02-19-2013, 03:32 AM | #31 |
monkey on the fringe
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Personally, I think government should supply the pipes (cable, DSL, fiber, satellite, wireless, etc) and let private enterprise supply premium content.
A shakeup is needed in this industry and no one should be allowed to supply both content and internet. There's too much room for abuse. |
02-19-2013, 06:53 AM | #32 | |
Readaholic
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Our city wanted to put in a municipal cable company to compete and lower prices. We were paying more than twice what cities like Atlanta paid for less content. The cable company took them to court. When that failed they offered the local politicians a supposed deal that would eventually lower our cable bills. The city took the deal and, surprise surprise, our bills went down for one year and then back up. Apache |
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02-19-2013, 06:58 AM | #33 | |
Illiterate newbie
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02-19-2013, 07:12 AM | #34 |
monkey on the fringe
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02-19-2013, 07:29 AM | #35 |
Basculocolpic
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Sort of like how the government provides highways and airports but GM and Boeing provides cars and airplanes?
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02-19-2013, 08:06 AM | #36 |
Autism Spectrum Disorder
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The trouble is, the businesses aren't providing that last mile in all areas, but are trying to stop local governments from setting up their own last mile.
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02-19-2013, 08:16 AM | #37 |
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The last mile is open to competition, or alternatively home-owners could start their own company and provide the connections at cost.
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02-19-2013, 08:22 AM | #38 |
monkey on the fringe
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02-19-2013, 12:44 PM | #39 |
Well trained by Cats
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Palo Alto's 'Fiber to the Home' project was a disaster.
1) it was 'Dark Fibre' 2) the connection fee was $10K and you had to provide your own terminal equipment. (they must smoke Woodside Whoopie Weed down at City Hall ) |
02-19-2013, 07:30 PM | #40 | |
Wizard
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to have competing electric lines, water mains, sewer systems, and road networks - to select from. Garbage Collection can, and is, often provided on a competitive basis for business customers even if residential collection is provided by the city. Despite support by the government, (in many ways, not just financial), the mail service continues to show itself as being unable to compete with private service providers. Not to mention with e-mail. As to "under-served" areas; first, they should be free to adopt whatever lawful measures they can to address the problem, using their own resources. Second, if there is a benefit to be had, that is worth the cost - for a larger community, then it might make sense for that larger community to subsidize providing the service to that "under-served" area". A big problem being that there will be radical advocates and contract seekers making the case for a subsidy under very suspect logic. Luck; Ken |
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02-19-2013, 09:34 PM | #41 |
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The Post Office is able to compete quite well with its private competitors, its problem is that it is being sabotaged. In 2006, a law was passed requiring the USPS to fully fund its retirement fund 70 years into the future, and do so within 10 years. The USPS is required to fund the retirement of employees who aren't even born yet. UPS and FedEx don't have to fund their retirement funds for even half that long. UPS and FedEx aren't going to deliver a letter for 46 cents.
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02-20-2013, 03:39 AM | #42 | |
eBook Enthusiast
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Also in the UK, the national telephone company, British Telecom, provides the ADSL broadband infrastructure, but, although they are an ISP themselves (the biggest ISP in the country, in fact), they are also required by law to act as a wholesaler and sell Internet bandwidth to all other ISPs at the same price they sell it to themselves at (ie "BT Wholesale" is legally a separate company from "BT Broadband"). It's very easy to separate the infrastructure provider from the service provider. |
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02-20-2013, 07:03 AM | #43 |
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@HarryT, btw, is VOIP still illegal in UK?
Similar in Belgium, electricity, gas, mobile phone markets are completely "open" - naturaly is only one state entity in the back. |
02-20-2013, 07:13 AM | #44 | |
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The result has always been a price war against the infrastructure provider, with only the infrastructure provider's customers paying for maintenance. |
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02-20-2013, 07:29 AM | #45 |
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