3 ms·

Knowing so little about the situation in Colorado, why can't they just allow more competition in the city, instead of running it themselves?

• sanderjd 9y ago
  (I live in Boulder County, which passed something similar.) As far as I know, competition is allowed, it just doesn't exist. The market has failed to provide us with broadband options. This vote is not actually for the government to run it themselves, it's just to override a state-level ban on municipal broadband. The next step will be for Comcast to lobby against municipalities actually setting up competing broadband offerings. A few steps after that and Comcast might actually start responding as if they are competing in an actual market, for instance by improving their services and/or lowering their prices. If they clean up their act enough, they might even get to keep their monopoly. But their reputation is already so bad that it seems somewhat unlikely at this point.
  • mtnsun 9y ago
    The Boulder vote was to override the ban, but the Fort Collins vote was to allow the city to grab $150M in bonds for fiber deployment. FoCo already voted to override the ban a few years ago.
    • sanderjd 9y ago
      Ah! Sorry, I didn't realize that.
• s73ver_ 9y ago
  Few want to compete against such an entity as Comcast. Hell, most of the other large ISPs don't want to.
• wafflesraccoon 9y ago
  There are other ISPs in Fort Collins (CenturyLink/FRII) but it is something like 90%~ of the town is serviced by Comcast. This gives them massive amounts of control when it comes to pricing in the town.