Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead • Hacker News Board

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#241

Post by sethrin » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 7:50 AM UTC

greggyb wrote: post #238

sethrin wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I am not arguing that bandwidth is unlimited. That would be prima facie impossible. I'm somewhat confused and distressed to read a summation of my argument which implies such an absurdity; it seems objectionable in the context of a calm and reasoned debate. I'm sure that you meant no offense. I'm not incapable of arguing absurdities, but I hope that this is rare, or at least I hope that you may assume so for cour…

When an ISP leases bandwidth to a customer, they must reserve some amount out of their total available. They may reserve the full amount they have leased, or they may reserve some portion of it. Either way, the reserve is finite and proportional to the actual total bandwidth (the proportion may be 1:1, which is the simplest, but the proportion does not matter for this discussion). The marginal cost of provisioning me…

For residential service, there is no reason to expect a 1:1 reservation. This would be extremely wasteful. The exact number is not relevant, but residential bandwidth is oversold as a matter of course. Talking about capex and aggregate costs also seems to be drifting from the main theme here: whatever it costs to double the network's capacity is going to be pretty circumstantial, and not directly relevant to the topic of consumer pricing. Ceteris paribus, the marginal cost per individual is still negligible, and the price per unit of provisioned bandwidth only loosely coupled to cost. ISPs charge extra for higher-tier packages because having only one tier of service is leaving money on the table, and because they can.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#242

Post by rayiner » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 10:49 AM UTC

philipps wrote: post #231

rayiner wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except infrastructure is awful in solidly blue states as well as red states. What "conservative politicians" are to blame for the NYC subway falling apart? I think you've got the causation backward. There's a bigger "market" for anti-government rhetoric in the U.S. than in Europe because the governmental units closest to the people here are so awful.

Democrats in the US would be considered center right in many European countries. The highest income tax rate in Denmark is around 80%. If you want excellent public infrastructure, you need to be willing to invest into the commons (not hand it over to the private sector - there is no example I am familiar with where that has led to better outcomes in the long run).

That’s not really true either. Tax rates are higher outside the U.S. (but also flatter—VAT taxes which are pervasive in Europe would be considered a right-wing attempt to shift the tax burden to the middle class here.)

But infrastructure isn’t more “left” in Europe, and it’s often more “right.” The Danish telecom operator owns all the copper and almost all the cable and is a fully private company. And Denmark got rid of its telecom regulator recently. The Danish rail operator is a for-profit government owned company that is in the process of being privatized. Deutsche Bahn is organized as a for-profit company. (The Japanese rail operators are all for-profit companies.) Stockholm’s dark fiber provider is organized as a for-profit company. Whereas De Blasio has turned fiber in NYC into a social justice issue, the Stockholm fiber provider built out its network based on demand and revenue generation (e.g. businesses first), and charged high initial hookup fees (approaching $1,000). The British commuter rail system is run by private companies. While London’s subway is run by the city, it pays for itself with fares (while half the costs of the New York subway come from the government). Nobody in Europe has anything like our Universal Service Fund, which shifts billions of dollars a year from urban areas to rural areas. It goes on and on. Europe was late to the deregulation game, but ran with it in the 1990s and 2000s.

Case study: the U.K. The U.K.'s telecom infrastructure is almost entirely owned by a single private, for-profit company: BT. British telecom law imposes an open access requirement, requiring BT to lease access to competitors. However, because British regulators are sane, these leases are made at rates that leave BT with similar profit margins to Comcast. BT, unsurprisingly, has invested in upgrading its copper network. The U.S. had a similar requirement for DSL, but the FCC set the rates so low (at cost) that it basically killed investment in the copper network.

The idea of the government owning and running rail, power, or telecom infrastructure these days is solidly left of center compared to Europe.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#243

Post by sokoloff » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 10:56 AM UTC

philipps wrote: post #230

sokoloff wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When considering handing over a [n effective] monopoly on ISP services to a local government, it's reasonable to look around and see if they're generally managing other things that they do have a monopoly on well or poorly. While I don't love Comcast, their uptime and consistency for me has been excellent for me over the last decade and their value-for-money acceptable-[0]. I would not have the automatic expectation…

Comparing the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with service in other developed countries (and some developing countries) clearly shows how poor a job Comcast is doing. The fact that you find Comcast quality or price reasonable is further evidence that market-based outcomes for internet service in the US are not efficient.

I pay Comcast $78.04/mo (all-in) for “up to 150/10 Mbps”, no data cap, and 100+ channels (inc HBO) of TV. Internet uptime has been 100% since the last major multi-day power outage and speeds measure consistently 100-110/5-6. (Comcast has a monopoly in my town.)

How does that compare to your area? What measure(s) of quality of residential service should I consider?

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#244

Post by leereeves » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 11:21 AM UTC

philipps wrote: post #230

sokoloff wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When considering handing over a [n effective] monopoly on ISP services to a local government, it's reasonable to look around and see if they're generally managing other things that they do have a monopoly on well or poorly. While I don't love Comcast, their uptime and consistency for me has been excellent for me over the last decade and their value-for-money acceptable-[0]. I would not have the automatic expectation…

Comparing the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with service in other developed countries (and some developing countries) clearly shows how poor a job Comcast is doing. The fact that you find Comcast quality or price reasonable is further evidence that market-based outcomes for internet service in the US are not efficient.

Compare the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with internet in Canada.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#245

Post by philipps » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 12:30 PM UTC

nonce413 wrote: post #232

philipps wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comparing the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with service in other developed countries (and some developing countries) clearly shows how poor a job Comcast is doing. The fact that you find Comcast quality or price reasonable is further evidence that market-based outcomes for internet service in the US are not efficient.

Marked based outcomes are efficient. 90 miles east of here, metro Boston generally has a choice between three modern providers - Comcast, RCN, and Verizon. The western part of the state seemingly does not have the population density to attract this kind of investment. Comcast here is the monopoly provider of what we consider modern service, and AFAIK engages in their standard monopolistic playbook of throttling, caps…

Markets can work. But often they don’t. I live in the center of Boston and have access to Verizon (not FIOS!) or Comcast. I’ve spent more time on the RCN website than I’d like to admit and they do not cover my building.

If you need more evidence that in this case the market does not lead to desirable outcomes, Verizon charges a monthly 5$ fee to NOT list your phone number (this is for the phone number you are required to sign up for in order to get internet service).

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#246

Post by philipps » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 12:53 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #242

philipps wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democrats in the US would be considered center right in many European countries. The highest income tax rate in Denmark is around 80%. If you want excellent public infrastructure, you need to be willing to invest into the commons (not hand it over to the private sector - there is no example I am familiar with where that has led to better outcomes in the long run).

That’s not really true either. Tax rates are higher outside the U.S. (but also flatter—VAT taxes which are pervasive in Europe would be considered a right-wing attempt to shift the tax burden to the middle class here.) But infrastructure isn’t more “left” in Europe, and it’s often more “right.” The Danish telecom operator owns all the copper and almost all the cable and is a fully private company. And Denmark got rid…

The key point is that you need tax revenue to manage (build, own, operate, or regulate) public infrastructure well.

Expecting great rail, road, or internet service without paying high taxes and strong government involvement hasn’t worked out. Nothing in your post contradicts that.

In many cases, public funding was even required to put in place the core infrastructure and conditions for privately operated companies to succeed. That’s certainly the case for high speed rail in Germany.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#247

Post by barrow-rider » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 1:00 PM UTC

leereeves wrote: post #244

philipps wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comparing the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with service in other developed countries (and some developing countries) clearly shows how poor a job Comcast is doing. The fact that you find Comcast quality or price reasonable is further evidence that market-based outcomes for internet service in the US are not efficient.

Compare the price and quality of Comcast internet in the US with internet in Canada.

I'm from the US but live in Canada and the price of everything is higher, to include network and, especially, cell phone costs.

Doesn't mean that Comcast isn't crap though.

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/why-canadian-cell-phone...

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/wireless-prices-cell-phone-...

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#248

Post by aisofteng » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 1:21 PM UTC

cm2187 wrote: post #24

rayiner wrote: post #16

I feel like people are being shortsighted about municipal fiber. It’s not a one time and you forget it thing. Verizon has upgraded the FiOS network several times since 2005. We have some towns on the eastern shore of MD that did municipal cable, back when that was the state of the art. Those systems are lagging far behind Comcast now because nobody wants to raise rates to generate cash for upgrades. Municipal fiber i…

The thing is the bulk of the cost is pulling wires. Fiber optic cables have an almost unlimited theoretical bandwidth. You just need to upgrade the hardware on both sides, which is getting cheaper by the minute.

“almost unlimited” doesn’t mean anything.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#249

Post by brenschluss » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 3:13 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #215

Symbiote wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really doesn't help your argument to compare rail and water with communications infrastructure. They have very little in common. I struggle to think of anything they do have in common. Capital cost, operating cost, speed of innovation, the average American's interest in the level of service provided, the possibility for competition, the practicality of parallel infrastructures... does rail/water have anything in c…

Water/sewer hookups (1) have most of the cost recovered at construction time, via a $20-30,000 per-house charge; and (2) once built, don't require upgrades to keep up with advancing technology and higher per-user demand. If municipalities struggle to maintain infrastructure in the face of static or slowly growing demand, why on earth would you expect them to do better when it comes to infrastructure with rapidly adva…

2) is just absolutely incorrect. Buildings are renovated and incoming services changed all the time.

Clearly you know very little about physical infrastructure other than its translation into $.

Re: Comcast rejected by small town, residents vote for municipal fiber instead

#250

Post by magduf » Thu, Dec 13, 2018, 3:20 PM UTC

foldr wrote: post #122

magduf wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the problem here. The government doesn't need to be competent to design anything; the job of government is to control the funding and legalities, and contract with companies that can do the work. If the government isn't competent to hire a competent company, that's the government's fault, and by extension, the voters'. If the voters can't elect competent people to run their government, that's really OK: t…

>If the government isn't competent to hire a competent company In a small town, there may just not be anyone with the necessary knowledge and expertise. You can't vote for someone who doesn't exist.

The town has a government comprised of the people from that town. If there isn't anyone in the town smart enough to run for government who, as the other responder pointed out simply needs to look for other towns that did something similar and ask them how they did it and who they contracted with, then obviously the town is full of utter morons, and by definition, the democracy in that town is working as designed: the people are getting what they deserve.