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Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

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Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#81

Post by waldothedog »

sxg wrote: post #33

I just moved back to Cleveland, and I signed up for Cleveland Broadband (clevelandbroadband.com), which is incredible! I pay $50/mo for 1 Gb/s download and upload speeds with no contract or temporary introductory pricing. The best part is the customer service, which I've only had to use twice while initially setting it up, but it's a direct line to a person who physically came to my place within an hour and was super…

Damn, got my hopes up but this is for large apartment buildings only :/

Enjoy your gig, I’ll be here waiting for spectrum to arbitrarily raise my rates again

Welcome back btw!

Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#82

Post by bigstrat2003 »

parineum wrote: post #57
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One can blame both parties. It was foolish (or corrupt, take your pick I guess) for the government to give out money without formal strings attached. It is unethical for the companies to take that money knowing it's intended for $thing, without ever intending to do $thing. Neither is good.

This is a classic example of the scorpion and the frog though. The government is ostensibly giving them money and saying, "We hope you choose to do the thing we want with this money but you don't have to, no pressure." Exactly what you'd expect happened, they took the money and did nothing. I honestly have a hard time finding that nearly as unethical as the government being incredibly irresponsible with our money, ei…

I don't understand how you can think the government is the more unethical party here. Should they do better? Yes. But in the scorpion and the frog story, the scorpion is the bad guy. You don't get to go "sorry it's just how I am bro" after you take advantage of someone.

Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#83

Post by justin66 »

tuckerconnelly wrote: post #77
vineyardmike wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP, but Cleveland is kinda great kinda terrible. I spent a few years there in my early adulthood. It was once one of the nicest richest cities in America, and it has some of the best cultural institutions in the country as a result. It has every major sports franchise. It has some great architecture. It’s extremely affordable. The food is much better than comparable midwestern cities. There’s a reason it’s so aff…

I just visited a few days for a surgery and this seems pretty accurate. The food weirdly was the same at every restaurant, regardless of the cuisine: super oiled up. Usually mayonnaise and something pickled on top. Like preparing me to go to a factory for 14 hours. Nearly every Uber had a sports station on. Everyone seemed pretty gloomy there. "What's a must-do before we leave?" "Umm...yeah it's too cold for a Brown'…

A Clevelander told you it was too cold for a Browns game? In October?

Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#84

Post by JumpCrisscross »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #82
parineum wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a classic example of the scorpion and the frog though. The government is ostensibly giving them money and saying, "We hope you choose to do the thing we want with this money but you don't have to, no pressure." Exactly what you'd expect happened, they took the money and did nothing. I honestly have a hard time finding that nearly as unethical as the government being incredibly irresponsible with our money, ei…

I don't understand how you can think the government is the more unethical party here. Should they do better? Yes. But in the scorpion and the frog story, the scorpion is the bad guy . You don't get to go "sorry it's just how I am bro" after you take advantage of someone.

> don't understand how you can think the government is the more unethical party here

They aren’t saying that. They’re saying the ethics are functionally irrelevant. It’s not dastardly enough to provoke a standard. It’s just monumentally stupid on the government’s part.

Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#85

Post by jpk »

xenospn wrote: post #44
jpk wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of me likes this approach, but another part of me is hesitant putting the local government in control of all of the network infrastructure. It could conceivably allow local officials to turn it all off during a protest or something; similar to what we saw during the Arab Spring events.

They can already do that with ease by instructing the companies that own it to shut it down. I’d argue that having local officials in charge offers more transparency than a nameless corporation.

Sure, but the company has an incentive to resist such an order. So there's a check there. I guess all I'm saying is there should be a check, and transparency about when that check is tested.

Re: Cleveland launches plan to provide cheap broadband

#86

Post by eviks »

AnotherGoodName wrote: post #80
llsf wrote: post #25

Would it make sense for the municipality to own the pipes that run in the city ? Like some cities own the sewer pipes. Could it be an infrastructure that the city builds, owns, maintains and rents to ISP ? The city would have a full control on how many houses are connected. That is the type of investments that a city is suited for (i.e. large upfront cost financed by bonds). AT&T, Charter, Comcast, they have no incen…

As a general rule of thumb utilities is a mode of market failure for capitalism. No one's going to run multiple power/water/communication/sewer lines to your house and compete. At the very least they'll want to share poles/pipes. Anyway the solution is easy and exactly as you suggested. No idea why people find this hard to comprehend.

For the broadband topic at hand there are places where exactly this "no one's going to run multiple ... lines" happens and results in lower prices due to the market failure of capitalism
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