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England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

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Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#41

Post by lazide »

xbmcuser wrote: post #10

I think this comes across as shocking to Americans but the thing is the rest of the world treats internet as a utility so most governments try to get cheap and fast internet for as large a portion of the population as possible. Where as US cities and towns are stuck under its isp corporate monopolies.

It isn't shocking to Americans. It's frustrating.

Keep in mind however, we're really talking about 50 different 'countries', when we're talking about laws like this so far.

The EU for instance has no such Europe wide mandate. The populations are roughly equivalent.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#43

Post by dantheman »

mperham wrote: post #21
xbmcuser wrote: post #10

I think this comes across as shocking to Americans but the thing is the rest of the world treats internet as a utility so most governments try to get cheap and fast internet for as large a portion of the population as possible. Where as US cities and towns are stuck under its isp corporate monopolies.

Yep, it doesn't need to be treated as a utility, there just needs to be competition. Our Xfinity internet was locked at 150 Mbps for years until the local DSL provider (Centurylink) rolled out gigabit fiber. Suddenly Xfinity started offering gigabit also. Capitalism doesn't work if the market is captured by rent-seekers. Unfortunately this describes most American industries these days.

Capitalism doesn't work when the government grants monopolies to local companies.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#44

Post by cat_plus_plus »

Just in time for wired internet to be obsolete. Especially for apartment buildings, makes much more sense to provide WiFi throughout private and common area than running cables to each unit. Even for individual homes, neighborhood 5g cells can do the trick for most people's needs. Also locking in current technology when constructing a building that could last a century is really dumb. Better to have access panels in the walls that allow easily installing and maintaining any type of cables / pipes / etc that may make sense in future.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#45

Post by hgomersall »

drbeast wrote: post #13

Wonderful, let's make new homes even more expensive! And to those who are downvoting this, every building code requirement like this jacks up the price further. Not everyone is a SWE with a TC of $250k+ you over privileged ninnies.

UK house prices in no way reflect the build cost. The developers do the least they can get away with, which generally means the shittiest fabric with some polish that lasts until the end of the warranty period, just about satisfying the building regs (which are not really checked properly), then they flog the result at whatever the market will bear and pocket the difference. What the market will bear is entirely dictated by where the identikit houses have been built and little else.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#46

Post by lazide »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #29

It’s extremely challenging advocating for this in the USA because most people have no idea the difference between upload and download, and how data caps play into it. You can get gigabit 5G in many areas but it’s manifestly a different animal than symmetrical gigabit fiber internet without caps.

This is in-home/last mile. It's basically a law requiring every home have a minimum degree of ethernet or equivalent done and pulled to somewhere it can be connected to a provider, not a requirement that a provider of a specific speed be available.

Which is pretty good, and about time! It's like requiring the house be wired for electricity to a bare minimum (1 outlet per room, 1 switched light per room, that kind of thing).

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#47

Post by coob »

Gordonjcp wrote: post #34

Can we maybe edit the title to say "UK" instead of "England"? Also, we nearly had gigabit fibre to the home 40 years ago (before anything even needed to run at 1Gbit, or you could afford the transceivers, admittedly) because BT's vision for the future of telephony was to rip out all the copper and run fibre to every single house. Then the right-wing extremist Thatcher government got wind of the idea and decided that…

> Can we maybe edit the title to say "UK" instead of "England"?

No, because the law only affects England - Building Regs a devolved matter in Wales and Scotland.

There is a separate law mentioned in the article which is telecoms related and not devolved in Wales - but that is about landlords not needing to grant access to engineers.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#48

Post by mhb »

izzydata wrote: post #36
mhb wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So no need for a law then...

To me it seems like a way to really consider internet to be a public utility such as water and electricity. I'm sure there is a law that says any new construction requires it to be connected to the electricity grid, even though it would be pretty unreasonable to not connect it to the grid. Does that mean there is no need for it to be a law? At least this way you can have a good expectation of a new buildings utilitie…

When you set a minimum standard, something that could have been bought for less that didn't meet that standard will no longer be an alternative. So some people will have something better and others will not have an option that they once did.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#49

Post by rayiner »

xbmcuser wrote: post #10

I think this comes across as shocking to Americans but the thing is the rest of the world treats internet as a utility so most governments try to get cheap and fast internet for as large a portion of the population as possible. Where as US cities and towns are stuck under its isp corporate monopolies.

Internet infrastructure regulation varies quite dramatically across the developed world. Canada, Germany, Switzerland, etc., do not “treat the Internet like a utility” for the most part.

Also, “treating Internet like a utility” actually means a “corporate monopoly” nearly everywhere. The situation in the UK is very similar to the situation in much of the northeast US. You have a former monopoly provider (there BT, here Verizon) that is a private company that was incentivized to build out fiber. Its like PG&E in California, not like your municipal water or sewer service.

Re: England just made gigabit internet a legal requirement for new homes

#50

Post by OJFord »

Gordonjcp wrote: post #34

Can we maybe edit the title to say "UK" instead of "England"? Also, we nearly had gigabit fibre to the home 40 years ago (before anything even needed to run at 1Gbit, or you could afford the transceivers, admittedly) because BT's vision for the future of telephony was to rip out all the copper and run fibre to every single house. Then the right-wing extremist Thatcher government got wind of the idea and decided that…

> Can we maybe edit the title to say "UK" instead of "England"?

I think it's correct actually, housing is devolved.

'The Building etc. (Amendment) (England) (No. 2) Regulations 2022' - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2022/984/contents/made - my emphasis.

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