 
S_engineer
join:2007-05-16
Chicago, IL
| first thought "It would require that a free service tier be offered to 50% of the population within four years and to 95% of the population before the end of the term."
First thing I thought of was the Illinois toll road that was supposed to be free after a period of time. I suppose starting off w/50 % of people possibly getting something rather than nothing from the FCC is a good thing though!
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"Anything worth having is worth cheating for." WC Fields | |
|  | Joe12345678
join:2003-07-22
Des Plaines, IL
| Re: first thought said by S_engineer  : "It would require that a free service tier be offered to 50% of the population within four years and to 95% of the population before the end of the term." First thing I thought of was the Illinois toll road that was supposed to be free after a period of time. I suppose starting off w/50 % of people possibly getting something rather than nothing from the FCC is a good thing though! The Illinois toll road upped there toll 100% a few years go but I-pass uses got 50% off makeing them pay the old rate.
Any ways they will just keep adding on so it will likely not be free for a long time. | |
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S_engineer
join:2007-05-16
Chicago, IL
| Re: first thought But if you use the I-pass, the Illinois toll authority is tarcking your speed between points. You will then get hit with speeding violation charges, and they will hold your license hostage until you pay.
I know this was off topic, but the premise that something will be free to the consumers after a period of time is extremely suspect!
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"Anything worth having is worth cheating for." WC Fields | |
| | 
n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY
 ·Optimum Online
| said by S_engineer :First thing I thought of was the Illinois toll road that was supposed to be free after a period of time. The New York State Thruway was supposed to be the same deal. The bonds were paid off in 1994 but the tolls remained. However, I do have to say that they use the money for road maintenance and it is one of the best kept roads in the state because it has tolls. When a snow storm hits, the "Thruway Army" is out keeping the road at bare asphalt. Granted there are times when they are overwhelmed but for the years I was commuting I-87/I-287, the road was always open no matter the weather. Colleague's that took I-684, a non-Thruway maintained road that connects with I-287, had to contend with sheet ice, snow covered lanes and potholes. I honestly felt that my tolls were doing some good as I never had issues with the road, just the traffic!
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I support the right to keep and arm bears. | |
| 
TK Junk Mail
Go ahead, make my day
Premium
join:2002-03-03
Margate City, NJ
clubs:
·Comcast
edit:
May 24th, @10:15AM
|  And 2 congresscritters want spectrum "family friendly"
Meantime, Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) and Christopher Cannon (R-Utah) are pushing a bill to foster deployment of a national, family-friendly wireless broadband network with open access. Their bill envisions one auction of airwaves in the 2155-2180 MHz band and another auction involving yet-to-be-determined spectrum below 3 GHz. More here:
»www.rcrnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/ar···13896907
Eschoo’s bill directs the two national licensees to provide a tier of free service -- one absent of obscene and indecent material -- to consumers and public-safety agencies. The two auction winners would be required to complete construction of networks within 10 years, and they would have to cover at least 95% of the population. --
My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page | |
| | 
Boogeyman
Drive it like you stole it
Premium
join:2002-12-17
Huntsville, AL
·Comcast
| Re: And 2 congresscritters want spectrum "family friendly" »dictionary.reference.com/help/ahd4.html
ob·scene
adj.
1. Offensive to accepted standards of decency or modesty.
2. Inciting lustful feelings; lewd.
3. Repulsive; disgusting: "The way he writes about the disease that killed her is simply obscene"
4. So large in amount as to be objectionable or outrageous: "local merchants in nearby stores get hammered by stratospheric rents and obscene taxes"
So I guess we wouldnt be able to talk about the amount of money Bill Gates has (because he has an obscene amount of money). Or the national debt... The list just goes on and on. | |
| | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
edit:
May 24th, @08:16PM
| Re: And 2 congresscritters want spectrum "family friendly" Perhaps more than 5GB of data per month is obscene  | |
| 
Thumper21
@wideopenwest.com | don't understand the logic why would a company want to bid on it if they can only make money off of 5% of the population?
what kind of speeds would the consumer be getting? why would a consumer want to pay for broadband if they can get it free? | |
| |
TK Junk Mail
Go ahead, make my day
Premium
join:2002-03-03
Margate City, NJ
clubs:
·Comcast
| Re: don't understand the logic said by Thumper21 :
why would a company want to bid on it if they can only make money off of 5% of the population?
what kind of speeds would the consumer be getting? why would a consumer want to pay for broadband if they can get it free?
The do say free service "TIER", meaning that there would be multiple tiers. The free tier could be speed limited to say 768/128 and the pay tiers would be faster.
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My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page | |
| | | NOCMan
Verizon Fios User
Premium
join:2004-09-30
Flower Mound, TX
| Re: don't understand the logic I find it hard to believe that any company would do this for free unless they did heavy ad insertion, collection of stats, and other unsavory things to make money.
Now if the government wanted to take that band and make it a public safety wireless network I'd be for that. You could use QOS to guarantee access to the network despite congestion and still be able to provide a service to communities. | |
| | | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
| Re: don't understand the logic said by NOCMan :I find it hard to believe that any company would do this for free unless they did heavy ad insertion, collection of stats, and other unsavory things to make money. Exactly. What kind of business model is this? I bet there will be mandatory surveys and mandatory signups for various crap, or "free" service will be referral based (Pyramid Scheme). Think AllAdvantage, but 10 times worse. | |
| | | Joe12345678
join:2003-07-22
Des Plaines, IL
| said by TK Junk Mail :said by Thumper21 :
why would a company want to bid on it if they can only make money off of 5% of the population?
what kind of speeds would the consumer be getting? why would a consumer want to pay for broadband if they can get it free?
The do say free service "TIER", meaning that there would be multiple tiers. The free tier could be speed limited to say 768/128 and the pay tiers would be faster. they would be nice for laptop users on the road and if they make the higher tiers cost less then the cell phone based broadband then WIN WIN.
also how can they be family-friendly and have open access?
as be family-friendly may block alot of sites. | |
| 
Penguins
Have You Played Atari Today?
join:2001-12-01
Cleveland, OH | 95% 95% of the population?
Does broadcast television even reach 95% of the population, with its powerful one way transmission system?
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Pure magic in 2k of 6502. | |
| | probboy
join:2008-01-10
Natick, MA
| Re: 95% said by Penguins :Does broadcast television even reach 95% of the population, with its powerful one way transmission system? Another metric might be whether or not cellular networks are built out to reach 95% of the population after 20-25 years. I don't see how anyone can make money deploying a network to reach 50-95% of the population and offer (at least some) service for free. | |
| | | DataDork
Premium
join:2008-01-13
Ventura, CA
·RoadRunner Cable
| Re: 95% lol, its just a goal.. doesnt mean they will hit it... all companies forecast and want to hit 100% if they could.. but they throw #'s out there to please the mass.. i think if a project like this really did take off the ground.. major players in the game such as ATT, Verizon, Sprint, etc would have a shit fit and get their hands on it as it would def affect their wireless broadband sector of the industry... | |
| | | iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Fredericksburg, TX
 ·magicjack.com
·Comcast
 ·Qwest.net
 ·Sprint Mobile Broa..
| Okay, so here's the deal...
1. The free service could be allowed on just a few ports. Enough for IM and webmail but that'd be about it. Sort of like NetZero does with their dialup. Maybe more, but you don't have to offer full-port service You have a device that requires a "connection manager" to run, which would put an AdWords leaderboard at the top of the screen, plus some connection controls, again a la NetZero. Nobody's gonna complain; it's free. The AdWords stuff *might* be based on the addresses that people type in or something; that can be done and has been done with the Opera browser of yore. No privacy violation or ad competition. Then you cap speeds at a decent, though not great, 768/256. QoS for lower tier users wouldn't be a riority since you're supposed to have at least a 384 connection to them, I think with 128 upload, and where there's no QoS there's no bandwidth-hogging VoIP or video conferencing.
If people use the connection for an hour a day, every day in a month, and each web page hit was counted as an impression on the adbar at the top of the screen, you might be able to get $15-$20 per month from the ad money. That's enough to finance light usage like the free plan would sustain, which I'd think would top out at around 1GB per month just because of the way it works, not because of any specific FAP.
Then, have an ad in the adbar offering higher speeds and "full" internet, and no ads, for money. There might be another ad-supported tier, but it would be unlimited as to usage, and faster (maybe 1.5/512) for $15 month. That way everyone's happy.
Above that, offer higher ISP-class tiers as usual for increasing amounts of money, with a different piece of equipment that could be connected to a wireless router rather than just to a computer. Then make money on that, too. Also, on the free service the device could be $59 with a $59 mail-in rebate contingent on 3 months of service. Everything's still free, but it gets people using the service.
Oh, and 50% coverage in four years shouldn't be a big deal, you just need to roll out in a lot of areas. For those first four years, you just play like the metro-unlimited cell carriers and roll out in big cities. Once you're finished there, roll out in the suburbs of those big cities. That should get you 50% coverage. 95% is a LOT more challenging, as that's roughly equivalent to the coverage footprints of both CDMA and GSM coverage combined in the U.S. I think, but it could probably be done.
Which reminds me, what's the term of the license and is it just one nationwide block? If it's nationwide that's pretty hard to do on buildout requirements but if the areas are auctioned on a regional or semi-local area you could obtain 95% buildout, no problem. I'm pretty sure that around here Pocket Communications, which is 2 years old, has their PCS network covering 50%+ of the people it serves. On the other side of things, a local carrier switched from TDMA to CDMA maybe five years ago, and they have probably 98% coverage people-wise...thank God for the 850 band of cellular service.
Oh, and for filtering, just do a cheap license deal with whatever filtering software...maybe by someone like CA (who tends to give things away right) and defray some of the cost by giving them advertising in the "connection manager" adbar. Oh, and please make the filtering softare optional. I don't download pr0n or anything like that but filtering softare has false positives...
By the way, in case anyone takes me seriously, this post is licensed Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike. | |
| | | | 
wifi4milez
In Need Of Garbage Pail Kids 1st Series
join:2004-08-07
New York, NY
·Sprint Mobile Broa..
| Re: 95% said by iansltx :Okay, so here's the deal... Where did you get that info? Do you have a link to support those details or is that just how you assume it will be done? The idea certainly sounds ambitious, but I can see how it could work if rolled out properly.
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Have YOU thanked a soldier today? If not, think about doing it as you speak ENGLISH this memorial day. God Bless America, and God Bless our troops.
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| | | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY | I'm wonder how expensive the access cards/devices will be for this network. A $300 dollar card can pay for quite a few months of service. | |
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FCC Discusses Auction to Give You Free Wireless Broadband