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The internet should be a public utility

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Re: The internet should be a public utility

#191

Post by hiram112 »

threentaway wrote: post #173
kekeblom wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The city of Zurich has what to my understanding is public fiber which is available to most buildings. (I assume there are some exceptions). It is managed by the electricity company run by the city. https://zuerinet.ch Setting up routers, billing etc. has been delegated to any third party ISP willing to do the job. I think they can charge what they want, as there are some very small differences in price. I pay ~44CHF/…

> ~44CHF/month for 100mb/s. While not dirt cheap That _is_ dirt cheap by US prices. Comcast (my only option) is $75/mo for 250/5 (yes, only 5 megabit up!).

That's approximately $46 USD, which is actually in line with most cable companies when you are a new customer.

Of course, they get you by turning that $45 for 100Mb down with the modem rental for $10 / month, the 'fees' and taxes that are another $10 / month. Then, after your 'introductory' prices expire, you end up at $70 / month for the same 100Mb. But listen to this - a deal you can't refuse when your intro prices expire: They will sell you a 'bundle' with included cable TV for the same price of $70.

And now you're looking at the original $70... plus digital box fee of $10 / month x 2 or 3 outlets, and also another $5 for sports programming fees you never watch, DV recorder boxes for all the outlets, so you can record that one show, and even an HBO Go trial that was 'free' for 6 months, but then turns into a $10 / month recurring charge.

And this is how the average household in America ends up paying $150 / month, when all they really wanted in the first place was a $40 /100MB internet connection. Unless you're making below poverty rates, where the telecoms are forced to offer you a basic internet plan for under $20, you're going to get screwed because there is no way to get just decent internet without all the add-ons.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#192

Post by AnthonyMouse »

est31 wrote: post #123
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The danger with government nationalizing telecommunications networks is that once it is done, innovation and quality go way down. Who needs nationalization? The market for transit is reasonably competitive. Local municipalities could install fiber along the roads they already maintain at a modest incremental cost, then offer the service to residents for a monthly fee to pay off the bonds without even spending any t…

Starlink does require towers because the data has to be beamed back to the ground. The more bandwidth you serve in an area, the more towers you need. However, in areas with low bandwidth demands where cellular towers are currently as dense as they are in order to reach every part of the area, Starlink does make sense. Starlink, Cellular and ground based internet serve different points on the density /mobility curve.

> Starlink does require towers because the data has to be beamed back to the ground. The more bandwidth you serve in an area, the more towers you need.

That's a ground station, not towers. The "towers" are the satellites. And the number of grounds stations you need doesn't really have much to do with how much bandwidth you use, because they can use directional wireless or laser communications at higher power levels than ordinary devices, so they're not the bottleneck.

The reason to have a large number of ground stations is so that there is one within range no matter where a satellite is. But they have plans to build an inter-satellite mesh that would remove that requirement as well:

https://hackaday.com/2019/05/20/everything-we-know-about-spa...

In principle if they wanted to serve a higher density area they would need more satellites so they could each cover less area, but that's not really its purpose. Dense areas can more than justify a fiber network. What the satellites get you is world-wide coverage from one network, particularly including the places that don't have existing coverage because their density is too low.

And the combination of that doesn't leave much left for cellular to do. You have a very high bandwidth fiber connection at home, at work, backing the wifi in any kind of a hotel or coffee house, and then Starlink for when you're in a rural area or in a car and you want to look at a map but aren't near any of those. What's left for cellular?

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#193

Post by dantheman »

coldpie wrote: post #39
tarde wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Her argument is that ~20 mbps DSL is good enough that is insane. How having no internet is fine because 20mbps is enough? That could be a good argument against fiber (which i also think is overkill, decent cooper is lower maintenance and with enough repeaters as good as) but it is hardly an argument against it being available to all as a public utility. > And, by the way, the FCC thinks I have a dozen options for b…

> from the bush-omaba-trump admin become the most corrupt organization one can think of I don't know whether they were corrupt, but Tom Wheeler did a fantastic job from a consumer rights & Internet health perspective during the Obama admin. Most notably he implemented Title II regulations to enforce net neutrality (since undone by a Republican), but also supported municipal broadband (since undone by a Republican), f…

Yeah we should encourage executive overreach - clearly title II was not for the internet and the FCC has no role. If congress wants to give them that role - then that is the job of congress.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#194

Post by [deleted] »

threentaway wrote: post #173
kekeblom wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The city of Zurich has what to my understanding is public fiber which is available to most buildings. (I assume there are some exceptions). It is managed by the electricity company run by the city. https://zuerinet.ch Setting up routers, billing etc. has been delegated to any third party ISP willing to do the job. I think they can charge what they want, as there are some very small differences in price. I pay ~44CHF/…

> ~44CHF/month for 100mb/s. While not dirt cheap That _is_ dirt cheap by US prices. Comcast (my only option) is $75/mo for 250/5 (yes, only 5 megabit up!).

[deleted]

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#195

Post by rascul »

threentaway wrote: post #173
kekeblom wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The city of Zurich has what to my understanding is public fiber which is available to most buildings. (I assume there are some exceptions). It is managed by the electricity company run by the city. https://zuerinet.ch Setting up routers, billing etc. has been delegated to any third party ISP willing to do the job. I think they can charge what they want, as there are some very small differences in price. I pay ~44CHF/…

> ~44CHF/month for 100mb/s. While not dirt cheap That _is_ dirt cheap by US prices. Comcast (my only option) is $75/mo for 250/5 (yes, only 5 megabit up!).

$50/month here for me in southern Mississippi for gigabit fiber from AT&T. I'm not sure what dirt cheap is for internet in the US but I think I'm there.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#196

Post by mr_toad »

jessriedel wrote: post #180
cbhl wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I daresay, it's even worse than that. Your neighbors are actively fighting against the installation of infrastructure that would enable faster internet speeds. AT&T tried to bring FTTN to San Francisco years ago, but neighbors decried the "ugly" green boxes that would run down the street. Boxes that are standard in literally any suburb with fast internet. There are limited parts of the bay area with gigabit fiber, in…

It's so crazy because if you have ever seen the same neighborhood with and without power lines, the difference is dramatic. Power lines are horrendously ugly. But after people got use to them, they can barely be bothered to pay 10% extra on their power bill for the lines to be buried. Likewise, people would instantly forget about the green boxes after a few year.

> Power lines are horrendously ugly.

So is the 20 foot wide expanse of dirty tar next to the power lines. But people have lived with that all their lives, and barely notice it.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#197

Post by marcusverus »

joveian wrote: post #132
marcusverus wrote: post #18

Has the author never heard of the Lifeline Program for Low-Income Consumers (aka Obamaphones)? This program already provides a benefit designed to provide free access to mobile internet. The $10 per month subsidy may not seem like much, but it'll buy you ~1Gb per month via Tracfone, for example. It's important to note that this program includes a requirement that "Obamaphones" be hot-spot enabled so that they can be…

I've had that and a major issue is that the $10/month covers both phone and internet, not just internet. The combined plan I had was supposed to include 500MB per month internet but I'm fairly sure hot-spot was not enabled and direct tethering was certainly not enabled. Also the phones are extremely locked down and don't even allow USB audio devices. The $10/month can be used towards a more expensive plan which is wh…

Lifeline currently pays separate subsidies for voice and data, see the link from my first post.

The quality of device has nothing to do with lifeline, which is device agnostic. The author's stated solution is also device agnostic.

As for concerns about bandwidth, they're kind of bunk, IMO. The argument by the author is that basic internet access is necessary to function in today's world, and Lifeline already exists for the express purpose of meeting that that need. A free-tier service doesn't have to be Netflix-friendly to be a success.

I think the issues you're attributing to corruption are just as easily explained by the low cost of the service. Whenever you're consuming a service at the lowest possible price point on the market, your experience will very likely be worse than the average, curruption or no.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#198

Post by marcusverus »

lostmsu wrote: post #22
marcusverus wrote: post #18

Has the author never heard of the Lifeline Program for Low-Income Consumers (aka Obamaphones)? This program already provides a benefit designed to provide free access to mobile internet. The $10 per month subsidy may not seem like much, but it'll buy you ~1Gb per month via Tracfone, for example. It's important to note that this program includes a requirement that "Obamaphones" be hot-spot enabled so that they can be…

1G is not enough. Dial-up would let you get more.

The author isn't arguing that people need access to the internet so that they can binge Netflix or venture down the YouTube rabbithole. The tug-at-the-heart-strings examples that the author used to justify her pet project are all easily fulfilled with 1GB per month.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#199

Post by harryh »

coldpie wrote: post #44
sneak wrote: post #29

I'm not sure that I want the government in a position to be a single point of control for which websites I can or cannot access.

This is a blatant violation of the 1st amendment. You are at more risk of this from private entities, who are not bound by the 1st amendment.

There are numerous content restrictions on broadcast television that have been found legal despite the 1st amendment.

Re: The internet should be a public utility

#200

Post by [deleted] »

cbhl wrote: post #95
zbrozek wrote: post #4

I talked with the mayor of Los Altos Hills, CA yesterday where I advocated for a municipal fiber ISP. It seems crazy to me that in Silicon Valley, and specifically in one of its richest towns, that broadband is not available to every residence. She makes a good point: the residents don't care. Her argument is that ~20 mbps DSL is good enough for the elderly population. And further - that for those who find that inade…

I daresay, it's even worse than that. Your neighbors are actively fighting against the installation of infrastructure that would enable faster internet speeds. AT&T tried to bring FTTN to San Francisco years ago, but neighbors decried the "ugly" green boxes that would run down the street. Boxes that are standard in literally any suburb with fast internet. There are limited parts of the bay area with gigabit fiber, in…

[deleted]
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