Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 131 posts

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#51

Post by ksk »

spott wrote: post #13
ksk wrote: post #8

I dislike Comcast as much as the next guy, but are we really betting on a government project to stay within budget as well as provide a high quality of service? Just digging a tunnel in Seattle took us $2 billion dollars! Instead of setting this up as the "government internet" - which is going to make it super political, why not just have the public own the 'last mile', and then let private companies plug into the gr…

There are a number of well done municipal internet projects around the country that have done just that: Chattanooga, Tennessee; Longmont, Colorado; Salt Lake City, Utah to name just a few. For more: https://muninetworks.org/communitymap

Thanks for the link. I will have to spend time researching to understand how successful they are.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#52

Post by markshead »

yardie wrote: post #14
ksk wrote: post #8

I dislike Comcast as much as the next guy, but are we really betting on a government project to stay within budget as well as provide a high quality of service? Just digging a tunnel in Seattle took us $2 billion dollars! Instead of setting this up as the "government internet" - which is going to make it super political, why not just have the public own the 'last mile', and then let private companies plug into the gr…

> Just digging a tunnel in Seattle took us $2 billion dollars! Did the government dig those tunnels? No they hired a contractor who sold them on one price and then sent them a bill for a much higher price. So much for private enterprise saving the taxpayer money. > why not just have the public own the 'last mile', and then let private companies plug into the grid? This is how most municipal broadband works right now.…

> You, the ISP, rent the fiber from them.

Where is this being done? The cities I've seen that are doing municipal broadband like Chatanooga are actually in the ISP business. (as far as I understood)

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#54

Post by ksk »

mgaruccio wrote: post #18
ksk wrote: post #8

I dislike Comcast as much as the next guy, but are we really betting on a government project to stay within budget as well as provide a high quality of service? Just digging a tunnel in Seattle took us $2 billion dollars! Instead of setting this up as the "government internet" - which is going to make it super political, why not just have the public own the 'last mile', and then let private companies plug into the gr…

It doesn't HAVE to be super political, there are municipal water, sewer, electric, and gas utilities all over the country and they are very rarely politicized. If you consider broadband a basic need (I do) then it makes sense for it to be provided by the community just like those other utilities.

What isn't and is politicized is not a logical deduction, nor is it rational. Its emotional.

>If you consider broadband a basic need (I do) then it makes sense

I don't think having such a simple gating mechanism for prescribing government policy makes much sense. I also consider food to be a basic need, but I don't want a government cheeseburger.

Like I said, I'm all for the public owning the last mile and then the private players compete.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#55

Post by krakenkode »

rockostrich wrote: post #38
stilldavid wrote: post #5

Best phone call I've made in the past few years was canceling my ~$100 Comcast internet plan in favor of my municipality's $50 gigabit plan. A year in and haven't had so much as a hiccup in service.

I'm switching to RCN this weekend because I just realized it's the same price as my current service except gigabit instead of my current 150 mbps plan. I'm not sure why I never looked into it before. Sadly it's not municipal, but it's still better than throwing money away on Comcast.

I moved to a new apartment and made the switch as well (Previously had comcast/verizon/cox/century link). RCN has been excellent in Chicago. $45/month for Gigabit internet and other BS charges. Customer service is also the best. I called them because they charged me an installation fee by accident and waived it immediately no questions asked. Can't honestly ask for any better than that.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#56

Post by [deleted] »

hood_syntax wrote: post #4
bpicolo wrote: post #2

Good. Municipal broadband is only a thing because Comcast services are terribly below par

I've never understood this. If you have a real or de-facto monopoly, why would you jeopardize it by providing poor service/overpricing your product? That just draws attention to the situation. Keep things reasonable and it's a lot harder for people to make noise because the majority will be fine with the way things are.

[deleted]

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#57

Post by xir78 »

ender89 wrote: post #16

I mean, duh. They basically have a monopoly and a license to print money right now. they can't make the same profit margins they have been if they have to compete with local municipal providers who aren't based on a profit model unless those local providers are so incompetent that they can't deliver reliable fast internet to their area. Comcast can't do price hikes and data caps and generally continue treating their…

It’s hard to imagine what more incompetent than Comcast would look like, the dial is already at 9 or 10 for troubleshooting their own internal technical problems with home internet service, they happily leave you for weeks without service, lose your billing info and not notify you, typo MACs ad tell you to physically visit their office to fix backend typos.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#58

Post by ams6110 »

ender89 wrote: post #16

I mean, duh. They basically have a monopoly and a license to print money right now. they can't make the same profit margins they have been if they have to compete with local municipal providers who aren't based on a profit model unless those local providers are so incompetent that they can't deliver reliable fast internet to their area. Comcast can't do price hikes and data caps and generally continue treating their…

Agree, in most places the cable company has a monopoly or close to it. But why do we think giving the municipality a monopoly is better?

Every municipal service I can think of is overstaffed and inefficient compared to private businesses.

The "nickle and diming" is just moved to tax rates and fees that are under the radar for most people.

Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I think you'd be surprised.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#59

Post by rayiner »

ams6110 wrote: post #58
ender89 wrote: post #16

I mean, duh. They basically have a monopoly and a license to print money right now. they can't make the same profit margins they have been if they have to compete with local municipal providers who aren't based on a profit model unless those local providers are so incompetent that they can't deliver reliable fast internet to their area. Comcast can't do price hikes and data caps and generally continue treating their…

Agree, in most places the cable company has a monopoly or close to it. But why do we think giving the municipality a monopoly is better? Every municipal service I can think of is overstaffed and inefficient compared to private businesses. The "nickle and diming" is just moved to tax rates and fees that are under the radar for most people. Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I t…

> Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I think you'd be surprised.

We should make franchising requirements illegal at the federal level. There is no need for them, and all they do is artificially limit competition. Even though the franchises are, by law, non-exclusive, the terms for getting a franchise are usually onerous enough that nobody but the incumbent is willing to put up with them.

Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off

#60

Post by rayiner »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #6
bpicolo wrote: post #2

Good. Municipal broadband is only a thing because Comcast services are terribly below par

Just about every internet provider has shitty service. Time Warner Cable - the only option in many parts of New York City - is the bane of our existence. Literally, literally every time we move, we've tried to cancel the internet at our old apartment and set it up at our new apartment - and had them end up canceling the internet at the new place. (What happens with the old internet is different every time; either it…

> Just about every internet provider has shitty service.

ISP operations are very locally run, so the service quality is pretty random. I've had Verizon FiOS for four years, and it's been rock solid. I had one outage a few years ago, and they sent a tech out the same day to replace the failing ONT. And except for some recent growing pains with gigabit, I've gotten 10% over my rated speed at all times of day.

Post reply on HN