New Report On Municipal Wireless

PublicNet SF Coalition introduces us to a new report by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance called "Localizing the Internet: Five Ways Public Ownership Solves the U.S. Broadband Problem." It makes a strong case for municipal ownership of new wireless and fiber-optic networks. The history shows that there is a need for more aggressive public involvement in broadband deployment, and the affordability of wireless is a great opportunity for this.

Comments

DREAMERS!

[MilesNaismith]

Haven't we been hearing for 5 years now that Muni-WiFi is going to solve all our problems? Yes there are some fools who think because they can setup Aunt Mildred's WiFi-router, that they are now well-equipped to cover a city! Issue of interference, maintenance, management of free-loaders, paying for 24x7 techs (think AT&T linemen) and consequent insurance costs, etc. never seem to enter their minds. I read the RFP for the City of Atlanta muni-WiFi and couldn't stop laughing. For all the freebies and conditions they wanted to layer onto it, there was no contract lockin as incentive. Meaning you could spend years and get a network setup, then the next administration rolls in and says hey we are changing contractors because my cousin knows all about computers, please hand over the keys. Now, where's my flying car?

Re:DREAMERS!

[Kadin2048]

I don't think that anyone is realistically advocating free internet service for anyone. If they are, then I'll join you in calling them a bunch of twits.

However, what there are some decent proposals for, would be systems where municipalities pay for, and thus own, and absorb the risk of, actually laying the bare infrastructure. So the muni lays the fiber, or pays for the APs, or whatever. Then the municipality, in turn, sells capacity on that network to third parties, who actually provide service to customers. Now, it could be that there are multiple third-parties on the network at once, which IMO would be the best arrangement, because it ensures some customer choice, but practically it might be that there is some sort of selection process and then a recompete or review periodically, which is far less ideal, but better than being stuck with that company forever because they own the only fiber running to your house.

Certainly I don't want my ISP to be the same bunch of numbskulls who operate the DMV (although, they may actually be better than Comcast, it's sort of a tossup). However, I don't think that municipalities have a terrible history when it comes to the deployment and maintenance of infrastructure. While there are indeed potholes in my road, there is also a road there, and there are roads on each side of it, and there are quite a lot of roads elsewhere, which as a network, are in pretty good shape. (As in, I can pretty much get from any point to any other point without being accosted by bandits or falling into crevasses, or going through a lot of tollbooths, etc.) Looking around, I don't think there are a whole lot of other entities who I'd really trust to take over from them.

While I normally consider myself pretty far to the Right on the economic scale, I think there are certainly some areas where there are bona fide public interests, and where government is the most capable agency of completing a project (or is the only one you'd want to own and monopolize the finished product); in these areas it doesn't make sense to not do it within the public sector.

But just because the public owns the infrastructure doesn't mean they have to operate it. Think of the fiber as a canal. Just because the government paid for the canal, doesn't mean that they run the freight companies that ship stuff on it. As a consumer, you can ship goods on the canal using any number of companies, without any contact with the government. The government just extracts their pound of flesh from the companies who ply the canal -- taking the same from each, based on a standard metric -- in order to recoup the investment and do maintenance. The public benefit is in having the canal there in the first place, and in not having it monopolized by one company who is going to maximize profit rather than public utility. (The individual canal boats, in this example, will all seek to maximize profit, but since none of them own the canal proper, they can't monopolize things in the way that a single owner could.)

The U.S. has a long history of successful heavy-infrastructure projects that were initially funded with public monies, and which paid huge dividends in terms of direct tolls (the canals were huge cash cows, almost to a fault) and economic growth. There's no reason why modern informational infrastructure is any different, inherently, from transportation infrastructure 150-200 years ago. The same trade-offs exist, and the same risk, but also the potential for the same rewards.

Re:DREAMERS!

[Stooshie]

... just point to one city that is actually DOING THIS ...

South Korea funded a national project, not just city-wide, and now has one of the highest penetrations of Broadband in the world. I have also heard that they get 100Mbps standard connection speed.

Re:DREAMERS!

[@madeus]

There are people in this country right at this moment, without telephone service, or cable-TV, or maybe even enough food or enough money for the rent. Those are real problems. Getting internet, not so much. Just because a small number of people are unable to feed and house themselves despite living in a prosperous western society does not mean that providing internet access to the *working* poor is not worthwhile.

Internet access to young families and the poor is potentially very useful to them, and all the more meaningful because of their circumstances (by which I mean they stand to benefit the most from free access). Added to which, they are the least likely of consumers to spend money on something like 'internet access' in the first place because they are spending what money they do have on immediate needs like food and clothing.

Internet access opens up the means get cheaper goods and services (they can price compare, order good online for less than retail, etc), as well as an excellent educational resource for both informal and formal learning (with a wealth of government funded - and accredited - online learning initiativesm e.g. things like Lean Direct, here in the UK).

Don't wait to lift the bottom 0.01% up out of abject poverty in a western society before you start helping the rest of the bottom 10%. I've got lazy deadbeat relatives in my own family, and they have had all the same opportunities I've had (some more, in fact). Some people just can't be arsed and there is a limit to the patience of others in a reasonable society when it comes to dealing with them - it's not as if they are in a developing nation and have been denied the chance to improve their situations.

Did submitter RTFA?

[MilesNaismith]

The article mentions wireless as a solution, but is not the focus of the article. Overall, this is an incredibly vaugue policy puff-piece. It seems "for" city ownership of networks mainly by comparison to things cities already own like roads and sewer systems. I'll note that it studiously avoids the obvious comparison... TELEPHONES! Why don't we talk about case-studies of cities owning phone systems in the public interest. That would be directly applicable experience to running a complex network. It is conspicuous for it's absence.

Did *you* RTFR?

[modeless]

The article may be vague, but the report is quite specific and detailed. There are many case studies of publicly-owned communication infrastructures, some offering telephone services. There is also debunking of industry-funded studies claiming failures of projects which are actually succeeding.

As I read the report, I found myself constantly nodding my head. It sounds like it was written by a Slashdotter (but then edited for clarity). This report lays down in plain language every single good reason why communications infrastructure, including both wireless and fiber, should be publicly owned (not necessarily publicly operated). Every public official from city council members up to Congress needs to read and understand this report before they make policy decisions on these issues.