Slashdot Mirror
Kansas Delays Municipal Broadband Ban
Mokurai writes with an update to a story from last week about legislation in Kansas that would have banned most municipal broadband, including the expansion of Google Fiber. Now, after the public backlash that erupted online, government officials have postponed the legislation's hearings, putting it on hold indefinitely. From the article:
"Senate Bill 304 would prohibit cities and counties from building public broadband networks. The Commerce Committee, which [Sen. Julia Lynn] chairs, was scheduled to have a hearing Tuesday, but Lynn released a statement that hearings have been postponed indefinitely. 'Based on the concerns I heard last week, I visited with industry representatives and they have agreed to spend some time gathering input before we move forward with a public hearing,' Lynn said in a statement. 'We'll revisit the topic when some of these initial concerns have been addressed.' Lynn elaborated while exiting a Senate Judiciary hearing. The senator said she has instructed 'the parties' involved with the bill to address the public’s concerns. The bill was introduced by John Federico, a cable industry lobbyist."
So... you're thinking the introduction of government into this system will make the system cheaper and higher quality?
Trust me, I work in state government in technology.... if you even think for just a moment that broadband can be provided by the gov't: 1) less expensively and 2) at a reasonable quality and 3) without spying on your every web request or 4) trying to intervene and filter what you are able to do with that connection.... then you are a blind idiot and need to pipe-down. I would much rather have Google spam me with targeted ads, rather than give the State Dept. of Homeland Security access to every query/web request/porn etc. etc.