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FCC Favors Net Neutrality
dkatana writes: Yesterday, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said net neutrality is high on the agency's agenda, and a set of rules will be proposed beginning of next month. He also talked about reclassification of internet providers such as Google Fiber as Title II Telecom Companies. If Google and other fiber providers are given pole access, it could be the beginning of a race to deploy fiber-to-the-home to many cities and towns, where the cost of digging trenches has deterred many initiatives and protected the monopolies of the entrenched telecom providers. Advocates for net neutrality believe that Title II classification would allow the FCC to protect Internet services by regulating against paid prioritization.
A related article suggests one side effect of the internet becoming a public utility will be higher costs for internet access.
Today is not 1 April!
Hard to believe what I'm reading here. I was starting to grow cynical.
Anyhow, just wanted to post to say this appears to be a good thing. Very, very exciting.
blog
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The authors of that related article: "Grover G. Norquist is president of Americans for Tax Reform. Patrick Gleason is the organization’s director of state affairs."
Hmmm - really? Anyone recall the POTS Long Distance war??? Sure drove down pricing there, same thing will happen with Internet providers.
Don't worry. Verizon and its buddies are filling up those bribe bags for the incoming Congresscritters as we speak.
Not if we get real competition and municipal services out of the deal. Whatever happens will be sure to protect the incumbent interests, so all this talk right now means little to nothing.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
And as it relates to any topic, a person writing a story or an article can always find a slant one way or another to meet their own political views or agendas.
As far as new taxes, have you looked at your bill recently.. all those lovely below the line fee's disguised as taxes of some sort, or regulatory recovery fees, you know things that should be included in the price because they are the cost of doing business, but instead are disguised as creative taxes and fees which are not mandated by any gov (state local or federal) entity, just so the company can keep it's base advertized price the same and claim they are not raising prices.
Under regulation, this would hopefully go away. Also, the feds have said they do not have to apply all of the Title II regulations (and they specifically call out the tax portions) to ISPs.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
On average, consumers would pay an additional $67 for landline broadband, and $72 for mobile broadband each year,
I dont mind this. Especially since it will help others who do not have broadband now.
When you cant win, ad hominem.
Google is the one asking for it. It makes sense to reduce their cost of deploying fiber. In Europe Internet access is heavily regulated but FTTH is everywhere and much cheaper than in the US.
If services like Google Fiber are made Title II, watch how fast those sorts of projects come to a screeching halt.
Oh really?
While Google's filing never specifically throws its support behind Title II, it does specifically point out how Title II rules could come with some significant benefits. Specifically, Google's director of communications law Austin Schlick argues that as a freshly-regulated telecom service under Title II, Google would gain access to utility poles and other essential utility infrastructure to aid expansion of Google Fiber. While the FCC has the right to forbear from these provisions, Google argues they really shouldn't if they value improved broadband services:
"In determining whether forbearance is consistent with the public interest, the Commission must consider whether forbearance would "promote competitive market conditions, including the extent to which such forbearance will enhance competition among providers of telecommunications services." Forbearance from allowing BIAS providers access to available infrastructure under Section 224 would have the exact opposite effect, maintaining a substantial barrier to network deployment by new providers such as Google Fiber, that telecommunications classification otherwise would remove."
Seems Google disagrees with your opinion of what they would think and do.
Okay, currently Google Fiber is $70/month for Gig service.
Now, say it goes up that $67/year that was quoted.
That means it's going to be $76/month (call it $80 just to be outrageous).
So, oh NOEZ! I'm now paying more for service!
When, before, my other options were $125/month for Comcast's 50/10 service and $50/month for 3M/512K DSL?
Oh! The pain! The pain!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
You, dear consumer, will be the one taking it in the shorts.
Riiight. Because the current mega-ISPs are such great companies to deal with and are always looking for ways to lower the prices of their service, increase data caps, etc. Oh wait...
Take a very close look at ANY of your utility bills and tell me how many fees you are paying that have nothing to do with the thing you are using (the actual electricity, the actual water, etc).
Ok, just did. Everything in my utility bill had to do with city services I use. Nothing was an extraneous fee.
ISPs are going to pass the cost on to the customers. Period.
So nothing new. But at least in this case the cost will be for good.
And you can kiss the small, local ISPs goodbye because they don't have the resources to deal with this.
Except that the small, local ISPs are mostly wanting the Title II regulations.
Remember, Google isn't out to make profit directly through providing Internet service. They are an advertisement company, and just want to make sure as many people as possible have unfettered access to their ads.
Yo ass-hat Google is requesting the classification. They see it as a good thing.
Perhaps you could enlighten us as to why you think there is some kind of mysterious and sinister side to net neutrality.
This paid shill announcement brought to by Verizon.
What fucking local ISP? Verizon or Time Warner. Those are the choices. The change would allow Google to compete. Google has asked for this re-classification. Read moron read.
Then it's good enough to regulate the ISP's. Look at what at&t was before the government broke it up in the 1980's. It was a regulated monopoly. But today we have some competition in the telecom - regulation could only enhance it by removing ownership of the poles.
Google did not say they support regulating broadband as if it were POTS. Their letter is pretty short - the first page pretty well covers their position, then there are 2 1/2 pages supporting it.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.do...
If one page is too long for you to read, here's the one sentence summary of what Google said:
If you assholes have bureaucrats set our pricing under title II, you'd better also give us access to poles under title II.
It's like telling the dentist "if you pull out my tooth, use novacain" - that doesn't mean you want the tooth pulled.
There are some small, local ISPs usually in remote locations and according to the FCC those companies are in favor of the regulations as well. The GP is just some whoring shill.
This isn't regulating the Internet. It's regulating the people who provide access. There's a huge difference. And tons of Internet businesses and smaller ISPs are very much for this reclassification. The only people against it are the megacorps who seek to lose a lot of control and will no longer be able to extort money from competing content providers.
Perhaps you could enlighten us with the thinking behind that weird statement. When something similar was done to the phone company, we grew from a grotesquely overpriced Bell monopoly to the present vast array of providers. I'm getting unlimited voice, unlimited domestic long distance, unlimited texting, and unlimited 2G data (although only 2.5GB of 3G) on my $35 Virgin Mobile no-contract plan. And I have a vivid memory of the bad old days of Bell Telephone when every call to even 30 miles away was a long distance charge, I couldn't install any equipment of my own, and had to pay enormous phone rental charges FOREVER.
Google has never specifically asked for it. But to claim they will stop their fiber buildout if the reclassification happens is pure fiction. Their own policy statements say that Title II reclassification would make it easier for them to build out their fiber network.
All we need is a simple rule that says if you sell it, you have to support it. Prohibit the bullshit "Up to" marketing and make them specify what bandwidth you will have ALL THE TIME. Full Disclosure.
Then, they HAVE to support it by expanding their infrastructure as needed. if they don't then the consumers should receive pro-rated refunds of their monthly fees.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
And why will they go no where? If they go no where it is directly due to both the house and senate being GOP controlled.
Will this change your voting habits?
love the taste, hate the texture
A related article suggests one side effect of the internet becoming a public utility will be higher costs for internet access.
OK, first, I'm dubious. But suppose it does go up. How much is it worth to have access to all the Internet offers? At $50/mo, we're hardly pushing the limits of what this stuff is worth. If we just have to pay a little more to get broader access, no content restriction by privateers, and competition for higher speed networks, I'll do the dance of joy.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
In the linked article is the statement:
“Most studies find,” Hood stated, “that lower levels of taxes and spending, less-intrusive regulation correlate with stronger economic performance.”
Sounds pretty, doesn't it? Who could argue against that? Think of the children!!! Mom and apple pie!!!!
What they DON'T tell you is what this weasel phrase "stronger economic performance" means: Does it mean "better service, lower prices and increased customer satisfaction" OR does it really mean "higher profits and f*ck the customer"?
Go on, take a wild guess...
Look at your bill again. Here's what my APS electric bill looks like for this month for my warehouse space:
Customer account charge $4.16
Delivery service charge $3.33
Demand charge - delivery $0.00
Environmental benefits surcharge $0.97
System benefits charge $0.24
Power supply adjustment* $0.12
Metering* $34.82
Meter reading* $2.24
Billing* $2.48
Generation of electricity* $5.50
Federal transmission and ancillary services* $0.34
Federal transmission cost adjustment* $0.21
LFCR adjustor $0.52
Taxes and fees
Regulatory assessment $0.11
State sales tax $3.14
County sales tax $0.42
City sales tax $1.12
Franchise fee $1.10
Cost of electricity with taxes and fees $60.82. Note that the actual cost of generating the electricity is less than 10% of the total bill.
related article....
go fuck yourself OP. go do it now. piece of shit.
Seems like there are more megacorps benefiting from net neutrality, than what we have now. I'm not worried about Google, Facebook or even Netflix passing the costs onto me, so much as I am the cable company. They WILL pass the buck if their cost of business go up. For Google, it just means a small dip in revenue.
What Net Neutrality means to Wheeler and pals is something quite different than what you or I want.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
I don't care if Comcast wants to negotiate more money from Google for a fast lane. Net Neutality lets big companies like Google and Facebook off the hook and passes the upgrade costs onto consumers.
The internet has worked just fine without these regulations. Once the FCC starts regulating it, don't be surprised when they start to grow their mandate into regulating trolling as bullying, and other unintended consequences.
From what source? Industry? From what I can tell, Ruters just vomited up what the Progressive Policy Institute postulated. Usually "Think Tanks" are simply political shills, but this one is supposedly "independent" or so says their website and Wiki. However from the PPI article, they list about zero details as to how they arrived at their numbers other than to say "we calculated".
All I know from similar discussions on Slashdot, people have posted about various countries around the world that have moved to the treating of ISP's as public utilities, and there wasn't one that didn't offer better faster more inclusive internet service at much lower costs than the US or Canada. Unless the PPI is unintentionally identifying the corruption, and political influence leading to favorable legislation towards telecommunication companies to keep the status quo.
You can't regulate the Internet, only the companies operating on it. The Internet is just a bunch of interconnected networks. If you create a completely separate collection of networks that's sufficiently large enough, you could also call it the Internet, say Internet 2 (oh wait, that's taken already).
I have no problems with regulations on how companies behave, especially when it comes to anti-competitive behavior. But it sounds like you do.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
The arguments being made for Net Neutrality are not for Neutrality but control. The Pro "Neutrality" angle is a government dominated Internet, the anti-Neutrality angle is a corporate dominated one. There's not much of a difference considering how hard it is to tell the difference between the two. Real net neutrality is a level playing field without government protectionism (which we have tons of at the moment) and the ability to purchase whatever we want and there's real repercussions for companies that attempt to fuck over the users because the users have another option.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
I've lived in one of those European FTTH areas. There was a lot of government spending on FTTH. For years, it couldn't be hooked up because the necessary hardware was too expensive, and when it could get hooked up, it wasn't any faster than other Internet access either. The whole thing was a gigantic boondoggle for unions, telecoms manufacturers, and the telecoms industry.
If you're talking about "cheaper" you have to ask "cheaper for who". For the average tax payer, no it isn't cheaper, because they pay a lot in extra taxes for the government subsidies of the infrastructure. And it gets even more expensive because in many cases, FTTH has been an inefficient solution.
Of course, this sort of deal is very appealing to young, educated folks like students who don't pay a lot of taxes but see the lower ISP bills. That's what makes "European" anything so appealing to that group. But even as far as subsidies for young intellectuals go, this kind of crap is a bad way of doing it, because it mostly transfers money into the hands of big corporations and well paid union workers.
Any one need any more proof that Net Neutrality crusade is just about control and money? FCC all in? Aaaaahhhhh yeahh kinda says it all. Places like netfilx are all in because it fits their business model. Someone else taking care of bandwidth.
I'm not sure I get your point. How are costs going to go up with net neutrality? Your pipes are laid. If you don't lay new pipes, you're not incurring any new costs.
Net neutrality is about what goes through those pipes. As an analogy, your sewer company wants to charge Pepsi money for your piss that's from Aquafina water, and charge Coca-Cola money for your piss that's from Dasani, or limit the flow rate so that your toilet gets backed up if you drink any of those products. And what's more, your sewer company is doing this because they have their own water bottle company that they want you to use. Net neutrality just says your sewer company must accept whatever liquid waste comes out of your house equally, irrespective of the size of your sewer pipe. If the sewer company doesn't want or can't handle so much of your shit, they shouldn't have put in such large pipes out of your home in the first place (fortunately, there are regulations and building codes that manage this bit for real sewer companies and sewer systems).
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
If Netflix is paying Comcast for priority, they're not getting their money's worth. Lately we've had Netflix stalling and taking forever to load. If Netflix is paying for priority, they're getting ripped off. But, then again, why would Comcast treat Netflix any different than they treat any of their other customers?
When Netflix calls to complain Comcast would try to upsell them on subscription channels after hanging up on them three times.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I'd prefer there to be one line company and multiple providers. They broke it out that way in texas and the result has been very good financially.
So I can choose from close to a hundred different electric companies who deliver electricity to me over the line.
Some are "green" and expensive.
Some are cheap.
Some are free on weekends.
Some are free between 10pm and 6am.
Some are short term contracts at 8.8c pkwh.
Some are mid term contracts at 12c pkwh.
Some are long term contracts at 10.5c pkwh.
Some are well known and seem to just charge higher prices "because".
And every term and price along those curves.
I.e. I have options and cost savings are there.
When there is an electrical service problem tho-- I only go to the one "line" provider. They maintain the lines. The electrical providers just put power on the grid.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Wrong. That deregulation was regulation requiring that whoever owned the wire, had to rent it out to competitors. Thus, competitors were born and prices for long distance plummeted.
From 1999:
http://articles.latimes.com/19...
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Now that the GOP controls both houses, if anything the FCC proposes angers the Republican paymasters (Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, et al.), Congress will just zero-out the parts of the FCC's budget that is even remotely attached to overseeing cable / broadband. Nothing is about to change. Nothing.
we have the most pathetic excuse for broadband in the United States today.
Perhaps with some enforceable rules in place we can finally get some competition in to break up the big ISP's.
Yeah, we'll have the ones who will threaten to take their ball and go home, but it's expected out of some of the big players. Watch how fast they change their mind when the government funds the network infrastructure needed and opens the lines up to anyone who wants to play ISP. ISP's don't like things to be equal because they no longer get to set the rules.
My choices today for ISP:
1) Satellite. HAhahahahah. No.
2) Comcast. ( My current selection )
3) Verizon DSL ( via a decrepit copper plant that barely handles voice as it is. Tried it, got 56k downloads on a good day. )
4) Cellular.
That's pretty much it.
As far as I'm concerned, since the big boys can't seem to play nice on their own, someone needs to lay down the rules to break up this regional monopoly problem. Imagine what our prices would look like if we had true competition in the ISP market. Say, a dozen vendors who can promise equal speeds. Think we would be paying what we are today ? Hah. Not likely. When the playing field is equal, the only way folks choose Company X over Company Y is due to price, reliability, and incentives. ( Usually in that order )
Look at the bright side, ( if they end up regulating it ) now when the most hated ISP on the planet shrugs off customer complaints, you can bring the issue to the PUC. In my organization, that level of complaint gets VP's and other executive levels involved instantly. Seems they don't like to get hit with the hefty fines the PUC likes to wield when company X is doing something stupid.
Given the state of broadband in the US today, do we really want to continue on with the current status quo ?
I am looking forwards to the day when an enfeebled Grover Norquist demands all of his Federal benefits, just like that hypocritical waste of skin Ayn Rand.
Isn't part of being classified as a telecom company, come with the regulation that you can't record your users activities?
Way to create a false dilemma. I dont pirate anything, yet I support net neutrality 100%. The cable operator I pay for an internet connection should not determine who/where I go to. I pay for a connection and if they want to oversell the connection that is something they have to deal with.4
When you cant win, ad hominem.
There are quite a few states that allow this sort of setup:
http://www.alliedpowerservices...
And it's the same as the situation with DSL over POTS already (but there are few providers on the market).
Note that the new taxes would be about $6 per month. Balance that against price reductions due to added competition and it should work out nicely for consumers. You do believe in competition as a market force, don't you?
The rest of your complaints are more related to a lack of competition than classification as a telecommunications service, so you should add them to the cost of not taking this action.
All the way back to Smith it has been understood that providing a level playing field to build a market on is very much the job of government.
The Republicans are already making plans how to kill it.
I certainly do believe that. I also know — both from past history and the current state of affairs — that government regulation reduces rather than increases competition.
The proposed reclassification of Internet-service as "public utility" has nothing to do with "leveling the playing field". Directly it neither levels nor upends it. Indirectly — by increasing the regulatory burden — it increases the barrier to entry to anyone, who'd challenge existing monopoly(ies) — the way Google is currently challenging them, for example.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Google is in favor of title II. Apparently they believe it will help them to enter the market so they can challenge the incumbents. I'm fairly sure that is the result of in-depth analysis and not due to consulting the magic 8 ball.
Currently, many people have a complete monopoly situation in broadband. It is literally impossible to reduce competition in those markets. Others have 2 choices. It is nearly impossible to reduce competition there. Do you REALLY think title II will drive Comcast or AT&T out of the market>?
It seems to me you're knee jerking on regulation without assessing the situation as it stands now at all.
And AT&T, in its time, was also happy to get a deal with the US government, that granted them a monopoly on telephone service. Why must Google's opinion on this matter influence ours? They have the best search engine today, alright. Is that why I must accept their interests as those guiding public policy?
Something must be done. This is something. Therefor it must be done! Is that your argument?
I just don't want to see the Internet-service provision added to the sorry list already containing electricity-delivery and public roads...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Google's opinion matters because they are exactly one of the new competitors you claimed (by name) would be hurt by this.
Something must be done. This is something. Therefor it must be done! Is that your argument?
No. Your worst case scenario is already the case for most of the country, therefor the new action cannot make it worse.
I just don't want to see the Internet-service provision added to the sorry list already containing electricity-delivery and public roads...
How fortunate then that nobody has proposed granting additional monopoly power to the ISPs. You still argue as if you think title II will somehow grant new monopoly power to the ISPs in spite of the move being taken to open closed markets up to competition. Surely you don't think that opening the market to additional competition is bad?!?
I don't need to. My bill is exactly as I stated. Seems you have a shitty utility company.
Exactly. That is all mine is as well.
Right and that cable company has little incentive to expand those pipes if service is good enough (which it is). Netflix was paying more, in order to deliver slightly faster buffering times to their customers. If Netflix isn't paying for the massive amount of bandwidth they're using, then it's the cable company customers who pick up the cost. Why should cable company customers, who don't even have netflix, be forced to subsidize the rest?
And just because the pipes are laid into my house, doesn't mean that the providers aren't constantly upgrading their switches and routers to handle all of this. If what they have is fine enough for non-netflix traffic, then let netflix pay more for what they hog.
that government regulation reduces rather than increases competition.
So does that explain why my local cable company has a complete monopoly on all cable internet access? Oh, wait ...
I certainly do believe that. ...
The proposed reclassification of Internet-service as "public utility
I do not think Internet ISP per se should be a public utility. However, the lines those Internet service providers require to get the information to the end point absolutely must be a public utility. ISPs should not own the lines, as all we get at that point are government granted/allowed monopolies, like olde Bell, and whatever DSL/Cable provider the town decides to contract with. Your upstart ISP cannot tear up the roads to lay more cables, or tear up peoples' backyards for that matter, and why should they have to? Have high-speed connections to the houses and let the homeowner choose from an array of competing options.
Which one, and when?
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
None of those seem extra - it only looks that way because for some reason they've decided and/or are required to give a separate line-item to everything rather than just having
Subtotal (including all CODB): $55
Tax: $5.82
Total: $60.82
like most receipts you've ever encountered.
Arguably, all the separate line items are a bad thing because (you'd think) that most of the items on your list COULD (should) simply fit in under a big "costs of doing business/cost of product" banner - imagining this type of billing in a different scenario, I can imagine people having a little shitfit if they got a receipt from their local chain-store for a bottle of Shampoo that read as
Shampoo cost: $2.18
Business licensing fee: $0.21
Electricity surcharge: $0.13
Staff wages: $2.46
Chain-store franchise fee: $1.45
Transportation from warehouse: $0.43
Shelving fee: $0.67
POS system charge: $0.47
City Sales Tax: $0.63
State Sales Tax: $0.24
Total: $8.87
I think half the reason that certain bills (electricity, phone, Internet/cable) have all these little line items, though, is because of the stupendous & ridiculous tax code in America - everyone wants a cut, so the taxes and fees that apply in one ZIP code/town are different to a neighbouring ZIP code/town, and this makes everything unnecessarily complicated.
It really doesn't need to be as granular as it is, and my position is that it would be nice to see all the little individual taxes and fees fuck off and at the very most have different taxes and fees on a per state basis. It would make accounting, tracking and the legal things a whole lot easier - you know, "keep it simple, stupid" - and prices for things like Internet/cable service would only have to vary by state (if at all), which in turn would make it easier to compare prices directly if/when Title II does become the way to go and several competing retailers can compete on 1 or 2 sets of infrastructure.
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
Funny that you should mention shampoo. Many years ago, my father was renting space in a warehouse to store his RV. The majority of the warehouse was used as a shampoo bottling operation. The owner was showing all of this to my dad. As it turns out, there was this giant tank of shampoo and many boxes of different brand bottles. So the same stuff was being branded and priced differently.
But to the issue of classifying ISPs as a utility, once you do that, the whole thing becomes a political football. States have entities like the Corporation Commission whose function is to exert public control on the utilities. In theory anyway. These are elected officials. The utility comes along as whines and complains that they can't continue to operate unless they get a rate increase. Publicly, anyway. Behind closed doors, these rate increases have already been negotiated. The officials have been bought and paid for because, after all, they need to campaign to keep their jobs. Somebody has to pay for that.
Ultimately, the consumer might think that they're data rates aren't being impeded because a piece of paper says so but there is no way they can prove it to themselves. The ISPs aren't going to invest money in "infrastructure" unless they can recoup the investment and make more money than they did before. If a mandate comes down from some government bureaucrats to increase your download speed from 10MB/s to 20MB/s, they're going to get a rate increase. If a mandate comes down that they have to invest in rural internet access, they're going to get a rate increase in exchange. Personally, I'd rather Netflix users pay for their excess bandwidth.
This is what I've been pushing for in many of my diatribes as well, and I think (ultimately) what people will want when they stop being taken in by all the FUD - this is how it works in many other countries and it is by most accounts (and in my experience) working rather well.
Where I come from (NZ), the situation has improved vastly since LLU happened. I can only hope that it happens in the US for ALL types of infrastructure (DSL, Cable, Fiber) - then we'll see some real competition.
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
Mainly because often enough the prices we get charged are higher than the retail price.
More often than not, the main benefits you can get from an "alternative" provider are things like customer service and no-bullshit service terms (none of this "$20 for the first 6 months, then we rape your bank account because you signed an auto-debit form and you're on a contract so the ETF is $500" stuff).
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
Mainly because often enough the prices we get charged are higher than the retail price.
Here where I live, the city I'm in as well as another nearby has opted into get group rates from one of these providers. I am saving a couple cents per KwH with really no effort on my part. For that matter, I still get and pay my bill to the provider that owns the lines.
But you're right if you're talking about DSL, for the most part. However, in my old hometown almost everyone was on a nearby CLEC's DSL service when Verizon owned the lines. In fact, I don't think Verizon even wanted to offer DSL - despite having all the equipment installed. When Frontier bought out the area's lines, everyone switched directly to Frontier. Some mainline providers are worse than others.
And for further amusement, get a load of this. On this month's electric bill, there's yet another new fee entitled Four-Corners adjustment. What's that, you say? Well, because environmentalists in Washington have decided that coal is evil and the Four-corners electric generating plant is coal-fired, it is therefore evil and must be shunned. Is APS going to eat that cost? Hell no. This is on top of the so-called Environmental benefits surcharge. Oh, so I have to bend over because a lot of people believe that electricity generation is bad for the planet. Got it. So, what's going to happen if global warming *cough* I mean climate change turns out to be total b.s.? Am I going to get all that money back plus interest? Yeah, right.
What's even more ludicrous is that in the case of my warehouse, because it's metered for three-phase power, the cost of the meter is ten times the cost of a two-phase residential meter at over $30 a month even though I don't use three-phase power. What this means is that even though I don't use Netflix, I'm still going to have to pay for the infrastructure improvements to get Netflix.
If a mandate comes down that they have to invest in rural internet access, they're going to get a rate increase in exchange. Personally, I'd rather Netflix users pay for their excess bandwidth.
Isn't that what higher tiers are for? I think I already *do* pay for my "excess" bandwidth consumption - I subscribe to my ISP's 100mb service instead of their next highest tier (50mb IIRC) not necessarily because I *need* 100mb rather than 50mb, but because I use more than a lot of users and in theory, I should get more speed than someone on a lower tier when there's congestion (by which I mean, if there is congestion the ISP can only deliver 20% of the speed, I would probably notice a drop from 100mb to 20mb less than I'd notice a drop from 50mb to 10mb).
Rate increases shouldn't be "allowed" because the 2 main factors ISPs bitch about (bandwidth and equipment) get bigger, better and faster (and sometimes, cheaper) with each iteration - and sometimes without having to spend significant extra money for those upgrades. A year ago, the local CLEC charged $1000 for 100mb symmetrical dedicated fiber with an SLA, but it now costs under $700. For $1000, you now get 200mb. More bandwidth for no extra money - presumably because their upstream(s) give them better rates now. The supplied CPE equipment is/was already gigabit-capable equipment, so there are probably at least 3 or 4 more years of upgrades left before they have to replace any of that.
In the ISP core networks, it gets even better because the cost of the equipment is spread out over a significantly larger number of subscribers - if an ISP spent $1mm on a pair of terabit routers 3 or 4 years ago, that same $1mm will get them multiple terabit capable stuff now, and since that $1mm is spread out over probably 100k subscribers, you're looking at an increase of mere cents per month - IF an increase can be justified at all, because periodically replacing equipment is (as I see it) a cost of doing business.
Hell, the big players are likely on some kind of lease agreement whereby the manufacturer auto-upgrades the ISP every 3 or 5 years (which is great for tax reasons and depreciation and stuff) so their month to month operational cost doesn't actually change, but they get more bandwidth and bigger equipment for little to no additional cost, and even then, in my experience, certain manufacturers have been known to offer extraordinary deals on equipment.
If the ISPs really want rate increases, they really should have to justify the hell out of them and if they can do that, they should only be allowed to increase the rate enough to cover the actual cost. But since the main things an ISP buys only continue to get cheaper and cheaper as time goes by, I could only hope that whoever looks at the rate increase proposal says no.
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
...You don't happen to be in a certain part of Southern Illinois and talking about the CLEC Clearwave, do you? That area used to be GTE then Verizon now Frontier, and I know at least one town that recently opted to get group rates with a competing electricity supplier and everyone was automatically switched unless they opted out.
But yeah, I was talking about DSL. If I were offering it in that area, I would be able to offer "up to 6mb" DSL for about $70/mo. Frontier offers it for $35 and AFAIK, this isn't an introductory rate, but it is more than $20 BELOW my cost -- for $70 a month, Frontier will do a 24mb DSL/phone bundle with unlimited calling.
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
And for further amusement, get a load of this. On this month's electric bill, there's yet another new fee entitled Four-Corners adjustment. What's that, you say? Well, because environmentalists in Washington have decided that coal is evil and the Four-corners electric generating plant is coal-fired, it is therefore evil and must be shunned. Is APS going to eat that cost? Hell no. This is on top of the so-called Environmental benefits surcharge. Oh, so I have to bend over because a lot of people believe that electricity generation is bad for the planet. Got it. So, what's going to happen if global warming *cough* I mean climate change turns out to be total b.s.? Am I going to get all that money back plus interest? Yeah, right.
What's even more ludicrous is that in the case of my warehouse, because it's metered for three-phase power, the cost of the meter is ten times the cost of a two-phase residential meter at over $30 a month even though I don't use three-phase power.
...well then. Maybe this is one of those exception/rule things.
What this means is that even though I don't use Netflix, I'm still going to have to pay for the infrastructure improvements to get Netflix.
Well yes, of course you are. You probably also pay for parts of the highway that you don't use as well (not that anybody is necessarily stopping you) but those that ARE using it thank you for your contribution.
That being said, the infrastructure improvements aren't specifically for Netflix, are they? In theory, infrastructure improvements mean ISPs can offer you faster speeds and better services and so on - whether you use them or not - but they are available, and if you decide to start using them, how you use better/faster Internet is entirely at your discretion. If Netflix is the only thing you can come up with, well, that may be lack of imagination on your part.
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
I am in a certain part of Southern Illinois - and near enough to have heard of Clearwave. There are at least two towns around here that opted into a competing electric supplier automatically. However, the ISP I was talking about was in my hometown - much further north. This particular CLEC bought out an ISP in Macomb, IL. Surprising, because this ISP was established in '95 as a dial-up provider and managed to stay relevant for years by later adding DSL and wireless Internet.