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Comment by altacc | Hacker News Reader

I long ago came to the conclusion that utilities shouldn't be run by for-profit companies. Companies exist to maximize shareholder profit, everything else is consequential. Essential utilities (which arguably includes internet connectivity) run by companies typically lead to worse service and higher prices for customers. Even worse that most utilities are absolute or de facto monopolies, giving consumers no real choice to even pretend there's a market. This is especially bad when countries are pressured by institutions like the IMF to privatize their utilities as conditions for receiving international loans. Our current model of capitalism is failing in so many ways and the answer is not more capitalism and more ownership by companies.

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Internet is different to most utilities because there are so many competing delivery methods: Cellular (several networks competing here alone), wired (competition between DSL, FTTP, Cable), and the emerging satellite internet market (currently led by Starlink but plenty of room for competition as it's a global market).

This compares to the power grid or water supply in a given city, which are more of a natural monopoly. (Or indeed the railway lines)

And yet the actual best way to deliver data (and TV, etc) services has been unchanged for quite some time: single-mode fiber. PON is a sort-of monopoly-requiring technology, but boring active fiber is not. Someone, e.g. the city or a nonprofit or even the homeowners, could own the fiber, and the other end goes to an exchange point, and service providers can compete to provide service at the other end.

If all the ridiculous permitting and attachment rights get sorted out, single-mode fiber is cheap and straightforward to install.

Take a look at any of the rural nonprofit fiber services. They’re not particularly expensive to build or operate.

Utilities are weird anyway. A private company provides the service, but pretty much every aspect of the service is heavily regulated by the government. Isn't that basically a government-controlled company in that case? Why not just have the government handle it?

For telco at least, some countries have exactly that and unfortunately it does not run more efficiently and centralizes potential content control. Innovation comes from competition, and privatization keeps content more freely flowing. If we can solve those two while centralizing that would be amazing but maybe unrealistic with current policy.

You're conflating capitalism with privately-held public utilities, which are very different things.

I'm strongly in favor of capitalism, but deeply oppose the concept of privately-held utilities with local monopolies. No company should be able to "own the telephone poles" and have the last word on how they are used and by who. The poles, water pipes, gas pipes, sewer lines, etc, should all be owned by the municipality or county and vendors should have to compete to service and maintain them. There would be a lot of red tape, and plenty of room for corruption, but at least we wouldn't be starting from the position of, "oh, we can't have municipal broadband because that company a few states over owns all of our infrastructure."

The thing is, what is a luxury to some is an “essential utility” to others. How many people really need gigabit internet? Is that “essential”? 20 years ago you might have been arguing that cable television was essential.

I don't think many TV consumers relied on it for their income.

I mean, contractors rely on distributors like Home Depot for their income, that doesn't mean they have a right to Home Depot's in the middle of nowhere just because they want to work there.

Cable TV was never a primary method of accessing government services, banking, interactive education during the pandemic, etc...

They don't need gigabit internet but for large numbers rural residents even normal 25Mbps broadband isn't available.

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