Steve et al., You won¹t hear a disagreeing peep out of me re: telco broken promises it¹s remarkable to me that state regulators haven¹t gotten used to the shell game they play.
But these public broadband projects are scarcely different in my mind. We¹re just replacing the telcos with another group of emerging private interests who want to compete with the big boys. I¹m all about the actual competition, but when they whisper in the ears of public officials in an attempt to tap the vast tax coffers of big cities, those words are just as poisonous as an RBOC telling regulators that they¹ll build fiber if they can just get a break on rate regulation or whatever else they¹ve sought over the years. But because it¹s easy to hate Verizon, people listen. Interestingly, I¹m here in Baltimore, MD at the WiFi Planet Conference and Expo, where yesterday I heard David Isenberg espouse the virtues of a ³dumb network² that uses the commons model. Ideally, if I understood him correctly, the network of the future is devoid of access providers and ³middlemen² - if you have a device, probably wireless, you can connect directly to the Internet backbone. I like the idea but I worry about the notion that the commons has to be publicly-owned. It would be hypocritical of me to argue that everyone wouldn¹t benefit from having broadband access. What I do believe, however, is that not everyone is ready for broadband tomorrow. If we believed that, most of the folks on this list wouldn¹t spend so much time training people, furnishing low-income homes with computers or devising ways of making the Internet culturally relevant. Metro-wide public broadband strikes me as a very politically attractive way to pay lip service to the digital divide without actually improving access, demand, cultural relevance or training. I see your $.15 and raise you a quarter. :) -Charlie On 6/15/05 9:14 PM, "Stephen Snow" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Charlie, et. al., > >> As to Steve's point, however, I think the bill is quite clear: >> >> "neither any State or local government, nor any entity affiliated with > such >> a government, shall provide any telecommunications, telecommunications >> service, information service, or cable service in any geographic area > within >> the jurisdiction of such government in which a corporation or other > private >> entity that is not affiliated with any State or local government is > offering >> a substantially similar service." >> >> I read this as: don't offer a service in an area where the private sector > is >> already offering a service. Is it an impossible stretch of the > imagination >> to say that where private companies are NOT offering a service that the >> government MAY do so? Do others disagree? >> > This is deja vu "all over again". > > Here's the thing. The telcos *say* they are offering the service. But guess > what? They offer it...BUT YOU CAN'T GET IT! hahaha! The joke is on us! This > is *so* similar to 10-15 years ago when the baby Bells were saying all they > needed were a few billion in tax breaks and they would have fiber to the > home in 4 years. Well, they got the breaks, worth billions, and never > delivered the fiber. Oops! I am sure that was just some little oversight. > They *meant* to provide fiber...they just forgot! > > Well, with so much going on in the telecom business, you can certainly > understand how THAT could happen! This is no different. Of COURSE they are > "offering" wireless *just about everywhere*. they can show you their plans. > They put it in their long-range work plan, fer gosh sakes. Just like they > are "offering" DSL in Charlotte, NC, where I live. But why can't I get DSL > from BellSouth? Oh, they offer it in their service district, but just not my > PART of the service district (lata). > > That is telecom-speak. Always has been. If you believe anything else for > longer than a New York minute, then please contact me about my "near the > high water line" property. > > My $0.15 > > Steve Snow > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > _______________________________________________ > DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list > [email protected] > http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide > To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with > the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message. > _______________________________________________ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
