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Free Wi-Fi Threatened?
jasonmicron writes "The Houston Chronicle is reporting that if certain state officials have their way, cities in the state of Texas will no longer be able to offer free WiFi to their citizens. This could set a dangerous precedent if passed, as broadband providers could start lobbying officials in the other 49 states to ban free WiFi as well. According to the article, Pennsylvania has already fallen victim to such a law but it excluded Philedelphia due to the city's 'existing efforts.'"
Good question! On that note, why do we have well-maintained roads and highways, and streetlamps, and hospitals, and schools, and firemen and policemen? Why don't we just privatize EVERYTHING, dammit!!
It's not. But if the residents of a city want to share the cost of wireless internet access, why should state legislatures and the telecom industry be allowed to stop them? But even if the law gets passed, there's nothing to stop people from creating non-profit organizations to do the same thing. It would just be a bit more work to get the required funding.
what benefits exist if the government provides wifi networks instead of corporations?
Probably lower costs for the consumers. But, that's only if it stays at the city level. My gut feeling is that doing something like that at the state or federal level would only waste lots of time and money.
who is going to pay for this?
The tax payers, obviously. Or, in the case of a non-profit organization, anyone who wants to help cover the costs. Keep in mind that if money was short, a non-profit org might have to limit access to contributors only, or cap bandwidth for non-contributors.
"The newly born animals are then whisked off for a quick run through a giant baking oven." --heard on Food Network
It seems that there are three obvious sides here-
1) WiFi/Net access is a luxury. It is not a basic utility and should not be considered one. The availability of massive quantities of information to the public might be in the general interest, but they can go to a library.
2) Net access is becoming a utility. It is as necessary to the everyday life of the average american as running water and electricity. Remember, we started out without them. At what point does Net Access work that way? We're not quite at that debate yet. We probably won't be there for a while, although maybe it'll be considered if and when somebody establishes a monopoly.
3) Incentive. Are communities providing free wifi to encourage businesses to move in/stay local? This seems the best reason to do it. Although it might be better addressed by providing a tax incentive to businesses to provide indoor coverage than by a government-controlled system that's going to be inefficiently managed. [As a side-note, are these systems going to remain as open as they are after the first few major hacks from such points? What about liability for the Wireless Access provider? Does he have any responsibility to be sure his hardware isn't being used for malicious purposes, or is it like a payphone in the back of your business?]
Mmmm... just a few uninformed thoughts.
The real answer is that there are solid reasons that exist for municipal wifi. Say you have a city like Philadelphia blanketed with wifi, or wimax, or whatever they decide to use (wifi for now). Cops are always online, ambulances are able to be online while traveling, trucking and delivery are better able to work with real-time inventory.
Then there's the issue of the digital divide. Forget the individuals, let's talk about the communities that aren't cost-effective for the ISPs to run broadband into. If the government doesn't get involved, what are they going to do?
I live in Long Beach, CA. The downtown is covered with free wifi. It's great, but most certainly hurts the cable and telephone companies. Everyone I know who lives around there picks up the wireless from downtown at home. Don't think that these anti-municipal wifi bills weren't preceded by heavy lobbying from Verizon (in Texas) and the cable companies.
There are places in the US where broadband is not available. *A collective gasp sucks the air out of the room* That's right, those places exist. For example, I live in the big empty spot in Virginia west of Richmond, east of Lynchburg, and Northwest of South Hill. There's no service here. The only hope of service is if the local public school system can get permission to put up a wireless network. (Which they're trying to do) The big corporations do not think it's profitable to wire the area, which is probably true. Heck, there's STILL no cable here; if you want TV, enjoy satellite or an antenna. It's so bad, Verizon won't even update the phone lines enough for me to dial in to any service provider at a speed higher than 26.4k. You read that right. And that, my friends, is why government should be allowed to provide internet. - Trip
1/ Quality of service. Government involvement doesn't stamp out competition. It could spur private enterprises to provide better, faster, stabler, less conjested service. It could potentially mean *more* competition.
2/ This is a public good. Many hard-core libertarians would disagree with money spent on public goods, and that's really just a matter of philosophy. But given the precedents of public parks (why build public parks when you could have Green Grass Enterprises provide parks and charge the little kids money each time they want to go down a slide?), public libraries (why have libraries when you can be overcharged by Borders?), a military (why have government build and own the nukes that protected us from the USSR and not NukeUSA Inc.?), etc., what is wrong with public Internet? Oh, right, Internet is more lucrative than the park business. Anyway, enough sarcasm. The point is, the precedent is set. Sometimes the line between special interests and genuine public goods can be blurry, but in this case, I'd definitely call it a public good, and by precedent, it should be fine!
3/ A rising tide raises all ships. Sometimes, social engineering is a good thing. Seeing as how much a paradigm the Internet is, getting people access to it can help change the nature of society. By the way, most economists (even conservative ones) consider education and information to be public goods.