Let them lose it. They are one of the worst monopolists ever.
Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
81–90 of 131 posts
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
I argue going one step further, even at the loss of some theoretical efficiency. Split layer 1 from layer 3. I want a fiber pair from my house to the central office, where I can then patch to any provider who decided to pay the cost-recovery based co-location connection fee. Basically I should be able to tell this wireline provider to plug my patch cord into service provider X and they do it within a reasonable timef…
Having helped shepherd municipal broadband initiatives along, I'm sorry to say that your requirements are a hill too far for almost all consumers. They don't care about the level of provider selection you want, they simply want The Internet (Netflix, Youtube, Google Gmail, et al) at the lowest possible cost (and reliable to boot). > many networks will likely be built out and then left to languish long-term if there i…
"Having helped shepherd municipal broadband initiatives along, I'm sorry to say that your requirements are a hill too far for almost all consumers. They don't care about the level of provider selection you want, they simply want The Internet (Netflix, Youtube, Google Gmail, et al) at the lowest possible cost (and reliable to boot)."
I feel this is really only because there's been no real competition in this space at all. There's been one phone company, one cable company, and that was it. Compared to other markets where there is some semblance of competition, and you see the comparison shopping behavior. I don't really see why it couldn't translate to internet access, given time.
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#83My colleague argues that it's ok for Time Warner Spectrum/Comcast to control specific areas and districts because they laid the pipe and own the last mile (when they've decided to). I try and argue that it's anti-competitive and that I shouldn't be held to ransom by 'Rectum for $60/mo (their minimum) if I want reliable internet. I do see where he's coming from though but I don't know how to counter those arguments as…
Pacific bell laid the cable. The Rockefellers dug the oil they sold for less than the competition could. The thing is none of these things happened in a vacuum. Everything has externalities. People enjoy considering other people as independent creatures but we're all working within the limitations of each other. We grow up in hives, learn in hives, go to work in hives, and eventually form hives we die in that we like…
>No one owns anything. If someone claims to, ask them again in one hundred years.
That's a pretty useless definition of ownership. Nobody I know of requires permanence in the definition of ownership.
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having helped shepherd municipal broadband initiatives along, I'm sorry to say that your requirements are a hill too far for almost all consumers. They don't care about the level of provider selection you want, they simply want The Internet (Netflix, Youtube, Google Gmail, et al) at the lowest possible cost (and reliable to boot). > many networks will likely be built out and then left to languish long-term if there i…
> Municipal broadband is accountable to its local citizens or stakeholders, depending on the model used to develop it (government owned or non-profit owned). If it languishes, it will only do so because its citizens or users allow it to. I don't find this comforting. Citizens regularly allow public services to languish, through a combination of a myopic focus on cutting costs/taxes and lack of accountability. When I…
"One of the things the environmental law clinic at Northwestern does is identify municipal water/sewer systems that are not in compliance with the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. There are many such systems, and invariably they remain out of compliance because citizens are unwilling to raise water/sewer rates to fix the infrastructure."
Well, why should they have to? The main purpose of the water/sewer company is to provide service in compliance with that act. If costs have risen due to the natural order of things, that's one thing. But in many cases, it seems like the maintenance has been neglected on purpose, in order to benefit shareholders. And now you want me to pay more to do what you should have been doing in the first damn place?
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agree, in most places the cable company has a monopoly or close to it. But why do we think giving the municipality a monopoly is better? Every municipal service I can think of is overstaffed and inefficient compared to private businesses. The "nickle and diming" is just moved to tax rates and fees that are under the radar for most people. Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I t…
> Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I think you'd be surprised. We should make franchising requirements illegal at the federal level. There is no need for them, and all they do is artificially limit competition. Even though the franchises are, by law, non-exclusive, the terms for getting a franchise are usually onerous enough that nobody but the incumbent is willing to put up…
That's not entirely true. There is a very good reason for some of them: To ensure that lower income areas are serviced. Usually, a municipality will make servicing those areas a requirement of getting the franchise.
Now, if we have municipal broadband, that could ensure lower income areas are serviced instead. But without that fallback, cancelling franchise agreements would likely increase competition in the rich neighborhoods, and lead to things being just as bad or worse than they are now in poor ones.
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#86I mean, duh. They basically have a monopoly and a license to print money right now. they can't make the same profit margins they have been if they have to compete with local municipal providers who aren't based on a profit model unless those local providers are so incompetent that they can't deliver reliable fast internet to their area. Comcast can't do price hikes and data caps and generally continue treating their…
Agree, in most places the cable company has a monopoly or close to it. But why do we think giving the municipality a monopoly is better? Every municipal service I can think of is overstaffed and inefficient compared to private businesses. The "nickle and diming" is just moved to tax rates and fees that are under the radar for most people. Just cancel the franchises and let the market compete for internet service. I t…
What's the market incentive to provide service in lower income, inner-city neighborhoods?
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am not a fan of Comcast, but I'm not switching my hard-wired Internet for satellite Internet which is high-latency and subject to weather conditions.
LEO service is low-latency. Light's got a few hundred clicks to go, and much of that in hard vacuum. About 1-4 milliseconds, call it 2-8 round-trip ping. Geosync is a whole 'nother ballgame. It's a quarter second outbound, and a half-second round-trip ping (earth-bird-earth and back). Radio talks through clouds just fine.
1000 miles in a vacuum is 5.36 ms. Don't forget that it's up and back two times so you're looking at just over 21 ms waiting on light. The packet actually needs to go onto the Internet at that point too.
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don't get the wrong idea: I'm not opposed to municipal broadband. I was just pointing out that citizen accountability often doesn't do anything to prevent poor service quality. (As we speak, I'm getting a stream of MARC delay/cancellation text messages.) If we were starting from scratch, I'd advocate for the Stockholm model: https://www.stokab.se/Documents/Stockholms%20Stokab%20-%20A%... . A public entity to build da…
I appreciate the reply! > I do think the FCC should preempt all state-and-local franchising laws, and also state-and-local restrictions on municipal broadband. Private providers can compete in areas and neighborhoods that support competition (my neighborhood has two providers for gigabit fiber, for example), and municipalities can address areas that are overlooked by the private sector. My concern with this is if you…
> My concern with this is if you don't mandate covering all neighborhoods, private providers will cherrypick the most profitable areas, leaving less well off areas underserved or not served at all.
That's fine. It's the government's job to step in and provide the safety net. Look at what Sweden did with fiber in rural areas. Instead of forcing companies to serve rural customers in return for the right to serve urban ones, the government simply gave a tax credit to rural residents to defray the costs of building fiber.
With the emergence of 5G wireless, it becomes much more practical for the government to be "the ISP of last resort."
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Municipal broadband is accountable to its local citizens or stakeholders, depending on the model used to develop it (government owned or non-profit owned). If it languishes, it will only do so because its citizens or users allow it to. I don't find this comforting. Citizens regularly allow public services to languish, through a combination of a myopic focus on cutting costs/taxes and lack of accountability. When I…
"One of the things the environmental law clinic at Northwestern does is identify municipal water/sewer systems that are not in compliance with the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. There are many such systems, and invariably they remain out of compliance because citizens are unwilling to raise water/sewer rates to fix the infrastructure." Well, why should they have to? The main purpose of the water/sewer c…
You're right that a lot of the cost increases is due to maintenance that has been neglected over the years. You're wrong in blaming shareholders--almost all U.S. water/sewer systems are run by municipal utilities. Taxpayers are shortsighted too, perhaps even more so than shareholders. Because water/sewer rates are subject to public regulation, there is a huge push to keep rates low. Consequently, needed upgrades (e.g. replacing lead water pipes) and general maintenance fall by the wayside.
Re: Comcast has a lot to lose if municipal broadband takes off
#90My colleague argues that it's ok for Time Warner Spectrum/Comcast to control specific areas and districts because they laid the pipe and own the last mile (when they've decided to). I try and argue that it's anti-competitive and that I shouldn't be held to ransom by 'Rectum for $60/mo (their minimum) if I want reliable internet. I do see where he's coming from though but I don't know how to counter those arguments as…
I, for one, don't give a shit that they think they own it. I care about the level of service, and I'm entirely in favor of eminent domain to just take it, since they've proven they can't provide service worth a damn.