Broadband as a public utility: City provides 100mbps fiber, now fighting ISPs' lobbyists
indyweek.com
indyweek.com
Why would you be stuck on the city's network? Consumers could freely switch to the telco's network whenever they wanted.
If the telcos want to upgrade and beat the city on speed, that's fine. Either way the consumer wins.
Sure, you get faster internet because you're handing over control and subsidization to government, but then you're taking something that really should be in the hands of every private individual and allowing the government to get its hands into something that has traditionally been defined by open access and freedom.
Personally I'm very happy with my private fiber service and would much rather have a private company with consumer interests (supposedly) at stake instead of simply plugging into Big-Brother Net.
It would be naive to think the government isn't already monitoring, scraping, and sniffing every corner of the net that they can. However, it has to be a much easier pathway to abuse once Internet service leaves the hands of private enterprise.
Your second point is just plain stupid. If a government makes it lawful to snoop, it won't make any kind of difference who controls the servers - ISPs are not going to start breaking the law of the land on behalf of their customers.
For sake of argument, let's say that everyone's abiding by the rules and the government's ultimate goal is to have as much access to private data as possible. Which method do you think is easier?
"We're doing you a favor!" - own the network by marketing ridiculously cheap subsidized internet with extremely high-speeds.
"We're taking away your freedom" - change the rules by forcing privacy-violating legislation past the house and senate
Putting telecommunication service in the hands of municipalities reduces the possibility of diabolical eves-dropping schemes for all the same reasons that it's less efficient than private enterprise: it's decentralized and it's run by incompetent local government.
The mere idea that a corporation would be run with the consumer interest in mind is weird. I do believe corporations are designed to maximize profits, not to maximize public interest. And maximizing profits means screwing over the rural communities, just like described in the article and just like private health care means screwing over those in poor health.
The local city government is at least required to maximize their number of votes to stay in business.
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2008/09/telco-to-town-wer...
Name one telecom monopoly that wasn't created by the government.
Federal government created the telephone monopoly.
Local governments create cable TV and cable modem monopolies.
On purpose.
They do it through legislation.
The stated intent is to "avoid wasteful competition".
IMO, the actual intent is to get a single company under the thumb of government regulators, which then gives more power to the government officials.
Those who can, create.
Those who can't create regulate.
Local governments are sometimes a lesser evil, because sucking at that level can't be done as anonymously.
City councils are definitely going to be more responsive to their own neighbors than AT&T is going to be to some complaints from a podunk town.
I'm not sure where you're getting your facts, but your story is pretty far from the truth. The government did not create the telecom monopoly that we have now, they only failed to prevent it (can you blame them? The Big 3 all lobby Congress). It was the government who started all of this back with ARPA, so I wouldn't point the finger at government because they supported the research efforts to create the Internet. Point the finger at the corporations who are refusing to build a better, faster network (even though their revenues support it) and practice redlining. The faster your speeds, the worse off their old business models are.
I assure you that local municipalities have the interest of the people at hand when they build these networks out, after all, the people collectively decide to build something like this before it gets approval. And they would most likely not have access to it any other way.
http://jtame05.wordpress.com/2008/10/21/network-neutrality-w...
I'm even in favor of municipal broadband, because I'm sick of having the same speed of DSL that I had seven years ago, but I had never considered the absurdity of the idea (that companies can constrain a city's actions) itself. An altogether startling wakeup call.
Lets say it actually costs $40 to provide this service. TWarner currently provides it for $45 and makes $5 a month per subscriber. The local government provides it for $35. They make -$5 per subscriber. The deficit is covered by taxes (probably a $10-$20 tax increase as government is rarely very efficient).
It is now impossible for any carrier to provide the service and make money. Its actually costing the consumers more. People who don't even use it are paying for it. The market has been defacto-socialized, perhaps without even a proper vote.
The cable companies suck monkey balls but this is not automatically the right thing either. It might very well be. Local governments usually do a pretty good job with water. Still, it should not be undertaken lightly no matter how mad at comcast you might be.
Your example is a strawman argument, as there is no evidence that government is less efficient than a private enterprise. (The example that comes to mind is Medicare, which as far as I understand it has lower administrative costs than most private plans.) That's not the point of the lawsuit, in any case.
I agree there is a difference between the government providing a service as a nonprofit, self-financing corporation and using taxes to finance a service. But you can't just argue that the market has been "defacto-socialized" without saying why that would be bad.
There are many instances where people who don't use it are paying for it. Roads, for example. A "fair" system would be to have every inch of roadway be toll road, where the toll would be in proportion to the amount of space used and wear inflicted on the roadway. Pedestrians would pay next to nothing, bikes slightly more, then motorcycles, cars and finally SUVs and trucks. Every lane on the freeway should be toll, with an increasing toll for the lower-numbered lanes in case you want to go "faster". Such a system would be ridiculously inefficient and cumbersome, so I'm fine paying my share of the roads even if I use them less than average, because roads are an essential infrastructure.
In the same vein, a city should be able to decide that a fiber network is an essential infrastructure that should be provided to all inhabitants and that shrinking the digital divide is important enough that low-income people should have subsidized access. And no corporation should be able to argue that this is "illegal".
Private corporations are allowed to exist to serve the needs of the people, not the other way around.