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

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431–439 of 439 posts

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

#431
post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wasn't Cat6 or Cat7 enough? Do you think it was worth spending that much for fiber at home? Also, do you have any problems with the connectivity or damages? If it is damaged, can you fix it yourself?

Not only cat6 or cat7 wouldn't have worked at a length of 1000 feet (one would need repeaters, which can and did fail, see my initial post), but it wouldn't have saved much money. The bulk of the cost was in the labor to hand-dig a trench through rocky soil while avoiding multiple buried utilities. Also, cat6 and cat7 would have been slower at 1 Gbps (10 Gbps is impossible at 1000 feet with repeaters). My fiber cable…

Thank you.

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

#432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People used to subscribe to fire service, or ambulance service. It doesn't work, and is also bad for society. That's interesting - FEMA says that 70% of the fire departments in the US are all-volunteer, and >90% have a volunteer component. https://apps.usfa.fema.gov/registry/summary#g I've lived in areas with volunteer fire departments that paid for their operations primarily with "fire dues" for most of my life. A…

Subscription fire departments and volunteer fire departments aren't the same thing. I know all about volunteer fire departments, and have worked with them in the past. Subscription fire departments were commercial entities, sometimes run by insurance companies, to which you paid a regular subscription fee. If you house was on fire, they'd extinguish the flames. If your neighbor's house was on fire, and they didn't su…

That’s literally how it works in much of the rural South. You pay fire dues, or they will only act to save human life. Otherwise they’ll watch your house burn to the ground with you.

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

#434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is literally exactly what would happen. It need not be blood thirst motivation; simple profit dynamics are enough to ensure this outcome.

keep on dreaming

Good thing you will never find out.

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

#435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are probably not actually hosted on AS2. Bad actors can inject garbage into BGP AS paths, either accidentally or deliberately.

Bad actors aren’t blacklisted for repeatedly injecting garbage?

Maybe? Sometimes? It probably depends if what they're doing causes operational issues. BGP is primarily a trust based system. Many upstreams have filters to limit route announcements from their downstream / customer ASes, but at its core, it is trust based.

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

#436
post #345

>"I have at least two homes where I have to build a half-mile to get to one house," Mauch said, noting that it will cost "over $30,000 for each of those homes to get served." is this really a valuable use of taxpayer money? sending a wireless link over a half-mile isn't that difficult, surely there's a better way to spend $60k of public money than delivering internet service to two families. especially now that starl…

Especially since he's burying the lede about the people he's servicing--its true 'in general' that the area is lower income, but most of the homes he's serving will be millionaires.

Washtenaw is certainly an affluent county, but not that rich. I live in another part of the county and used to work in Mauch's part of it; it's by no means mostly millionaires. I think the simplicity of the project's goal -- every household served, no exceptions -- is one of the reasons that it got off the ground.

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

#437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bad actors aren’t blacklisted for repeatedly injecting garbage?

Maybe? Sometimes? It probably depends if what they're doing causes operational issues. BGP is primarily a trust based system. Many upstreams have filters to limit route announcements from their downstream / customer ASes, but at its core, it is trust based.

It’s hardly trust based if enforcement against those who break the trust is so sporadic.

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

#438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> -- customers who don't behave as well or kindly as before Easy. Refuse service. You aren't legally obligated to offer your service to assholes. Any business has the right to do or not do business with whoever they want, provided they’re not refusing service for a reason that violates local, state, or federal law. > -- customers who need 24 hour customer service Also easy. You are under no obligation to meet peoples…

Right, but that's OPs point. If he does what you say, he's no better than Comcast, ignoring customers and telling them to screw themselves at the first sign of trouble.

I seem to see this a lot especially with American business owners. You don't have to service every customer market. If you offer only certain speeds or certain hours of support, despite being able to support otherwise, that's fine. Not every customers fits your target market.

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

#439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because we as a society are better when everyone has access to the Internet. Just as we ran electricity and running water to neighborhoods that could never pay back the investment. Just like we build roads, bridges, and tunnels that probably never be afforded by the people they serve. Maybe the person that lives in that house in the next generation is the next great scientist that discovers how fusion can work reliab…

This is the most bizarre comment I’ve seen in a while. You don’t think folks do cost-benefit analysis before building out infrastructure? If so, you are in for quite a surprise when you attend a hearing at your local municipality.

This is why "progress rides on the backs of unreasonable people".

To hell with your paperwork. The wire is getting hung. You don't have to connect it, but if you want to, it's there.

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