Consumer Group Wants $44 Billion For U.S. BroadbandBut again, plan skirts around and over the primary problem... ( old news - 06:41PM Wednesday Dec 17 2008) tags: legal · prices · coverage · business · alternatives · bandwidth · Op/Ed · PoliticsEver since we began flinging unaccountable billions around for backrubs, huge bonuses and who really knows what else, the pressure has been growing to spend some of our apparently limitless taxpayer wealth on United States infrastructure -- including broadband services. Consumer group Free Press, to the horror of Milton Friedman fans and "free market" proselytizers, today released their proposal, which urges the government to spend $44 billion to fill in rural and under-served broadband coverage gaps. The Cliff notes version: •Produce next-generation networks capable of delivering speeds of 100 Megabits per second through tax incentives that stimulate private investment.
•Spur competition by awarding higher tax incentives to companies that deploy world-class, fiber-optic networks that are open to multiple competitors.
•Fund the construction of next-generation broadband and wireless networks in rural and unserved areas.
•Help low-income Americans get connected by using stimulus funds to extend universal service programs to support broadband.
•Modernize the e-Rate program to connect children at home by supplying them with computers and lowering the monthly cost of Internet access.
•Bring health care and public services into the digital age and provide technology training to senior citizens and families with children. The plan is a combination of tax cuts, incentives and the revamping of existing money pits like the Universal Service Fund. I'm still dissecting it, but nothing here initially leaps out as anything that hasn't been proposed before. Countless proposals of years past, many of which had the same essential marrow, haven't worked because they fail to first focus on the core problem: incumbent telecom lobbying firms have direct control over Washington. The result is that any truly consumer friendly proposals are killed in the legislative womb. Until that's corrected, it simply doesn't matter how ingenious your solution is. Here's links to the executive summary and the full report for your own analysis.
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JohnQPublic
Premium
join:2002-03-22
Xanadu
| Yeah, that's the ticket! That's exactly what's needed to fix the current economic meltdown. We just need to beef up our broadband offerings in the cornfields of Nebraska. Yeah, that's the ticket. 
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BF69
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! said by JohnQPublic  :That's exactly what's needed to fix the current economic meltdown. We just need to beef up our broadband offerings in the cornfields of Nebraska. Yeah, that's the ticket. If you want to have an intelligent discussion please respond with some intelligence. There's close to 50 million people or more that can't get access to broadband. That's a lot of fucking people. | |
| | | cornelius785
join:2006-10-26
Worcester, MA
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! now where to these '50 million people' (i won't bother asking where that number came from cause its pretty apparent) live? out in the middle of frellin' nowhere? it make absolutely no sense to spend an absurd amount of money on a few people when that same money can make ftth happen for perhaps hundreds. | |
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BF69
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! said by cornelius785 :now where to these '50 million people' (i won't bother asking where that number came from cause its pretty apparent) live? out in the middle of frellin' nowhere? it make absolutely no sense to spend an absurd amount of money on a few people when that same money can make ftth happen for perhaps hundreds. Let's see 300 million people in the US 1/6 at least do not have access to broadband. 1/6 of 300 million is 50 million. Basic math too hard for you? | |
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fatmanskinny
Premium
join:2004-01-04
Wandering
 ·Comcast Digital Vo..
 ·Comcast
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! said by BF69 :said by cornelius785 :now where to these '50 million people' (i won't bother asking where that number came from cause its pretty apparent) live? out in the middle of frellin' nowhere? it make absolutely no sense to spend an absurd amount of money on a few people when that same money can make ftth happen for perhaps hundreds. Let's see 300 million people in the US 1/6 at least do not have access to broadband. 1/6 of 300 million is 50 million. Basic math too hard for you? Ouch! 
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middleofknowhere
@jacksonhole.com
| Apparently it's too hard for you also.
300 million people.
of which 74 million are children.
So 226 million adults.
50% of adults are married.
So 113 million individual households.
1/6 of them is 15 million households.
How many of them do now want or cannot afford broadband?
what percentage doesn't own a computer?
What percentage does not want a computer? | |
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funchords
Hello
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join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
 ·Verizon Online DSL
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| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! said by BF69 :Basic math too hard for you? said by middleofknowhere :
Apparently it's too hard for you also.
So 226 million adults.
50% of adults are married.
So 113 million individual households.
Apparently it's too hard for you also. 
(the amazing thing is that even though his math is off, his wrong answer is admirably close -- »www.census.gov/population/www/so···007.html has 117 Million households in the USA.)
Still, the broadband reports on the subject generally compare the have and have-nots and these use various numbers and ways to say.
Who has (60-65%): Cities, Upper Income, Older
Who has not (25-33%): Rural, Low Income, Younger
And that's part of the problem of waiting for "the market" to solve it -- the "have nots" are the most expensive to reach, the most likely not to subscribe at any price, and least able to pay regularly. Meanwhile, more and more typical services are delivered on the net -- registering for college, applying for jobs, hell -- just doing your high-school homework!
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
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| | | | | hihi
join:2007-05-06
Port Orange, FL
| said by BF69 :said by cornelius785 :now where to these '50 million people' (i won't bother asking where that number came from cause its pretty apparent) live? out in the middle of frellin' nowhere? it make absolutely no sense to spend an absurd amount of money on a few people when that same money can make ftth happen for perhaps hundreds. Let's see 300 million people in the US 1/6 at least do not have access to broadband. 1/6 of 300 million is 50 million. Basic math too hard for you? We need to wire the entire world not just usa
china right? only 10 percent has internet connection while in usa we have at least 60 percent so thats about 2/3
poverty around the world need connection to wire the entire globe
what should be the universal language? | |
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funchords
Hello
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join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! said by hihi :what should be the universal language? Internet Protocol. | |
| | | | 
Siryak
join:2005-11-26
 ·WildBlue
| said by cornelius785 :now where to these '50 million people' (i won't bother asking where that number came from cause its pretty apparent) live? out in the middle of frellin' nowhere? it make absolutely no sense to spend an absurd amount of money on a few people when that same money can make ftth happen for perhaps hundreds. Yes it makes no sense to get someone out of the stone age where they can actually use the internet at all rather than give these poor mistreated people with only 10mb connection that FTTH connection. Somebody is wasting a precious extra 3 seconds to download their porn when they could have it 3 seconds sooner! The nerve of some people!
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| | | 
DavePR
join:2008-06-04
1 edit | They don't have access to Domino's either.
$44,000,000,000 seems like way too much money to hang some stuff on telephone poles. I smell a giveaway to fat cats. | |
| | |
coolguyP
@wildblue.net
| said by BF69 :said by JohnQPublic :That's exactly what's needed to fix the current economic meltdown. We just need to beef up our broadband offerings in the cornfields of Nebraska. Yeah, that's the ticket. If you want to have an intelligent discussion please respond with some intelligence. There's close to 50 million people or more that can't get access to broadband. That's a lot of fucking people. Yeah, and I'm one of them goddamn it!!!!! | |
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BIGMIKE
Premium
join:2002-06-07
Westminster, CA
| US stares at a $1 trillion deficit. How bad is that?
NEW YORK - The US government's extraordinary effort to rescue the banking system may have pulled America's economy back from the brink, but it comes at a cost – helping to push an already bloated deficit up to an estimated $1 trillion for this fiscal year.
That would be a record in today's dollars – and would represent the highest level of federal red ink as a share of the overall economy of any US budget since the 1940s. For each household, this year's deficit would pile on an extra $8,620 of federal debt. »www.csmonitor.com/2008/1016/p01s05-usec.html
$10 trillion
The estimated population of the United States is 305,294,541
so each citizen's share of this debt is $34,835.86.
»www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ | |
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funchords
Hello
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join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| Re: Yeah, that's the ticket! It's bad. It would be a record in any day's dollars!
We have a GDP of $11-12 trillion -- so the thought of $1 trillion to get things moving again isn't absurd on its face, the actual plan ought to be considered.
When you're out of work, sometimes you retool -- you buy some new clothes, take a course or two you might need, spend money seeking that employment -- and as a result, you get that next job.
In this case, there is some make-work fluff here. They're trying to get "main-street" consumers employed and spending again. We probably wouldn't want government to do stuff like this in normal times.
But there's plenty of "we need to do this anyway" stuff here, too.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
What you do at Christmas does not matter so much; What counts are the Christmas things you do all year through. | |
| 
hayabusa3303
Over 200 mph
Premium
join:2005-06-29
clubs: | Please 44 billion They will only use 2 bilion to do real work and 42 billion to lobby. | |
| | Pv8man
join:2008-07-24
Hammond, IN | Re: Please 44 billion lol, ya consumer groups need to start paying lobbyists to get a voice.
Come on, get with the modern bribery system, that is, the over abused free market. | |
| | jc100
join:2002-04-10
| You are crazy! 2 Billion for real work? 42 billion will be pocketed and go to lobbyists, the other 2 billion will be misplaced. This committee will then say they ran out of money during the research stage, and nothing else will get done. Isn't tax payer money the ultimate slush fund, or what? Why get a real job when you can write a government grant and steal from those who earn their money. | |
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funchords
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Washington, DC
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2 edits | Incumbent telecom lobbyists -- fight fire with fire ... incumbent telecom lobbying firms have direct control over Washington, resulting in any truly consumer friendly proposals being killed in the legislative womb ...
Corporate lobbyists buy influence with contributions, and get policy-makers attention by sheer persistence. They represent zero voters.
Two can play at that game, AND represent actual votes as well. WRITE your Congresscritters. Make it so that when your Rep. or Senator wants to know something about this "Megabits" thing, that they already know what the voters want and they don't have to answer the call from a telecom. Support your candidates who get it.
We can't invent the next generation of cool things if we're stuck on a last generation network.
We're not leading the race if all we can see are somebody else's tail lights.
It's critically important that we get these back-assward telecoms out of the business of perfecting meters and throttles and into the business of blowing the doors off of speed and consumption limits!
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Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
What you do at Christmas does not matter so much; What counts are the Christmas things you do all year through. | |
| | jaminus
join:2004-10-14
Arlington, VA
| Re: Incumbent telecom lobbyists -- fight fire with fire Yes! Let's spend other people's money on something that all of us on BroadbandReports.com agree is the best thing ever--super fast broadband. Sure, there a lot of people who could get broadband but decide against it (according to Pew reports) but they're all obviously just idiots. We'll take their billions and spend it far better than they ever could.
The best part about broadband is that the marginal gain of each additional megabit exceeds the marginal cost at any point. Broadband is just one of those things where there's no such thing as too much, no matter the cost. This is especially true when we're using government funds. As long as we're going to run the U.S. into the ground with mounting debt, might as well do it in style, eh? | |
| | | 
bent
not broken
Premium
join:2004-10-04
Loveland, CO
clubs:
·Comcast Formerly ..
| Re: Incumbent telecom lobbyists -- fight fire with fire Because developing infrastructure to keep pace with the rest of the developed world is a terrible thing. Hell. Our schools can't keep up, why should our communication network?
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| | |
funchords
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Washington, DC
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1 edit | said by jaminus :Yes! Let's spend other people's money on something that all of us on BroadbandReports.com agree is the best thing ever--super fast broadband. Obviously not, since many readers here do not agree. This won't fly if America generally doesn't agree with it, and it shouldn't fly if that is the case. But I think it makes sense, cold-hearted fiscal conservative that I am, because I see the Milton Friedman free-market in it.
There's a reason why we don't sell our city streets to the highest bidder, and that's because if Wal-mart was in charge of the street, none of them would ever go to Target. So we all own the streets, and everyone benefits.
Last-mile broadband can be the same way.
said by jaminus :Sure, there a lot of people who could get broadband but decide against it (according to Pew reports) but they're all obviously just idiots. We'll take their billions and spend it far better than they ever could. Actually, I respect those that can turn off the TV, Internet, and phones at home. Had I had my life to live over again, I would have had better balance for my family with more actual activities and fewer dumbstruck hours in front of the tube(s).
But Pew also found that apparent disinterest in Broadband wasn't really disinterest at all.
Non-broadband users cite a number of reasons for not using the service
– including availability, price, and lack of interest.
62% of dial-up users say they are not interested in giving up their current co nnection
for broadband.
When asked specifically what it would take to get them to switch to broadband:
35% of dial-up users say that the price of broadband service would have to fal l.
19% of dial-up users said nothing would convince them to get broadband.
14% of dial-up users – and 24% of dial-up users in rural America – s ay that
broadband service would have to become available where they live.
»www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Bro···2008.pdf
said by jaminus :The best part about broadband is that the marginal gain of each additional megabit exceeds the marginal cost at any point. Yeah, but look what's happening. The ISPs are moving to a pay-more-as-you-go model, where overage charges mean that the next gig is more expensive than the previous ones. With throttling beyond some usage, they also create the situation where you're paying more for less.
said by jaminus :Broadband is just one of those things where there's no such thing as too much, no matter the cost. That's a tasty sound-bite (byte?) but it doesn't mean a lot. For many people, that's true for highway speeds, education, health care, food, clean pools, puppy dogs, etc. etc....
said by jaminus :This is especially true when we're using government funds. As long as we're going to run the U.S. into the ground with mounting debt, might as well do it in style, eh? The reason I'd like 100 Mbps fiber is because copper has a limited lifetime and our copper solutions tend to be add-on technologies. Our copper-POTS wasn't designed for data, we added it as an after thought. Same with Cable data. If we're going to spend the money, let's spend it on something efficient. At the moment, there seems to be no stopping photonics as they continue to work the light spectrum into smaller and faster segments year after year. Let's spend the money wisely, not on something that'll be dead in the ground in 10 years.
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Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
What you do at Christmas does not matter so much; What counts are the Christmas things you do all year through. | |
| 
fiber_man
Things Happen For A Reason
Premium
join:2001-01-27
Port Saint Lucie, FL
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| Clec's AT&T and Verizon have been deploying fiber to stop the clec's from sharing their networks. That was a problem of the telecom act of 1996. They had to share their copper network but not their fiber network. I have no problem with another company building their own network to serve customers. Good luck placing all of the cables under the roads,railroads,bridges,etc...,dealing with all of the governments for ROWs,easements,permits,etc..
Attaching to the poles?? Not enough space on many of them. How many pole lines do you think the public wants to see. Hell they are bitching about the Vrads,yards being dug up,etc.. all over the country.
44 billion will not go to far after everything else is taken into consideration.
Good Idea just needs more consideration for the networks that are already in place.
Government control is the reason that overseas countries have passed by us.
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| | RayW
Premium
join:2001-09-01
Layton, UT
clubs:
·XMission
| Re: Clec's said by fiber_man :Government control is the reason that overseas countries have passed by us. Rephrase that to be "laws bought by the commercial enterprises prohibiting the people and their local public entities from building decent infrastructure and service is the reason that some overseas countries have passed by us."
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I am not lost, I find myself every time. | |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC | (agree with everything in your first paragraph)
I personally hate the idea of government control -- but how do we make internet / cable / phone a competition? | |
| | | Skippy25
join:2000-09-13
Hazelwood, MO
| Re: Clec's How? The government provides one network that can reach every business and user that is managed by only a few (2-4) not-for-profit privately owned companies that are not allowed to provide content on the network or offer incentives for "special tubes" of any kind for those that want to provide content. Their only job is to transparently pass packets and manage/upgrade the network as needed. They are paid by regulated lease fees from any business that wants to serve the consumer at the other end being it serves as an ISP, phone, TV or what have you.
This of course is my personal opinion. | |
| | | | jdjbuffalo
join:2004-01-17
Denver, CO
| Re: Clec's This is by far my favorite solution to the last-mile problem.
I've been saying that this is the way we need to go for a long time. Unfortunately, Washington would have to ignore their Telecom and Cable lobby groups to actually get it passed. The chances of that happening are very low. | |
| cornelius785
join:2006-10-26
Worcester, MA
| so this is a good idea? i'm all for upgrading broadband in logic manners that are fair to the majority (if you think you can be fair to all, you smoking crack). it almost sound like they want to ensure every cow has access to broadband. after reading those bullets, a part of me opposes this.
why concentrate on sparsely populated areas?
since when is broadband a necessity?
should a luxury item be subsidized for the lower classes?
why should a company really want to deploy fiber ($$$$) and allow other companies to lease for cheap(-ish)?
does it even matter is the fiber is open to multiple competitors? why should i even care? it's not like i'll save a lots of money.
aren't there already training services in place? what about computer literate relatives or even neighbors? | |
| |
BF69
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN
| Re: so this is a good idea? said by cornelius785 :i'm all for upgrading broadband in logic manners that are fair to the majority (if you think you can be fair to all, you smoking crack). it almost sound like they want to ensure every cow has access to broadband. after reading those bullets, a part of me opposes this. why concentrate on sparsely populated areas? since when is broadband a necessity? should a luxury item be subsidized for the lower classes? why should a company really want to deploy fiber ($$$$) and allow other companies to lease for cheap(-ish)? does it even matter is the fiber is open to multiple competitors? why should i even care? it's not like i'll save a lots of money. aren't there already training services in place? what about computer literate relatives or even neighbors? You do realize that 75-100 years ago your same arguments were use for electricity and phone service EXACTLY. Where those people right? No. I see many people here don't get the BIG picture. Which is surprising because one would think those that frequent a site like this would be of at least above average intelligence. guess not. | |
| |
funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| said by cornelius785 :why concentrate on sparsely populated areas? Because aside from metro-area greenfield developments, we're really not expanding broadband's footprint anymore. That's why we went from #1 to #__ (not even in the top 10) in deploying broadband.
said by cornelius785 :since when is broadband a necessity? Part of this -is- a make-work project to fund jobs and stimulate the economy back into life. But part of this is acting on data that shows that for three percent or so of broadband adoption, we tend to employ about a million more people in various ways.
said by cornelius785 :should a luxury item be subsidized for the lower classes? It's a loaded question. But with copper theft a big problem, not to mention it's limited future of usefulness, we should all be moving toward fiber anyway.
said by cornelius785 :why should a company really want to deploy fiber ($$$$) and allow other companies to lease for cheap(-ish)? I'd rather property owners pay for this myself. My next house will have fiber, or I'm not buying it. I wouldn't buy a house without an electrical or water or sewer connection -- with the high value I place on broadband, I'd be crazy to buy a house that wasn't served by fiber.
said by cornelius785 :does it even matter is the fiber is open to multiple competitors? why should i even care? it's not like i'll save a lots of money. Have you ever tried to buy food in a movie theater? It's expensive! There is no competition, so they charge you $4 for some corn and some "Golden Flavor" that passes itself off as butter.
Yeah, it matters.
said by cornelius785 :aren't there already training services in place? what about computer literate relatives or even neighbors? Sure. And if they're looking for a job, there will be jobs for them -- perhaps.
We shouldn't do stuff just to spend the money, and if that's your point, I do not disagree. But if we're going to make increasing the reach of broadband a national priority, then its more than just laying fiber.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
What you do at Christmas does not matter so much; What counts are the Christmas things you do all year through. | |
| rradina
join:2000-08-08
Chesterfield, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| Ridiculous... What do we get for that $44 billion? How many people get service? Whenever I hear spending billions on rural, I think $100,000 spent to wire and maintain a few customers. My parents live in rural Missouri and they went with high-speed wireless. They are in the middle of nowhere and they have two service providers. It isn't great, it isn't cheap ($50/month) but it's always-on, it's 10 times faster than dialup and it's good enough. | |
| |
Siryak
join:2005-11-26
·WildBlue
| Re: Ridiculous... said by rradina :My parents live in rural Missouri and they went with high-speed wireless. They are in the middle of nowhere and they have two service providers. It isn't great, it isn't cheap ($50/month) but it's always-on, it's 10 times faster than dialup and it's good enough. You are severely missing the point here. If they have it they are not the target. Not everybody has even a wireless provider available to them. I agree it is good enough. The problem is dial-up is not and that is what they are trying to get to.(The people stuck with dial-up as an only option)
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| | | rradina
join:2000-08-08
Chesterfield, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| Re: Ridiculous... I'm not missing the point. The point is those that don't have it, want me to help them get it. I already do that way more than most in the form of federal, state, medicare/medicaid, social security, property and sales taxes.
The entire government is nothing more than a bloated and completely corrupt (think Obama's clean -- yeah right...) wealth-transfer system. The ridiculous part is most of the time it's from those of us who make the economy work to those who already have way too much (how about those auto-executives offering to work for $1...gee, they might have to sell their backup limos. I feel so bad for them.) The financial bailout, the auto bailout and now those scammed out of their life's savings are all turning to the government. To propose that the government spend billions on high-speed networks is no different.
I lost half my 401K. Can I get a bailout? Where is it going to come from? Are they going to tax me more so they give it back to me minus administrative overhead? I'd rather just keep my money and rebuild it myself!
When did we forget that the government is you, me and everyone else. We pay for our government. If you need a new roof on your house or your lawn trimmed, are we now a nation that feels entitled to knock on our neighbor's door and ask for money? Educate me as to how asking for billions to upgrade our Internet is different?
The loss of one's life savings, a life cut short due to inadequate health care or a newborn addicted to drugs are all terrible tragedies and we should do all we can afford to do. But what can we afford to do?
Our government isn't just printing money, it's giving each one of us a high-interest credit card with a two-comma balance. I think we all know it and yet we continue to turn our palms to the sky and ask for even more. And when we get it, don't anyone even think about trying telling us how we should live. We'll take the handout, thank you very much, but there cannot be any rules attached. We need total freedom to express ourselves even though today's kids look silly and ridiculous with their piercings, tattoos and pants around knees and completely oblivious and indifferent parents who blame the lack of sex education in the school system when their 14 year old daughter gets pregnant.
A recent mother of three was allegedly killed in her home by two high school seniors that were robbing her house. She walked in on them and one of them shot her three times. Her 10 year old son came home and found her dead in the hallway. Neither of the suspects had attended school since before the Thanksgiving break. The parents of the boy who did not pull the trigger were quoted as saying, "We knew our boy was capable of robbery but he would never murder anyone."
Is it just me or does it sound like these parents accept the fact that their son was robbing people? Is this why we all feel entitled? We just don't know any better? | |
| iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Golden, CO
·Comcast
·Qwest.net
·magicjack.com
 ·BeeCreek Communica..
·Sprint Mobile Broa..
| $44 BEEEEELLLLLION dollars That's a lot of money.
No seriously, if we're looking at 50 million non-broadband US peeps, that's $880 per person, enough to give each of them a year of cellular broadband service on the likes of Millenicom. Assuming they're all in different households. If not, the pircutre gets even rosier...like running fiber to lots of those people and paying for WiMAX equipment for the rest.
Or $146.67 for every US citizen, likely enough to make ADSL2+ available to everyone, I'd think. Everyone. At a decent price.
Waitaminute...$146.67 per CITIZEN? Sounds like that's gonna come out of everyone's taxes. Howzat gonna work? You can buy a few years of dialup for that much...or do other stuff. Or you can *not* pass the cost on, leaving gov't even more in debt.
Then again, we just spent $700+B on bailouts, so...yeah...
How about offering tax rebates to broadband providers if they either
a) Use those rebates to roll out more service
b) Pass that rebate directly to customers' bills?
So Comcast could get a tax rebate of, say, $176.4M, for taking $1 per month off of all their customers' bills for a year. No rate hikes would be allowed in order to collect on this break, so the fat cats can't walk away with anything. Or they spend that money upgrading Colorado to DOCSIS 3. Of course, there'd be a limit to the amount of taxes taken off: the amount of taxes owed in the first place.
Just a random outta-my-butt thought.
Seriously tho9ugh, where would that munny come from anyway? Don't get me wrong, I'd love 100/100 FTTH both to my in-town apartment and to my parents' house a few miles out of town, but what's the overhead here? Mind if loyal BBR users were on the board to make sure the companies didn't take money and run? We'll work cheap, just give us 100 Mbit symmetric fiber to do our oversight over :-D | |
| decifal
join:2007-03-10
Bon Aqua, TN
| keep in mind keep in mind.. Rural doesn't always mean one house per 50 miles.... Theres more to rural broadband needs than a cornfield with an outhouse... Seriously, this country is way underserved with broadband... Its laughable and pathetic.. If we are going to keep giving company's like AIG money just to go on vacation.. We can at least do this. | |
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middleofknowhere
@jacksonhole.com
| Re: keep in mind Why? Why can we at least do this?
I work for a small ISP. We server the under-served. We are constantly trying to figure out ways to profitably serve tiny communities. All it takes for us to expand is to find clusters of 30 customers to make it a worth while investment.
There are parts of Wyoming where it will never be economically feasible to serve these customers. That is what satellite broadband is for. The terrain and distances are the biggest obstacles.
We recently received a grant to provide broadband to a small town. It will take 6 towers to bring in bandwidth, 110 air miles, at a cost of 3/4 of a million. Thats just to reach about 200 residents. How many will pay for it remains to be seen. So, thats 3,750 per person. Care to guess how many will actually pay for service?
My guess is about 50 or about 15000 per customer.
Your tax dollars at work. | |
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kontos
xyzzy
join:2001-10-04
West Henrietta, NY
|  Investment Risk
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joe1
@windstream.net | obama has billions for big cities we need billions for every ittle nook and cranny in the rural U.S.A. for high speed internet that is comparable to cable.... | |
| | rody_44
Premium
join:2004-02-20
Quakertown, PA
·Comcast
3 edits | Re: obama has billions for big cities if they want to do something they should just fly some birds and provide wireless. its a lame world when broadband is lumped with electric and phone. two of them is needed and one is not. if your looking to create jobs this would be about the worse way to do it. they need to create jobs with methods of like building wind mills for electric. or something to cut our demand of oil. screw high speed internet. if you need it for your job, a duh dont move where it isnt available morone. | |
| | | decifal
join:2007-03-10
Bon Aqua, TN
| Re: obama has billions for big cities said by rody_44 : if they want to do something they should just fly some birds and provide wireless. its a lame world when broadband is lumped with electric and phone. two of them is needed and one is not. if your looking to create jobs this would be about the worse way to do it. they need to create jobs with methods of like building wind mills for electric. or something to cut our demand of oil. screw high speed internet. if you need it for your job, a duh dont move where it isnt available morone. Technically, you can live without any utilities.. However though, rural, city dweller whatever, we tend to not live like this.. Having broadband gives people many many options. Gives buisness's options, gives government options. Its just a good thing to spread and keep neutral.. I mean its cool if your liking the great outdoors etc, I like to wonder off the trail myself every now and then, but when I come back I want to be efficient, entertained and well informed.. And at decent speeds, not load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load... Almost there.. load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load load .. Welcome to your gmail account!! We noticed your on dialup! Why haven't you purchased fastaccess DSL? Theres no reason not to!.. Oh wait.. Unless its not available in your area (( duhhh)) | |
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Bring back the WPA and REA
We need to bring back the Works Progress Administration and Rural Electrification Administration. When I was a kid in the mid 50' I lived in an rural area about 65 Miles from New York City. I became fascinated about the development of the area. I learned that the road in front of our home was originally called the Greenville Turnpike. In the 1800's it was a toll road as were most other roads that connected towns and cities in the County. Between the mid 1800's and the 1930's the turnpikes were purchased by the government and made public. In the 1930's US Highway 6 was constructed by the WPA which replaced the Greenville Turnpike. Electrical power was installed at the house through REA Loans and the Telephone service was installed by a telephone cooperative under an REA Loan. The best part about the WPA and REA was that it created jobs and provided residents of the area with necessary services. If it was not for the WPA and the REA we would have had to use Kerosene Lamps for light, use an outhouse take a crap and communicate using homing pigeons. Those of you who oppose government intervention in creation of a national twenty second century broadband network should consider how our current infrastructure was created.