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Baby Bells Victorious Over Sharing Rules
An Anonymous Coward sent in somewhat troubling news for people who like high-speed internet access at reasonable prices: the Baby Bells have won their legal challenge of FCC rules requiring them to accomodate competitors providing high-speed internet access. The FCC has already been moving toward this on its own (the FCC is headed by political appointees appointed by the President), but this court decision will accelerate it: neither the current FCC nor the courts are going to stop the Bells from squeezing out their competition. There's a CNet story and the decision is online.
oh wait.... no.
I can't believe the communist crap I am reading on this board.
The reason we do not have better high speed internet acccess is BECAUSE no one wants to bother investing money in something that the government will force them to give away for free under penalty of law!
There are miles and miles of unused fibre optic cable in this country that could provide T1 speed to every home in America easily, but because whoever bothers to build that infrastructure will HAVE to share that service with a competitor at prices dictated by the government no one will invest a dime.
I can understand how the small minds cannot understand the rather esoteric issues regarding intellectual property, but outright capital investment such as this is a no brainer. There are currently no high speed connections to houses. Yes, some smart people have found ways to use the phone and cable networks installed 20-30 years ago to provide faster than modem speed, but true synchronous high speed internet access is out of the reach of all but the most wealthy.
Someone needs to build a high speed network for the regular joe sixpack. Who is going to do it? Right now, NOBODY. You can complain about monopolies all you want, but you are not going to find anyone, anywhere who will invest a dime in infrastructure when he will not own it in the end.
Hypothetical: Lets say you buy your dream car and it costs you $300 a month. What if the government came along and told you that unless you want to go to JAIL, you will give your brand new car to your neighbor for six months a year and you cannot charge him more than $250 a month to use it. The government doesn't care that you will lose $50 a month. The government says that because your neighbor can't afford $300, this is only fair.
Does this sound reasonable? I think not.
This ruling is a victory for the Americans everywhere. The iron grip of Washington is losing its grasp on the throats of innovation.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
It's strange that a country so concerned about security and stability would let its own citizens be manipulated and abused by commercial "governments".