the local phoen lines and 'sometimes' offers DSL)? Well that's gonna be a 30 mile drive to the biggest city in the region. Then you can talk to a peon behind the billing desk, because no one else will talk to you...
So uh yeah when I can personally smack the mayor upside the head for being a dumbass or a company where I can't even talk to anyone above a receptionist... Well I'll take the local government thanks.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Interesting)
You want to know why? Well tough no ones bothering to answer you as to why, it just is. Has been, maybe always will be.
In place were their are no choices your statement makes not one bit of sense. Who am I going to go to?!? Their is no one else normally. Moving isn't the option either.
I'm tired of people who don't understand the point that bussiness doesn't allways (or even some of the time) do what is best for the people and so when that happens it might (just might now) make sense to let the local government provide a solution! Instead you'd rather I not have any options aparently, by blocking my (& my neighbors) ability to leverage our local tax dollars and government to help ourselves! What gives you the right to do that exactly?
I know this will go over your head (it has any other time I've ever tried to point this out on slashdot), but government isn't allways bad, heck companies aren't allways bad... What matters is what works for the people in the end. And if nothign else having a municipal run broadband that was successful would spur companies otherwise uninsterested in an area that maybe (just maybe!) their is a market and therefore money to be made giving me chocies in the end.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:3, Insightful)
& yes cell towers would be a good community/local government project. To bad this is the US and the companies 'own' the bands used by cellphones making it a good idea that can't legally happen..
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes.
This recorrent myth that "private business" is always more efficient and beneficial for the user doesn't even stand a chance under a closer look. I find it hilarious that these great saviours, the "private businesses", need good old government interference to forbid any effort of providing a community and/or municipal WiFi network access. I private business is oh so much more efficient, why do they need these? Their obvious higher quality and pricing should be enough right? Except that they are there to maximize their profits, not primarily to provide a service. If they can (and they always can, with the power that big business has over the corrupt politicians) keep prices high and provide shitty service, they will. Only if the bottom line is affected is the behaviour changed, and even then, trough price fixing and other cartle like tactics, nothing substantial changes.
Internet access is becoming important enough to constitute a basic necessity (education wise, for example). As such the State should provide it. If private business can top the State offer, that's great! But, as the British pension fiasco showed, they seldom can.
I'm not from the USA though, so I lack that "Sheriff and a saloon and many guns!" kind of view on individual liberty as opposed to colective beneficts dispensed by the Government.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
Good point. And one that I would like the average Randian Libertarian
Though if we had community cable/broadband, and it cost a couple bucks more, I'd choose it over the telco or cable company, just to support my community. I doubt that most people would do this, though, caring more about their pocket books than the state of where they live. If my neighbor takes my money for service, I view that as a better situation than some rich ass living in New York or California taking it.
But then again I live is a rather small violently liberal community, one that passed a law to keep superwallmart out, and from undercutting the locally owned buisness.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:3, Insightful)
That has nothing to do with lowering the cost _to_consumers_. Competition does that. Which is why the local unregulated monopolies have to do anything in their power to stop competition.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:4, Interesting)
And the whole jist of this, is COMMUNITY, not government. Yes, I like my community. I'd pick it over free market, or a 5% price difference. Wanna know why? Because the money goes to community, and hence enriches MY enviroment, and my neighborhood. Seems like a better thing than making Ayn Rand or Adam Smith happy.
Remember, it is YOUR government if you voted. And if you didn't you have no right to open your mouth.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
A recent study (I heard it on NPR) showed that the government-run VA provided better health care than the private competition. Something about knowing the patients would come back, enabling them to focus more on long-term and preventitive care.
Social Security spends less on administration than most private retirement plans. And they provide expensive-to-manage disability insurance as well.
Medicare and Medicaid provide health services with far lower overhead than private insurance companies; IIRC, spending 3% of revenues on administrative expenses vs. 30%. And that's with "free market competition".
When the private supplier has a monopoly position, watch out. The suppliers are maximizing their profit, which means high prices and expensive service has to be justified by the revenue that it brings in (or the revenue that would be lost if they didn't).
"Government subsidies" are another name for corporate welfare. And you can claim they won't be permanent, but they will end up like copyright, renewed and extended every time they're about to expire.
Your examples (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:this is nothing new (Score:3)
Re:this is nothing new (Score:3, Interesting)
you said "what we need is more competition". How do you think this is going to happen?
Here's the problem: our country's broadband infrastructure is owned and operated by a couple of corporations who own all the pipes to people's homes. I don't have a problem with corporations building out infrastructure and seeking to make a very lucrative buck off of it. This is what they do. This is free enterprise. Free enterprise is a good thing. Making money is a good thing. However, and understandably enough, loca
Re:I'm not sure if I'll ever understand this (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Water
2. Power (electric)
3. Sewer
There's a long history of goverment doing each of these cheaper and more reliable than the for-profit companies that take over when these utilities are privatized.
Re:I'm not sure if I'll ever understand this (Score:3, Insightful)
2) What? Mix ups? No. Corruption, yes. I would hardly call Enron a 'mix up'.
3) Yes, taxpayers are paying for sewer. But they are paying less in property tax than they would to a private corporation (a
Re:I'm not sure if I'll ever understand this (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep. There's nothing unhealthy in it. It sometimes has a metallic taste, so I'll run it through a filter on my end, since _ANYONE_ sending water through miles of metal pipes will result in water with a metallic taste.
Please actually do some long term research rather than just pointing at messed up transitions pains.
I have. Have you? Muncipial power companies in CA were forced to privatize their serves. They're still paying tons more per KWh. So how many years will this 'transition period' last? Oh, btw, in other countries were the power grid was privatized as much as 20 years ago, they still pay a ton more per KWh (even taking inflation in to account).
Just because you don't see the $100 a month to pay for something doesn't mean it isn't there.
Well, as a municipal utility you get to see the books. If you want to know how much of your taxes are going to subsidize it, you can simply read their annual reports.
Every municipal utility I'm aware of cover their day-to-day expenses from their service fees. Some do get government funding to help for captial improvements, but many private utilties also get government funding for captial improvements.
Re:I'm not sure if I'll ever understand this (Score:3, Funny)
But through the miracle of competition, the private sector has shrunk this ratio to only 4-fold. At this rate we'll have parity by 2010.
Re:this is nothing new (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, they can. Why does the state think they can stop you from shooting up some heroin (or stop you from looking at kiddie porn (or stop you from copying music)), in the privacy of your own home?
What are they going to do?
Detect wireless networks and prosecute. They can simply issue fines on the basis of a triangulated detection on your residence. They can then advance this concept by issuing blanket search warrants, which leads to police knocking on your door and confiscating equipment.
Bust down my door and take my WIFI router away?
That's unlikely to occur. It's overall better to simply fine you. They may also knock, and demonstrate that their detection equipment shows that your home is the problem, hence they have probable cause, so please open the door, Sir, or we'll have to force entry. Chances are, the scared little White boy (the probable target population for wireless crime) is going to open the door, and he's going to get fined, lose his equipment, and maybe be arrested.
Throw me in prison for building a network?
Yes. It's more likely, however, that they'll fine you. Fines are nonviolent, bring in revenue, and avoid all that nasty uncertainty of actual court action (in which a jury might actually decide you are not morally guilty of committing a crime).
The government just loves to illegalize the things that people tend to do for themselves to bring pleasure and capability. In America, this is trending sharply upward, so we must now as a class consider our positions as constant criminals. I look forward to the magic day when cops will just say "ah, screw it" and routinely ignore things
Re:Taking things a little too far... (Score:3, Insightful)
Best of both worlds (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Best of both worlds (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Best of both worlds (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't understand (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I don't understand (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I don't understand (Score:3, Informative)
well (Score:3, Interesting)
(Same thing happened 2 years ago in France, a wireless operator in the south got its ass sued into oblivion by France Telecom because it set up a simple wireless network for small villages)
Re:I don't understand (Score:3, Interesting)
And then do the oppposite for for-profit companies -- sandbag their requests and tie them up in red tape to make it difficult
Re:I don't understand (Score:3, Insightful)
They could ... (Score:5, Interesting)
That said, even though I would not support government broadband in my community, I do not like these laws. I am a pragmatic liberterian but I also believe in democracy formost. If these comunities want thier towns to provide broadband, that is their decision to make. The federal government has no place telling the states what services they can and can't offer, and the states have no place telling the counties/towns what services they can and can't offer. Besides, the fact that there is such demand from the comunity for these services shows that the existing monopolies are not serving the people well, and creating legisation to enshrine them further is not the answer.
Re:They could ... (Score:5, Insightful)
With public wifi, the costs are an internet connection, and various adapters. (Don't have to pay for locations, businesses love having a free wifi connection in their business.)
With for pay, you added 'billing', and 'keeping track of who paid their bill', and all sorts of crap.
Sticking up a public network might cost, oh, 300 dollars a month, with a startup cost of 5000 dollars. (Probably need a system admin, but, then again, they probably already have an IT guy for the government. Or just have the local high school students volunter to run it.) This is trivially within reach of any town over 200 people.
Now add billing, and someone to keep track of it. Well, you could do that with income tax, except people don't pay local income tax. There are going to have to be bills sent.
Now add the fact that keeping track of the people on the network is now a full time job...you need to keep track of MAC addresses or logins or something, and match those up with the billing.
I mean, you've at least tripled the cost. You've probably added another full-time staff, and you've turned it into a business.
I mean, imagine the street in front of your house, and all those people who don't use it. Imagine all the streets that you don't use, and how you pay for them. Now imagine that the government could keep track of who used what streets, at least statistically, and just billed everyone for their existimated useage...that would cost a lot more than just having the streets.
Sometimes, just doing things for everyone is a hell of a lot cheaper than billing people for them. Yes, people without computers will pay for people who have them, but people in cities paied for phone lines in the country, and people without cars pay for roads, people without children pay for schools, etc, etc. A wifi broadband connection is peanuts compared to one road being built on the other side of the state, which you pay for all the time.
OTOH, my local touristy city has an open wifi network on the square that I think was setup by the Chamber of Commerce. Or just three or four businesses on the square working together. (Of course, I'm talking about a football field worth of coverage here, not a city.)
Re:I don't understand (Score:3, Insightful)
Community or government? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Community or government? (Score:5, Insightful)
This only seems non-obvious looking at cities like Los Angeles or New York. Go out to Tumbleweed, Idaho and suddenly the relationship to local government is pretty friggen obvious when your cousin is the judge, your neighbor is the mayor and aslo the gas station attendent. In that sense, community and government are utterly synonymous.
And it don't stop, and it won't stop,... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously community internet will lead to community controlled media eventually squeezeing out cable/phone and every other communication medium. I don't blame the companies one bit. But I will blame the government if they let this happen.
Re:And it don't stop, and it won't stop,... (Score:3, Insightful)
Hehehehehe he said if . This is the government we're talking about remember? Nothing personal, it's just bidness.
Don't worry, America... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, and Saddam really did have all those weapons. Honest. I swear.
I don't think governments should be competing... (Score:5, Insightful)
While in the vast majority of instances, it might be appropriate to ban a city from setting up its own ISP, there might be a few towns which are being ignored.
We have towns like that in my northern state. My father lives in a town with no broadband, heck, with NO local dial-up! To say that city can't set up its own ISP is ludicrous. The private sector has had decades to set up something but they've failed to even take notice. The city should be able to take action "for the common good" to set up its own.
This must be what they mean by "free market" (Score:5, Insightful)
And they say profit motive is a good thing... (Score:5, Insightful)
Anti competitive (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Anti competitive (Score:3, Insightful)
I think the best way to go is akin to Utah's Utopia Project [utopianet.org]. The state takes out some municipal bonds, lays out vast swaths of fiber optic cable, connecting a lot of the cities in Utah. Then it pays the bonds back as private service providers rent the lines and compete for customers. The best thing about it is, rather than havin
rather strong legislation for Texas (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.freepress.net/communityinternet/=TXbil
Under the bill, municipalities and municipal electric utilities would be prohibited from providing, directly or indirectly, alone or in partnership with other service providers, either "telecommunications" or "information" services as those terms are defined under federal law.
libertarian arguments against government works (Score:4, Interesting)
Greed (Score:3, Interesting)
A company such as SBC should really be playing both sides here as they could still charge for a fat pipe to be run a town. The difference being that a municipality has the money to subsidize the pipe and basically sell the bandwith to residents at a loss. SBC makes it's money albeit slightly less than if they were to provide service to each household but money none the less.
We'll see what happens, but I'm seriously considering asking some of my neighbors to get together to lease a line from SBC and then set up a community router. It will save all of us money and I'll finally be able to get a decent connection without interference from the 8 other routers my laptop can connect to.
This isn't stopping Communities!!! (Score:5, Informative)
It's stopping local governments from doing it!
Re:This isn't stopping Communities!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
By the way, the lack of cheap Internet access stalls the local economy. So it's in the best interest of community businesses to support community networks
My experience with municipal broadband (Score:5, Informative)
Phone costs $10.50/mo per line.
Basic Cable costs $5.00/mo
3Mbit/sec broadband costs $27.50/mo.
Not to mention some of the lowest electric rates in the state.
The reason we did this was because the local cable company had spent decades gouging on the prices on cable and having crappy service and we finally had enough of it and built our own system.
Mediacom still is around, but now charging fair prices. This municipal effort INCREASED COMPETITION, breaking the monopoly the phone and cable companies enjoyed for so many years.
I'm a firm believer in Municipal Utilities, if you have the chance to write a letter to your congresspeople by all means do it now.
Re:My experience with municipal broadband (Score:3, Informative)
Single phone line: $40 (verizon)
Basic Digital TV Package: 80$/m (adeplhia...)
3/256 Cable Modem: 50$/m.
There's simply no other choices in my community.
Re:My experience with municipal broadband (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a big problem with how capitalism has been going. When there is competition it's a win, but when there is little competition we end up with oliopolies and monopolies, and they will charge as much as they can get away with to maximize their profit. I'd argue that having a single company control a business is much worse than having the government control it, as at least theoritically the government can provide the service at a fair price, whereas without competition the business will not.
I do have some qualms about government going into business's that are handled by the private sector, besides the big brother issue. The main issue is that the if the government wants to allow there to continue to be a private market, they have to ensure they don't charge less than what it costs to provide the service. In the case the parent post provides, it appears they have not run out the competition, which is a good thing. What I'd like to see is for industries such as this where the government wants to do something about unfair prices, the government help setup co-ops that would be self-sufficient after x number of years. As long as there is a rule of (at minimum) self-sufficiency, private enterprise should still be able to thrive.
Does anyone else out there (Score:3, Insightful)
...have a problem with government controlling access to the Internet? Anyone at all?
I know this is Slashdot and we're supposed to hate big buisiness and everything, but isn't government-provided Internet access just a bad idea? First off we have the fact that government can always undercut the opponent and hide the costs in taxes; few will ever complain. So clearly there's the risk that in the end we'll end up paying even more for broadband than we used to. Second, once government is involved, this throws the door wide open for "concerned mothers" to start lobbying for state-, county-, or city-wide controls on the content. You know how draconian those content filters are at government-run schools? In all likelihood these will go on municipal broadband offerings, too.
If it's like any other government service, it will be poorly and insecurely run, slow to respond (for instance, blocking ports to stem the spread of viruses), and twice as expensive as anything else. And by the time it's in, we'll be stuck with it for the rest of eternity (Amtrak, anyone?).
Re:Does anyone else out there (Score:4, Insightful)
Not at all.
Government is bound by the constitution, and the first and fourth amendments should be easy to leverage into stopping those 'concerned mothers'. (Filters are legal in schools and libraries, because minors have very limited constitutional rights. Adults can ask the librarian/teacher to disable the filtering while they use the computer.)
Private companies, OTOH, have no such restrictions. Your local cable monopoly could decide to respond to those 'concerned mothers' and slap on a filter, and there would be nothing you could do about it. In theory you could switch to another provider, but in most places there's a monopoly on broadband.
If it's like any other government service, it will be poorly and insecurely run, slow to respond, and twice as expensive as anything else
Take a look at the history of municipal utilites that were privatized. The municipal service offered water, sewer and electric power for less than for-profit companies that replaced them. And they did operate in the black while doing it, and service was as reliable as private companies.
In a completely free market, I'd agree that government is bad, but in the case of utilites there is no free market.
Re:Does anyone else out there (Score:3, Informative)
Those books are open. And, in my experience, there is never any lack of picky people complaining. Private corps, by comparison, can hide any level of profit, gouging, or executive largess behind their closed books. And they can ignore any complaints.
If it's like any other government service, it will be poorly and insecurely run, slow to respond (for instance, blocking ports to stem the spread of viruses),
Trading one monopoly for another? (Score:4, Insightful)
Personally, where I live, I wouldn't mind seeing the gov't reeled in a bit. That way that can't force my neighbor (who is happy as a clam w/out broadband) to subsidize my broadband. If my broadband provider starts to suck, I'd like the option of not subsidizing someone else's broadband. I don't see any way to do this latter part if it's run by a gov't.
For a group of people strongly opposed to monopolies (e.g. micorosft), I don't really understand why you'd prefer to have some other monopoly (e.g. the local gov't) running your lives.
Is there something obvious that I'm missing?
Had this been applied to electricity... (Score:3, Informative)
We wouldn't have had the TVA, BPA and Rural electrification. Many rural areas would probably still be without electricity.
Interestingly enough, the Bush admin wants to get rid of the BPA (Bonneville Power Admin) that runs the dams in the Northwest. Doing so will amount to a 30% rate increase for electric customers in the Northwest. So much for the free market...
Larry says... (Score:3, Informative)
1.) This legislation is despicable.
2.) Don't take my word for it. Listen to Prof. Lessig's first podcast [lessig.org] for a thoroughly considered explanation of why this is not in our best interest.
Municipal Cable and Internet Parallels (Score:4, Interesting)
Municipal cable TV proposals aren't completely dead, they've just gone out of style. However, The city of Burlington, Vermont, is petitioning the state public service board (http://www.timesargus.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?
What do they want? If it's open markets, they should be willing to compete with municipal projects on a level playing field (i.e. one where the city can't subsidise their system through tax revenues).
If they champion "first-to-post" efficiency, then whoever builds the network first should be able to reap the benefits. Given government's alleged inefficiencies, that may mean that even if a city builds a cable or wireless network, they'd eventually have to sell it to a commercial provider if it becomes a liability to the city.
All it will take is one state allowing this before it becomes a national issue with a fight in Congress. The big cable companies are fighting this state to state at the moment, but Vermont is a very independent-minded state. IF they let Burlington proceed it wouldn't be the first time they've told an industry co-op to buzz off and set a precedent for any city that wants to do something similar either with cable or IP. I expect Adelphia to pull out every weapon they can find to stop them, but I'm hoping, as with the sign restriction laws, land development rules, and the non-returnable bottle ban, that Vermont holds its ground and lets Burlington take Adelphia on head to head.
They may ultimately fail, but I'd rather see them go down in a fair fight than see the project get bound, gagged, and tossed in Lake Champlain before it can get to the arena.
I live in Tallahassee, we already have Canopy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, just for reference: Comcast highspeed internet without cable, $55/month. Gotta love monopolies fighting tooth and nail to hang on to their huge profits.
Since Adam Smith, the balance has changed (Score:5, Interesting)
Case in point: in our town, Walmart wanted to build on a green field site. By the time they got around to it zoning rules had changed, but guess what? Our small municipality could not afford the legal fees to take on Walmart. Big corporate crushing small government.
And this is the same thing again. The fact is, if small municipalities can afford to provide broadband at reasonable rates, the private suppliers should easily be able to match them. Because private enterprise is so much more efficient than public enterprise, isn't it?
Well, pardon me while I beg to differ. Why should private enterprise, with its private airplanes, hugely overpaid execs, vast corporate dick-swinging-contest headquarters, and layers of management, be so much more efficient than small community efforts where the management overhead is minimal and the project manager isn't spending most of his or her time trying to do down the internal competition for the coveted corner office job?
Private enterprise is very good at delivering capital goods cheaply, but actually not always terribly good at delivering services cheaply.
It is hard to understand on what basis private companies have the right to prevent citizens banding together to co-operate on projects, whether it be putting up a community hall or a local broadband service. Perhaps a constitutional lawyer could explain it, but an expert on the cash flow of lobby companies might do better.
Freedom (Score:4, Insightful)
Individuals have all the same rights. But companies have more rights then individuals.
That's the so called democracy in the United States.
If the big boys aren't interested... (Score:3, Insightful)
If the cable/DSL duopoly isn't interested in serving an area, why should they get to whine when the local government steps in to fill the need? The demand is clearly present, or the city fathers wouldn't bother either.
Then add the provisions that apparently hinder public websites for city/county/state government, and you REALLY have to start wondering.
The problem here is two-fold (Score:3, Insightful)
The second issue is in the areas where the telecom monopolies are providing it, they are the only choice and are charging too much. If the government wants to get involved, contract out the data infrastructure. Don't leave it in the hands of a Verizon to control everything.
Which scenario is better?
Scenario A: Verizon runs fiber to my house. Verizon is my only choice of ISP. If I want another ISP, they have to run a separate fiber line to my house. Nuts!
Scenario B: Gov't awards job to contractor to run fiber to my house. I can choose from multiple ISP's for my service over this fiber.
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh wait, that would fall under anti-trust territory and we all know that "utilities" are basically exempt from that.
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:4, Insightful)
Nope - it's not about the money. It's about control. This would make my open WiFi node illegal, closing one of the few remaining anonymity gaps on the 'net.
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:3, Insightful)
"This would make my open WiFi node illegal, closing one of the few remaining anonymity gaps on the 'net."
Actually it would not. These are laws preventing governments from providing internet. This is about telcoms and cable providers not wanting to compete with governments for customers.
I kind of have mixed feelings about this. I am not sure I want to subsidise internet service on the government level. On the other hand, the information gap for low income people is a huge disadvantage in seeking empl
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately, in the majority of these markets it is not "free" enterprise, it is basically a monopoly. If the market can provide the cheaper/faster access people will choose it over the muni access.
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:3, Interesting)
I would argue that
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:5, Interesting)
I disagree with your opinion. :-)
But at least opinions can be changed with facts... it'd be worse if you blindly "believed" it, like many here do.
Thing is, there are areas where non-profit organizations (governments included) can and do provide cheaper (better, more efficient, more complete) service. These are mostly in areas of health care, education and infrastructure. For example, most other western countries are what many rightist politicans would consider "socialistic" health care: such systems provide for better coverage (everyone gets treated, no medical bankruptcy if you get cancer etc. etc.), at about half the price (per-capita health care spending ratio between US and other industrialized countries). Same applies to education (interestingly enough, even the cost ratio is about the same: 2-to-1 in favour of society-sponsored system). And in the infrastructure area (where municipal networks woudl be), even US has government run entities like US Post Office... so there has to be something good in there.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Exposes the lies to cost claims? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not just that they don't want municipalities competing against them -- they don't want groups competing against them who have open books.
Re:Exposes the lies to cost claims? (Score:3, Insightful)
These laws are not about "Community Groups" providing access. This is about the local government spending taxpayer money to compete with commercial providers for Internet access.
Build a Broadband Co-Op! Just don't make the taxpayer pay for it.
Re:Exposes the lies to cost claims? (Score:4, Interesting)
For the most part, it takes something the size of a municipality to put together something that size. Most of these companies already have government-mandated control of our communication -- that's really not too far from tax capability.
Adam Smith considered big business to be roughly the same as big government... Both result in centralized planning, local market inflexibility and sucking capital out of the local market.
A municipal communicatins corporation provides local control of communications capability.
I grew up in Edmonton, Alberta. Ever since the dawn of the Telephone era, they had a municipal telephon company -- once again started because the big players didn't consider a small town in the middle of the praries (early 1900's) worth investing in. The company ran at a profit, and helped to lower Edmonton's taxes.
Now it's owned by Telus -- a multi-provincial conglomerate partly owned by MCI. I really don't see much of an advantage in the new setup.
Some people seem to think that large corporations have some sort of constitutional right to profit -- they don't. The original purpose of corprations was to pool community resources to provide a service to the community. Whether those pooled resources come from Bill Gate's Windows Tax, or a municipal levy doesn't make much of a difference to my pocket book -- either way the money's gonna be coming out of my pocket. With a municipal company, at least most of the profit and control is going to stay local.
If a company feels that my community is worth investing in, then they should do it -- now. If they're not willing to do so, then they shouldn't be getting in the way of anybody else providing the service that they're not willing to -- governmental or otherwise.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:3, Funny)
Urggh? "Little Sally" must be one tough little girl. And you left out:
5) Profit!!!
Re:Like I have always known... (Score:3, Interesting)
Adding a new set of wires to the poles behind my house is a trivial expense compared to the cost of digging up my street and laying new water pipes. The pole behind my house has two cables for two companies and there are only limited barriers to adding new cables. Water distribution is a classic example of a natural monopoly [cmu.edu]. The monopoly exists because of the cost structure of providing the good, not because of government regulations. In fact, the
Shouldn't it be my choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
Whether I do or don't is immaterial.
The real question is:
As a resident, as a citizen, isn't it my right to empower my local government to deliver WiFi/Broadband if I desires?
Perhaps I think my local government does do a good job delivering services.
To me, the argument about essential versus non-essential services is interesting, but not at all relevant to the discussion here.
Come on, where are the responsible citizens? (Score:3, Insightful)
We are the government. We hold the power (responsibility?) to change things. If the government was considering building a municipal network in your area, as a technologically adept citizen, what would stop you from getting ahold of the people responsible, and having a sit-down talk with them about the proper way to do it? What would stop you from volunteering to administer or advise this project? What
...and your head is in the clouds. (Score:3, Funny)
You have 3 or 4 sets of DSL and cable wires running into your house? That sounds great. There are parts of New York City that totally lack DSL and cable. In 2005. I wonder why, after so many years? Surely the free market would not let such a need go unfilled!