Houses With Tails

nnfiber writes "What if home owners could also own their Internet connection? Tim Wu, of New America Foundation and Derek Slater, Google's Policy Analyst, say this can be a new effective way to encourage broadband deployment — an important issue in 'America's economic growth.' In his post, Timothy B. Lee says: 'That might sound like a crazy idea at first blush, but Wu and Slater do a great job of explaining how it might work. The key idea is "condominium fiber," an arrangement in which a number of neighboring households pool their resources to install fiber to all the homes in their neighborhoods. Once constructed, each home would own its own fiber strand, while the shared costs of maintaining the "trunk" cable from the individual homes to a central switching location would be managed in the same way that condominium and homeowners' associations currently manage the shared areas of condos and gated communities.'"

Comments

Obviously never been to a condo assoc meeting

[sunking2]

Just because you live near each other doesn't mean you play well together. Especially when money is involved. How could you possibly do this and not have someone ticked off for paying more than they think they should. Should my mother who doesn't even own a computer be subsidizing everyone elses usage? Or what happens when someone who believes in the RIAA moves into your neighborhood and then starts enforcing his beliefs on you. Sounds crazy, but how many people get fined a year because they have too much crap on their condo deck, or some other abserd thing. Oh, the arguments may or may not be rational, but that won't stop them. Especially in a neighborgood that spans a large age group. Instead of get off my lawn, it'll be get your porn of my internet.

Re:Won't work

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Have either of these guys ever owned a condo? I made that mistake once - never again. Years to get simple repairs done, friends of the condo board getting repairs long before other people and often before people who requested needed repairs first, etc. etc. ad nauseam. Owning a condo is a good way to see some of the worst traits humanity has to offer. Let an organization like that control the quality or even existence of my net connection? No way.