7 ms·

Telecom companies should be regulated like electric and gas utilities

harryh 10y ago
If we did that then we'd all still be stuck with DSL. Electric and gas utilities aren't expected to drastically improve performance year over year, but we want that from our telecom providers.
- bluedino 10y ago
  There's no need for gas/electricity to drastically improve year over year. But when there is a need, as there is with electric cars, the government steps in and offers tax credits and covers the installation fees for things like home car chargers.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- digi_owl 10y ago
  How about municipal fiber runs? Stuff it into the ground, and then offer any service provider access.
  - harryh 10y ago
    Because city governments are really great at investing appropriately in infrastructure! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis
    - dublinben 10y ago
      Where municipal fiber is available, it is better than the commercial alternatives.
      - sgt101 10y ago
        It is for now; come back in 10 years and lets see. Keeping fibre in the ground working in the face of storms, other people digging it up and tech churn (ok, what is after 10Gbe ? How are you going to run that round the mainstreet?) isn't rocket science, but it is a technical maintenance task and new build infrastructures have a great upfront advantage. For a while.
        amazon_not 10y ago
        Buried fiber works just fine regardless of storms. Aerial fiber is a different matter. Patching up fiber cables after a cut is no big deal. Tech churn, i.e. what active equipment to use, is just run of the mill stuff. You can upgrade the optics to 100G if you need it, but if you don't nobody is forcing you to move past 10G. I've built and ran fiber networks for over 10 years and operations and maintenance is no big issue.
        sgt101 10y ago
        Super interesting: what fault rate (per 1000 per week) do you see and what kind of geography are you in (urban?) On the past 10Gbe point : contention is the killer, there is a rise of "super users" for example video editors shipping to and from the cloud, which drives the need for > backhaul - are you not seeing that? Also on the bigger points; small providers have to peer, like everyone, but do they get good deals? How about prices on kit? Strategic deals with Huweii / Cisco are hard enough for tier one, do you not think that you'll get squeezed ?
        amazon_not 10y ago
        Buried fiber doesn't really develop faults once it's put in the ground and doesn't really require any maintenance either. The deeper you put it the safer it is and when we put in fiber we put it in deep. The rate faults that occur are fiber cuts and these fiber cuts are usually the result of some contractor not using call before you dig or being sloppy about it. Bandwidth usage is always growing, but then again the cost of IP transit is constantly going down too. Heavy users aren't really an issue and end user 10G connections are rather rare. Those that really need dedicated 10G connections buy leased lines or wavelengths and pay accordingly. More bandwidth usage isn't a problem, it's a good thing that drives more business. Peering is easy and cheap to small and large providers alike. Transit is also so cheap that it often is cheaper to buy more IP transit than to build out more peering capacity. Access to networking hardware is not a problem and there are products for every need and price point. The largest issues are access to capital, barriers to entry and competition.
    - theothermkn 10y ago
      > Because city governments are really great at investing appropriately in infrastructure! > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis This sketch of a sketch of an argument that you have laid out it a total non sequitur. It seems to me that you're pointing to the Flint water crisis as proof either that all municipal infrastructure efforts are disastrous, or that enough of them are that the public utility alternative is essentially dead. If that is the "argument," then the easiest way to defeat this is just to say, "Flint was news because it represented a rare and egregious failure." That's it. That's all we need to say to rebut that in its entirety. If we stop there, however, we miss the opportunity to point out the converse: It's not news when customers get gouged for sub-par service, because corrupt and monopolistic practices are rampant within capitalist institutions, especially around lock-in. Cable companies. Phone companies. Privatized utilities. Airlines after deregulation. Military suppliers. It's just not news. We'd also miss the opportunity to point out that the tactic of pointing to one criminal failure of a civic organization as proof positive that private industry is universally better is a favorite tactic of a certain obnoxious kind of 20-something free-market fanboy set. HN is better off when that set either stays home or ups its game.
      - harryh 10y ago
        Flint is an extreme example, but underinvestment in infrastructure is not rare. It's endemic. Governments across the country are underinvesting in infrastructure at all levels. It's not just me who's saying this. It's been a major talking point of the democratic party for years. And that's for infrastructure like roads and water delivery where technology is largely static. The problem would likely only be worse for more dynamic infrastructure like broadband.
        dredmorbius 10y ago
        In large part because the wealthy, and corporations, have entirely shirked their taxpaying obligations. That is: paying for the services which enabled them to become wealthy in the first place.
      - rayiner 10y ago
    - c0nducktr 10y ago
      If city governments are so incompetent, why are ISPs lobbying to prevent municipal networks?
      - yompers888 10y ago
        Because the incompetence of municipal governments (in most of the US) is in overbuilding infrastructure to serve unproductive areas so that maintenance obligations come to consume ever larger portions of the budget unless they can achieve the Ponzi scheme of paying for it with the taxes from new growth. That would be terrifying to compete with.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- Retric 10y ago
  US broadband is a horrible. 50mb up down is DSL with today's tech. It's 5% the speed of what many company's roll out for ~60$ / month. As to density arguments, you don't need to cover every square foot of the US with fiber only where people actually live. We build Roads to just about every house which cost 50+ times what broadband does. (2-3 million per mile in rural areas per mile vs ~50k per mile for fiber.)
- drzaiusapelord 10y ago
  >Electric and gas utilities aren't expected to drastically improve performance year over year There's a reason for that. We have enough electricity to power our things. We have enough gas pressure to create a flame. Delivery, price, performance, etc are all pretty good. They're solved problems. Not too long ago Edison was running filthy coal plants in downtown city centers and running thick-gauge DC wires to businesses. That's where we are today with the mish-mash of cable and copper for last-mile internet. Half-assed, but profitable, efforts by players incentivized by the wrong things. The last mile problem is largely solved via municipal fiber. The real question is do we have the political will to socialize/monopolize these things like we did in the past. It seems that we don't. We have the innovations and we know how to fix this. Its getting there politically that is the problem.
- xenadu02 10y ago
  Well private monopolies aren't doing any better so I doubt the government could be worse. The government should lay fiber just like they lay water pipes and pave roads. Anyone can connect on either end of the fiber, providing a nice competitive market for ISPs... just like the original days of dialup ISPs.
Alupis 10y ago
> Telecom companies should be regulated like electric and gas utilities Well, played out to the full extent of electric and gas utilities, I doubt few of us actually want telecom to go the same way. With the utility companies - you often get zero choice of which company services your home. Usually these are government sanctioned monopolies, without competition. Yes, the government may set the maximum rates, but they can't force a utility company to actually be a "good" company. Customer service, willingness to problem solve, be flexible for customers, provide better service at the same price - let alone reduce rates, etc. With a telco acting as a utility, over the long term, there's little incentive to provide better service... which essentially is the core issue of the Net Neutrality movement. What we need instead, is to foster an environment in which every city has 5-6+ telco's capable of servicing every home. We need to get out of the 1-2 telco company system, and create a competitive environment in which consumers have massive choice. The ability to leave a company and take your business elsewhere is what keeps companies performing and doing better by their customers. They offer cheaper rates, along with better service, etc. We've seen this working to great effect in the wild. Every city Google Fiber has encroached on, suddenly saw the incumbent telco's massively upgrade service offerings at cheaper rates. We need more competition - not government sanctioned monopolies.
- cortesoft 10y ago
  Well right now we get the bad parts of a regulated utility company (zero choice about what company services your home) without the good parts (regulation on price and service).
  - Alupis 10y ago
    That's a great point - and really does describe the situation for many of us. However, that doesn't imply we should head down the regulatory path - because once we do, we can't come back (at least history indicates this).
    - amazon_not 10y ago
      Many a nations telco has been privatized. So there is always away back.

If we did that then we'd all still be stuck with DSL. Electric and gas utilities aren't expected to drastically improve performance year over year, but we want that from our telecom providers.

bluedino 10y ago
There's no need for gas/electricity to drastically improve year over year. But when there is a need, as there is with electric cars, the government steps in and offers tax credits and covers the installation fees for things like home car chargers.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
digi_owl 10y ago
How about municipal fiber runs? Stuff it into the ground, and then offer any service provider access.
- harryh 10y ago
  Because city governments are really great at investing appropriately in infrastructure! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis
  - dublinben 10y ago
    Where municipal fiber is available, it is better than the commercial alternatives.
    - sgt101 10y ago
      It is for now; come back in 10 years and lets see. Keeping fibre in the ground working in the face of storms, other people digging it up and tech churn (ok, what is after 10Gbe ? How are you going to run that round the mainstreet?) isn't rocket science, but it is a technical maintenance task and new build infrastructures have a great upfront advantage. For a while.
      - amazon_not 10y ago
        Buried fiber works just fine regardless of storms. Aerial fiber is a different matter. Patching up fiber cables after a cut is no big deal. Tech churn, i.e. what active equipment to use, is just run of the mill stuff. You can upgrade the optics to 100G if you need it, but if you don't nobody is forcing you to move past 10G. I've built and ran fiber networks for over 10 years and operations and maintenance is no big issue.
        sgt101 10y ago
        Super interesting: what fault rate (per 1000 per week) do you see and what kind of geography are you in (urban?) On the past 10Gbe point : contention is the killer, there is a rise of "super users" for example video editors shipping to and from the cloud, which drives the need for > backhaul - are you not seeing that? Also on the bigger points; small providers have to peer, like everyone, but do they get good deals? How about prices on kit? Strategic deals with Huweii / Cisco are hard enough for tier one, do you not think that you'll get squeezed ?
        amazon_not 10y ago
        Buried fiber doesn't really develop faults once it's put in the ground and doesn't really require any maintenance either. The deeper you put it the safer it is and when we put in fiber we put it in deep. The rate faults that occur are fiber cuts and these fiber cuts are usually the result of some contractor not using call before you dig or being sloppy about it. Bandwidth usage is always growing, but then again the cost of IP transit is constantly going down too. Heavy users aren't really an issue and end user 10G connections are rather rare. Those that really need dedicated 10G connections buy leased lines or wavelengths and pay accordingly. More bandwidth usage isn't a problem, it's a good thing that drives more business. Peering is easy and cheap to small and large providers alike. Transit is also so cheap that it often is cheaper to buy more IP transit than to build out more peering capacity. Access to networking hardware is not a problem and there are products for every need and price point. The largest issues are access to capital, barriers to entry and competition.
  - theothermkn 10y ago
    > Because city governments are really great at investing appropriately in infrastructure! > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis This sketch of a sketch of an argument that you have laid out it a total non sequitur. It seems to me that you're pointing to the Flint water crisis as proof either that all municipal infrastructure efforts are disastrous, or that enough of them are that the public utility alternative is essentially dead. If that is the "argument," then the easiest way to defeat this is just to say, "Flint was news because it represented a rare and egregious failure." That's it. That's all we need to say to rebut that in its entirety. If we stop there, however, we miss the opportunity to point out the converse: It's not news when customers get gouged for sub-par service, because corrupt and monopolistic practices are rampant within capitalist institutions, especially around lock-in. Cable companies. Phone companies. Privatized utilities. Airlines after deregulation. Military suppliers. It's just not news. We'd also miss the opportunity to point out that the tactic of pointing to one criminal failure of a civic organization as proof positive that private industry is universally better is a favorite tactic of a certain obnoxious kind of 20-something free-market fanboy set. HN is better off when that set either stays home or ups its game.
    - harryh 10y ago
      Flint is an extreme example, but underinvestment in infrastructure is not rare. It's endemic. Governments across the country are underinvesting in infrastructure at all levels. It's not just me who's saying this. It's been a major talking point of the democratic party for years. And that's for infrastructure like roads and water delivery where technology is largely static. The problem would likely only be worse for more dynamic infrastructure like broadband.
      - dredmorbius 10y ago
        In large part because the wealthy, and corporations, have entirely shirked their taxpaying obligations. That is: paying for the services which enabled them to become wealthy in the first place.
    - rayiner 10y ago
  - c0nducktr 10y ago
    If city governments are so incompetent, why are ISPs lobbying to prevent municipal networks?
    - yompers888 10y ago
      Because the incompetence of municipal governments (in most of the US) is in overbuilding infrastructure to serve unproductive areas so that maintenance obligations come to consume ever larger portions of the budget unless they can achieve the Ponzi scheme of paying for it with the taxes from new growth. That would be terrifying to compete with.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
Retric 10y ago
US broadband is a horrible. 50mb up down is DSL with today's tech. It's 5% the speed of what many company's roll out for ~60$ / month. As to density arguments, you don't need to cover every square foot of the US with fiber only where people actually live. We build Roads to just about every house which cost 50+ times what broadband does. (2-3 million per mile in rural areas per mile vs ~50k per mile for fiber.)
drzaiusapelord 10y ago
>Electric and gas utilities aren't expected to drastically improve performance year over year There's a reason for that. We have enough electricity to power our things. We have enough gas pressure to create a flame. Delivery, price, performance, etc are all pretty good. They're solved problems. Not too long ago Edison was running filthy coal plants in downtown city centers and running thick-gauge DC wires to businesses. That's where we are today with the mish-mash of cable and copper for last-mile internet. Half-assed, but profitable, efforts by players incentivized by the wrong things. The last mile problem is largely solved via municipal fiber. The real question is do we have the political will to socialize/monopolize these things like we did in the past. It seems that we don't. We have the innovations and we know how to fix this. Its getting there politically that is the problem.
xenadu02 10y ago
Well private monopolies aren't doing any better so I doubt the government could be worse. The government should lay fiber just like they lay water pipes and pave roads. Anyone can connect on either end of the fiber, providing a nice competitive market for ISPs... just like the original days of dialup ISPs.

Alupis 10y ago

> Telecom companies should be regulated like electric and gas utilities Well, played out to the full extent of electric and gas utilities, I doubt few of us actually want telecom to go the same way. With the utility companies - you often get zero choice of which company services your home. Usually these are government sanctioned monopolies, without competition. Yes, the government may set the maximum rates, but they can't force a utility company to actually be a "good" company. Customer service, willingness to problem solve, be flexible for customers, provide better service at the same price - let alone reduce rates, etc. With a telco acting as a utility, over the long term, there's little incentive to provide better service... which essentially is the core issue of the Net Neutrality movement. What we need instead, is to foster an environment in which every city has 5-6+ telco's capable of servicing every home. We need to get out of the 1-2 telco company system, and create a competitive environment in which consumers have massive choice. The ability to leave a company and take your business elsewhere is what keeps companies performing and doing better by their customers. They offer cheaper rates, along with better service, etc. We've seen this working to great effect in the wild. Every city Google Fiber has encroached on, suddenly saw the incumbent telco's massively upgrade service offerings at cheaper rates. We need more competition - not government sanctioned monopolies.

cortesoft 10y ago
Well right now we get the bad parts of a regulated utility company (zero choice about what company services your home) without the good parts (regulation on price and service).
- Alupis 10y ago
  That's a great point - and really does describe the situation for many of us. However, that doesn't imply we should head down the regulatory path - because once we do, we can't come back (at least history indicates this).
  - amazon_not 10y ago
    Many a nations telco has been privatized. So there is always away back.