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I don't have a contract, and will never have another one again. When I was on a contract, I hated being locked in when I discovered that AT&T sucks in interior Alaska and couldn't switch without incurring a penalty. (While in Cantwell, I had a signal, but couldn't make a call: They couldn't tell me why. There were at least two more reasons I wanted to switch away.)

I have a vague memory, though, of reading that carriers can get the model of your phone, and will happily add data if they find you're using a smart phone without a data plan. Perhaps I should be more bold.

Right now, I'm paying $30/mo for a local plan, with an older phone. It includes unlimited calling ad unlimited texting with 1 GB of data and fantastic coverage. I don't have a strong incentive anymore for trying to dump the data fees, though I did give it serious thought and eliminated the possibility because of the limitations I perceived.

Do you mind sharing which carrier you use?

My ISP in Alaska just went from quasi unlimited (until they tell you it's limited) to officially capped. The top tier that costs nearly $200 month gives you 120GB of transfer @ 22MB/4MB. Before the cap on average I used about 70GB a month with my plan, my same plan with the caps imposed was 20GB a month. When I called my ISP 'GCI' the person on the phone outright told me the only way anyone uses that much bandwidth is if they are a thief using torrents. When i asked about watching HD movies streaming, and downloading games on steam, and system updates, and video skyping with my sister over seas they threatened to cancel my account. I'm now paying nearly $200 a month for CAPPED INTERNET. My other choices which I have tried is ATT WIMAX which would drop it's connection about once an hour and I couldn't get over a half MegaBit on downloads and my upload was under 100kilobits. So I tried ACS DSL which is about $70 a month for unlimited use @ 3MB/512KB. Their latency was actually worse than the WIMAX when it was working. Doing trace routes the speed on the hops inside of Alaska were great at under 30ms, then it hit their main facility that links via fiber to the lower 48 and the pings went up over 1000ms so streaming constantly stuttered and skype was almost unusable since we were cutting each other off because of the 1 to 1.5 seconds lag in the conversation. So now I pay almost $250 a month for premium cable TV, a phone line and 120GB capped internet access. I rarely watch Cable TV (use HULU or NETFLIX for the few shows I want to watch) but GCI requires you have 'premium' cable if you want to increase your internet speed and cap amount. The phone (digital, comes with a analog to Digital conversion box so it also goes over the digital cable line) is a joke that I've never plugged in since I have a cell. So really i'm paying almost $250 a month for internet access with a 120GB cap, the rest of their 'convenience' bundle is a joke that I never use. Just another way to prop up their old tired way of doing things at GCI. Check out http://assets.gci.com/2011/01/packages_anchorage111_01.gif if you want to have a laugh.....

My ISP does do this. Then again, Alaskans don't seem to know any different. Not that we have any choice in the matter. Our internets really are tubes.

http://www.gci.com/for-home/alaskas-fastest-internet

You think Comcast or AT&T are bad?

Check out I've been dealing for way longer in Alaska: http://www.gci.com/forhome/promos/xtreme/ultimate_xtreme_tier_2.htm
And at its cheapest: http://www.gci.com/forhome/promos/xtreme/xtreme_asd7.htm
Those are the Anchorage rates.

Now for where I live in Southeast Alaska, and this service just got launched in December. We were formerly paying roughly the same rates for stupidly slow DSL. A 1mb line was about 125 bucks. Can we poor ole Alaskans have some nationwide nerd outrage too please? Alaska has been needing to import an angry torch and pitchforks mob for a while.

Check out I've been dealing for way longer in Alaska: http://www.gci.com/forhome/promos/xtreme/ultimate_xtreme_tier_2.htm
And at its cheapest: http://www.gci.com/forhome/promos/xtreme/xtreme_asd7.htm
Those are the Anchorage rates.

Now for where I live in Southeast Alaska, and this service just got launched in December. We were formerly paying roughly the same rates for stupidly slow DSL. A 1mb line was about 125 bucks. Can we poor ole Alaskans have some nationwide nerd outrage too please? Alaska has been needing to import an angry torch and pitchforks mob for a while.

It's all satellite based. No matter how fast it is, the latency is killer (>500ms).

Want to know why it all satellite based? Check a map.

As for cheap... I wouldn't exactly call it cheap, but it sure beats dialup (which also goes over satellite).

Tech jobs here are few and far between. The two ISPs here, ACS and GCI are the two biggest players outside of the state for tech jobs. Turnover is slow because there's not much to move into. Leaving Alaska for a job is tougher than elsewhere (except possibly Hawaii) due to distances. Moving in and out of Alaska is expensive with respect to time and money. For many folks, getting a tech job is a waiting game.

Corporations and locals governments aren't really interested in Alaska from a tech standpoint. Alaska, by and large, has a higher cost of living (about 30% average state-side average). That excuse only seems to go so far, especially when there's still 600,000 people living in Alaska. With the median income being about 50ka year, Alaska has high computer ownership than most other states(sorry no figures, just winging that one from memory), one would believe that there'd be ample market to exploit. With corporations and local government possessing slow turn-over and little growth in Alaska otherwise, getting a tech job is kind of hard.

Personal note: I have a tech job and I'm very happy with it. It was highly contested and I was hired in part due to my knowledge of Linux but that's a discussion for another topic.

My circumstances are probably different than yours. I don't need to be as available as you seem to. I'm at my desk while at work and so my family can easily contact me. When I'm not at work, I'm with my family. If I were going to be out of touch, it'd be on the water (no, I'm not on that page yet), and I'd get a couple of marine VHF handhelds to keep in touch.

Here's one ISP that I know of that serves the middle of nowhere.

Also, internet-connected computers maintained by a non-profit public health corporation exist in native villages as small as 250 people, in the middle of nowhere (and the middle of the Bering Strait, where it's not exactly cost-effective to pull a wire).

I could give you gory details, but then my client would have to kill me.

There are exeptions. Perhaps few and far between, they do exist. Shops that are both increasing available speeds and experiencing financial success inspite of being hit hard by bad debt from WorldCom.

There are exeptions. Perhaps few and far between, they do exist. Shops that are both increasing available speeds and experiencing financial success inspite of being hit hard by bad debt from WorldCom.

Sure you can (from your comfortably air-conditioned apartment with your choice of DSL or cable) scoff at satelitte base internet access, but if it's that or AOL's 800 service over crap phone lines... You have no idea how good you've got it.

&ltdisclaimer&gt I live in Anchorage, AK (250,000 people) and I have a 512/256 cable modem, but I have fairly frequent contact with people in the rest of the state, who are not so lucky. Yet.&lt/disclaimer&gt

I'm not for or against this project but I thought I'd add clarity to some of the mis-information that has been given.
1. There is fiber bandwidth the Prudhoe Bay.
2. There is bandwidth to the lower 48. Each OC-48 can be upgraded to an OC-192. Read the page for more details.
I can't answer for other company's redundancy but GCI uses a satilite system if for any reason the fiber goes down. It does cause some hellacious lag but the packets still get there.
3. There are no penguins
4. There are polar bears
5. There are some really huge mosquitoes.
6. No we don't live in igloos and yes, we have indoor plumbing......some of us.....

Thanks entirely to the efforts of unregulated private companies Alaska already has a high percentage of broadband access. In Anchorage, where I live, I have the choice of three different broadband techs from several different providers. We have cable, DSL (3 or 4 ISP's I think are offereing it) and ATT wireless broadband, and I believe a couple of local companies are offering their own wireless broadband as well) We have two fibres leading out of the state to Seattle, including a new high capacity one only a few years old built be GCI a local telco. Most all of the population centers in the state have a broadband option now, today. All of this funded by private companies w/out government aid.

Industry and agriculture are not struggeling Alaska, the oil industry is still going strong, older fields are still profitable and the soon to be opened ANWR region is very promising, and a massive natural gas pipeline is in the works to run the same course as the famous oil pipeline.

Highspeed internet goes to the places where it is best used and at the moment that includes both Alaska and Silicon Alley and plenty of other regions. You may have intended your post to be funny but you should still get your facts straight before spouting off.

because alaska has the highest per capita broadband pentration in the world. this company owns 75% of the alaskan cable market and has cable modem access on almost all of that. the same company has a network for hooking up schools to the internet -- even in the most remote villages.

industry here is not suffering, either. my friends in the construction business are hopping as always, and with GW in the white house, we all expect ANWAR to get opened up Real Soon Now.

and the only real agriculture we have is big cabbages and good weed.

i don't mean to go off here, but hey, most alaskans get tired of the misconceptions.