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Still Little To Do About a Bad ISP
theY4Kman writes "The Washington Post reinforces the grim situation on Net Neutrality and limited ISP choices faced by Americans: 'The FCC's research shows that 78 percent of American households have access to only two land-based broadband providers and that 13 percent have one. Don't expect that to improve. Many competing DSL services have left the market, spurred by the end of line-sharing in 2005 and other corporate consolidations. A few months ago, for instance, AT&T elected to close its WorldNet DSL service. Meanwhile, technologies that were once promoted as alternatives to phone and cable-based services have flopped. City-wide WiFi access ... turned out to be a business bust. The power-line broadband that then-FCC Chairman Michael Powell lauded as having "great promise" in 2004 fared no better: Last week, Manassas voted to unplug its pioneering service. ... We have a situation full of lawyerly jargon, with risks that can't be dramatized by putting a sick kid on a stage. I hope you like your Internet provider, because you may be stuck with it for a while.'"
Regulation of a market only works if the regulation is free from the influence of those operating in the market; in this case, as with the Banking sector, regulation doesn't solve anything because any corporations with something to lose will simply lobby to shape the regulation to their liking.
Broadband regulation has, on the whole, worked pretty well in Europe - here in the UK, forcing BT into LLU has led to an extremely competitive broadband market and so far, every time BT have looked to take advantage of the situation, OFCOM have smacked them down. If the government hadn't stepped in, we'd be in pretty much the same situation that the US is in; Cable via Virgin Media (where available) or ADSL via BT.