6 ms·

Part of the issue is the monopoly most broadband providers have in the US and Canada. If you had two truly distinct cable options, say Comcast and TascCom. You

Part of the issue is the monopoly most broadband providers have in the US and Canada. If you had two truly distinct cable options, say Comcast and TascCom. Your friends with Comcast say Netflix sux, low quality, lots of problems. Your friends with TascCom say netflix is awesome, great HD content, too bad there's only like 8 3D movies! You'll sign up for TascCom. Comcast's board will get angry they're losing customers, and fix their interconnects. But it's all a dream, there is no TascCom, there's only Comcast.

wdewind 12y ago
Yeah, this does seem to be a core issue. How can we make it easier for people to start last-mile ISPs? It seems like a pretty capital intensive business to get involved in :)
- jeffasinger 12y ago
  The core issue isn't at the last mile, but in connecting a last mile network to the internet? Maybe we make Cable companies share their last mile networks like we did with DSL?
  - rayiner 12y ago
    > Maybe we make Cable companies share their last mile networks like we did with DSL? Which killed investment in DSL. Who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are forced to lease out at wholesale rates to competitors?
    - bryanlarsen 12y ago
      Yet somehow we manage to spend trillions of dollars on streets, sewers and other infrastructure
      - GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
        For now.
      - rayiner 12y ago
        Those things are built with public money, not private money, which introduces problems of its own. Once you start using public money to build infrastructure, politics determines the level of spending rather than actual demand. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that we have $3.6 trillion in delayed maintenance and underinvestment of our core infrastructure (water, sewers, bridges, power lines, etc): https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/04/08/infr-a08.html https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/04/08/infr-a08.html. I'm not one of those people that believes we shouldn't have public infrastructure, but I do think you have to be cognizant of the trade-offs involved. Take something like Amtrak. Amtrak has an almost $9 billion maintenance backlog on the Northeast Corridor: http://usa.streetsblog.org/2011/06/15/house-plan-to-privatize-northeast-corridor-more-moderate-than-expected http://usa.streetsblog.org/2011/06/15/house-plan-to-privatiz.... The NEC is the only part of the whole system that generates an operating profit. A private company would shut down the rest of the network, and try to make the NEC service as attractive as possible for customers. But in a regime where politics decides where the money goes, the operating surplus generated by the NEC instead goes to funding money-losing lines in the rest of the country. Road building, too, is the result of distorted incentives. As an urbanite who doesn't like to drive, I would spend $0 on highways designed to get suburban commuters into the cities, and spend that money on public transit instead. Surbanites, of course, feel differently. Who decides how that money is allocated? Not the market, but the political system, which at the national level systematically over represents rural and suburban votes. The situation with telecom companies isn't ideal, but I don't think the dynamics of the telecom market are amenable to the kind of broad political consensus necessary for a successful municipal service. Take water, for example. Everybody needs roughly the same amount of water, and is satisfied with a relatively similar level of water quality. Meanwhile, I'd bet 95% of people would be perfectly happy with 5 mbps service, while a small minority wants gigabit. Do you think the political system is set up to make that small minority happy? If there is anything to learn from how municipalities handle public infrastructure is that when you put it to a vote, the voters will spend as little as possible to get the minimum acceptable level of service. That's exactly what happened to our power and water infrastructure.
    - nitrogen 12y ago
      In other words, who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are guaranteed to profit from due to regulated rates set on a cost-plus basis?
      - wmf 12y ago
        And yet telcos weren't happy with the regulated profit that unbundled DSL provided them. Either they're just lying (which I consider entirely credible) or it's not that simple. For example, if the regulated profit is less than in an unregulated scenario, "shareholder value" thinking will argue for deregulation. Also, there's no profit if the regulated cost-plus price is so high that nobody buys it (what if the cost of FTTH is over $100/month?).
    - rhizome 12y ago
      Who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are forced to lease out at wholesale rates to competitors? The government should, but they wouldn't lease them out to competitors, but providers who happen to be in competition with each other. Make the last mile a utility, like sewers.
    - shkkmo 12y ago
      Lots of local community governments would love to do this. Unfortunately Comcast is working very hard to make sure that this is not allowed.
  - wdewind 12y ago
    Right, but having more last mile networks would create pressure to resolve the connecting last mile ISP to infrastructure ISP issue.
  - AnthonyMouse 12y ago
    > The core issue isn't at the last mile, but in connecting a last mile network to the internet? Not really. The cost of the interconnect between e.g. Comcast and Level 3 is immaterial in the cost of operating a network. The only reason there is so much contention there is that it's a choke point where Comcast can try to put up a toll booth.
- jessaustin 12y ago
  Once the FCC finally takes the brakes off unlicensed wireless, rural and lower-density urban customers will see a competitive market of WISPs. They've been dragging it out for years, though, so who knows when that will happen?
  - wmf 12y ago
    Are existing WISPs spectrum-constrained today?

wdewind 12y ago

Yeah, this does seem to be a core issue. How can we make it easier for people to start last-mile ISPs? It seems like a pretty capital intensive business to get involved in :)

jeffasinger 12y ago
The core issue isn't at the last mile, but in connecting a last mile network to the internet? Maybe we make Cable companies share their last mile networks like we did with DSL?
- rayiner 12y ago
  > Maybe we make Cable companies share their last mile networks like we did with DSL? Which killed investment in DSL. Who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are forced to lease out at wholesale rates to competitors?
  - bryanlarsen 12y ago
    Yet somehow we manage to spend trillions of dollars on streets, sewers and other infrastructure
    - GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
      For now.
    - rayiner 12y ago
      Those things are built with public money, not private money, which introduces problems of its own. Once you start using public money to build infrastructure, politics determines the level of spending rather than actual demand. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that we have $3.6 trillion in delayed maintenance and underinvestment of our core infrastructure (water, sewers, bridges, power lines, etc): https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/04/08/infr-a08.html https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/04/08/infr-a08.html. I'm not one of those people that believes we shouldn't have public infrastructure, but I do think you have to be cognizant of the trade-offs involved. Take something like Amtrak. Amtrak has an almost $9 billion maintenance backlog on the Northeast Corridor: http://usa.streetsblog.org/2011/06/15/house-plan-to-privatize-northeast-corridor-more-moderate-than-expected http://usa.streetsblog.org/2011/06/15/house-plan-to-privatiz.... The NEC is the only part of the whole system that generates an operating profit. A private company would shut down the rest of the network, and try to make the NEC service as attractive as possible for customers. But in a regime where politics decides where the money goes, the operating surplus generated by the NEC instead goes to funding money-losing lines in the rest of the country. Road building, too, is the result of distorted incentives. As an urbanite who doesn't like to drive, I would spend $0 on highways designed to get suburban commuters into the cities, and spend that money on public transit instead. Surbanites, of course, feel differently. Who decides how that money is allocated? Not the market, but the political system, which at the national level systematically over represents rural and suburban votes. The situation with telecom companies isn't ideal, but I don't think the dynamics of the telecom market are amenable to the kind of broad political consensus necessary for a successful municipal service. Take water, for example. Everybody needs roughly the same amount of water, and is satisfied with a relatively similar level of water quality. Meanwhile, I'd bet 95% of people would be perfectly happy with 5 mbps service, while a small minority wants gigabit. Do you think the political system is set up to make that small minority happy? If there is anything to learn from how municipalities handle public infrastructure is that when you put it to a vote, the voters will spend as little as possible to get the minimum acceptable level of service. That's exactly what happened to our power and water infrastructure.
  - nitrogen 12y ago
    In other words, who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are guaranteed to profit from due to regulated rates set on a cost-plus basis?
    - wmf 12y ago
      And yet telcos weren't happy with the regulated profit that unbundled DSL provided them. Either they're just lying (which I consider entirely credible) or it's not that simple. For example, if the regulated profit is less than in an unregulated scenario, "shareholder value" thinking will argue for deregulation. Also, there's no profit if the regulated cost-plus price is so high that nobody buys it (what if the cost of FTTH is over $100/month?).
  - rhizome 12y ago
    Who wants to spend billions on infrastructure they are forced to lease out at wholesale rates to competitors? The government should, but they wouldn't lease them out to competitors, but providers who happen to be in competition with each other. Make the last mile a utility, like sewers.
  - shkkmo 12y ago
    Lots of local community governments would love to do this. Unfortunately Comcast is working very hard to make sure that this is not allowed.
- wdewind 12y ago
  Right, but having more last mile networks would create pressure to resolve the connecting last mile ISP to infrastructure ISP issue.
- AnthonyMouse 12y ago
  > The core issue isn't at the last mile, but in connecting a last mile network to the internet? Not really. The cost of the interconnect between e.g. Comcast and Level 3 is immaterial in the cost of operating a network. The only reason there is so much contention there is that it's a choke point where Comcast can try to put up a toll booth.
jessaustin 12y ago
Once the FCC finally takes the brakes off unlicensed wireless, rural and lower-density urban customers will see a competitive market of WISPs. They've been dragging it out for years, though, so who knows when that will happen?
- wmf 12y ago
  Are existing WISPs spectrum-constrained today?