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Navajo Nation Losing Internet Access
An anonymous reader writes "Due to contracts that are allegedly FUBAR, and associated wrangling, the Navajo Nation is being cut off by its satellite ISP. This is the final stage of the process, which already deprived chapter houses of access last April. While the business mechanisms play themselves into the expected ludicrous snarl, the real question may be: Is there a place for an inexpensive ham/technogeek/FOSS solution that could bypass the antics of the for-pay providers?"
Not only is amateur radio restricted to non commercial uses - meaning important things like NO ADS ALLOWED more than simply no generation of profit for sending over those frequencies. However, it's also "no vulgarity", and "no encryption" as well.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
The world is full of unimaginable horrors and humans being deprived from basic necessities and rights. The idea of a nation is to divide the world into blocks that are small enough that you could possibly do something about the terrible condition in which you and your fellow citizens exist.
How much more likely are you to be able to uplift the condition of a small nation than a large one? A great deal.
How likely are you to be successful in attempts to uplift the condition of all men in all nations? Not very likely.
This not due to USAC's problems.
This action is being taken because the service provider and the applicant for the services BOTH conspired to break the rules surrounding the ERATE (Federal program that gives discounts on ELEGIBLE technology, at ELIGIBLE locations, to ELIGIBLE entities).
Wireless services were ONLY supposed to be offered at eligible school locations (classrooms, areas where data needed to transit to GET TO classrooms), but instead the wireless services were installed as a generic community service, some of them winding up in admin areas, boarding halls, and bus barns (all NON-ELIGIBLE areas).
Some folks are making this out to be a case of 'the white man screwing over the indian,' where in reality it is a case of 'the white man catching another white man and the indian breaking rules, and making them pay for their actions.'
For more information, go dig up some article from the Funds for Learning website (www.fundsforlearning.com) or eschoolnews.com
Perhaps they could pay for their own Internet access. Like, ya know, everyone else.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
Totally insensitive to the actual reprecussions of their actions, some GS weenie, probably balding and fat and fearful of doing anything constructive to solve problems because it might screw up his/her next stepping increase in the future, consigns thousands of people to being offline.
Government just doesn't really work.
You might want to RTFA a second time.
USAC, which administers billions of dollars in FCC grants every year to provide Internet service to rural areas and low-income consumers, is refusing to continue funding after an audit by the tribal government revealed questions over payments by the Navajos to their Internet provider, OnSat. As a result, another company, SES Americom, which provides satellite services to OnSat, is scheduled to pull the plug today.
USAC says the provider is under investigation, after the audit raised questions about the bidding process and possible overpayment. But the provider rejects the findings and plans to fight them in tribal court.
Surprise surprise, there was a corrupted bidding process overseen by an Native American Tribe.
Unfortunately, many of the Native American Tribes have poor &/or corrupt governance, none of which is the fault of the U.S. Government. If the Tribe was really serious about resolving the issue, they would conduct the quickest inquiry ever and do everything possible to create immediate reforms in order to regain the confidence of the USAC.
BTW - the USAC is a non-profit corporation, so they're not technically part of the US Gov't
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Is tribal governance not handled by some kind of tribal government?
Government screws stuff up. Tribal government, local government, federal government, doesn't really matter. If there's government involved, something is probably being forced to work inefficiently.
True, but...
1. Native American Government is much much less transparent about their business than is normal in a 'Western' government, allowing shenanigans that even their own people would protest. We're not talking inefficiency here, we're talking about a (apparently/allegedly) broken bidding process.
2. The OP specifically singled out "some GS weenie".
GS = General Schedule = US Federal Government
This problem is of the Tribe's own making and as I pointed out,
the USAC is not the Federal Government.
http://www.usac.org/about/usac/
The Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC) is an independent, not-for-profit corporation designated as the administrator of the federal Universal Service Fund by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
A lot of the Native American Tribes need to join the modern era and create some transparency in their governance. It's one thing when their malfeasance/corruption benefits a minority of members, it's another thing entirely when it publicly harms the entire Tribe. How hard is it to run a kosher bidding process? They could have hired a bonded and insured company that adheres to Federal Standards to do it for them.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
"How hard is it to run a kosher bidding process?"
I'm posting anonymously, but one of my clients from time to time is a tribal government. It's actually pretty damn hard to run a kosher anything, when there are no trained employees whatsoever.
Consider that only 7% of the Navajo nation over age 25 has a college degree. That includes associates degrees too. Only 56% made it through high school.
Need someone who can e.g. run Excel or quickbooks? And someone who isn't caught up in the various things that occur disproportionately often in extremely poor areas, such as health deterioration, family issues, drug abuse, etc? Good luck with that.
Say you're lucky and land the perfect employee to help with running your government office. Congratulations, they just left for better pay in another division (or off the reservation entirely)!
It's really a rather difficult and sad situation that won't resolve itself for a generation or more, barring drastic change.
While the theft of the term "liberal" by leftist anti-liberals did take place many decades ago, it is still a term that does not apply to them and should not be used to describe them.
A liberal is someone who believes in liberty and who pursues policies that create, expand, and protect liberty. A leftist is someone who believes in tyranny, and who pursues policies that create, expand and entrench tyranny.
When you allow the left to choose the terminology by which they will be described, you are hand them a victory. You don't call a child molester a "boy lover." You don't call a rapist a "persistent suitor." You don't call a terrorist a "freedom fighter." And you sure as hell don't call a leftist a "liberal." To do so tarnishes the good name of the men and women who have fought and died to bring the light of freedom into the world.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
It is 60 miles to the nearest town with net access.
So I will venture that town has fiber.
Fiber can be run close to 200 miles without a line amp.
A cpl of Asynchronous Xfer Mode cards for each end are a
few hundred bucks, and some older refurb Cisco gear and
your good to go.
An OC-3 in the town 60 miles away from the local
carrier will cost less than $10,000/mo. and give them
155 Mbps that they can hookup to a Squid Box to
use as caching mechanism to save on xmitting the
same data twice to two different hosts.
Local cable TV companies ran their fiber in aerial protected
cabling with a strength enhancing strand down the center.
When you consider how much aerial fiber the cable companies
ran in major cities, I'd say it is easily doable.
The Navajo should contract it out.
For 2.25 billion I dare say they could do their own Coop ISP
like some other ppl have done around the US.
http://www.coop.net/
And when they run it run multi-strand in case one fiber pair
has issues at some point in the future.
In fact I bet as a PR stunt Cisco would come out and profile
the whole setup for them.
Just my two cents...
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
>deduce the internet connection from taxes
Pray tell, Watson, how would one do that?
Worst. Poem. Ever.