North Carolina cities mobilize against anti-muni broadband bill | Hacker News Reader

North Carolina cities mobilize against anti-muni broadband bill

arstechnica.com

118 pointsevo_913 comments

One of the more active previous discussions of this controversy, fwiw: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2328116

Good to see opposition to this mount.

Today, it seems like there is a plague of (fake) "libertarian" arguments for protecting essentially government-sponsored enterprises from ... the government.

IE, the oligopolies which currently control broadband are protected from private competition by regulation (control of right-of-ways in the case of broadband) and from government competition by "libertarianism"/"free-market" arguments/ideology.

We can also see this in health care, intellectual property, etc, etc.

Someone should coin an evocative term for these entities-outside-either-markets-or-serious-regulation.

(Notice the quotes to distinguish this from real libertarian arguments)

Today, it seems like there is a plague of (fake) "libertarian" arguments for protecting essentially government-sponsored enterprises from ... the government.

No this is old big co. lobbying, nothing new under the sun.

Their arguments are particularly libertarian, or particularly anything, they are not intended to convince anyone, that's what the lobbying is for, and it is not aimed at the general public.

Maybe the arguments aren't new but their, uh, quantity is.

Their arguments are [not] particularly libertarian, or particularly anything, they are not intended to convince anyone, that's what the lobbying is for, and it is not aimed at the general public.

Mostly... but I think you today there are perhaps more people who can get up-in-arms ready to embrace these arguments none-the-less. I don't want to name any particular political movements (cough, cough...).

You could say the arguments on the regulation side aren't real liberal arguments any more and the arguments on the "no regulation" side aren't real conservative arguments.

That is a huge blind spot in libertarian thinking: the failure to realize that a lot of "private" industry is not actually private.

I don't consider myself a libertarian by any stretch, but isn't their argument in favor of a completely free market? If so, any government regulations that protect these de facto monopolies would not be supported either, as they are by definition creating a regulated market.

Wired broadband companies can't exist without government support, because they need right of way to run wires across many peoples' property. The problem is that governments tend to give permission to do that to only one or two companies.

Which is what libertarians hate. The argument against government is that government unscrupulously uses eminent domain to seize land at below-market prices, which is then handed over to the ISP. Government's intervention a la eminent domain takings favors the most-favored-ISP. So what they're doing now in NC is have government step in to solve government problems, which doesn't solve the cause of the problem.

What land in NC has been siezed by the givernment and handed to an ISP?

Look, just like phone, water and electricity, broadband is a natural monopoly, at least until peer-to-peer access becomes a reality. Not many people complain about the city running water servives because often it is just more effecient. Broadband is no different. The only" scary" thing is that thecity might screw it up. And while that is a possibility, at least you as a citizen can directly participate in how the tech is rolled out and indirectly participate by voting. OTOH, good luck convincing your cable provider that last mile fiber is a good idea.

In principle, usually, but you tend to see one side supported a little bit more zealously than the other.

Many libertarians hope to convince the government to reduce regulation and protection of BigCos, instead of adding more regulation to make the market "fairer" for other players. But I got to agree that's not very realistic with all the lobbying going on.

As a North Carolinian, I am all for more competition. Just today I found out I can order Wideband Internet from Time Warner Cable (50Mbps down) for only $99. This is after languishing for over a decade at 5-7Mbps. I'm theorizing that the muni-backed broadband initiatives are spurring the existing monopolies to "step their game up" so to speak.

It doesn't always work out well. My city's entry into broadband was a colossal disaster that ended up losing millions of dollars: http://www.eastbayexpress.com/eastbay/the-other-shoe-in-alam...

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