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Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

arstechnica.com

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Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#31

Post by cgeier »

qwe----3 wrote: post #21
TrueGeek wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: he had $2.6MM in help from the "American Rescue Plan's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds". He's being paid by the government to bring Internet access to homes in the state that aren't currently wired for it.

That bill and these types of projects are basically why we have 10% inflation now.

How does spending a lot of government money make goods and service more expensive?

EDIT: At least here in Western Europe, we mostly have a supply side inflation, because energy got a lot more expensive, not because the government has been "printing" a lot of money. I suspect it's the same in the US.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#32

Post by LetsGetTechnicl »

qwe----3 wrote: post #21
TrueGeek wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: he had $2.6MM in help from the "American Rescue Plan's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds". He's being paid by the government to bring Internet access to homes in the state that aren't currently wired for it.

That bill and these types of projects are basically why we have 10% inflation now.

Inflation isn't at 10% but it seems like investing in infrastructure is a good idea. If we needed to pinch pennies we could start at the bloated military budget

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#33

Post by Bloating »

TrueGeek wrote: post #17
fourthark wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At $55/mo, he'll start making a profit in 45 years.

From the article: he had $2.6MM in help from the "American Rescue Plan's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds". He's being paid by the government to bring Internet access to homes in the state that aren't currently wired for it.

Gotta pay your fair share, so it can be granted out for someone elses gain

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#34

Post by kombucha13 »

qwe----3 wrote: post #21
TrueGeek wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: he had $2.6MM in help from the "American Rescue Plan's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds". He's being paid by the government to bring Internet access to homes in the state that aren't currently wired for it.

That bill and these types of projects are basically why we have 10% inflation now.

That doesn't make any sense.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#36

Post by bombcar »

dataflow wrote: post #18
the_only_law wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if it’s what the person in question did, but there’s a whole guide that pops up on here occasionally regarding building a wireless ISP. https://startyourownisp.com/

I can't find any section of that guide that talks about peering or whatever ISPs are supposed to do to connect to the broader internet. Do you see any step that explains this?

As a small ISP you don't peer - you just buy transit from a bigger ISP. So the basic steps are:

1. Buy a 1G/1G or 10G/10G whatever link to a building you own.

2. Resell that link in parts to customers.

Or you can get yourself into a POP (point of presence) somewhere that multiple providers are also in, and get transit that way. Depends on where you are and what you can get access to.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#37

Post by q3k »

dataflow wrote: post #28
haunter wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the 2nd step https://startyourownisp.com/posts/fiber-provider/ If you just Google then it's usually called leased or dedicated internet Just some (US) examples https://www.business.att.com/products/att-dedicated-internet... https://business.comcast.com/learn/internet/dedicated-intern... https://www.verizon.com/business/products/internet/internet-...

So they're leasing ("buying"?) fiber from the same ISPs they're trying to displace and relying on that payment to provide them with continued internet access? This doesn't sound like a real first-class ISP, but something akin to an MVNO where they're at the mercy of the same companies they're competing with. I get the initial sale might seem fine, and the established ISPs might be fine with this as long as the compan…

You can lease fibre/lambda/L2 transport to an IXP (and there peer with other local ISPs and get global transit from Tier 1 providers) from many companies that don't even have any residential offering.

Or if (technically/financially/legally) possible, even run your own fibre to a PoP housing an IXP on your own.

Once you're in multiple PoPs and on multiple IXPs and with multiple upstreams/peers you're pretty much independent from the whims of a single ISP.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#39

Post by bombcar »

dataflow wrote: post #28
haunter wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the 2nd step https://startyourownisp.com/posts/fiber-provider/ If you just Google then it's usually called leased or dedicated internet Just some (US) examples https://www.business.att.com/products/att-dedicated-internet... https://business.comcast.com/learn/internet/dedicated-intern... https://www.verizon.com/business/products/internet/internet-...

So they're leasing ("buying"?) fiber from the same ISPs they're trying to displace and relying on that payment to provide them with continued internet access? This doesn't sound like a real first-class ISP, but something akin to an MVNO where they're at the mercy of the same companies they're competing with. I get the initial sale might seem fine, and the established ISPs might be fine with this as long as the compan…

Because it's all business to them, and if they did it overtly they could get sued.

But also because once you're in a single location, you can pretty easily get multiple providers to that location for a Price, so there's really no point. Even small rural towns usually have multiple internet connections from different companies, and if they don't you can pay to run fiber if you really wanted to.

People find it hard to believe, but Comcast et al are actually businesses, not Satan's marketing department; and they happily take money even from "competitors".

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#40

Post by moffkalast »

kevmo314 wrote: post #23
the_only_law wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if it’s what the person in question did, but there’s a whole guide that pops up on here occasionally regarding building a wireless ISP. https://startyourownisp.com/

From https://startyourownisp.com/posts/fiber-provider/ , doesn't this site basically say connect to another ISP?

Well there three tiers of ISPs, each one buying service from the one above them. It's ISPs all the way down, and the higher up you go the more expensive the hardware to run it gets.
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