> > providing customer support > It could be argued that they don't even provide this adequately in areas where they are a market monopoly. It's almost as if

> > providing customer support > It could be argued that they don't even provide this adequately in areas where they are a market monopoly. It's almost as if being a monopoly means you don't have to invest in cost centers like customer support... Really though this is pretty much the core problem. High costs + build-out requirements mean monopolies are granted, whether explicitly or not. Municipal last mile means the hardest part is done once, and then any ISP is free to compete -- which they can do based on offering the best support, fastest peering, etc. The cost of entering the market is reduced to getting set up in the PoP(s).