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I see you are on Verizon and telecoms team, the anti-innovation force run by the MBAs and bean counters over what is needed nationwide. >> Overall broadband IS

• rayiner 10y ago
  > In the late 90s there were $400 billion given to broadband providers and the job was by 2006 for everyone to have fiber running to their homes. They stole that cash [1]. That number is fictitious. I've addressed it at length here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7709556 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7709556. The number is built out of two pieces: 1) Comparing the company's rate of return to that of utilities like power companies, and calling everything above that "excess profits." (By that analysis, taxpayers are paying Google and Facebook enormous subsidies.) 2) Calling accelerated depreciation of telecom network infrastructure a "tax break," while ignoring that accelerated depreciation made total sense in the 1990s as telcos upgraded their core networks with fiber. > Verizon is horrible at keeping it's promises on fiber [2][3][4]. Everyone is horrible at keeping promises on fiber. See Google halting Fiber rollout. Beyond that, the question is: what's the harm? Did New York pay Verizon a bunch of money for building out broadband in New York City, only to have Verizon renege on its end of the bargain? Here is the lawsuit New York City filed against Verizon relating to the deployment: https://consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/verizonsuit.pdf https://consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/verizon.... Here is the underlying franchise agreement: https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doitt/downloads/pdf/verizon_nyc_franchise_agreement_approved_by_fcrc.pdf https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doitt/downloads/pdf/verizon_nyc_.... Read both, and point me to the big check New York wrote to Verizon to get FiOS service. Or even the big tax break. You won't find either. If those things existed, they'd be in there (because "and then they pocketed the money we gave them" makes for a way better lawsuit). What you do find is that Verizon got to pay New York millions of dollars + 5% of gross revenues for the privilege of spending another billion dollars building the FiOS network out to New York City. So on the moral outrage meter that ranks up there with Lenovo teasing the Thinkpad Classic but never releasing it. People aren't outraged because they pre-ordered and Lenovo kept their money. They're outraged because they want it and they can't get it. > They are still as sloppy and slacking big time in gigabit/fiber. They've deployed fiber to 15x as many subscribers as Google, and are rolling out near-gigabit (provisioned at 1024 mbps but marketed as 750 mbps) throughout the FiOS service area through 2017.
  • drawkbox 10y ago
    You keep going back to comparing them to Google who only entered the market really to add some competitive pressure. It worked, nearly every company re-doubled their fiber/broadband efforts. It took a non broadband company to only hint of competition and it spawned the biggest movement up in download speeds and fiber rollouts than anytime before, yet you disregard that entire effort. Again I think we'll have to agree to disagree. We get it, you love Verizon, I hope you are invested with this much love for a broadband company that will take you at every turn they can. But have fun if you ever need a line installed from them or make a deal with them to do so across a city. Do you have fiber from Verizon? If not maybe take a step back. Fiber has been largely danced around by broadband/ISPs and even Verizon is far, far from coverage that people expected by 2017.[1] In most cases they were offered monopolies over areas in agreement with them wiring it and offering good service to all, an immense benefit for monthly customer subscriptions. They have failed so far, it is 2017 and barely anyone in the US has fiber or gigabit (<10%). We are letting the broadband/ISPs drag us down, we should be leading the world in broadband/gigabit/fiber. Verizon doesn't actually want to run fiber. The simple fact is that Verizon has been trying its damnest to get out of the wired business altogether. Back when Ivan Seidenberg was in charge, he made a giant bet on fiber, which is why Verizon became such a national leader in broadband with FiOS -- a service that people really seem to love. However, Wall Street has always hated it, because it's capital intensive, and Wall St. recognizes that without any real competition in the broadband space, Verizon can avoid investing in such infrastructure upgrades, and just swim in larger profits while America's broadband infrastructure suffers and falls further and further behind other countries. Once Seidenberg left, the beancounters quickly took over and looked for ways to stop all that investment. Why invest in the future if there are no competitors to push you to do so? [2] Verizon has tricks. A decade ago, we wrote about how Verizon had made an agreement in Pennsylvania in 1994 that it would wire up the state with fiber optic cables to every home in exchange for tax breaks equalling $2.1 billion. In exchange for such a massive tax break, Verizon promised that all homes and businesses would have access to 45Mbps symmetrical fiber by 2015. By 2004, the deal was that 50% of all homes were supposed to have that. In reality, 0% did, and some people started asking for their money back. That never happened, and it appeared that Verizon learned a valuable lesson: it can flat out lie to governments, promise 100% fiber coverage in exchange for subsidies, then not deliver, and no one will do a damn thing about it. [2] I am with the people that want fiber across the US, beancounters and investors of Verizon want the opposite. I guess you are in the latter category? [1] http://fiberforall.org/fios-map/ http://fiberforall.org/fios-map/ [2] https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131012/02124724852/decades-failed-promises-verizon-it-promises-fiber-to-get-tax-breaks-then-never-delivers.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131012/02124724852/decad...