4 ms·

Except that nationalization is part of the plan, under the guise of "affordable municipal broadband". A government owned near-monopoly replacing a private one.

delinka 9y ago
When has that ever been the case? The FCC doesn't build anything. If you're worried about the federal government paying private companies to build out such a thing, take a look at the first decade of the current century where taxpayers funded the telecoms to build out broadband infrastructure with pretty much zero regulation around, well, any of it. There was no specification that the network be nationalized or become government property or that some random government agency could coerce the telecoms into controlling information on the internet ... So what are you talking about?
- wmf 9y ago
  It's local governments, not the federal government. In theory there is a concern that a municipal ISP could outcompete commercial ISPs due to lower cost of capital and such, but it's not clear if that has ever happened.
  - stale2002 9y ago
    Uhh, isn't that a GOOD thing though. If the other companies can't compete because their prices are too high, well sucks to be them. The only thing that matters is the consumers.
    - rayiner 9y ago
      Artificially suppressed or subsidized prices are not a good thing and in fact are a huge problem in the infrastructure world. It kills infrastructure investment. Our electrical grids, water and sewer systems, transit systems, roads, etc., are all crumbling because short-sighted "pro consumer" types thought the most important thing was to keep prices low for consumers.
      - eat_veggies 9y ago
        We're getting high prices and dogshit slow internet anyways due to laws that keep competition out. Even Google gave up on trying to deal with the telecoms. Your argument would be fine if our high prices actually resulted in innovation but we haven't had that in a decade. For a while my family was paying about fifty bucks a month for three megabits down.
        adventured 9y ago
        High prices yes, slow internet no. It's no longer true that the US lags behind on Internet access speeds. The US is ranked #10 in the world in average Internet access speeds, just barely behind Denmark and Japan. The countries that rank in front of the US are mostly tiny population wise. We're far faster than eg France, or Australia. Competitively, US access speeds have improved substantially in the last ten years. Here's who ranks in front of the US: South Korea, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Hong Kong, Finland, Switzerland, Singapore, Japan. Here is who the US ranks in front of: Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Russia, Brazil, China, Mexico, Taiwan, New Zealand, India, Indonesia, Netherlands, Romania, Britain, Czech, Belgium, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Poland, Italy, Greece, Israel, Turkey, Saudi Arabia - and all of Africa + all of Latin America. The US has 2x the average access speeds of Italy, and neary 2x the speeds of France. Within 24 to 36 months, the US will likely pass Japan on average access speeds. This is a massive improvement over where the US was ten years ago and it's getting better faster than most countries. The US ranks #8 on percentage of connections above 15mbps (48%), just behind Sweden and in front of Denmark. The US ranks #10 on percentage above 25mbps, with dramatically faster growth in that segment than anyone else in the top 10. Between Q1 2016 and Q1 2017, the US saw a 65% leap in % of connections over 25mbps; Finland, ranked #9, by comparison saw a 31% improvement. So not only is the US killing it on access speeds now, particularly for a massive country of 330 million people, it's improving far faster than most other comparable nations.
        jbclements 9y ago
        Sounds like you have a good source of information; any chance you can share pointers? Thanks! Apologies if I missed this in upstream posts.
- rayiner 9y ago
  > If you're worried about the federal government paying private companies to build out such a thing, take a look at the first decade of the current century where taxpayers funded the telecoms to build out broadband infrastructure with pretty much zero regulation around, well, any of it. Except this isn't true. Almost all the existing broadband infrastructure was built with private money, not taxpayer money.
  - s73ver_ 9y ago
    Except it absolutely is true. The incumbent ISPs were granted hundreds of billions of dollars to wire the country with fiber. They took the money, and did jack shit with it. http://newnetworks.com/ShortSCANDALSummary.htm http://newnetworks.com/ShortSCANDALSummary.htm
    - rayiner 9y ago
      The claim is FUD. No governments wrote $200 billion of checks to have broadband built. Look at the methodology used to derive that number: https://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/broadbandgrants/comments/61BF.pdf https://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/broadbandgrants/comments/61B... (starting on page 222). $103 billion is "excess profits." I.e. if you pretend that telcos should receive the same profit margins as water companies, during a period of massive growth in demand for their product, then you can count any profits above that level as "taxpayer money paid to the telco." By that logic, taxpayers are giving Apple hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies. $78 billion in "excessive depreciation." If you assume that depreciation schedules during the POTS era should be the same as during a period where everyone was replacing their networks to build broadband, then you can count the "excessive depreciation" as "taxpayer money paid to telcos." If you actually read the origin of the number, nowhere will you find reference to checks written. The gripe is about deregulation in and of itself--the very idea that the government should not be deciding what prices to charge for what services. That kind of thinking is totally outside the mainstream among telecom regulators in the developed world. Every major European country deregulated their telcos in the 1990s and 2000s. The government in Germany or France doesn't sit there and decide how much broadband service should cost, and call everything above that "excess profits."
sliverstorm 9y ago
Given the choice between a government-owned monopoly and a private monopoly, why would you choose the latter?
- patmorgan23 9y ago
  Because the latter can and will be displaced by a shift in the marketplace. The former can literally shut down its competitors with state power.
- mattmcknight 9y ago
  That's a bit of a false dilemma though, as you don't need any monopoly. It is the local governments that granted the monopolies in the first place.

delinka 9y ago

When has that ever been the case? The FCC doesn't build anything. If you're worried about the federal government paying private companies to build out such a thing, take a look at the first decade of the current century where taxpayers funded the telecoms to build out broadband infrastructure with pretty much zero regulation around, well, any of it. There was no specification that the network be nationalized or become government property or that some random government agency could coerce the telecoms into controlling information on the internet ... So what are you talking about?

wmf 9y ago
It's local governments, not the federal government. In theory there is a concern that a municipal ISP could outcompete commercial ISPs due to lower cost of capital and such, but it's not clear if that has ever happened.
- stale2002 9y ago
  Uhh, isn't that a GOOD thing though. If the other companies can't compete because their prices are too high, well sucks to be them. The only thing that matters is the consumers.
  - rayiner 9y ago
    Artificially suppressed or subsidized prices are not a good thing and in fact are a huge problem in the infrastructure world. It kills infrastructure investment. Our electrical grids, water and sewer systems, transit systems, roads, etc., are all crumbling because short-sighted "pro consumer" types thought the most important thing was to keep prices low for consumers.
    - eat_veggies 9y ago
      We're getting high prices and dogshit slow internet anyways due to laws that keep competition out. Even Google gave up on trying to deal with the telecoms. Your argument would be fine if our high prices actually resulted in innovation but we haven't had that in a decade. For a while my family was paying about fifty bucks a month for three megabits down.
      - adventured 9y ago
        High prices yes, slow internet no. It's no longer true that the US lags behind on Internet access speeds. The US is ranked #10 in the world in average Internet access speeds, just barely behind Denmark and Japan. The countries that rank in front of the US are mostly tiny population wise. We're far faster than eg France, or Australia. Competitively, US access speeds have improved substantially in the last ten years. Here's who ranks in front of the US: South Korea, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Hong Kong, Finland, Switzerland, Singapore, Japan. Here is who the US ranks in front of: Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Russia, Brazil, China, Mexico, Taiwan, New Zealand, India, Indonesia, Netherlands, Romania, Britain, Czech, Belgium, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Poland, Italy, Greece, Israel, Turkey, Saudi Arabia - and all of Africa + all of Latin America. The US has 2x the average access speeds of Italy, and neary 2x the speeds of France. Within 24 to 36 months, the US will likely pass Japan on average access speeds. This is a massive improvement over where the US was ten years ago and it's getting better faster than most countries. The US ranks #8 on percentage of connections above 15mbps (48%), just behind Sweden and in front of Denmark. The US ranks #10 on percentage above 25mbps, with dramatically faster growth in that segment than anyone else in the top 10. Between Q1 2016 and Q1 2017, the US saw a 65% leap in % of connections over 25mbps; Finland, ranked #9, by comparison saw a 31% improvement. So not only is the US killing it on access speeds now, particularly for a massive country of 330 million people, it's improving far faster than most other comparable nations.
        jbclements 9y ago
        Sounds like you have a good source of information; any chance you can share pointers? Thanks! Apologies if I missed this in upstream posts.
rayiner 9y ago
> If you're worried about the federal government paying private companies to build out such a thing, take a look at the first decade of the current century where taxpayers funded the telecoms to build out broadband infrastructure with pretty much zero regulation around, well, any of it. Except this isn't true. Almost all the existing broadband infrastructure was built with private money, not taxpayer money.
- s73ver_ 9y ago
  Except it absolutely is true. The incumbent ISPs were granted hundreds of billions of dollars to wire the country with fiber. They took the money, and did jack shit with it. http://newnetworks.com/ShortSCANDALSummary.htm http://newnetworks.com/ShortSCANDALSummary.htm
  - rayiner 9y ago
    The claim is FUD. No governments wrote $200 billion of checks to have broadband built. Look at the methodology used to derive that number: https://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/broadbandgrants/comments/61BF.pdf https://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/broadbandgrants/comments/61B... (starting on page 222). $103 billion is "excess profits." I.e. if you pretend that telcos should receive the same profit margins as water companies, during a period of massive growth in demand for their product, then you can count any profits above that level as "taxpayer money paid to the telco." By that logic, taxpayers are giving Apple hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies. $78 billion in "excessive depreciation." If you assume that depreciation schedules during the POTS era should be the same as during a period where everyone was replacing their networks to build broadband, then you can count the "excessive depreciation" as "taxpayer money paid to telcos." If you actually read the origin of the number, nowhere will you find reference to checks written. The gripe is about deregulation in and of itself--the very idea that the government should not be deciding what prices to charge for what services. That kind of thinking is totally outside the mainstream among telecom regulators in the developed world. Every major European country deregulated their telcos in the 1990s and 2000s. The government in Germany or France doesn't sit there and decide how much broadband service should cost, and call everything above that "excess profits."

sliverstorm 9y ago

Given the choice between a government-owned monopoly and a private monopoly, why would you choose the latter?

patmorgan23 9y ago
Because the latter can and will be displaced by a shift in the marketplace. The former can literally shut down its competitors with state power.
mattmcknight 9y ago
That's a bit of a false dilemma though, as you don't need any monopoly. It is the local governments that granted the monopolies in the first place.