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Reviews:
 ·Charter
| reply to tmc8080
Re: follow Kansas and Missouri unfortunatly, in 34 states now, it is illegal for municipalities or public entities to own or run broadband and TV network(well, not illegal, but draped in so much red tape, it may as well be). We just thwarted a law like that in MN here, and they(incumbents, of which charter and mediacom and frontier all say they have no hand in these bills, which is utter bullshit, and we all know it) are trying again. Seriously, there should be a federal law on the books that states if a county or city is under served(meaning a portion of homes cannot get service at all because the current incumbents wont run it, and those that do have terrible speeds) the city can wire itself. The incumbents are trying to drive profits into the pockets of their greedy investors, while a city is just trying to serve its citizens. I hope the public wins, but that is not always the case. Also, as much as the incumbents like to claim wireless as a replacement, its not. With even more ridiculous canada like low caps, and slow speeds in most places, as well as high overage charges, wireless broadband will never be a replacement for a landline based service. The problem, as you pointed out, is the purchased legislature in most states. Hell, if these companies spent a fraction of what they spent on lobbying last year on network upgrades, most of us would be on FTTH by now. | |
openbox9Premium
join:2004-01-26
japan
kudos:2 | said by Chubbysumo:unfortunatly, in 34 states now, it is illegal for municipalities or public entities to own or run broadband and TV network(well, not illegal, but draped in so much red tape, it may as well be). Which states are these? I asked the question the other day but never received a valid response.said by Chubbysumo:while a city is just trying to serve its citizens. Uh huh  said by Chubbysumo:Hell, if these companies spent a fraction of what they spent on lobbying last year on network upgrades, most of us would be on FTTH by now. I doubt that a few million bucks spent on lobbying would have done much to deploy FTTH across the nation. | |
| reply to Chubbysumo
Your comment "it is illegal for municipalities or public entities to own or run broadband and TV network(well, not illegal, but draped in so much red tape, it may as well be)." is exactly what is wrong here. Some very short-sighted at best legislation. It shouldn't be a situation where so much red tape make sit impossible to server the needs of the public. Imagine how bad this country would be if the Federal Interstates had to deal with the red tape of today's political environment.
I guess we will end up needing an environmental impact study done so government can collectively "scratch it's ass" and do nothing but leech off the public. | | |
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Reviews:
·Charter
| reply to openbox9
said by openbox9:]
I doubt that a few million bucks spent on lobbying would have done much to deploy FTTH across the nation.
You do realize, that verizon alone spent nearly 53 million just to pay their top lobbyist(that is 1 lobbyist, the next down got 23 mil), and they claim to have spent over 100 million on lobbying(not counting pay). AT&T is about the same, so, thats 300+ million dollars from 2 companies. Charter spent about 30 million in lobbying last year, and frontier, for as "little" as they are, spent over 50 million(again, not counting pay for the lobbyist firms and people). If these companies spent this money on upgrading their network instead of buying laws, we could have probably already have had FTTH 100% deployed in the USA, because over the course of 10 years, that is a lot of money spent on lobbying. Seriously, think about how much they actually spend on their networks(its all in their publicly filed taxes), not the inflated numbers they give, but raw investments(equip, materials, labor, installs, fiber and cable runs, and "3rd" party expenses), they spent about half as much lobbying as they did on their network.
As far as the states that have made broadband illegal, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Nevada, Pennsylvania, texas, utah, louisana, North carolina, virginia, florida, Missouri, Minnesota, Wisconsin, for the full list, see »www.muninetworks.org/communitymap. Uncheck all but the ones that highlights the "states with barriers" in red.
Many states dont have outright bans, but they cause the project to be draped in so much red tape that it will never survive, along with being assaulted by the incumbents from all sides with endless spending. Instead of wasting countless millions on lawyers, they could build out the local network of the place trying to wire themselves because the incumbent wouldnt, and shut everyone up, instead, they choose to try and shut these projects down, and no one benefits but lawyers and the incumbents. | |
Reviews:
·Charter
| reply to Twaddle
said by Twaddle :Some very short-sighted at best legislation.
Its actually not short sighted legislation at all, its legislation and laws that were written by current incumbent lawyers very carefully, to create a competition-less market place. Sure, those communities that aren't outright banned from doing them can, but they may(and some laws are written exactly like this) have to hold a referrendum every time they need to do something, and anything(including telling the contractor or guy he can sneeze). seriously, these laws were written in a manner that only purchased, incumbent protection laws can be. The other problem lies in the current incumbents unlimited spending on smearing and mudslinging any project that gets off the ground or tries too. I remember seeing the ads here when charter tried to stop a few communities from wiring themselves, and they were filled with outright lies, but the communities dont have the money to fight it, and those that are not informed believe whatever comes out of the TV. | |
openbox9Premium
join:2004-01-26
japan
kudos:2 | reply to Chubbysumo
said by Chubbysumo:If these companies spent this money on upgrading their network instead of buying laws, we could have probably already have had FTTH 100% deployed in the USA, because over the course of 10 years, that is a lot of money spent on lobbying. Your numbers add up to $380M. Making huge assumptions and greatly simplifying the math, at 10 years, that's only $3.8B. How much did VZ spend on deploying its FiOS to only part of its footprint? It was a lot more than $3.8B.said by Chubbysumo:Seriously, think about how much they actually spend on their networks(its all in their publicly filed taxes), not the inflated numbers they give, but raw investments(equip, materials, labor, installs, fiber and cable runs, and "3rd" party expenses), they spent about half as much lobbying as they did on their network. I'm throwing the flag on that one. That's simply not accurate.said by Chubbysumo:As far as the states that have made broadband illegal, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Nevada, Pennsylvania, texas, utah, louisana, North carolina, virginia, florida, Missouri, Minnesota, Wisconsin, for the full list, see »www.muninetworks.org/communitymap. Uncheck all but the ones that highlights the "states with barriers" in red. Ok, I clicked on all of the states in that map. Nevada looks to prohibit relatively populated municipalities from selling services to the general public. Nebraska does appear a little onerous. Texas appears to limit municipalities from obtaining the necessary certificates/licenses. The "hurdles" that I see from some of the other states are things like feasibility studies, holding referendums to determine if the majority of citizens actually want to spend the money, and asking private industry to deploy infrastructure before doing it themselves. Sounds requirements IMHO, given the fiscal challenges that some of the states and municipalities face across our nation.
Thank you for providing the link and actually trying to answer my question instead of simply perpetuating inaccurate headlines. | |
Reviews:
·Charter
| well, in the short term, it may not be much to spend, but with how much verizon claims to have spent on their FiOS buildout, all the money spent on lobbying over the past 10 to 15 years(and years into the future) could be spent and could have been spent on connecting lots of people with FTTH. Blame investors for that one, because all they care about is how many % of RoI that they can get.
The problem not only lies within the laws, but, you have to consider all the legal assaults that the current incumbents put out to try and stop them. Im sure lake county has met all the "requirements", except the current incumbent(frontier) has decided to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on lawyers instead of spending that on their slow crappy network to please the people. Instead of letting it go on, or invest in their own(frontiers) network to compete with the community initiave, they have hired lawyers and thrown dozens of lawsuits to try and outright stop the project. So, answer me this: If Frontier will not invest in the network, and the community decides to do it themselves, meets all the requirements, and has the laws on the books on their side, WHY DOES FRONTIER CONTIUNE TO WASTE OUR TAXPAYER DOLLARS by continuing their legal assault? If they arent going to invest, why should they have an interest in fighting the project? I dont believe that any incumbent who has forsaken an area has any right to file legal roadblocks to stop a community from picking up the slack where they wouldnt, but that is exactly what incumbents do.
So, look at it as a whole package. The incumbent buys a law, maybe a law that is not an outright ban, but they get one. Then, they stop investing in a communitys broadband and infrastructure starts to get worse or fail, yet the incumbent wont repair and replace it. The community as a whole decides to jump thru all the hoops to get their own broadband system going, they(the community) follows all the rules, laws, and comes up with private/public funding. The incumbent, fearing competition from better services, instead of trying to upgrade their own network to compete, instead launches a legal assault to drain the funds by forcing them(the community) to pay for lawyers, and thus, puts the project in the red before its off the ground. Then, they(the incumbent) puts out misleading adverts saying the project is bad, and that it will fail, and that its already losing money(which strokes the public fear button), and then the community effort dies from a combination of public fear mongering and legal assaults from the incumbents who refused to wire the community in the first place. Please tell me you feel that this is wrong. I dont think an incumbent has any right to file any objections to a community run project unless they can show they are investing to improve. It just comes down to greed. The investors fear the loss of an easy profit, and a really high profit margin. I say down with the stock market, and down with CEOs who earn many millions per year to basically do next to nothing but puppet out their boards decisions. | |
openbox9Premium
join:2004-01-26
japan
kudos:2 | As an investor in VZ, ROI is obviously a big deal. But not all of us are so shortsighted that we're only looking to the next Q. After all, investing is about future earnings, so we definitely want to keep working towards that goal.
As for spending money on lobbyists instead of deploying fiber. Unless made illegal (why isn't lobbying at least capped? blame Congress ), companies will spend money on lobbying Congress. That expense is already allocated. If it didn't go toward lobbying, I doubt that it would be spent on deploying infrastructure. If anything, it would probably be returned to the shareholders.
said by Chubbysumo:The problem not only lies within the laws, but, you have to consider all the legal assaults that the current incumbents put out to try and stop them. I tried making this point the other day in a different discussion, but don't you think that actually having laws in play stipulating what municipalities can and can't do for deploying broadband infrastructure that incumbent lawsuits might be mitigated? After all, as long as the municipalities are following the laws, on what legitimate grounds do incumbents have to file suit?
said by Chubbysumo:So, answer me this: If Frontier will not invest in the network, and the community decides to do it themselves, meets all the requirements, and has the laws on the books on their side, WHY DOES FRONTIER CONTIUNE TO WASTE OUR TAXPAYER DOLLARS by continuing their legal assault? I'm not educated enough regarding this situation, but I'll assume that Frontier believes that the municipality isn't following the law and/or satisfying the requirements.
said by Chubbysumo:If they arent going to invest, why should they have an interest in fighting the project? I dont believe that any incumbent who has forsaken an area has any right to file legal roadblocks to stop a community from picking up the slack where they wouldnt, but that is exactly what incumbents do. I agree with you so long as the laws are followed and all requirements satisfied by the municipalities.
said by Chubbysumo:Please tell me you feel that this is wrong. As you've portrayed the scenario, yes, I "feel" that it's wrong.
said by Chubbysumo:I say down with the stock market, and down with CEOs who earn many millions per year to basically do next to nothing but puppet out their boards decisions. Sigh, not this again. Equity and debt markets are very much needed. Businesses and consumers rely on them every day. Our economy wouldn't exist without the ability to source capital. I'll grant you that executive compensation is grossly out of whack in some situations and the boards of directors need to wake up and figure out how to hire and compensate talent based on performance, not simply promising fat checks for showing up to work. | |
| reply to Chubbysumo
You can thank ALEC and the States Policy Network think tanks for pushing these laws that create the monopolies for just a few companies. Telecomm has been a major area for ALEC for years. | |
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