The Misleading Fliers Comcast Used To Kill Off a Local Internet Competitor

Jason Koebler (3528235) writes In the months and weeks leading up to a referendum vote that would have established a locally owned fiber network in three small Illinois cities, Comcast and SBC (now AT&T) bombarded residents and city council members with disinformation, exaggerations, and outright lies to ensure the measure failed. The series of two-sided postcards painted municipal broadband as a foolhardy endeavor unfit for adults, responsible people, and perhaps as not something a smart woman would do. Municipal fiber was a gamble, a high-wire act, a game, something as "SCARY" as a ghost. Why build a municipal fiber network, one asked, when "internet service [is] already offered by two respectable private businesses?" In the corner, in tiny print, each postcard said "paid for by SBC" or "paid for by Comcast." The postcards are pretty absurd and worth a look.

Comments

Explains some things

[nine-times]

Maybe these fliers were honest, and Comcast just believes the investing in an ISP is a money-losing venture. It would explain some things.

I guess the only sensible response is to sell your stock in Comcast. They view their own business as a money-pit and a disaster waiting to happen.

The advertising is okay

[soft_guy]

The questions raised in the advertising are pretty good ones. If the city bungles the fibre network and loses a lot of money, you'll be forced to pay for it in taxes. If Comcast fucks up and their costs go out of control, you at least have a choice to opt out. As much as I don't like Comcast and AT&T, I have no faith in government to be an ISP.

Re:Appropriate punishment

[PopeRatzo]

But slander and libel are notoriously hard to prove, and both Comcast and AT&T have very good lawyers to vet the message so that there was a very fine line they did not cross.

It's not their lawyers that are protecting them. It's their lobbyists and officers who decide on political donations.

We're in a brave new Citizens United world now. Makes no difference that a very large majority of people disagree with Citizens United and corporate personhood. Until Antonin Scalia and/or Clarence Thomas go to meet their judgement, we're stuck with it.

I WAS THERE. IT'S ALL TRUE.

[PeteCollins]

All: Feel free to hit me up with any questions. Either here, via email, or phone. Pete Collins I.T. Manager City of Geneva, Illinois pcollins@geneva.il.us 630.232.1743

Re:Get used to this...

[grep -v '.*' *]

I have no trouble seeing through corporate fear mongering.

I suspect there are a lot of people who feel the same way. Some of them may have participated in the vote and not voted the way you wanted them to.

Ding! This. 100x this.

Going WAAY off topic here, I think this exact thing is the cause for a bunch of angst, worry, and anger: The ever-so-simple and plain, obvious "FACT" that I'm right. If you agree, then you're smart. If not, then you're either a dumba** or a corporate tool.

This can be seen in Religion, Reps vs Dems, Political Correctness, Climate Change, _any_ kind of "truthers", cigarettes, and even Flat Earth.

And I'm sorry, all we've got to go on is science. If not that, the fallback is Old Wives Tales and Religion. What else is there?

That's what the "Elders" (AKA elected Mayors or Governors) are for; they've seen it already, or at least are a point of local authority. Either that, or go find the leader of the local gang and quit thinking, because after all: that's HIS job.

How do I justify this? Well first of all, I'm right. :-) I think I'll finish this out on my website, this seems to be an interesting thought. But here's a parting thought.

Back in the 3-Network days, newspapers and TVs let us broadcast one-way (simplex) and people actually trusted them (Walter Cronkite). Moving to 24-hour cable and such did that with more information to sift thru. And now the "internet" (Facebook, and your favorite news site that filters and reinforces your beliefs) still lets that happen, but now we can hear other thoughts and have to sift thru them as well. (All thoughts are equal, right?) And you don't want to ignore new "evidence", so keeping up with the times is both interesting and mandatory. But at a certain point you finally give out and freeze your current thought, or proxy it out elsewhere.

Never mind the special people who are actually trying to manipulate and put their own "special" way to view things.


"Won't someone think of the children?" some people cry occasionally to emotionally buttress their argument. Well gee, *I* do: I like them fried, with lots of ketchup; so what's your point?