6 ms·

Fast lanes are just one horrible side effect of our "everything capitalism" country. The fact that most cities in the USA are duopolies when it comes to wired

by ck2 12y ago

Fast lanes are just one horrible side effect of our "everything capitalism" country. The fact that most cities in the USA are duopolies when it comes to wired internet means essentially everyone is screwed. Even if the FCC was strict with them, it wouldn't matter. I pay $45/mo for 5mbps in 2014. Higher speeds are available but at much greater cost, because there is no competition.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
icebraining 12y ago
I agree - the socialist solution we have in my country of having multiple private companies compete a relatevily free market (as opposed to one where local governments have passed laws to limit competition, like the US has) is much better.
- Noctem 12y ago
  This thread is all backwards. Cronyism/corporatism is being called capitalism, and capitalism is being called socialism. The socialist solution would be public ownership of one firm without private competition, and would be (at least in my opinion) disastrous.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    My post was sarcastic :)
    - sitkack 12y ago
      How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?
    - Noctem 12y ago
      Oh good. I wondered if that was the case, but suppressed the urge to ask since people often don't take kindly to assumptions that their actual views must be sarcastic. There are also plenty of inaccurate conceptions of capitalism/socialism, and people tend to ascribe successes to their own preferred system, regardless of reality. I'm glad that's not the case here.
- WildUtah 12y ago
  I want some sockpuppets just to upvote this more times.
crazy1van 12y ago
>Fast lanes are just one horrible side effect of our "everything capitalism" country. The fact that most cities in the USA are duopolies when it comes to wired internet means essentially everyone is screwed. The duopolies you describe are definitely terrible. They are cronyism and corporatism operating under the guise of capitalism, but they are very far from the free markets of capitalism. It's worth noting that these monopolies could not exist without government regulation. More ISP's can't run fiber to your house because the local law prevents them. I'd rather get rid of those bad laws instead of piling more bandaid laws on top of them.
- _delirium 12y ago
  > More ISP's can't run fiber to your house because the local law prevents them. Wouldn't these companies need some kind of affirmative government assistance, not only the lack of government prohibition? Very few (if any) potential new entrants into the market actually own land or rights of way sufficient to run "last-mile" cables to residential homes. At the very least it seems like they'd need permission to dig up streets (which they don't own) and get some kind of easement rights across property they don't own. Or are there really utility companies that 100% own all the land (or delegated rights such as an easement) needed to do a run, and are still being prohibited by local law from running the cables on their own land? I could imagine the latter situation existing in a few cases, but not many; more or less only in the case of a greenfield development where the developer owns the entire subdivision.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- digikata 12y ago
  How many times to you think companies would pay to run a connection to a house? After the first, or maybe even the second time, does the financial payback for laying additional redundant physical lines make sense? City gov't is a minor problem, but remove that and you still have strong natural monopoly conditions. It seems like the only way to get competition in the last mile is that the entity which owns the last mile infrastructure must be required to provide competitive access to that network. Ideally that might have been government owning the infrastructure, with a market of multiple competitors running services across the last mile. It seems like many nations with competitive last-time ISP markets got there by starting out with national ownership of much of that infrastructure, but when much of that network is privately owned - it's much harder to get there.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

by ck2 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

icebraining 12y ago

I agree - the socialist solution we have in my country of having multiple private companies compete a relatevily free market (as opposed to one where local governments have passed laws to limit competition, like the US has) is much better.

Noctem 12y ago
This thread is all backwards. Cronyism/corporatism is being called capitalism, and capitalism is being called socialism. The socialist solution would be public ownership of one firm without private competition, and would be (at least in my opinion) disastrous.
- icebraining 12y ago
  My post was sarcastic :)
  - sitkack 12y ago
    How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?
  - Noctem 12y ago
    Oh good. I wondered if that was the case, but suppressed the urge to ask since people often don't take kindly to assumptions that their actual views must be sarcastic. There are also plenty of inaccurate conceptions of capitalism/socialism, and people tend to ascribe successes to their own preferred system, regardless of reality. I'm glad that's not the case here.
WildUtah 12y ago
I want some sockpuppets just to upvote this more times.

crazy1van 12y ago

>Fast lanes are just one horrible side effect of our "everything capitalism" country. The fact that most cities in the USA are duopolies when it comes to wired internet means essentially everyone is screwed. The duopolies you describe are definitely terrible. They are cronyism and corporatism operating under the guise of capitalism, but they are very far from the free markets of capitalism. It's worth noting that these monopolies could not exist without government regulation. More ISP's can't run fiber to your house because the local law prevents them. I'd rather get rid of those bad laws instead of piling more bandaid laws on top of them.

_delirium 12y ago
> More ISP's can't run fiber to your house because the local law prevents them. Wouldn't these companies need some kind of affirmative government assistance, not only the lack of government prohibition? Very few (if any) potential new entrants into the market actually own land or rights of way sufficient to run "last-mile" cables to residential homes. At the very least it seems like they'd need permission to dig up streets (which they don't own) and get some kind of easement rights across property they don't own. Or are there really utility companies that 100% own all the land (or delegated rights such as an easement) needed to do a run, and are still being prohibited by local law from running the cables on their own land? I could imagine the latter situation existing in a few cases, but not many; more or less only in the case of a greenfield development where the developer owns the entire subdivision.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
digikata 12y ago
How many times to you think companies would pay to run a connection to a house? After the first, or maybe even the second time, does the financial payback for laying additional redundant physical lines make sense? City gov't is a minor problem, but remove that and you still have strong natural monopoly conditions. It seems like the only way to get competition in the last mile is that the entity which owns the last mile infrastructure must be required to provide competitive access to that network. Ideally that might have been government owning the infrastructure, with a market of multiple competitors running services across the last mile. It seems like many nations with competitive last-time ISP markets got there by starting out with national ownership of much of that infrastructure, but when much of that network is privately owned - it's much harder to get there.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]