71–80 of 166 posts
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Without power or water your basic standard of living drops significantly. Without high speed internet you....don't get netflix? I don't really see why lumping all these things together in the same category makes sense.
I can make a living with my water off. I can't with my internet off.
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According to speedtest.net I have a 58 MBit download and 39 MBit upload. Yet, Netflix is basically unwatchable at around 6PM on weeknights. I literally get a better connection on my parents DSL than with Verizon Fios in Northern VA. Remember Netflix maxes out at 3MBit/second and use useable at .75MBit/second so I am getting ~1-2% of my theoretical connection speed.
That's an issue specific to Netflix, as far as I'm aware, and implicates a wholly separate issue. I'm fully willing to concede that U.S. telecom policy gives infrastructure companies more leverage over content companies.
Hell, the battery backup in their fiber > coax box died after 18 months and they want 50$ to replace it. I don't actually care if it works though a blackout as my router is going down anyway, but the damm thing will not stop beeping.
> Chattanooga has the largest high-speed internet service in the US, offering customers access to speeds of 1 gigabit per second – about 50 times faster than the US average. The service, provided by municipally owned EPB, has sparked a tech boom in the city and attracted international attention. EPB is now petitioning the FCC to expand its territory. Comcast and others have previously sued unsuccessfully to stop EPB’…
No monthly data caps either according to these reviews http://www.dslreports.com/comments/3492
I think by now it's hard to deny that Comcast & friends are stifling the progress of the US economy. The US is 31st worldwide on bandwidth speed (which really can't be explained by the US's size alone), consumers and businesses are complaining across the board about high pricing, bad service, and lack of options. These companies do the country and its inhabitants a big disservice. I think the only reasonable option f…
> The US is 31st worldwide on bandwidth speed (which really can't be explained by the US's size alone) By what measure? Certainly not Akamai's ( http://www.akamai.com/dl/akamai/akamai-soti-q114.pdf?WT.mc_i... ). The top 10 U.S. states (much of which are in the Northeast and are Comcast territory), would appear comfortably in the top 10 of the global rankings (compare page 14-15 with page 18). On Ookla's ranking, the…
The point is, there is not a legitimate "population density" excuse for NYC or LA or Dallas or Seattle or SF or any other major metropolitan area to have much slower internet speeds than cities like Seoul or Tokyo, or nations like Israel or Singapore.
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No monthly data caps either according to these reviews http://www.dslreports.com/comments/3492
Bandwidth is insanely cheap compared to last-mile infrastructure. Bandwidth caps are basically just a way to soak the customers who use the service more and are, hence, willing to pay more.
Fiber nicely solves that though.
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I guess part of it is that there's the idea here in the US that everyone should have access to certain things like power, water, telephone, etc. There are a lot of universal service laws about these utilities and the internet is fast becoming another utility. Worse is that with the internet you have to be hooked up to the central grid or else it's useless. A farmer in a rural part of Kansas who's tired of not getting…
Without power or water your basic standard of living drops significantly. Without high speed internet you....don't get netflix? I don't really see why lumping all these things together in the same category makes sense.
The internet is an information network that gives consumers nearly perfect information about price; which translates to a much more ideal market (in economic jargon,) which is much more efficient. It is essentially a utility, if people without it are at a significant economic disadvantage like that.
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Cable could easily offer these rates by using the bandwidth currently occupied by their tv channels. If comcast had a unified digital backbone it wouldn't be a problem. It is only because they have monopoly power. I find it completely distasteful the number of laws that prevent other entities from passing laws in certain domains. Washington state has a law that prevents cities from legislating any form of rent contro…
> I find it completely distasteful the number of laws that prevent other entities from passing laws in certain domains. Washington state has a law that prevents cities from legislating any form of rent control. Are you serious? Rent control laws are awful, destroy the incentive to maintain housing stock or build new housing stock, and ultimately raise rents for everyone except the lucky few who can get rent controlle…
This is a really good example of how lobbying works. On one hand, these telecom companies have a clear interest in not having to "compete" with cheap, publicly funded broadband. On the other hand, their position just happens to tie in with a broader political debate: states and municipalities are on the verge of bankruptcy, and municipal infrastructure projects are a disaster outside a few well-managed cities like NY…