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Yikes, this article is so myopic. They treat large "ISPs" as if they are a single independent entity. The largest ones are owned and operated by gigantic corpor

Yikes, this article is so myopic. They treat large "ISPs" as if they are a single independent entity. The largest ones are owned and operated by gigantic corporate interests, and their sales figures are part of a broader plan, and thus so is pricing. The profits of "EPB Fiber Optics" don't go towards paying for content rights worth billions of dollars a year. The larger the network, the more expensive it costs to maintain and upgrade. Of course a tiny regional co-op ISP doesn't cost much to run. They don't have 25 million customers in 21 states, or 145,000 miles of fiber in 39 states. I mean, jesus, this article goes all over the place. It's saying provisioning isn't expensive, and suggests that deployment cost is lowered by changing building codes to require conduit. How does that affect the 91 million homes that already exist? The article states that net neutrality "prohibits [ISPs] from charging unjustified fees on Internet services". No, it doesn't. They can charge whatever they want for their services. They will increase the price of internet services whether or not net neutrality exists, because it is not getting any cheaper to run a giant ISP that is responsible to the shareholders of a media conglomerate. If the author really thinks the only reason big ISPs charge high fees is because they're mean and greedy, they really are going to lose this fight, mainly from a lack of critical thinking skills.

jethro_tell 9y ago
Well it's actually quite a bit cheaper to do data in volume, buying dark fiber or laying it your self will give a much better return if you can use it all. Generally referred to as Economies of Scale. It goes for most businesses.
- peterwwillis 9y ago
  It's cheaper to do things in volume, but you still have to compare the scale. If the tiny ISP has 100 miles of fiber, they still look really good on a balance sheet because they haven't had to deal with infrastructure 1,450 times larger. Because it's a much smaller set of problems they can be much more efficient.
  - heavenlyblue 9y ago
    What are you on about? A single provider would have to pay literally 2x their current budget to increase their 100 mile capacity assuming it was a single link. A larger business can do that in stages by absorbing the risks. Besides, internet isn't centralized, so you might as well manage each segment of the network as a sub-provider, only managing the financial risks at the higher level. It makes it only easier.
wolfgang42 9y ago
By that logic, wouldn't a large ISP want to maximize its profit by splitting itself into smaller regional divisions with smaller, less expensive networks?
- ksk 9y ago
  I think what GP is also saying is the money maker divisions subsidize the 'loser' regional divisions. It would be interesting to see that data...
  - peterwwillis 9y ago
    Absolutely. Modern ISPs are part of corporations which have other business interests that are very, very expensive. All corporations use all of their money-making ventures to help subsidize other parts of the business. Just look at the old Bell system. They charged exorbitant rates for the long distance service and used this to subsidize local service. When Bell got broken up, local phone service got more expensive, but long distance got cheaper. Later on, a lot of the baby bells got absorbed by others because they were not efficient enough to generate profits as individual units without the "mothership" subsidizing them. The way a giant corporate monolith works is completely different from a tiny local company.
    - creeble 9y ago
      Then they should kill the business units that are expensive to run, not jack up prices on the profitable services.
- peterwwillis 9y ago
  No, that would be a logistical nightmare, and the amount of waste and complexity added would just bog down the whole thing and profits would fall. If you have 100 acres of land to farm, it does not get cheaper or easier to manage by buying 10 sets of tractors, 10 sets of farm hands, 10 grain silos, 10 of everything... you don't need all those things, and they all have implied costs which will all eat away at your profit by the time the grain gets to market.
rsingel 9y ago
"The article states that net neutrality "prohibits [ISPs] from charging unjustified fees on Internet services". No, it doesn't. They can charge whatever they want for their services. They will increase the price of internet services whether or not net neutrality exists, because it is not getting any cheaper to run a giant ISP that is responsible to the shareholders of a media conglomerate." Yes, it does. The 2015 rules prohibit an ISP from charging a site or service such as Airbnb to load for an ISPs' subscribers. This is a subset of the no blocking rule. The 2015 rules don't regulate prices that ISPs charge their subscribers, though the FCC reserved the right to step in if an ISP's were egregious.
- apk17 9y ago
  > Yes, it does. The 2015 rules prohibit… …extortion, basically.
rafiki6 9y ago
I don't understand what the argument being made here is. They charge high fees because they can. They can because there's no competition to take customers from them. There's no competition because Large ISPs are greedy and lobby local/state/federal governing bodies to protect their interest to ensure they stay on top. They stay on top by not only lobbying but by merging and buying smaller regional companies and aggressively expanding their reach. They are greedy because, well any for-profit company is. That's why we have regulations to keep them in check.

jethro_tell 9y ago

Well it's actually quite a bit cheaper to do data in volume, buying dark fiber or laying it your self will give a much better return if you can use it all. Generally referred to as Economies of Scale. It goes for most businesses.

peterwwillis 9y ago
It's cheaper to do things in volume, but you still have to compare the scale. If the tiny ISP has 100 miles of fiber, they still look really good on a balance sheet because they haven't had to deal with infrastructure 1,450 times larger. Because it's a much smaller set of problems they can be much more efficient.
- heavenlyblue 9y ago
  What are you on about? A single provider would have to pay literally 2x their current budget to increase their 100 mile capacity assuming it was a single link. A larger business can do that in stages by absorbing the risks. Besides, internet isn't centralized, so you might as well manage each segment of the network as a sub-provider, only managing the financial risks at the higher level. It makes it only easier.

wolfgang42 9y ago

By that logic, wouldn't a large ISP want to maximize its profit by splitting itself into smaller regional divisions with smaller, less expensive networks?

ksk 9y ago
I think what GP is also saying is the money maker divisions subsidize the 'loser' regional divisions. It would be interesting to see that data...
- peterwwillis 9y ago
  Absolutely. Modern ISPs are part of corporations which have other business interests that are very, very expensive. All corporations use all of their money-making ventures to help subsidize other parts of the business. Just look at the old Bell system. They charged exorbitant rates for the long distance service and used this to subsidize local service. When Bell got broken up, local phone service got more expensive, but long distance got cheaper. Later on, a lot of the baby bells got absorbed by others because they were not efficient enough to generate profits as individual units without the "mothership" subsidizing them. The way a giant corporate monolith works is completely different from a tiny local company.
  - creeble 9y ago
    Then they should kill the business units that are expensive to run, not jack up prices on the profitable services.
peterwwillis 9y ago
No, that would be a logistical nightmare, and the amount of waste and complexity added would just bog down the whole thing and profits would fall. If you have 100 acres of land to farm, it does not get cheaper or easier to manage by buying 10 sets of tractors, 10 sets of farm hands, 10 grain silos, 10 of everything... you don't need all those things, and they all have implied costs which will all eat away at your profit by the time the grain gets to market.

rsingel 9y ago

"The article states that net neutrality "prohibits [ISPs] from charging unjustified fees on Internet services". No, it doesn't. They can charge whatever they want for their services. They will increase the price of internet services whether or not net neutrality exists, because it is not getting any cheaper to run a giant ISP that is responsible to the shareholders of a media conglomerate." Yes, it does. The 2015 rules prohibit an ISP from charging a site or service such as Airbnb to load for an ISPs' subscribers. This is a subset of the no blocking rule. The 2015 rules don't regulate prices that ISPs charge their subscribers, though the FCC reserved the right to step in if an ISP's were egregious.

apk17 9y ago
> Yes, it does. The 2015 rules prohibit… …extortion, basically.

rafiki6 9y ago

I don't understand what the argument being made here is. They charge high fees because they can. They can because there's no competition to take customers from them. There's no competition because Large ISPs are greedy and lobby local/state/federal governing bodies to protect their interest to ensure they stay on top. They stay on top by not only lobbying but by merging and buying smaller regional companies and aggressively expanding their reach. They are greedy because, well any for-profit company is. That's why we have regulations to keep them in check.