8 ms·

I've always felt the real problem is the monopolies. Net Neutrality doesn't fix that--it's up to local governments to fix it. In the early 2000's when my home

by apeace 9y ago

I've always felt the real problem is the monopolies. Net Neutrality doesn't fix that--it's up to local governments to fix it. In the early 2000's when my home town still had dial-up only, Comcast came into the town and offered to build out cable broadband. They would even throw in a $300k grant to the school district for new laptops. The only catch? They needed to be granted a monopoly on all the telephone poles in the town. The town agreed. As circulated on HN recently, the town of Chattanooga, TN is another interesting example[0]. Chattanooga made the smart decision many years ago not to grant a monopoly in exchange for a fiber build-out. Instead they built their own fiber network. Years later they offered to expand their ISP to the surrounding towns, which only had dial-up and satellite. It would cost zero taxpayer dollars. Instead the state decided to give $45 million to Comcast/AT&T to build out--get this--DSL! As the parent article points out: despite cost-per-bit plummeting over the years, the cost to consumers isn't going down. The problem is monopolies naively being granted by local governments. In a world where that didn't happen, Pai would be right: ISPs would be forced to compete on features and quality, and so nobody would be talking about bundling websites like they do with cable channels, or whatever other nonsense Net Neutrality is designed to prevent. [0] https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/tennessee-could-give-taxpayers-americas-fastest-internet-for-free-but-it-will-give-comcast-and-atandt-dollar45-million-instead https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/tennessee-could-g...

croon 9y ago
I agree that local monopolies is the major problem, but I could still see the value of net neutrality if that problem was fixed. At least I as a consumer want companies to compete in efficiency of service, economies of scale, technology, etc, and not compete in whoever can sell me out the most or force services I don't want down my ISP subscription.
- juliangoldsmith 9y ago
  With adequate choice in ISPs, you would be able to force them to compete in those areas by rewarding those that do with your business.
  - croon 9y ago
    Theoretically. It's not as uncommon as one would hope with cartels and lowest common denominators. And if it's cheaper/more profitable to screw the end-user (I deliberately chose not to say customer) then why wouldn't they, unregulated?
    - juliangoldsmith 9y ago
      Competition. If we take lobbying out of the picture, and therefore prevent ISPs from drafting legislation to suppress competition, it would allow for small, local ISPs to spring up. A lot of customers will pay more to get decent service. (Otherwise, McDonald's would have driven sit-down restaurants out of business entirely.) If you're running a local ISP, whose business is based on providing good service, screwing over your customers would seriously hurt your business.
      - croon 9y ago
        > Competition. If we take lobbying out of the picture, and therefore prevent ISPs from drafting legislation to suppress competition, it would allow for small, local ISPs to spring up. You are assuming capital needed to set up an ISP is non-prevantably low. This can only be the case if the state, county or city owns the last mile and allows any business to rent it. > A lot of customers will pay more to get decent service. (Otherwise, McDonald's would have driven sit-down restaurants out of business entirely.) If you're running a local ISP, whose business is based on providing good service, screwing over your customers would seriously hurt your business. Your restaurant comparison doesn't work, because you don't have McDonalds customers or TGIF customers, you have people who eat at both at varying frequencies. And as for your second point, I said screwing over you end-user for a reason. If it's more profitable to undercut prices to get the cheapest users, while selling data and deals to other market actors based on your users data, ISPs will compete for that instead of speeds, privacy concerns and other. And your choice becomes between varyingly shitty deals. The "market" can't then make a choice until: 1) Someone wants to start an ISP with users as primary customer. 2) It being more profitable. 3) That someone having enough capital to do so.
HillaryBriss 9y ago
I'm pessimistic about both arrangements. I don't favor monopolies but, because I live in Los Angeles, I see that a city can act like a sluggish, greedy monopoly, too. Here, the city owns the roads and electrical grid, and it's doing a mediocre or poor job of maintenance. We don't, for example, have "state of the art high throughput roads." Many of the roads are crumbling and need complete replacement. There's a huge backlog. There's also a multi-year backlog of decaying wooden power poles which need to be replaced because they're in danger of coming down during a windstorm. And, when people go to the expense of having solar panels installed on their homes, they have to wait many months for the city to come out and inspect and give permission to connect to the grid. The city does not have a good handle on the problems. (Don't get me started about the leaky water mains.) City ownership of infrastructure is no guarantee of good service and value for money either. And of course, as you say, with monopolies, we're screwed too. I don't see any easy answer.
- apeace 9y ago
  All very good points, with great examples from where you live. At the very least when decisions are made on a local level as opposed to state/federal, there is more of a chance that 1) people will be able to wrangle control of the situation by voting, and 2) the people who don't like the result can move away. But you're right, it sounds like there is no easy answer for Los Angeles.
dhfhduk 9y ago
I agree with you, although also agree with another poster that net neutrality is still important, mostly because of interoperability reasons. However, you're also bringing up an issue that seems really neglected in public discussion, which is the role of municipal infrastructure and policy. To me there's three things: 1. The importance of net neutrality to the working of the internet, at a theoretical level. 2. The lack of competition. 3. The obligation of companies to the public because of advantages they've been granted. These discussions always proceed like big ISPs own the land that cables are going over, etc. when that's anything but the case. There's things like the telephones you mention, plus right-of-way laws. Why the EFF doesn't publish a huge map showing land used by ISPs that's not owned by them I don't understand. It outrages me to see these ISPs being given right of way, and then having them turn around and act like they don't owe anything to the public, when in fact they wouldn't exist without the public bending over backward to give them all sorts of privileges. They're acting like parasites. To me I might take arguments against net neutrality more seriously if those arguing against net neutrality would: 1. Lobby for the rights of municipalities and other institutions to set up their own ISPs and networks. No laws against public ISPs. 2. Lobby for ISPs to be held responsible for any and all criminally or civilly infringing content going over their networks. Want to preferentially treat packets? Then you should scan for child porn too. If not, you're implicitly supporting it. 3. Lobby for the elimination of right-of-way. Let municipalities, state and federal governments, and private landholders charge ISPs whatever they want for access over their land. Of course, ISPs would scream bloody murder and argue such things are ridiculous, but I would argue that they're not at all unreasonable given what the government is asking for in terms of net neutrality. They want to have their cake and eat it too.
- rayiner 9y ago
  > Why the EFF doesn't publish a huge map showing land used by ISPs that's not owned by them I don't understand. Likely because it wouldn't show anything interesting. State and local governments may only "manage the public rights-of-way or to require fair and reasonable compensation from telecommunications providers, on a competitively neutral and nondiscriminatory basis, for use of public rights-of-way on a nondiscriminatory basis, if the compensation required is publicly disclosed by such government." https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/253 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/253. In practice, rights of way are poles and conduits, which are rented to all companies at published, non-discriminatory rates: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/224 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/224. The idea that companies are sitting on all these free rights of way they don't own is largely false.
rayiner 9y ago
> In the early 2000's when my home town still had dial-up only, Comcast came into the town and offered to build out cable broadband. They would even throw in a $300k grant to the school district for new laptops. The only catch? They needed to be granted a monopoly on all the telephone poles in the town. The town agreed. I suspect you're not correctly remembering what happened. It's illegal under federal law for municipalities to grant telecommunications monopolies. Municipalities hand out cable licenses in return for 5% of gross receipts + random giveaways like school district grants. But there is absolutely nothing exclusive about it. To pick a random example, here's the cable franchise in my county: http://archive.aacounty.org/OIT/Resources/CableAgreement.pdf http://archive.aacounty.org/OIT/Resources/CableAgreement.pdf (see Section 2.4, "Grant Not Exclusive"). > despite cost-per-bit plummeting over the years, the cost to consumers isn't going down. Bits per second have been going up dramatically. My parents' house in Virginia, got 256 kbps SDSL sometime around 2000-2001. They got 50 mbps fiber over BPON around 2006. That got upgraded to 500 mbps over GPON around 2008. They just got gigabit this year. That's doubling of speed every roughly 15 months. The problem is not that municipalities are granting monopolies. It's that municipalities impose restrictions on building that make it untenable to compete with the incumbent. In most cities, a startup cannot come in and build out neighborhood-by-neighborhood based on demonstrated demand. They're required to commit to building out the whole city in a short time frame, without regard to demand.
- apeace 9y ago
  Thanks so much! I imagine you're right, I must have misremembered. Though as you insinuated, this is the same thing in practice: > In most cities, a startup cannot come in and build out neighborhood-by-neighborhood based on demonstrated demand. They're required to commit to building out the whole city in a short time frame, without regard to demand. -- EDIT I checked on this, and you're indeed correct. The franchise in my home town includes a non-exclusivity clause. As you said, it also contains a clause stating that "The Licensee shall make its Cable System Service" available to all residents of the town within seven business days of a request". So the network must cover the entire town. Finally, in the non-exclusivity clause, it states that if any other cable provider is ever granted a license with "more favorable or less burdensome" terms, then the town will renegotiate terms with Comcast. To me, this is the same thing as "granting a monopoly" in practice. But I appreciate your clarification! -- END OF EDIT I want to also point out: > The problem is not that municipalities are granting monopolies. In the case of Chattanooga that I mentioned, the law preventing the municipal ISP from expanding is unfair in the same way, even if this is not a case of a monopoly being "granted". Why shouldn't a company created by a town be allowed to compete in the marketplace?
r00fus 9y ago
> Years later they offered to expand their ISP to the surrounding towns, which only had dial-up and satellite. It would cost zero taxpayer dollars. Instead the state decided to give $45 million to Comcast/AT&T to build out--get this--DSL! This isn't even just Monopoly issues, it's pure corruption. That will require fixing gerrymandering and electoral corruption - a tall order.

by apeace 9y ago

croon 9y ago

I agree that local monopolies is the major problem, but I could still see the value of net neutrality if that problem was fixed. At least I as a consumer want companies to compete in efficiency of service, economies of scale, technology, etc, and not compete in whoever can sell me out the most or force services I don't want down my ISP subscription.

juliangoldsmith 9y ago
With adequate choice in ISPs, you would be able to force them to compete in those areas by rewarding those that do with your business.
- croon 9y ago
  Theoretically. It's not as uncommon as one would hope with cartels and lowest common denominators. And if it's cheaper/more profitable to screw the end-user (I deliberately chose not to say customer) then why wouldn't they, unregulated?
  - juliangoldsmith 9y ago
    Competition. If we take lobbying out of the picture, and therefore prevent ISPs from drafting legislation to suppress competition, it would allow for small, local ISPs to spring up. A lot of customers will pay more to get decent service. (Otherwise, McDonald's would have driven sit-down restaurants out of business entirely.) If you're running a local ISP, whose business is based on providing good service, screwing over your customers would seriously hurt your business.
    - croon 9y ago
      > Competition. If we take lobbying out of the picture, and therefore prevent ISPs from drafting legislation to suppress competition, it would allow for small, local ISPs to spring up. You are assuming capital needed to set up an ISP is non-prevantably low. This can only be the case if the state, county or city owns the last mile and allows any business to rent it. > A lot of customers will pay more to get decent service. (Otherwise, McDonald's would have driven sit-down restaurants out of business entirely.) If you're running a local ISP, whose business is based on providing good service, screwing over your customers would seriously hurt your business. Your restaurant comparison doesn't work, because you don't have McDonalds customers or TGIF customers, you have people who eat at both at varying frequencies. And as for your second point, I said screwing over you end-user for a reason. If it's more profitable to undercut prices to get the cheapest users, while selling data and deals to other market actors based on your users data, ISPs will compete for that instead of speeds, privacy concerns and other. And your choice becomes between varyingly shitty deals. The "market" can't then make a choice until: 1) Someone wants to start an ISP with users as primary customer. 2) It being more profitable. 3) That someone having enough capital to do so.

HillaryBriss 9y ago

I'm pessimistic about both arrangements. I don't favor monopolies but, because I live in Los Angeles, I see that a city can act like a sluggish, greedy monopoly, too. Here, the city owns the roads and electrical grid, and it's doing a mediocre or poor job of maintenance. We don't, for example, have "state of the art high throughput roads." Many of the roads are crumbling and need complete replacement. There's a huge backlog. There's also a multi-year backlog of decaying wooden power poles which need to be replaced because they're in danger of coming down during a windstorm. And, when people go to the expense of having solar panels installed on their homes, they have to wait many months for the city to come out and inspect and give permission to connect to the grid. The city does not have a good handle on the problems. (Don't get me started about the leaky water mains.) City ownership of infrastructure is no guarantee of good service and value for money either. And of course, as you say, with monopolies, we're screwed too. I don't see any easy answer.

apeace 9y ago
All very good points, with great examples from where you live. At the very least when decisions are made on a local level as opposed to state/federal, there is more of a chance that 1) people will be able to wrangle control of the situation by voting, and 2) the people who don't like the result can move away. But you're right, it sounds like there is no easy answer for Los Angeles.

dhfhduk 9y ago

I agree with you, although also agree with another poster that net neutrality is still important, mostly because of interoperability reasons. However, you're also bringing up an issue that seems really neglected in public discussion, which is the role of municipal infrastructure and policy. To me there's three things: 1. The importance of net neutrality to the working of the internet, at a theoretical level. 2. The lack of competition. 3. The obligation of companies to the public because of advantages they've been granted. These discussions always proceed like big ISPs own the land that cables are going over, etc. when that's anything but the case. There's things like the telephones you mention, plus right-of-way laws. Why the EFF doesn't publish a huge map showing land used by ISPs that's not owned by them I don't understand. It outrages me to see these ISPs being given right of way, and then having them turn around and act like they don't owe anything to the public, when in fact they wouldn't exist without the public bending over backward to give them all sorts of privileges. They're acting like parasites. To me I might take arguments against net neutrality more seriously if those arguing against net neutrality would: 1. Lobby for the rights of municipalities and other institutions to set up their own ISPs and networks. No laws against public ISPs. 2. Lobby for ISPs to be held responsible for any and all criminally or civilly infringing content going over their networks. Want to preferentially treat packets? Then you should scan for child porn too. If not, you're implicitly supporting it. 3. Lobby for the elimination of right-of-way. Let municipalities, state and federal governments, and private landholders charge ISPs whatever they want for access over their land. Of course, ISPs would scream bloody murder and argue such things are ridiculous, but I would argue that they're not at all unreasonable given what the government is asking for in terms of net neutrality. They want to have their cake and eat it too.

rayiner 9y ago
> Why the EFF doesn't publish a huge map showing land used by ISPs that's not owned by them I don't understand. Likely because it wouldn't show anything interesting. State and local governments may only "manage the public rights-of-way or to require fair and reasonable compensation from telecommunications providers, on a competitively neutral and nondiscriminatory basis, for use of public rights-of-way on a nondiscriminatory basis, if the compensation required is publicly disclosed by such government." https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/253 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/253. In practice, rights of way are poles and conduits, which are rented to all companies at published, non-discriminatory rates: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/224 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/224. The idea that companies are sitting on all these free rights of way they don't own is largely false.

rayiner 9y ago

> In the early 2000's when my home town still had dial-up only, Comcast came into the town and offered to build out cable broadband. They would even throw in a $300k grant to the school district for new laptops. The only catch? They needed to be granted a monopoly on all the telephone poles in the town. The town agreed. I suspect you're not correctly remembering what happened. It's illegal under federal law for municipalities to grant telecommunications monopolies. Municipalities hand out cable licenses in return for 5% of gross receipts + random giveaways like school district grants. But there is absolutely nothing exclusive about it. To pick a random example, here's the cable franchise in my county: http://archive.aacounty.org/OIT/Resources/CableAgreement.pdf http://archive.aacounty.org/OIT/Resources/CableAgreement.pdf (see Section 2.4, "Grant Not Exclusive"). > despite cost-per-bit plummeting over the years, the cost to consumers isn't going down. Bits per second have been going up dramatically. My parents' house in Virginia, got 256 kbps SDSL sometime around 2000-2001. They got 50 mbps fiber over BPON around 2006. That got upgraded to 500 mbps over GPON around 2008. They just got gigabit this year. That's doubling of speed every roughly 15 months. The problem is not that municipalities are granting monopolies. It's that municipalities impose restrictions on building that make it untenable to compete with the incumbent. In most cities, a startup cannot come in and build out neighborhood-by-neighborhood based on demonstrated demand. They're required to commit to building out the whole city in a short time frame, without regard to demand.

apeace 9y ago
Thanks so much! I imagine you're right, I must have misremembered. Though as you insinuated, this is the same thing in practice: > In most cities, a startup cannot come in and build out neighborhood-by-neighborhood based on demonstrated demand. They're required to commit to building out the whole city in a short time frame, without regard to demand. -- EDIT I checked on this, and you're indeed correct. The franchise in my home town includes a non-exclusivity clause. As you said, it also contains a clause stating that "The Licensee shall make its Cable System Service" available to all residents of the town within seven business days of a request". So the network must cover the entire town. Finally, in the non-exclusivity clause, it states that if any other cable provider is ever granted a license with "more favorable or less burdensome" terms, then the town will renegotiate terms with Comcast. To me, this is the same thing as "granting a monopoly" in practice. But I appreciate your clarification! -- END OF EDIT I want to also point out: > The problem is not that municipalities are granting monopolies. In the case of Chattanooga that I mentioned, the law preventing the municipal ISP from expanding is unfair in the same way, even if this is not a case of a monopoly being "granted". Why shouldn't a company created by a town be allowed to compete in the marketplace?

r00fus 9y ago

> Years later they offered to expand their ISP to the surrounding towns, which only had dial-up and satellite. It would cost zero taxpayer dollars. Instead the state decided to give $45 million to Comcast/AT&T to build out--get this--DSL! This isn't even just Monopoly issues, it's pure corruption. That will require fixing gerrymandering and electoral corruption - a tall order.