6 ms·

Oh, competition, wouldn't it be nice to have you around. Of course, given the massive up-front infrastructure investment, such competition is unlikely to mater

• tbrownaw 15y ago
  Of course, given the massive up-front infrastructure investment, such competition is unlikely to materialize. I thought it was more that cities (I think it's at that level, anyway) tend to sell exclusive rights to do that so wired competition beyond 1 cableco + 1 phoneco is largely illegal?
• lotharbot 15y ago
  > What would be wonderful is if the government ran fiber to everyone's homes, and then let companies lease it from them. http://www.utopianet.org/why-utopia http://www.utopianet.org/why-utopia -- sixteen cities in northern Utah have done exactly this. My dedicated fiber connection runs about $35 a month for 10 up/10 down, no caps that I'm aware of. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/google-bestows-1gbps-fiber-network-on-kansas-city-kansas.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/google-besto... -- Google is running fiber in Kansas City, KS. I'd assume they've run the numbers and can cost-effectively last-mile the whole city.
  • devicenull 15y ago
    I remember reading somewhere that they are doing it, and releasing all the information about how they did it, as well as common pitfalls. The purpose of that was to give other cities the information they needed to successfully implement it.
  • groby_b 15y ago
    Or if the government actually used its regulatory power and mandated that companies need to lease last-mile to anybody who wants it at competitive rates. Competitive rates means not at a loss to the provider - so the libertarian can please stop screaming. At the same time, last mile should be treated as a commons, simply because having everybody provide that doesn't make a lick of economical sense. (And if it has to be, split ISPs and last-mile providers. You can't run both. That removes a giant conflict of interest)
  • bradleyland 15y ago
    This is where I lay my vote. The whole hybrid situation where private companies are given (often) exclusive rights to lay infrastructure on private right-of-ways and easements leads to natural monopolies. The infrastructure on public land ought to be public.
• ams6110 15y ago
  Why would it have to be the government doing this?
  • techsupporter 15y ago
    Because infrastructure is a money pit. The up-front cost of building a last-mile fiber network is astounding (see also: Verizon FiOS) and carries with it a much longer payoff term than "next quarter." Most companies with a stock symbol have a board or shareholders that want very fast returns on investment. (Please take the following without any hint of political bias.) A government, on the other hand, builds infrastructure that isn't intended to have a return to it that's valued in money. Instead, that infrastructure benefits society in other ways. Arguably, building a network that functions as a "dumb pipe" where others can provide services on top of it--akin to a road--would allow greater competition in the business of moving bits because competitors would be freed from each of them expending and needlessly duplicating the others' infrastructure costs.
    • pennig 15y ago
      Kind of a tangent, but it frustrates me to see when a company makes its decisions based on the desires of its shareholders (by legal obligations or otherwise). The way I see it, this behavior only serves to weaken a company. Sure, the shareholders get their 5¢ dividends, but it's usually at the cost of a superior product offering. Capitalism, man…
• yumraj 15y ago
  What competition? Here in US AT&T has also started capping their DSL at 150GB for regular DSL and 250GB for their U-Verse. Competition only helps if there is lots of it, unfortunately we're in a duopoly market where even though theoretically there is competition, to get around anti-trust laws, they just follow each other so consumers are just screwed.
  • nhangen 15y ago
    So it's more collusion than competition.