Broadband Bermuda Triangle

An anonymous coward sent in: "Mike from Techdirt has written an article in Salon.com about how he is the bermuda triangle of broadband, and how the government should kick him out of the country if they really want to save the broadband industry. Apparently, he's been kicked off 4 or 5 different broadband networks in the past year alone as each company went bankrupt or gave up the business."

Comments

Broadband not profitable

[Heem]

It's a shame broadband internet services cant seem to turn a profit. I'd like to see a cable provider provide me with an IP address, and thats it. I'll take care of my email and other services. Something like 'Broadband for Nerds. Simplicity Matters.' or.. something like that...

Re:Broadband not profitable

[The Paradox]

I'll take care of my email and other services.

Buddy, I feel your pain. I'm with Verizon and they give you *four* 10-meg mailboxes, special 'news services', a 'portal'... And yet, they're too cheap to give me one single static IP. I can't even get it by paying extra, regardless of the propagandic lies on their site.

But could they do that? Nah. I'm running my own mail server, but they're trying to become the AOHell of broadband. Get this - when you call to report a service outage, they ask if you put a *filter* on the *DSL MODEM*!

Face it... most people haven't the technical expertise to go out and hunt for their own email server, or run one of their own (and yes, with a few nasty tricks with some dyndns services, I am indeed running one despite their lack of an IP). More's the pity that they don't, I agree...

But as long as the geeks are outnumbered by the morons, that's the way it's gonna be, sad to say.

my crazy idea:

[poemofatic]

Fuck local loops. The Bells will never open it up. IP laws will ease up around the same time this happens.

Let's treat internet infrastructure as infrastructure (aka roads) and have the govt lay the lines. We can fully fund this with the 70+ billion ca$h from the War on Terrorism. Remember, the Interstate highway system was built from Defense dollars during the Cold War, and that's why their symbol is a little shield. If bush can justify handing IBM a check for 1.3 billion in the name of homeland defense, then this should be a congressional walkover.

After that, let private ISP's bid to operate the lines (i.e. maintenance, routers, cacheing, etc.) and make money on service not bandwidth. Competing on the quality of service is more productive than getting into infrastructure wars -- suing who owes what to whom. You can then run your mail/web server and pay only the costs of administering your account, which should be billing you, electricity, and checking that no one cut the line to your house accidently. Shouldn't be too much. Those who want webmail and funky desktop icons which guide you through the internet search process can and should pay extra. Also, I think more people will sign up if there's a fiber optic line heading to just about every home in the major urban areas. As an extra plus, it'll give silicon valley a shot in the arm.

For those whom just can't stand the thought of govt. spending on public infrastructure, you can always just privatize the thing once the lines are laid and enough cutomers have signed up to make it profitable.