Broadband Obstacles

Strange Beer writes: "The Washington Post is running a story discussing many of the roadblocks and speedbumps that Telcoms and ISPs have encountered while trying to rollout broadband. Not surprisingly, most of the obstacles were built by them." The government approach is dysfunctional. Broadband prices are going up - 25% or more in the last six months. Simultaneously rollouts have stopped except in metropolitan areas, and the Bell monopolies are busy finishing off the last independent DSL providers. This is the "free market" in action (government-sponsored monopolies crushing independents), and therefore unquestionable in the US today, and it's also the reason why people aren't getting high-speed access. The only solution suggested in this article is to essentially browbeat citizens into overpaying for high-speed service that they don't want and probably isn't offered in their area, solely so that the MPAA can sell us movies on demand, if they ever decide to do so. What exactly is the thought process here?

Comments

Re:Lack of reliability

[underpaidISPtech]

see here:
>On the contrary, many folks have had exceptional service with DSL. --emphasis mine.

Now see here:
> I have had BellSouth's
> my IP
>There has been exactly one outage...after I got the service...which I used the freely-provided
>Most of my friends...have cable modems, and not a day goes by...complain about their connection going down
>It seems to me that cable modem technology ... are much more questionable than DSL.

Well it seems to me that you are using alot of I's, Me's, and My's in your "factual" account on "many folks' DSL service". And the rest is the opinion of your friends. Let me give you my *experience* as a seasoned helldesk tech at more than 3 companies that offered DSL and/or cable.

Invariably, customers of DSL broadband technology suffer more inconvenience/disatisfaction caused by faulty DSLAMS, line attentuation, network outages, software incompatibilities (PPPoE), and red tape from the Telco, than their cable modem counterparts.

Add to this the fact that average downstream and upstream speeds for cable users are usually twice as fast as DSL, waitlists are virtually non-existant, and availability is generally subject to whether or not you can get cable TV. If you can get TV, you can probably get broadband. Oh, and for the same price if not cheaper.

Vancouver

Shaw Cable (TV company): $39.95/month CDN, 2 dynamic IPs, no traffic limit, first month free(30-day trial). Average dl 80 KILOBYTES/s, ul 40 KILOBYTES, distance is irrelevent, usually installed within 5 days.

Telus (phone company): $39.95/month CDN, 2 dynamic IPs, 5GB down 1 GB up (residential! pfft!), 2 months free if you buy the modem (translation:you just paid 2 months), avg dl 40KILOBYTES/s ul 10KILOBYTES/s, speeds are dependant on distance from the CO, and affect availibility, eligibility affected by line integrity (for those of you in older buildings--you're screwed), waitlists are usually about 6 months.

Both companies offer outlandish "corporate" and SOHO accounts, but the links are there, make up your own mind.