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

Post by darkwizard42 » Tue, Nov 03, 2020, 10:11 PM UTC

biggermike wrote: post #127

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.

Post by rayiner » Tue, Nov 03, 2020, 10:18 PM UTC

woodruffw wrote: post #169

rayiner wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, programs get cut or funded based on various political considerations, and there might be cuts some years and growth other years. And there is a deliberate attempt to stymie provision of abortion services. That's a fair point. But overall, education spending consistently goes up over time: https://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/10facts/index.html#ch... > On a per-pupil basis and adjusted for inflation, public sc…

Maybe this is a nitpick, but: it can be both true that per-pupil spending goes up and that spending on social programs via the DOEd goes down. A concrete example: the current DOEd has increased funding of both charter and private schools. We can go back and forth on whether elements of that constitute social programs, but I think the point about it not being tied to the larger funding trend stands.

Post by jcims » Tue, Nov 03, 2020, 10:32 PM UTC

wrycoder wrote: post #171

jcims wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, got DSL at my current location in 2008 and they haven't upgraded anything since then. Very minor bump in peak bw they would configure, I'm at 15M/768k and that's as high as it goes. Network is garbage though and lots of time it's saturated upstream. $30K to run fiber to the DSLAM...if it was a fiber fed box I could probably get enough neighbors on board to swing it...but no.

I got my DSL in 2010. 1.5Mb/688Kb. No change in ten years. Also, I get dropped and reconnected every couple of days to a DSLAM channel running at 20Kb (!) down and have to reboot the modem to get back to 1.5Mb.

Post by maest » Tue, Nov 03, 2020, 10:38 PM UTC

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #90

marcus_holmes wrote: post #26

This is such a weird thing. After spending time in SE Asia, where bandwidth is cheap and plentiful (in the cities), it's painful coming back to Europe (and Australia). I'm in Berlin atm, and the wifi is shit, bandwidth is expensive and unreliable. And the phone plans suck. I was in Perth (Australia) before that, and access there is terrible. In Cambodia, 120Gb (per week) of download cost me US$1 (per week) over good-…

European cafes won't even give you tap water (even if you have bought other stuff) for free, let alone free wifi.

Post by exabrial » Tue, Nov 03, 2020, 10:38 PM UTC

bosswipe wrote: post #184

exabrial wrote: post #177

The problem is the proposed solutions really just entrench existing providers, specifically net neutrality policies: They legalize monopolies as long as they're "following the rules!" _You_ _cannot_ _legislate_ _good_ _behavior_ _into_ _monopolies_. So while I appreciate the spirit of Net Neutrality rules, the solution is fundamentally flawed. Let's say you want to open an ISP in your neighborhood. Based on their his…

> _You_ _cannot_ _legislate_ _good_ _behavior_ _into_ _monopolies_ Why not? Yes, breaking up monopolies is good but that doesn't mean we can't regulate industries before the point where things get so bad that there is enough political will to break them up.