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Small Town Builds Its Own Gigabyte Network; Cost To Citizens $57/month
An anonymous reader writes "On Thursday, the board of O-Net gave approval for residents to get access to [full gigabit bandwidth] for the same price that they currently pay for a guaranteed download speed of 100 megabits per second — $57 to $90 a month, depending on whether they have bundled their internet with TV and phone service. ... the town realized that it couldn't attract technology-based businesses and that bandwidth was a challenge even to ordinary businesses. It came up with a plan — it would install a fibre network throughout the town that would connect to the larger inter-community network being built by the government at that time — the Alberta Supernet."
Headline says gigabyte network, then the summary says gigabit. Finally, it turns out it's 100mbps.
By the time you finish reading this comment it will be 56k.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Canada.. figures.... Do that in the states and get sued into bankruptcy.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
From TFA:
On Thursday, the board of O-Net gave approval for residents to get access to a full gigabit (or 1,000 megabits) per second of bandwidth
I guess it was too much to expect someone posting as AC to actually click the link in the summary.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Olds, Alberta
(Population eight thousand)
Getting high speed internet in Alberta anywhere outside a larger population centre has been virtually impossible, so it's interesting to see rural towns take the problem by the horns on their own with success.
crazy dynamite monkey
It says Gigabyte not gigabyte... so it must mean the network features customizable voltages and clock speeds for easy-to-use overclocking and a good warranty policy.
why can't we have something like that is usa?
No, it's because the three major providers in the U.S. sue the municipality for trying to offer what the provider refuses to do, and at a similar if not lower price. The companies claim they can't compete against the government entity.
It's like the batshit crazy ex who doesn't want to be with you but also doesn't want anyone else being with you.
Either way, you're screwed.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
"Because we're a community-owned project we get to balance out profitability versus what's best for the community."
I'm from America, so could someone please explain to me what that last part of the sentence means. Does it have to do with Q4 fiscal projections, or stocks, or something else? I just don't understand what this whole "community" thing is.
People with no hands? Then what's the point of Internet access?
Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more!
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I'd still rather pay 5.70$ for 100 megabits, which would still 20 times faster than my current connection at nearly 40$ per month. Gotta love monopolies in small towns.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
There are lots of towns in the US, big and small. that have un-used fiber laying around, which was installed the last time they ripped up their streets for remodel, or which was built into subdivisions as a conditions of their permitting process. Most of this is used to tie a few buildings public buildings together, or (an a sad number of cases) not used at all.
There entire counties that have fiber running to every minor town. (Google county fiber network = 14 million hits).
Most of these towns don't have fiber running everywhere. So turning it on ind the downtown core is often avoided simply because it will cause a clamor for fiber everywhere from the rest of the tax payers. Some of it has been in the ground so long nobody knows if it works or not. Since it wasn't being used, in some cities it has been damaged by construction and nobody was even aware of it. Some towns are putting up FREE PUBLIC WIFI, using their fiber. And almost as soon as it is turned on the "won't somebody think of the children" crowd shows up demanding censorship. There are a lot of political land mines to dodge when putting this stuff to use. So far too much of it sits idle.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I thought government was inefficient and can't do anything right? How would a super efficient private company ever have trouble competing?
These folks need to get their stories straight.
We can still use computers with our mouth.
Socialism is defined by the character of trying to maximize the social good of government, regardless of the common conflation between socialism and communism.
Baloney. Socialism is government ownership of the means of production. Period. Sometimes that works well. Sometimes it turns out bad. But to say it is "socialism" only when it turns out well, is nonsense.
The boondoggle that keeps picking your pocket, on the premise that if more people are inserted as middle-men, the cost of service will go down.
"Competition in the market" is true for goods produced through labour. It does not account for structural differences in the sale of services and delivery, or in extractive "rent seeking".
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Agreed. The Internet is a DARPA baby. I would say that corporations interests is what's preventing the Internet from progressing faster.
Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the author.
That's always my question every time some company royally screws up. Like the plant in Texas which blew up because they lied about how much explosive stuff they had on hand or in my local area, a paving company has to go back and redo some work they did because the work wasn't up to snuff.
Every time a company screws up I say something to this effect on my local board because some guy always whines about the government screwing up and how private industry is always better.
It's like the people who espouse "Free Markets!" yet cheered when the taxpayer was forced to pick up the tab for the sins of the financial industry. Either you believe in free markets and letting them do what they do with as little government intervention as possible, or you want the government to be there to clean up after your mess and thwart the free market through trading collars and other rules.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
If we assume that the AC was just poking fun at the title/summary disagreement, then it was a fair comment.
Nothing is stopping private companies from doing this, yet none of them do.
False.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Now that I think about it, neither gave a frequency, so both can be correct. Perhaps the title was implying per eight seconds and the summary was implying per second.
Probably not though.
You could say the same thing about private enterprises. The bigger an organization gets, no matter government or business the less efficient it will tend to be. In my job I do a lot of "integration" with big companies, to facilitate passing data back and forth. Our timelines for these things are hours to days, depending on if they want to use our prepared systems or need more custom work. Their time lines are months to years. We also chronically find they are doing a worse job of security than we are.
Rather than have an extended debate over an what amounted to an aside, I'll just concede the point and withdraw my original statement.
Ashland, Oregon did this many years ago. From what I've heard from people that live there, it's worked out well.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"
Small scale Socialism is really good. (Individual chruches, Community) Large scale Socialism is really bad. (Federal / State Governments, THE CHURCH)
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
Is it? I can't tell if it's owned by the government or owned by the individual members of the community. (Yes, there IS a difference.)
Yea, but supposedly it's a government of, by, and for the People, so theoretically they're the same thing here in 'Merica.
Theoretically.
...except that this small town is in Canada, not the US of A.
The ;really good thing about the ay the country was originally designed was that it allowed for exactly this type of thing.
While the federal government had very little to do with a persons life the State and the Local Community were able to much more.
They had the ability do do many things. While the federal government guaranteed the right of the people to move freely to or away from these types of experiments.
Competition between States was a good thing.
Um, the towns that have tried to do this in the US have often fallen victim to lawsuits from private companies due to "unfair competition".
But that doesn't matter, because this town's not in the US. It's true that the way the country was originally designed allowed for exactly this type of thing. It also allows for Crown Corporations, where the people by default own stock in the incorporated entity. This leads to the public actually getting dividends and rebates when a crown corp turns a profit. It's somewhat surprising that this is in Alberta though, where privatization is a big thing, and I'd expect more American-style lawsuits regarding unfair competition.
I disagree.
My university was one of the first to get plugged into the Arpanet when it started expanding. Back then, my questions posted to the bulletin boards at the time were answered truthfully and frequently accurately. Information was accessible, there wasn't alot back then, but it could be obtained. Ftping the index.txt from a site would provide a carefully hand maintained index of what was available with a description and other relevant data.
Now if you look for something like, "nearest gas station", you'll instead get bombarded with ads for cars, motor oil, car wash products etc while waiting for Google to start delivering the search results while they update their database of search terms you're interested in.
I'd like the old, non-privatized internet back, thanks.
Is it? I can't tell if it's owned by the government or owned by the individual members of the community. (Yes, there IS a difference.)
Yea, but supposedly it's a government of, by, and for the People, so theoretically they're the same thing here in 'Merica.
Theoretically.
...except that this small town is in Canada, not the US of A.
What, you mean we haven't annexed that territory yet? Shit, no wonder maple syrup is still so damn expensive...
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Surprise, people with a common interest banding together and pooling their resources to make it happen is a model that can actually work.
Thinking about it, that's how corporations originally got started. You know, before they turned into immortal international government-corruption special interest lobby groups.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
It's like the batshit crazy ex who doesn't want to be with you but also doesn't want anyone else being with you.
Either way, you're screwed.
I thought the opposite was the problem...?
Then you do not know how to internet.
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
Since the last time you read a summary on Slashdot, I assume.
This is fail on a level I've not seen since...
the previous story?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on