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Because america is so anti-socialist. No, seriously. And it's the same reason why PG&E does such a shit job of maintaining their infrastructure, too. Letting a
by joshAg 6y ago
Because america is so anti-socialist. No, seriously. And it's the same reason why PG&E does such a shit job of maintaining their infrastructure, too.
Letting anyone tear up the street to run their own wires whenever they want isn't feasible. From a competitor perspective,that's super expensive and a massive capital investment, so any preexisting competitor with a large enough warchest could just lower their competing prices to drive the new competitor out of business. But from a municipal or society perspective, cable right of ways/culverts are already a constrained resource, and installation disrupts traffic and residents. So basically that last mile infrastructure is a great example of a natural monopoly.
If it wasn't such a natural monopoly, a market could be a great solution for increasing ISP quality, but since it is a natural monopoly, market based solutions fall flat due to lack of competition.
This is where the socialism bit comes in. If america were less anti-socialist, it would treat the last mile of wires like it treats public roads. It doesn't solve the natural monopoly issue, but it does solve the issue that ISP users have no means by which to get the ISP to improve service. Unlike, a private ISP whose only constituents are the shareholders, a governments constituents are the people being governed, so if they want a better ISP, they can vote for improving it through bonds or taxes or however they want to finance it. But that's socialist and america hates socialism, so instead state governments pass anti-municipal-ISP laws and/or municipal governments grant multi-decade-exclusive service contracts in exchange for the ISP deigning to maintain the infrastructure or promising to marginally improve it (but of course at a rate that never threatens their quarterly numbers).
- mistrial9 6y agoyes, and .. there was a time long ago in California when PG&E had a clear, engineering oriented management culture. In fact, great infrastructure was built and ran very reliably, for decades. But the times changed. There were relatively fewer 'grand challenge' engineering efforts, and far more day-to-day infrastructure and labor management, accounting and banking. Oh, lots of cash accumulation and cash flow control, too. A new set of PG&E leadership settled in -- bean counters and control-focused policy. The old engineers, for good reason, considered their "job well done" and went to play golf or whatever. The new management hid money, played hardball with sub-sub-contractors, and told old people on pensions to pay up, as business people tend to do.. source: attorney from the time of the Enron price crisis in California
- mikepurvis 6y agoI'm not sure exactly what the legal framework is around it, but Canada's monopoly network operators (Rogers for coax, Bell for copper) are I believe required to sell bulk bandwidth to MVNO-style carriers. I've been a long-time TekSavvy customer, and certainly I get way better pricing from them than I would buying equivalent service directly from Rogers. And for what it's worth, when I tracert out of my house, the very first hop (9ms away) is a TekSavvy IP address which geolocates to a point in my neighbourhood, so it's not like I'm going through a ton of Rogers infrastructure to get to them (unless it's all transparent and extremely low latency). There isn't much of a difference on the service side either; the trucks which come around here are all third party fulfillment firms regardless of who your ISP is (and they have super-bland, forgettable names like "Dependable HomeTech")
- joshAg 6y agoThere used to be something similar around telephone lines in the US, where bell had to let competitors use the lines at cost or something similar, but that way tends to lie madness because of fights over what the actual cost of maintenance of the infra is and how much of that cost should be borne by the actual owner and how much they can charge middlemen carriers (for lack of better term). It's extra sad because it didn't have to be this way for internet, but the US chose to privatise public internet infra back under clinton and then double and tripled down under bush. Meanwhile, it still maintains at least 1 set of infra for itself (I don't know if siprnet and jwics use separate cables).
- mikepurvis 6y agoI don't think it necessarily has to be madness, but you do need a competent and appropriately-separate regulating body overseeing the system and setting prices/rules that are fair to all the participants. In Canada, that body is the CRTC. I think they largely do a good job, though some of it ends up in the courts, and TekSavvy happily engages customers by bumping monthly rates up or down in response to the rule changes, and encouraging us to write our elected representatives if we like or dislike it. Examples: https://www.teksavvy.com/in-the-news/2019-press-releases/teksavvy-to-customers-we-lowered-your-internet-bill-thank-the-crtc/ https://www.teksavvy.com/in-the-news/2019-press-releases/tek... https://www.teksavvy.com/in-the-news/2020-press-releases/teksavvy-demands-immediate-refund-from-bell-rogers-after-fca-rejects-dubious-appeals-of-crtc-wholesale-rate-decision/ https://www.teksavvy.com/in-the-news/2020-press-releases/tek...