Americans Support Letting Cities Build Their Own Broadband Networks, Pew Finds (theverge.com) 113
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Most Americans want to let local governments build out internet service if the internet providers in their area aren't any good, according to the Pew Research Center. In a phone survey of over 4,000 people last month, Pew found that 70 percent of respondents agreed that local governments should have the power to start their own high-speed networks if current offerings are "too expensive or not good enough." The results show an overwhelming support for municipal broadband -- networks that are at least somewhat run by local governments -- at a time when encouraging broadband buildout is a top federal priority. But despite the support, in much of the US, building out municipal networks just isn't possible. More than 20 states have passed laws banning local governments from starting their own broadband service, largely at the behest of internet providers that want to avoid competition at all cost. Though Pew's survey found some positive results for municipal broadband, it found less support for broadband subsidies for low-income homes. Under half of all Americans, 44 percent, said they supported subsidies, while nearly everyone else surveyed said they felt internet service "is affordable enough" that most households should be able to pay for it. (At the same time, nearly half of all people surveyed said they didn't know what speed of internet they received.)
Way overdue (Score:5, Insightful)
Broadband should be a utility this day and age.
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Broadband data *is* a utility by use, demand, and market. It should be delivered thus.
We no longer bother to limit it to Internet service - it's more useful than that.
Re: Way overdue (Score:4, Insightful)
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The article is pretty crappy though, the question seems slanted to get the desired result:
Do you think local governments should have the power to start their own high-speed networks if current offerings are too expensive or not good enough?
I'm not sure what other answer there is.
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Why should broadband be a [public] utility? Do you believe that broadband should be a public service, available to all, regardless of income?
I do consider the Internet as a whole as a public service, and it is historically operated at one, something I wish to continue. But broadband is a very specific level of Internet access. It's absolutely fine if we get together and democratically agree to do this, but I would like some pretty good justifications before we effectively turn a private enterprise into a go
Re:Way overdue (Score:5, Informative)
Municipal interent isn't necessarily "public".... in the sense of free, in fact it almost certainly isn't... but is is cheaper just based on the fact that you are getting what you are paying for rather than than just feeding billions into some guy's pocket.
Re:Way overdue (Score:5, Informative)
Utility is perhaps the wrong word. Here in Canada, it is considered an essential service, meaning that the private (and public where they exist) internet providers have to provide you internet for a reasonable price if you request it, often with government (Provincial and perhaps Federal as well) often subsidizing the buildout in rural areas.
In my case, living about 40 miles from Vancouver, there is no cell coverage or cable and the phone lines seem to use rusty barbed wire, so only slow (26.4) dial-up. I was informed last year that my ISP was discontinuing dial-up service as of Nov 16th and suggested I switch to cellular (about $70 for 10 GBs + $150 for a modem). They quit charging me in the new year and froze my profile (big deal, I never touched it) but the dial-up is still working as they can't cut me off as long as I'm willing to pay. Once they finish building the new cell tower (subsidized by the Province so the smart metre will actually not require a meter reader anymore), I'll probably be forced to use it but until then, it's an essential service and they can't cut me off. Too much stuff depends on the internet now. Next year fiber is supposed to show up, once again subsidized by the Province and they'll have to sell it me for the same price as in town.
It's like electricity and the phone, if you pay, they have to supply it if possible and for the same price. You might only be able to get 110 volt service but that is considered acceptable
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Telephone service is treated very similarly around the world as what you describe as an essential service, including the US. Here in the US there are programs to help low-income people get free or subsidized phone service, and to help reconnect people who are behind on their bills.
Some countries operate their entire telephone network as a state run service, other countries allow heavily regulate private regional monopolies (roughly what the US has). But they still are able to provide essential telephone ser
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You're mostly agreeing with me, at least in the case of the telephone, an essential service that has been subsidized to make it available to the vast majority of the population, with similar rates for everyone (here it varies depending on how large the calling area is, costs about 30% more 10 miles west but they can phone about 2 million more people toll free).
Internet now isn't much different then the phone, bills, jobs, government services, requirement for school etc, all depend on the internet. While I a
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Nice thought, but why should it be a [public] utility? Is there a good reason?
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Considering your analogy to television: there is 'free' over-the-air TV in the US. And then there is subscription-based cable and satellite providers that still make money on expanded offerings.
I don't see why Internet service couldn't be similar - a basic muni wireless service can be there, but it won't be anywhere close to as good as if you subscribe to the offerings from a traditional telco. I'm good with it as long as I can use policy routing to send some traffic over the muni, and other traffic over
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The TV is free, but not a government organization nor is it a non-profit. Television is not a municipal service, at least not in the US. Television broadcast is a for-profit venture to make money selling advertisement. Cable TV subscriptions is just gravy on top of an already lucrative business. Cable TV started on the premise that while you can't own the airwaves but you can own the wires.
Works for me (Score:5, Informative)
I have been on a municipal fiber network for over 10 years and it's been great. A high bandwidth symmetrical connection with a wide choice in ISPs. Previously I had cable internet through Comcast and the network stability, level of service and price have been like night and day. Internet is pretty crucial to living in modern society, it should be treated as a utility and a basic level of service provided to each home by the government. TV, phone and internet service providers still compete for the customer's business, they just do it on a level playing field.
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I have been on a municipal fiber network for over 10 years and it's been great. A high bandwidth symmetrical connection with a wide choice in ISPs.
This is how it should be. The article is about "letting" cities build their own broadband. The very concept is absurd. Maybe it should be put to an actual vote, but the letting part just has to go, it some how implies that a collection of people working for a common cause has less rights than say a megacorp headed by maybe as few as a single person. In shorty, it doesn't pass the smell test.
This is also one of those things I don't think should be denyable by the next tier of government. It is too criti
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it some how implies that a collection of people working for a common cause has less rights than say a megacorp headed by maybe as few as a single person.
When that "collection of people" is a government that has entered a contract with the "megacorp" to require certain conditions be met for them to be allowed to operate within that jurisdiction, and then the same "collection of people" decides to directly compete with that corporation without requiring any of the same conditions, yes, they should have "less rights". They entered into the contract and now want to compete without playing the same game.
You also can't have a state or federal government telling a city not to do something so obviously beneficial to their residents.
Whenever an argument devolves into "obviously", it is usual
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No kidding (Score:5, Insightful)
With lower prices, faster speeds and better service, you bet people would want municipal broadband. We've all seen what happens when there is no competition: the U.S. still isn't in the top ten of industrialized nations [akamai.com] when it comes to broadband speeds (page 12 of the report).
I distinctly remember when my area got "competition" in broadband providers. Verizon came in and their CEO proudly stated, "We're not going to compete on price. We'll compete on quality." Well gee, thanks. To whom should I bend over for?
If Republicans would stop preventing broadband competition we'd be far better off. And before anyone wants to whine about being partisan, go take a look at the places which have outlawed municipal broadband. See the pattern?
Re:No kidding (Score:5, Insightful)
p>If Republicans would stop preventing broadband competition we'd be far better off. And before anyone wants to whine about being partisan, go take a look at the places which have outlawed municipal broadband. See the pattern?
California, Colorado, Minnesota, Nevada, Washington, Virginia all voted blue in the last presidential election, and all have some form of restriction or hurdle for municipal broadband. That's about 30% of the states with such regulations. The pattern is that of corporate corruption of politics, which affects both parties but Republicans more. Since you have solidly blue states such as CA and WA in on this, you really can't call it just a Republican problem.
Re:No kidding (Score:5, Informative)
Take a look at the states who have passed laws to prohibit or effectively restrict municipal broadband [ecs.org]. Citing a handful of states is cherry-picking. Of the states listed in the above report, 17 out of 24 voted for Trump and all of them have laws regarding municipal broadband.
In other words, 70% of states who voted red in the last presidential election and have laws restricting municipal broadband constitutes a pattern. Exactly as I said.
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You're making a false equivalency, just because both sides do bad things doesn't mean the scale of the problem is equal in both parties. I try to pick the best people regardless of affiliation however its getting harder and harder to find an honest and informed republican or for an honest person to support the pack of thieves currently calling themselves the GOP.
Re: No kidding (Score:1)
GP was wilfully misrepresenting things. Also ignored that of that 30%, D, half were R in the legislature too.
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Which part of the 4 sentence post is a misrepresentation? The first two sentences are verifiable facts, and with obvious math you can see that 70% are R-leaning, just like the GGP "corrected" me with. The remaining two sentences which make any kind of claim are:
(1) The pattern is that of corporate corruption of politics, which affects both parties but Republicans more.
(2) Since you have solidly blue states such as CA and WA in on this, you really can't call it just a Republican problem.
Which of those two
Re:No kidding (Score:5, Interesting)
You know when you combine our pots, 30+70=100 and 7+17=24, so you're saying the same thing. Also, it's 23 states, not 24, because you counted Washington twice as it shows up in the report table twice.
You were implying this is somehow a Republican-only problem, which as a Californian, I can confirm that it's not. Since CA has 12% of the US population all by itself, and is D controlled at nearly every level, it's pretty disingenuous to call it merely cherry-picked. Hell in my post I even say that it's mostly a Republican problem ("affects both parties but Republicans more"). However if you must view everything through the lens of "if one party is wrong the other must be right", then I can't help you.
Besides, raw counts are dumb since 30/50 states voted R, so really we ought condition or even weight by population:
Voted D: 6/20 = 30%, 49% population-weighted
Voted R: 17/30 = 56%, 69% population-weighted
So if you are in a D state, odds are 50/50 that you have restricted municipal broadband. In R states it jumps to almost 70%. What it most definitely is not, in either case, is near zero.
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The Presidential vote matter not one whit when it comes to these laws - the makeup of the state government at the time of enactment of the statute is what matters.
For instance, bright red Arkansas was a Democratic-controlled state in 2010 when Arkansas Code 23-17-409 was amended.
The Iowa House of Representatives was majority Democratic when Ann 388.10 was passed in 2016.
Louisiana was run by Democrats when 45:844.49 was passed in 2004.
Michigan was largely controlled by Democrats when their laws were passed i
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Eh... I made two math errors - that's 6 states that "flip", not 5, and while you gave the total as 24 states, ECS counts Washington twice, so it's only 23.
Plus, Ed Rendell was governor of Pennsylvania in 2004 when they passed their municipal broadband amendments.
So, you've now got 7 additional states that were at least partially controlled by Democrats from the ECS list. Add California, Colorado, Minnesota, Nevada, Washington, and Virginia and you get 13 out of 23. Virginia has flipped around a lot and it's
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The core of the problem is Representational Democracy when votes can be bought. The winning party will claim to have a mandate from the people when they won by an stistcically insignificant majority. If you can't get 2/3 or 3/5 of the people's representatives to agree to something, chances are it shouldn't be law.
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Gorsuch is a case in point... a judged cherry picked by the democrats who happens to be conservative enough for republicans to vote for but everyone is voting party lines less they break their piggy banks, all the while the rest of the country is falling apart.
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Gorsuch was suggested to the GOP by the Federalist Society, which is decidedly NOT a Democratic organization.
Merrick Garland was an olive branch from the Democrats to the Republicans, and it was roundly rejected.
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http://dailycaller.com/2017/02/01/meet-the-democrats-who-upported-gorsuch-in-2006/
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None of the above. Remember the previous bright idea of this kind — municipal WiFi?
One only needs to take an Amtrak train trying to use their "free WiFi" to get a feeling, what government-provided Internet will be:
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If Republicans would stop preventing broadband competition we'd be far better off. And before anyone wants to whine about being partisan, go take a look at the places which have outlawed municipal broadband. See the pattern?
Mitch McConnell, preventer of broadband services.... doesn't quite have the same ring to it as 'Grand Moff' does it?
Last mile (Score:5, Interesting)
My dream: local governments (or the local power company) run the "last mile" passive fiber to every home. Then any company can apply to come in and start hooking up at the switch boxes. This means new offerings like Google Fiber could hook up quickly, and the old guard can still provide competitive service if they choose to (also dragging them into a fiber-first model). No need to fret over who gets connected at the house level, because you have public oversight at that level, and not having to do the last-mile means there's less incentive to hook up only the rich neighborhoods, because all of them can be done fairly efficiently once you have backhaul. This design also keeps the government from trying to be an ISP, which they aren't really equipped for -- instead they maintain the street-level infrastructure, something they do a lot of already.
Before telecom deregulation I had a small ISP over Verizon's copper, and (for the time) it was great. The ISP of course got killed off as soon as Verizon was allowed to stop sharing the lines. A decade of stagnation followed. I'd love to see the smallest changes on the public side to make private competition viable, and a municipally owned last mile makes a lot of sense.
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My worry with that is that there's a big disparity in who gets it, as new construction tends to go to the upper-middle class and rich (at least in most of the US). In my previous state (Pennsylvania) the fiber really only went to the expensive neighborhoods; from a business sense I understand -- regular neighborhoods would be less likely to care about those packages, but it still leaves a bad taste. If the gov't is running something, it ought to be inclusive.
Of course what you say would be a good part of
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That is the model where I live, finally. It works marvelously. My speeds make everyone I know jealous (256Mbit synchronous, with a 1Gbit copper connection into the house) and my costs are certainly no worse, it only costs slightly more than the lowest-speed packages from the local incumbents, including a home number. It was a requirement for me to get into one of the served areas when I moved the family; and now that we've had it, we don't want to live anywhere else. Everyone I talk to is jealous and would
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Mind if you share where you live, or other places with the same model? I'd love to be able to point to real examples.
If my state ever gets it's head out of it's rear and drops its municipal network quazi-ban, I'd love to push this in my city. We were briefly on the "possible" list for Google Fiber, but instead of waiting for a unicorn I feel like we'd do well to push it far enough on our own that it becomes cheap for any ISP to move in.
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YES! But let me say that the ONT or "optical modem" should and needs to be provided by the city. There isn't exactly one pair of fiber going from your house all the way to a central location. It's a network and whatever your have at your house needs to plug into the local switch on your block or group of blocks. The actual modulation may be standard based or proprietary but it doesn't really matter since that decision should be left for whomever administrated the system. The equipment has to be standard fo
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Thanks that's a good point. I don't know much about the networks since I've never lived somewhere where fiber was a realistic option. In my previous town DSL barely worked over the ancient copper.
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What's kind of stupid is how we used to have that very same network, but it was called the phone system.
I'm curious if any telephone system, especially smaller ones if they still exist (county or regional co-ops), actually continuously upgraded their networks to the point where they were running a FTTH home network.
IE, phase one would have been a skeleton fiber network to neighborhood-level DSLAMs to provide as-good-as-it-got DSL over the existing copper runs to houses. And then over time doing the harder
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Re:The government can supply everything for less (Score:4, Insightful)
In other news, monopolies will always be inefficient, provide lousy service and charge more.
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We could permit regulated quasi-governmental utilities, sort of how I get water and electricity here in the Phoenix area. Might be better than the current monopolies.
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Worse, given the massive costs, tens of millions of Americans do NOT have adequate health care options.
And then it turns out that the infrastructure is also ageing, needing over $1 Trillion to fix it
And China is doing quite well, its now a bigger economy than the USA, its modernising rapidly in all areas.
Communism with corruption is a failure, but then so is capitalism with corruptio
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Wireless beats wired in one significant area: Cost. Not having to obtain right-of-ways (which is not always easy nor cheap) and not having to lay, monitor and maintain hundreds or thousands of miles of cable is an enormous savings. Throw in portability advantage and wireless is a pretty easy sell over wired.
Sure if you're extremely security conscious, you probably don't want wireless (but then you probably don't want to be using a public ISP at all..) For the rest of us, as long as the data isn't being
free market (Score:1)
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Generally speaking, this happens as follows:
Company: "We don't want to have to compete"
Politician: "But that's your job"
Company: "Here's $100k for your 'campaign' if you make it go away"
Politician: "Sold"
Now in many cases its not really that nefarious. Quite often the local government promised one company or another a local monopoly because it was the only way to get internet access at all -- this was way back in the days when the internet was fresh and new and nobody would have really thought to just buil
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How do you figure in states that outlaw municipal broadband? Wouldn't that preempt a contract expiration?
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Spurs Small Business Growth (Score:5, Interesting)
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Which part of which constitution do you think does that?
If it exists, I don't think anybody is following it. cf. student loans, health insurance, roads, etc.
Sure, until they actually start talking about it (Score:5, Interesting)
Asking people if they like municipal broadband you're going to get yes. Asking them after comcast says "THE GOVERNMENT WILL BE SPYING ON YOU" with "like we do" in fine print? There will be a ton of morons instantly declaring it's an anti-american idea.
I personally can't fathom why someone would fear the government they can vote in but love corporations they can't even sue, but I've been accused of being an out-of-touch liberal...
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Being wary of the government is a hallmark of republicans.
No it isn't, being wary of government is supposed to be the hallmark of Republicans, but they have shown a great fondness for big government. This is especially true when it allows them to use public funds to buy votes, pokbarrel large defense contracts, shield their friends' businesses from unwanted competition, gerrymandering districts to keep themselves in power, ... , the list goes on. Now, I'm not suggesting Democrats are any better. Just thought I'd get that out there eventhough we are not discussing
Sorry (Score:2)
Americans also support "in God we trust" (Score:2)
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Too bad God doesn't provide internet service. That comes from the Devil.
By definition, NO private ISP is good enough. (Score:2)
Municipal ISPs, however, won't happen either: Government has been captured at all levels by corporations.
Somewhat misleading headline (Score:4, Insightful)
Pew found that 70 percent of respondents agreed that local governments should have the power to start their own high-speed networks if current offerings are “too expensive or not good enough...
Under half of all Americans, 44 percent, said they supported subsidies, while nearly everyone else surveyed said they felt internet service “is affordable enough” that most households should be able to pay for it. (At the same time, nearly half of all people surveyed said they didn’t know what speed of internet they received.)”
Read the headline carefully. The survey did not find that most people think their municipality should provide the service. What it did find is that people think that under certain circumstances a municipality should be allowed to provide the service.
We were building them 15 years ago... (Score:1)
But the fucking scumbags that lobbied to make company profits more important stopped us. Community WIFI was a thing and was growing in a LOT of cities until scumbags like Comcast worked hard to make it illegal.
Conflicted (Score:2)
I'm highly conflicted on this idea now. On one hand, YES, PLEASE, SOMETHING OTHER THAN GREEDY FUCKING CORRUPT AS SHIT ORGANIZATIONS PLEASE RUN OUR INTERNET.
On the other hand, I live in Tacoma, a city that has had government municipal internet since the 90's, and I was on it from then up until a year ago. The problem? The government agencies involved with the local internet is just as fucking corrupt at this point. It wasnt that way when it was built out initially. But now it is also horribly mismanaged and
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Yep. Governments trying to run companies are usually pretty bad at it.
The problem in this case, and why municipal broadband seems like such a great idea is because monopolies are even worse at it.
Where governments are usually mismanaged due to incompetence, monopolies have a habit of being actively malicious in order to squeeze every last cent out of their customers while providing as little service above "slightly better than not having it at all" as they can get away with.
The free market only works when
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Who matters (Score:2)
A cooperative corp. seems a natural play IMHO (Score:2)
From Wikipedia "A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is an autonomous association of people united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically controlled business."
I wonder if a state could successfully outlaw a cooperative corporation? IANAL but it seems to me that if they tried they would fail if the co-op had enough public support. And what would the courts say? Now, admittedly, my state of Maryland
I'm sure (Score:2)
it has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the majority of Americans have zero choices in the broadband market as it exists today.
( We're pretty tired of paying $$$$ for mediocre service due, in total, to the monopoly status granted by existing laws )
If you want a decent internet connection, you'll have exactly one possible choice to go with and it's very much their way or the highway.
( Note I said the majority of us. Some of you lucky bastards have Google Fiber or what's left of Fios as competiti
I have a municipal ISP (Score:2)
I live in a town with a municipal ISP. Our town has a municipal light and power, and it's a part of it.
Pluses: Price, speed, support are good. Certainly better than I experienced other other commercial ISPs. By extension, our power rates are also very low compared to the rates of other towns that use commercial power providers. They also provide VOIP phone for a decent price. Reliability has been decent. You can unbundle or bundle cable TV, phone and Internet as you like with no significant penalty. A lot o
Americans say a lot of things. (Score:2)
So supposedly some survey says Americans support municipal broadband. And then those Americans go out and elect politicians who outlaw municipal broadband.
Surveys say Americans support a higher minimum wage. And then those Americans go out and elect politicians who will fight any minimum wage increase.
Surveys say Americans support the individual aspects of the Affordable Care Act (when asked about the actual policies and not just about "Obamacare"). And then those Americans go out and elect politicians who
NSA, CIA, FBI.... (Score:2)
all most certainly will support this.... so they don't need to use their hacking tools to get at what user do, to bypass corporate blocks. if there are any...