Hey, what do you know? All those meetings over the proposed
National Broadband Plan has amounted to something: a "yeah, we should probably hit this up." Today, the
FCC has kicked off an immensely ambitious project to bring "high-speed internet access to every corner of the United States." $7.2 billion of the economic stimulus package
has already been allocated for the task, but it'll be ages before anything becomes of this. For starters, the FCC is asking for input from consumers, businesses, etc, yet it doesn't require a response until February of 2010. Meanwhile, nations like South Korea, Japan and
Australia are all looking to implement similar rollouts, albeit with much higher speeds. You see, the FCC currently defines "broadband" as 786Kpbs, which obviously
isn't anywhere near median rates in some of the aforementioned countries. Pardon our skepticism in this becoming a reality, but at least we'll be extra elated if our
rock-bottom expectations are met.
posted April 9th 2009 10:11AM
Yep the continents of America are pretty big compared to those individual countries.
Unfortunately, this can only go in two directions. It can end up like cable...highly regulated with low profits for companies resulting in outrageous pricing and crappy service (see slower speeds). Or, it can be government owned and operated, subsidized probably through some kind of a tax on internet provisioning and rebated to a limited few based on income -- also will result in even crappier service.
Plus, if Obama wants poor people and rural people to have broadband (actually rural areas already have tons of broadband through the use of USF fees, but i digress), maybe he should try a cheaper, and more efficient, alternative, WiMax.
This is a government program; rest-assured they will generate a list of 50 possible solutions, evaluate them, and ultimately choose the worst one on the list.
I still say just find your local college make friends with the IT department and put a big WIFI antenna on there roof shoot that signal to your house ( assuming you live within 5 miles which is doable ) and lala instint 70mbps up and down :) thank you college ( I actually know someone who does this lol )
I pry to good that more compenys don't follow suit with comcast though I would be capped in half a month! I hate that ISP's are doing this stupid shit. If they are going to do this at least offer a unlimited plan for a little more every month ). I clocked my avarage bandwidth at about 400GBs a month ( and it would be higher if they gave me a faster connection :( only 7mbps :(
I want the hat.
Opps sorry about the spelling lol
BTW I think Australia is doing this the right way - they pay only 50% for a high speed network covering all of oz, while maintaining a majority share. The government pays, and it ends up owning what it paid for. It's also putting up 15Bn USD even though Australia is smaller than the US (and has way fewer people too).
Something like that would probably not happen in the USA because the lobby groups for the existing telcos would shoot it down. After all, while it might be beneficial to everyone else, it would eat into their profits.
I'll stick with my Verizon FIOS 50mbit/20mbit package tyvm ... I've heard rumors we're going to 100/100 within a year. Not too bad I guess^^
/I love FTTH
Not all of us can get fios. :( I can't even get at&t uvers or whatever the hell it is...
I live 3 miles outside fort worth, and all i can get is shitty 6mbps down 768k up. Across they street for a year in a smaller housing development they have had fios and UVerse. So i apologize if my faith in the private sector implementing fuck all, leaves a little to be desired.
All the nay sayers need to learn to be a bit more human. Just because like me you live in an area that has Fios and Cable why look down your nose at others? Gee should we stop running public transportation also to punish those with out cars. and if this could be worked on think of the jobs it would create. I guess as long as you have you nice jobs expensive cars and can pay that Fios or cable bill dam the rest of the country. Stop and think you loose your job and have to cut back how long will you have all those perks? And today anyone can loose their job at anytime.
Think before you post the world and our country is bigger then just you.
???
At one point broadband wasnt available in my city with a pop. of over 200,000.
We had to wait for the market to exist to make it cost effective, not use taxpayer dollars to bring it just because it's cool to have.
If the people of these hamlets want it bad enough, then lobby the cable company to bring it to that area.
@Look_Around_You yeah and at one point the same city didn’t have power or telephone and taxpayer money brought those necessities to you. We are not in 1995 anymore, the Internet isnt some fancy luxury, it is more important and more useful than the telephone.
The power and telephone companies, at least where I live, have always been private. Yeah, they have contracts with the city for obvious reasons, but we have never had a millage that paid for these companies to do anything.
You want power to your McMansion, you have to pay for it. It aint tax funded.
@Look_Around_You The private power and telephone companies didn’t pay to build out the area, the government did. The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.
"@Look_Around_You The private power and telephone companies didn’t pay to build out the area, the government did. The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it.The Government Payed for it."
Yeah... That's the whole "they have contracts with the city for obvious reasons" part comes in.
They use the public right-of-way for their polls and wires, but tax money does not pay for them to actually bring their services to homes.
And for the sake of argument let's say tax dollars did pay for these things. You can easily argue while power and telephone service are needed (power more than phone), broadband internet access is in no way an essential service worthy of tax money.
@Look_Around_you 8 to 10 years ago i would have totally agreed with you, but in this day and age the Internet is going to be a huge proponent of pulling us out of the spin we are in both financially and socially. I understand your points for sure, but at the same time i feel the Internet is more important than the phones.
Yeaa throwing money around?
I am sure it can turn out better than the last time we gave money to Telcoms for Broadband.
http://www.newnetworks.com/ShortSCANDALSummary.htm
WADDA YOU THINK? Do it ALL wirelessly piggybacking on the current cellphone tower infrastructure. If needed, provide download signal via satellite.
OBAMA'S GONNA MAKE ME HAVE TO BE A POOR PERSON! OMGZ!
As long as this national plan does not involve rolling out any more of that horrible RF-polluting BPL crap, I'll be happy. We should not be providing powerline internet access at the expense of vast swaths of our radio spectrum.
Hmmm. I know I read an old book about a government providing free porn to the proletariat to keep them stupefied....what was it... I think it was in the 80s when I read it.... '84 maybe....
When Bush first came up with a plan for this, all the tech pundits were against it.
Now that Obama's robbing taxpayers and their great-great-grandchildren to "pay for it," which means provide folding money to a few of his cronies for a program that does NOTHING, suddenly it sounds like a good idea?
100mbps broadband in the cities.
For those living in small cities (populations under, say, 5,000), I doubt this would pay for itself. The government should just put a priority on those smaller cities to get WiMAX / LTE first, to offset not burying fiber or copper in those areas.
I want that hat.
That 7.2 billion will be gone before they even start.
It is a very simple economic model to understand
Town population
Distance from backbone
construction permit cost
materials cost
equipment cost
remote field office cost
time until return on investment is realized
If it shows that it will take more than an acceptable period of time to recover costs for rolling out access to an area, then they do not bother. Many times these providers finance the rollouts, so if they show that it takes years longer then the terms of the loan to recover their expenses, then logically it cannot be done until a later date.
If the gov tries to roll out access to these areas, it will be done at a loss which means at the taxpayer expense. We are not just talking about one time construction; we are talking about adding a major yearly expense from now on, all on the backs of the taxpayers.
If the entire project is a money pit, then these people deserve no more than 1mb/s guaranteed with occasional bursts up to 3mb/s.
If they want more, then the towns should come up with some funds to offset the costs. If we do not make these remote towns contribute something, they will continue with their hands held out, asking for more network upgrades & services at our expense. It is not my obligation to ensure billy bob in a town of 150 has 15mb/s FIOS so he can stream porn full screen in high res.
Seems like we have a long way to catch up with Australia's "broadband"....
The FCC actually defines broadband as 200 Kbps symmetrical. I believe the 786 Kbps is used only for reporting / data gathering purposes. Also, there are a lot of good reasons that the government shouldnt subsidize nationwide deployment of broadband, principally that once you subsidize something it becomes an entitlement, which makes later reforms impossible. Just ask rural telcos and co-ops, to whom we all ship a buck or two every month under the universal service fund.
I'm so damned tired of you free marketeers. If you had your way, workers would live in corporate-owned shantytowns, paying more money for rent and groceries than they earn at their back-breaking jobs. Bet you Joe the Plumber wanna-bees would have blown a gasket at Teddy Roosevelt when he broke up the corporate trusts at the turn of the century, but we're all better off for it.
You'd think that by now, everyone would realize that corporations are just as capable of failure as the government. You'd also think that the rabid capitalists would realize that there IS no free market or competition in the broadband market. If a company like Google tried to offer a competing service, you'd better believe the free market hypocrites would protest loudly and use the government to stop it from happening.
"If you had your way, workers would live in corporate-owned shantytowns, paying more money for rent and groceries than they earn at their back-breaking jobs."
Actually it is precisely because of the free market that we have such varied choice in housing and the cost of food has gone down over time. It is thanks to government food price supports that some food is as costly as it is and is why we are overfed on corn products. Government is the reason why we have corn syrup in our soft drinks instead of sugar.
In contrast take a look at government housing. Go to a US public housing project and take a good look around. Look at government run food stores in the US. You really have no idea what you are talking about.
"You'd think that by now, everyone would realize that corporations are just as capable of failure as the government."
Except when they fail they pay the consequences, and when government fails we all pay the consequences. Failing companies go under while failed government programs -- which is most of them -- get expanded budgets. And yes, I am aware of the bailouts, which are anathema to capitalism and should never have been passed.
"f a company like Google tried to offer a competing service, you'd better believe the free market hypocrites would protest loudly and use the government to stop it from happening."
And you base this on what? I would stand and applaud for more competition. I wish I had my competition for my cable service instead of just Comcast. Fios is on the way but government put up plenty of hurdles before they were able to enter the market.
It's amazing how government fails time and time again and yet people want more of it. honestly, what does government do well? Agriculture policy? Prisons? Education (would you rather send your kid to a public or private school)? Housing? Health care (look how wounded soldiers get treated at Walter Reed, or look at the VA system)? Energy (ethanol anyone)?
What basis do we have for thinking that government broadband would be a success?
There was a town in Louisiana a few years back that wanted to built its own broadband internet infrastructure, because Cox Communications was slow to build their own. When Cox found out that the town was working on a broadband solution, Cox immediately took the town to court in an effort to stop it.
http://www.benton.org/node/3384
Also, what were you saying about corporations being held personally responsible for their own failures? Because the AIG mess suggests otherwise. Why are we being forced to bail them out with our precious tax dollars? Because deregulation pushed by free market proponents made the company "too big to fail." You know, fail, like your argument.
i can only have dial up where i live so i want this very much
786 Kilos per bit-second? Not sure what a bit-second would be, but I bet 786 kilos of anything to every household in America would be worth that 7.2 billion
and fail to Wade on the first page for repeating it
Sweet, let's waste all this money to run broadband out to some inbred farmer in rural arkansas. Then spend all that money to maintain that connection.
Isn't all that spectrum that just got bought gonna give broadband to everybody? Shit, Verizon covers half the country already with broadband.. and that's just EVDO.
@ Look_Around_You
The market's response is to uphold the status quo: take the money and do nothing.
@greengiant
Many homes in Japan has access to fiber for 50+Mb/sec for the same monthly prices as we do for 7Mb/sec metered, filtered and throttled cable internet access. Obviously the numbers are favorable when broadband is defined as 200Kb/sec. Shut up.
@Dorf
Wireless communications companies charge over all four of your limbs for data access over their networks, and they won't mind charging your aorta if you decide to watch an NFL Superbowl broadcast on your cellphone just outside US shorelines. In fact, it costs more for you to send a text message through your cellphone than it is to cut a 10mg slice of heroin.
Reply only when you've logged 60GB/month on data transfer with your cellphone.
OH NOES!!! THE SOCIALISTS HAVE WON!?!?!?!? WE MUST TURN BACK OUR CLOCKS AND DESTROY OUR COMPUTERS!!! ONLY THEN CAN WE DEFEAT T3H SOCIALIST FASCIST POLICE STATE (did I cover all the terms?) OBAMA!!!!
GRAAHHH!!!
/end sarcsastic rant.
its funny when you say what you said in jest, but its scary when you hear your boss say it seriously
Hopefully I'll finally be able to ditch my WISP and get AT&T.
Those people out in the sticks work for a living and pay taxes.
So do suburbanites.
Big city scum doesn't, so to the hell with them.
To hell with the snot-nosed, spoiled little college students, too.
They're living off the public dime, putting off their student loans, while living in Mommy's basement.
They shouldn't have Internet access at all.
I would be happy to get Cable/DSL.
It would be nice if the cable/phone companies would stop improving already decent service and look to those who are undeserved.
Why not have a fiber roll out and have the local governments control the lines and be forced to rent it out at wholesale pricing to companies but companies who want to serve customers can compete for there customer base.
Buy the time this happens developed nations won't even be using wired connections.
I live 2000 feet from homes that get cable internet and also DSL ... I'm close enough for DSL, however there is some crazy rules about my area is not yet zoned for DSL or something ... who knows ... called comcast for a quote on having them run 2000 feet over to my house, they got back quick with the quote ... $230,000, at one point we had something called Sprint Broadband Direct ... which was some line of site bs to some towers on a hill ... FAPs set at like 200 megs a day ... ping was 200ms ... Sprint shut the office down ... the 2 year mistake of a contract on hughes net just ran out, thank god ... biggest waste of money for internet ever ...
so as a small business ... in the end ... I fork over $600 a month to AT&T to have a T1 ... it was the only way I could get more than a 100 or 200 meg a day download limit and also a ping under 50 ...
2010? thats awesome ... by then I will be out another $7200, paid right to AT&T ... while people 2000 feet away get $15 a month AT&T DSL that is more than likely faster than my T1 on downloads ...
i'm bitter ...