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A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

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Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#121

Post by treis »

bob1029 wrote: post #107
x87678r wrote: post #74

I'm not convinced Comcast is ripping off everyone as much as everyone says. USA is a big country and its expensive to wire everyone up. Lots of companies around have tried including Google who basically decided its easier to do make money from ads and self driving cars rather than wiring up neighborhoods and dealing with local regulations. The ISPs and cell networks actually do the hard and expensive work of installi…

I know its a rhetorical question but I very much prefer having shares of CMCSA/VZ/T over the alternatives. I've always viewed Google, Facebook, Twitter, et. al. as very "soft" companies in terms of their competitive advantage. AT&T literally owns parts of the electromagnetic spectrum for their exclusive use. This is a completely different dimension of advantage.

The market disagrees with you. Any one of the GAFAMs is worth more than all the ISPs in the US put together. And that's with those ISPs largely being conglomerates that own other businesses outside of being an ISP.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#122

Post by ogre_codes »

Spivak wrote: post #116
ogre_codes wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this is a Dem versus Rep thing. Local corruption issues like this usually end up boiling down to following the money. Many municipal broadband projects end up being scrapped after lobbyists $$ get involved regardless of who is running the show.

It's less that lobbyists are involved but that "why go through the effort of setting up municipal broadband when we (AT&T/Spectrum) are more than happy to work with you and come to an agreement about serving your area." I'm not confident that municipal broadband will ever really take off in the US but I think local loop unbundling might have a chance since I'm sure companies are more than happy to unload all the expe…

Usually that is lobbying.

Company X: "We'd like to meet with you to discuss how we can service your community better than municipal broadband. Our representative is going to be in Hawaii for the next 3 weeks and we'd be more than willing to fly you and your family out to meet with him. Of course it's inconvenient for you to travel so we'd provide for hotel and airfare."

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#123

Post by nostrademons »

rayiner wrote: post #85
nostromo wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We see this so often now I'm starting to think it's an intentional strategy. Step 1: create conditions that prevent capitalism from solving a problem. Step 2: declare that capitalism has failed and call for government solutions.

I don't know about intentional, but I think it's unfortunately common. I think housing is the most egregious example. I live in a neighborhood filled with millennial parents who have their own detached homes and fairly modest jobs (mix of college/non-college). Meanwhile, my lawyer friends earning six figures feel like they can't afford homes or to start families. The difference is that they live in heavily regulated…

To add to jjoonathan's point, I'll share an interesting observation about the Bay Area housing market:

The Bay Area has a number of little-known unincorporated enclaves that are often located within incorporated cities. Places like Devonshire (San Carlos), Emerald Hills (Redwood City), the unincorporated strip of San Carlos Ave (San Jose), Ladera or Los Trancos Woods (Portola Valley), Castro Valley and San Lorenzo (Hayward/Oakland). I've noticed that in today's hot market, houses in those areas consistently go for anything for $0-150K under asking, while houses in the nearby cities go for $150-500K over asking. A typical swing in purchase price for equivalent homes in nearly equivalent locations is about $300K (on prices of about $1.8-2.2M).

The usual real-estate confounders don't apply here because the geographic locations are so similar. The fire danger is roughly equivalent (but high): places like Devonshire and Emerald Hills are inside of 280, and right next door to equally flammable but more expensive houses in Belmont, San Carlos, and Redwood City. Commute times are basically identical, if anything a little shorter. There's less regulation for building, but not much more additional supply of land since these are constrained enclaves.

It seems like buyers are willing to pay a premium specifically to get city services and city regulation. Instead of the free market being impeded, this is the free market speaking: buyers are paying a premium to live in areas where there are more services and more regulation.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#124

Post by Robotbeat »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #78
Robotbeat wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do need and can have multiple fleets up there. OneWeb has already launched a bunch of satellites, and there is enough room up there for several more, particularly as operators get better at safely operating them.

I would agree, but I've seen the mess that e-scooter organisations have made of this. The city is littered with e-scooters whose name changes every few months. If the business plan doesn't work out, who cleans up the satellites?

The satellites have to have ability to do a commanded deorbit. Additionally, at the altitudes Starlink operates at, if there’s a problem with the commanded deorbit, the satellites will naturally deorbit in a reasonable time.

EDIT:OneWeb operates at higher altitudes where if there's a failure, the satellite will stay there for hundreds of years, but to try to mitigate that a bit, they added a grappling fixture/fiducial to try to make it easier for a robotic deorbiting craft to capture it.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#125

Post by crusso »

InitialLastName wrote: post #106
nostromo wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We see this so often now I'm starting to think it's an intentional strategy. Step 1: create conditions that prevent capitalism from solving a problem. Step 2: declare that capitalism has failed and call for government solutions.

This is a strategy we see from both sides. From the other perspective: Step 1: Create conditions that prevent the government from solving a problem. Step 2: Declare that the public sector has failed and call for privatization.

You're claiming a "both sides" problem in a system with extraordinary power imbalances.

Businesses in a free market aren't writing laws and regulations that can put people in jail. With government's great power should come an acknowledgement that it must solve the problems it claims it can, in the way it claims it can, or back the hell off.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#126

Post by quibbler »

InitialLastName wrote: post #106
nostromo wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We see this so often now I'm starting to think it's an intentional strategy. Step 1: create conditions that prevent capitalism from solving a problem. Step 2: declare that capitalism has failed and call for government solutions.

This is a strategy we see from both sides. From the other perspective: Step 1: Create conditions that prevent the government from solving a problem. Step 2: Declare that the public sector has failed and call for privatization.

How do you create such conditions if you are not the government? Who does the creating?

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#127

Post by biggermike »

908B64B197 wrote: post #4

I'm always surprised this isn't discussed more. Big tech is accused of being monopolistic, but there is a constant flow of new players in the field, all gaining market shares and building the Next Big Thing, while telecom providers are pretty stagnant. I'm curious why cities don't directly lay down the infrastructure work for broadband access. In some cases that might raise property value enough that the town could m…

Big tech has big profit margins. Big telecom services doesn't.

Competitors don't enter the industry because there's little money to be made. The only way you make money by starting an independent ISP right now is by serving some niche clientele e.g. serving wireless internet to events at locations without enough broadband access.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#129

Post by 908B64B197 »

wstrange wrote: post #103
908B64B197 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are pretty hostile to international players setting shops. In such a non-competitive environment, it's no wonder rent seeking is the norm. Edit: I see the downvotes but no explanations.

The explanation is largely the same as in the US: It's very expensive to run cable / fibre to the house. It's a natural monopoly. Having a US incumbent enter the Canadian market isn't going to change that.

I could see why lobbyists would push that narrative, but deregulation and an open market worked extremely well in Europe.

Re: A tech antitrust problem no one is talking about: US broadband providers

#130

Post by joshAg »

mikepurvis wrote: post #93
joshAg wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because america is so anti-socialist. No, seriously. And it's the same reason why PG&E does such a shit job of maintaining their infrastructure, too. Letting anyone tear up the street to run their own wires whenever they want isn't feasible. From a competitor perspective,that's super expensive and a massive capital investment, so any preexisting competitor with a large enough warchest could just lower their competing…

I'm not sure exactly what the legal framework is around it, but Canada's monopoly network operators (Rogers for coax, Bell for copper) are I believe required to sell bulk bandwidth to MVNO-style carriers. I've been a long-time TekSavvy customer, and certainly I get way better pricing from them than I would buying equivalent service directly from Rogers. And for what it's worth, when I tracert out of my house, the ver…

There used to be something similar around telephone lines in the US, where bell had to let competitors use the lines at cost or something similar, but that way tends to lie madness because of fights over what the actual cost of maintenance of the infra is and how much of that cost should be borne by the actual owner and how much they can charge middlemen carriers (for lack of better term).

It's extra sad because it didn't have to be this way for internet, but the US chose to privatise public internet infra back under clinton and then double and tripled down under bush. Meanwhile, it still maintains at least 1 set of infra for itself (I don't know if siprnet and jwics use separate cables).

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