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How One Little Cable Company Exposed Telecom's Achilles' Heel (backchannel.com)
Reader mirandakatz writes: Forget net neutrality -- the real fight is over controlling price-gouging monopolies. As Susan Crawford writes at Backchannel, a little-known cable company, Cable One, just exposed the telecommunications industry's Achilles' heel: regulation. Cable One has been raising its data transmission prices quickly, and it's making cable giants very, very nervous. If people begin noticing that there's no competition, that Americans are paying too much for too little, and that the entire country is suffering as a result, that's a big problem for Big Cable. As Crawford writes, 'don't fixate on net neutrality... Even though the state of internet access is an issue that touches the bank accounts and opportunities of hundreds of millions of Americans and gazillions of businesses, very few people understand what's actually going on. Now you are among them. Do something about it.'
"Forget net neutrality - "
No. Paying attention to ANYTHING else does not justify forgetting net neutrality. Net neutrality SHOULD be a positive for anyone's political stance - it just means however imperfect the companies involved in providing services, they should have to treat content as just bytes, regardless of the source. That shouldn't be controversial, nor should it be forgotten, even 'for the sake of argument'.
Ryan Fenton
> How One Little Cable Company Exposed Telecom's Achilles' Heel
Your clickbait mind tricks will never work. The day before I read TFA before I start commenting is the day I turn in my SlashDot ID.
That's just another good reason why the network - the data center, the cables in the road etc. should be a public service like water pipes and electricity.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
Seriously gazillions?!?! is it me or does msmash get worse with every post.
In the USA, backbone data is cheap, the cable companies are a monopoly with built out networks that are 10+ years old, and they are raking in the cash with no price regulation and minimal oversight. It is high time that laws were passed to:
1. Determine a fair pricing model and require that where there are less than 4 ISPs available. Net neutrality is really about the quality of the product and what exactly you are buying every month. I am surprised no lawsuits over net neutrality have been filed over bait and switch yet.
2. Use anti trust laws to break up cable companies into cable providers and internet providers sharing the same lines owned by a third company that maintains and owns the lines.
3. Protect internet access in the same way that the federal laws currently protect US mail (both privacy and penalty wise) both the privacy of email and browsing.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
Trying to co-opt public outrage over net neutrality to a related, yet still entirely separate issue, is despicable. Net neutrality is absolutely one of the "real" fights. The idea that there can be only one is absurd. Who the hell is this woman? "Forget net neutrality?" No, fuck you. I will fixate on net neutrality as much as I damn well feel like it. She's actively hurting the case for her issue by spreading this nonsense, and that's a shame, since it is an important issue as well. Most U.S. Americans have absolutely no clue just how much more we pay for so much less than the rest of the civilised (and often, even uncivilised!) world.
Building networks is actually quite cheap, in comparison with the profit margins of major telecommunication companies. This is how many less developed countries are able to offer higher speed internet access to residents for far less money, using the same commodity networking equipment.
They charge $55/month for 100 Mbps cable, albeit with slow (3 Mbps) upload.
I was expecting double that amount if not more, to warrant an article like this.
triple play from $150/month. Expensive, but I've seen much worse.
Nice strawman, that's obviously not what he said or meant. But by all means, just scream "communism" as loud as you can until you get your way.
If this take on it helps people wake up and fight for net neutrality, then it is worth it. No doubt the article is right about the motives... it is always about profits and control from big businesses. The last thing they want is regulations.
Hmmm...
now that you mention it, yes, that's a good idea!
We didn't need this company to make this point, it's already common knowledge.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
And if the content providers ARE the broadcasters?
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
I fully agree, comrade. The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property.
So your counter argument is that the answer is NEVER to take public ownership of ANY private property? Otherwise, you're saying the situation is more complicated. In which case, you could use a few more sentences and/or paragraphs stating what your position actually is, rather than alluding to what it is not.
Do you have any idea what a profit margin is, or what the actual profit margins are?
Comcast average profit margin - 11%
Charter average profit margin - 0.57%
On the other hand
Google - 28%
Apple - 25%
All averages were over 4 years (2013-2016)
That's just another good reason why the network - the data center, the cables in the road etc. should be a public service like water pipes and electricity.
Not the datacenter. Just a termination facility for the last mile that any ISP can hook into. The last mile, specifically, is what needs to be a public utility. That's where the natural monopoly is. The rest the market really could sort out, as the barrier to entry would be small.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
So, my datacenter that I have built and put together myself should be a public service for everyone to use without compensating me for things like startup costs and growing pains? I don't think so.
No. In this simile in which the internets are like roads (which is relatively apt, it's better than tubes anyway) your data center is analogous to a shopping center. People do retain certain rights which people expect in a public place when they enter a shopping center, like photography, or not having your car towed away unexpectedly. People retain certain rights in your data center, like privacy. But they don't get space in your data center for free. They get access to the digital network used to get to your data center for free, just as they get access to the road network used to get to a shopping center for free.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Cable One has been raising its data transmission prices quickly, and it's making cable giants very, very nervous. If people begin noticing that there's no competition
I'm probably being hopelessly naive here, but if the likes of Comcast are so scared of what Cable One doing when there is no competition, then maybe they should, I dunno... compete?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Sure, building networks isn't cheap... but neither was the tens of billions of dollars subsidies that the telecom companies received to build those networks, yet we have little to show for those investments other than much higher costs for much worse service than virtually every other first world nation on the planet.
I dunno. Who pays for the electricity and the water?
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Cable one bad, big cable big meanies. I have Comcast as my ISP so I get hating your cable co, but there is just no information in this article. Cable One is raising it's rates too much ? How much is too much ? What are their current rates ? how do they compare to the rest of the country ? They charge too much for television ? How much ?
That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
It would not only not be cheaper, it would never get done either.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
you mean 250 megabits UP ?
That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
Who told you that, and when will you get your own opinion?
Calling for the government to control infrastructure is not the same as calling for government to control everything.
Government already controls infrastructure, the only thing we have left to argue about is what that control should look like.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
so dumbfuck - who pays?
Public power is common in America. About 50 million Americans, or about 15%, get their electricity from government owned utilities. They get a monthly bill and pay for their electricity the same way that the other 85% do.
So does "public power" work better? No, not really. But it doesn't seem to be any worse either. It is about the same in terms of both reliability and price. In general, a competitive market is superior to government provision, but since power generation is a natural monopoly anyway, competition isn't really possible, so the government isn't any worse than a regulated utility.
www.publicpower.org
We did deal with it. We let google fiber in.
You faggots immediately came running with halved prices and tripled bandwidth, knocking frantically on every door.
You don't have to call it "cheap" but you're gonna have to pick a word that means effortlessly handing it out because of easy margin. That's not an opinion, it already happened.
50 million households is far more than 15% of the American populace. Even if it was actually 50 million people that's still far more than 15% of the American populace (~300million).
This is the correct solution. The last mile should be a public utility and brought back to interconnection points. Charges for use of these interconnection points would based on the cost of running them. Anybody can run a fiber into these centers, pay for use of router ports, and interconnect without further charge.
I'd like to see towns stop renewing franchises for existing cable systems, nothing says they have to renew them. Give them five year warnings that the franchise won't be renewed and then conduct arbitration for purchasing the last mile infrastructure. It is not like you are throwing them out, they can hook up at the interconnect centers just like everyone else.
50 million households is far more than 15% of the American populace. Even if it was actually 50 million people ...
It is 50 million people, not households.
that's still far more than 15% of the American populace (~300million).
The current population of the USA is about 320M. 50/320 = 15.6%.
because that shows your intelligence level.
adding to debt daily... you call that efficient? i would fire you.
OK. I learned all about that now.
So does "public power" work better? No, not really.
Well where I live it does indeed work better.
My city owns the "power company" that provides electric power to the people/businesses that are here.
And it's significantly cheaper (and from anecdotes, better service) than the investor-owned utility that operates in the cities surrounding mine.
The IOU in the cities next door is Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E). For a similar house in PG&E area vs. in my city - the house using PG&E will spend more than 2x for electricity because they charge more.
And I haven't seen any evidence that my city subsidizes the electric rates or electric infrastructure via property tax (or other tax) proceeds.
That only goes to show that subsidies and grants need to require actual production. not just money to fuck off where ever you feel like fucking it off. That would stop a lot of abuse of the program
If the Government couldn't do it cheaper then they wouldn't be spending money to buy laws banning community internet.
You can get its footprint from publicly accessible sites like broadband.gov. It's not hard, just more work than the reporter wanted to do.
Have you seen the infrastructure in the USA? You know how many bridges and overpasses have an F rating? I've seen how well the government handles that along with the VA hospitals.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
You can pretend all you like, but you've been shafted twice to get internet access.
I got this from a 20 second search.
Sometimes you get the government to create a means for competition to exist at another level. Like the roads allow for commercial traffic, shared internet cabling would actually allow for more competition, by reducing the barrier of entry. Governments can help reduce the risk that provide corporations aren't willing to deal with. The government simply needs to commit to upgrading and maintint the shared infrastructure, though with fibre some of these upgrades are happening at the end-points.
In certain countries cable strands are leased out to various ISPs and they just provide their own hardware at both ends. With fibre you don't even share that bandwidth with a competiting provider.
In fact this 'commie' solution provides room for real competition. Now we just have kingdoms and the surfs just have to deal with it.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Looking at the figures for the last few quarters at Charter, I'm going to suggest there's some "accounting" going on:
March 31, 2017 1.52%
Dec. 31, 2016 4.42%
Sept. 30, 2016 1.88%
June 30, 2016 49.78%
I don't think a company struggling to make a profit stock goes from $228 to $327 in the same period.
Virtually all the infrastructure that makes your data center anything more than a heap of silicon was paid for by my tax dollars. The Roads, the power lines, telecom, the engineers (paid for with subsidized schooling). Everything. It wouldn't exist without my tax money.
And the total cost of providing high speed internet (datacenter + everything else including cust service)? $9/mo. How do I know this? Comcast puts that little tidbit in their SEC filing. You can lie to everyone in America except your major shareholders. Those guys we protect.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Not all utilities are publicly owned. I've been working with utilities for nearly 41 years. My observation is that the better ones are run by private companies. There's something about the profit motive that makes people more likely to want to get and keep customers.
Here are the utilities I have in my home:
Electricity from a private company
Cable and internet service from a private company
Garbage pickup from a private company
Water from a local water board
Of those, the worst is the water - constant rate increases, overpaid employees, board members under investigation, and a system that loses 25% of the water it produces. Wow, give me more of that.
There could be a public service provider that do not have to engage in competition with other companies making the private providers to start innovating to lure people into buying their service, that could minimize the effects of big consolidation (monopoly or mafia-like business).
It could be something like the public raising the bar for the private industry.
Now Internet has become essential to minimize the under representation in society and help to fight corruption, its becoming an important part of a democratic society like news papers were in their time.
Internet could be a real solution for some side effects of representative democracy (like when your governor manipulates groups of people to get his new yatch or expensive hunting trips, or senators commiting vote fraud or unethical actions); Internet empowers people to become closer to the ones that are manipulating society.
Read the reports. That one quarter you hilited had a $3.5B income tax benefit as result of reversing some previous over valuations. That was the only reason they were profitable that quarter. Prior to that quarter, going all the way back to 2004, they operated at a loss in every quarter except 2.
The stock increase is because of the merger with TWC.
As Susan Crawford writes at Backchannel, a little-known cable company, Cable One, just exposed the telecommunications industry's Achilles' heel: regulation.
What a trainwreck. A summary is supposed to be useful.
A friend of mine went to law school at NYU. Near where she lived, there was a park where the drug dealers did business. Drugs aside, it was the safest place in town. Because the dealers didn't want any shit going down that would attract the police.
Big Cable is pissed at Cable One because they don't want hearings on the industries business practices.
Have gnu, will travel.
Further you read the further you get an explanation of why they have had steady value increase regardless of the merger.
They would be making $billion profits if they weren't spending all their money on capital and interest. Instead they're getting $billion increases in value, and not blah blah future earnings Apple/Facebook value, tangible assets.
What they are /not/ is doing it tough.
> a public service like water pipes and electricity
vs
> All private property
EXACTLY: I don't think that word means what you appear to think it means.
Wow, what a financial genius! If you want to claim a company is making massive profits, all you need to do is hand-wave away all the costs of running the business. Brilliant!
FTA: See the problem? If people begin noticing that there’s no competition, that Americans are paying too much for too little, and that the entire country is suffering as a result, that’s a big problem for Big Cable.
Really? People haven't noticed? BS.
Everybody knows.
Everybody already knows that territories have been divided up to avoid competition. Duh.
Anecdote: As president of my HOA (almost 100 units), I pushed through an opportunity we had to get every unit pre-wired with fiber from Verizon FiOS. That meant that every unit had on-order access to telephone, cable (TWC), and fiber (Verizon/Frontier). I turned my complex into a location that had actual competition between internet providers. The result has been lower prices for everyone.
And, politics being what they are, and me having spent my political capital on creating an even playing-field, I was not re-elected to the Board. Such is the nature of politics: If you do good, you will lose your elected office. I think it's a law of nature.
Again: Everybody knows.
I'm pretty sure you're comparing apples to neutron stars here.
I'm not sure what your point is here? Sure Comcast the conglomerate may have 11% profit margin, but everything I've read estimates the profit margin to be around 20 - 30% for their network services. I've heard the broadcasting division is one that's really dragging down the profits.
That's a stupid example. Prior to using their own source, Flint was paying Detroit for water. And Detroit's water provider is a government entity.
What he wrote was "it's expensive, so the government needs to do it"
Whoa.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
I realize this is just an anecdote, and other localities may have the opposite situation, but I live in a small New England town, served by a private power company. I currently pay ~$.23/kWh for residential electrical service (when my PV array isn't pushing into the grid). There is a neighboring town that maintains a municipal (town-owned and operated) electrical system, and they pay ~$.06/kWh, and their system is better in almost every way, including buried lines instead of overhead lines on poles in their town center, and better overall reliability. I don't know all the details or the history of their municipal system, but that certainly seems better to me.
Yeah, that's why capital gains tax doesn't exist. Oh, wait....
I'll bite.
I am working to get Fiber rolled out city wide. According to what i've read and heard, City Council cannot enact a Tax or Fee on all residents in the city unless it is to benefit all residents of the city. What tangible benefit can I combat this law with? Or, what else could be done to get a "special tax" rolled out city wide to get us cookin? Many on the city council want to do it, but I'm not sure where to go from here.
I absolutely agree with you, but I'm stuck....
So long as you don't end up with something like Australia's NBN, where most of your expense of using these interconnection points is not per port but per MBit/s per month to lease bandwidth over that last mile.
09F91102 no, 455FE104 nope, F190A1E8 uh-uh, 7A5F8A09 that's not it, C87294CE no. Ah! 452F6E403CDF10714E41DFAA257D313F.
I fully agree, comrade. The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property.
What the fuck is wrong with you people? Do you really prioritise a company's ability to make as much profit as possible over your ability to get a fair and decent service? All the while you bang on about the free market fixing things while simultaneously doing everything to make the market as closed as possible. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you?
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That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
So do you think, roads, power, sewage, water etc should all be in private hands with access to them charged at whatever rate the owner sets? Do you think they should be able to have any competition or be able shut it down with lawyers and lobbyist and buckets of cash (that they got from gauging you) instead of with, you know, competitiion? Is it that you don't see internet connectivity as essential as water, power and transport is? Or is it it more that you got yours and fuck everyone else?
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I realize this is just an anecdote, and other localities may have the opposite situation, but I live in a small New England town, served by a private power company. I currently pay ~$.23/kWh for residential electrical service (when my PV array isn't pushing into the grid). There is a neighboring town that maintains a municipal (town-owned and operated) electrical system, and they pay ~$.06/kWh, and their system is better in almost every way, including buried lines instead of overhead lines on poles in their town center, and better overall reliability. I don't know all the details or the history of their municipal system, but that certainly seems better to me.
When there's no real incentive to improve something it won't get improved. Say your neighbour town starts offering the same deal to your town. The private company would obviously have to up their game or go out of business. You can bet what would happen though is, instead of that, they would fight tooth and nail, and spend a lot of cash, to stop the competing service coming in. You don't say but I bet there aren't any real competitors to this private company.
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Well, you might be right, but not for the 'for free' part.
Nobody said it was free. The claim was that access was free, which is the case for non-toll roads. The majority of roads are not toll roads no matter how you measure.
Government steals my money to pay for those roads so it's hardly free for me.
If you're getting something back for your money then it's not theft, it's taxation. Those who derive the most benefit from the road network (or any other aspect of the government) should pay the most to support it, which is precisely the kind of thing a graduated tax scheme like the one we employ here in the USA accomplishes, or at least it would if there weren't a whole bunch of corporate loopholes available to the wealthy. The poor have no access to these loopholes because simply employing them involves relatively fixed fees (not proportional to income) which represents a prohibitively larger portion of their available wealth, which is why the system is breaking down. The wealthy (who make policy, sometimes simply by purchasing legislation) are shielded from the results of their actions because they themselves do not have to pay for them. Even if they pay a larger number of dollars into the system than people who make less money, they actually wind up paying a proportionally smaller share when you compare the amount of benefit they're deriving.
TL;DR: Those who benefit most from the roads should be most glad to pay for the roads, and when any other situation prevails, the system fails.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
This word "all". Does it confuse you? Does that make you ignore it? Or, come to think of it, maybe it's the word "EXACTLY" that troubles you.
It appears you have absolutely no idea what capital expenditures are if you think capital gains tax would ever apply.
A capital expenditure is any money spent purchasing an item that is expected to be useful to the business for more than one year. For an ISP this would include things like: fiber, coax, servers, routers, modems for rent, fiber to coax converters, test equipment, tools, bucket trucks, service vans, office computers, and so on. NONE of those things will ever appreciate in value. In fact, they will all DEPRECIATE until their value becomes basically zero.
So when you make a brilliant statement like 'if they didn't spend all that money on capital and interest (on debt used to fund previous captial purchases) they would have a ton a profit' what you are really saying is 'if they didn't build or maintain their network they would have a ton of profit'. Of course, then they wouldn't have a business, but hey you're the financial wizard who knows how to make a ton of profit without having a business.
You're right.
You should totally ban the Americans complaining about no jobs due to mexicans too. They can't possibly afford health care insurance.
They should all be left to die rotting in the streets.
Incidentally, most of these people are conservatives trying to stay in towns and industries that No longer exist because of modernization
Have you seen the infrastructure in the USA? You know how many bridges and overpasses have an F rating? I've seen how well the government handles that along with the VA hospitals.
the current state of infrastructure is what you get when fiscal conservatives try to starve government of revenue. If we had a higher gas tax or mileage fees, we would have no problem funding infrastructure.
That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
No, he said, "That's just another good reason why the network - the data center, the cables in the road etc. should be a public service like water pipes and electricity."
Then AC said, "... The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property."
How you and he make the leap from "The network should be a public service" to " The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property" is the part I don't get. It is manifestly, demonstrably not what he said.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
so dumbfuck - who pays?
Everybody, collectively; since everybody benefits from it, collectively. It's fairly straightforward. I'm not sure where your confusion lies.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
There are countries you can move to that won't tax you. However, they are primarily in the middle east. Feel free to move there at any time.
I fully agree, comrade. The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property.
What the fuck is wrong with you people? Do you really prioritise a company's ability to make as much profit as possible over your ability to get a fair and decent service? All the while you bang on about the free market fixing things while simultaneously doing everything to make the market as closed as possible. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you?
This is what happens when ideology becomes divorced from reality.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
So, my datacenter that I have built and put together myself should be a public service for everyone to use without compensating me for things like startup costs and growing pains? I don't think so.
And neither does anyone else, so relax. This is about the cost of being connected to the Internet; not the servers that serve the data.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
From what I have read, Title 2 of the Communications Act actually has a provision for keeping prices fair.
Correct me if I am wrong.
Yet be sure to get all the facts, first!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
Have you seen the infrastructure in the USA? You know how many bridges and overpasses have an F rating? I've seen how well the government handles that along with the VA hospitals.
It's almost as if putting people who hate government in charge of the government creates a a self-fulfilling prophesy. People (maybe not you) rail about taxation as "theft" and then complain about inadequate government goods and services.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Cable One is a small cable company that has a blatant monopoly and is raising prices too high. As such, all the other larger cable companies are worries the government is going to step in to regulate Cable one. If that happens, ALL cable companies in the country will be regulated.
Quote from the linked article and edited
“..the unspoken fear among their larger peers is that over-reliance on broadband pricing invites regulatory intervention, not just for Cable One, but for everyone.”
Where I live, government provided power is significantly better.
I used to live in a city which had a city owned power plant. Rates per kWh were about 20% lower than surrounding cities, and there were no monthly connection fees. Depending on how much power you use, the total bill is 25-35% lower.
Reliability numbers are slightly better as well, but not by much.
My taxes go up consistently and yet I see no infrastructure improvements. Do you propose I start giving the government blank checks?
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
They do subsidize, but not how you're thinking:
A public company generally needs to make a profit to stay in business.
A government entity cannot make a profit (over any period of time) as far as I'm aware.
Also consider, that power plant had to be purchased or built somehow - costs are probably built into the electricity cost - but borrowing as a government body (bonds) is far cheaper than private/commercial lending so you have further savings there.
On the flip side, you see governmental waste in manpower and spending all the time since they DON'T have to turn a profit and often don't really have to stick to their budgets.
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
Not gains on the company assets, gains on the shares everyone involved holds.
Whatever man, I'm sure you're right, Charter are clearly some kind of magical business that can lose money every year for 10-20 years and no one is worried. They're not arranging their finances to minimize their tax obligations and expressing their profits elsewhere.
We should set up a gofundme page to help out.
Nah, I hate those asshats. But they sure know headline figures like Net Profit Margin alone aren't representative of a company's position.
There's also some really nice places in the South Pacific that have no tax.
Mind, you. The roads are terrible... and the internet is slow, unreliable, and expensive. Enjoy!
That's just another good reason why the network -- the data center, the cables in the road etc. -- should be open to competition instead of a government-granted monopoly like water pipes and electricity.
FTFY.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Hmm, we tried that over here in Britain with toll-pike roads, though the charges were regulated. Later on, with these things called canals. The toll-pike roads were pretty much taken in to public ownership by the 1820s, the canals in pieces in the 1870s-90s. That's about the time that cities started investing big-style in building sewers and water supply systems. They're still, effectively, publicly owned (with a Thatcherite surface gloss of privatisation which fools no one).
This from a country that brought you Adam Smith and the "Dismal Science" that is economics. I think you were having some sort of revolution at the time, so might not have been paying attention.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
these people think the "magic government will give us everything!" i got modded down for bringing this post back to reality. this place is turning into more of a dump than it was.
All incentives aren't monetary, that's what breaks the pretend capitalistic system we are told we have.
How do you think competition could realistically happen?
Cheap storage VM.
In general I agree, but for a company, an American company no less, there is no greater motivator than money. I'm sure there a bunch of people that would set up a high quality power, cheap power grid the world over if they had the facilities. The problem is you need money to make anything of substance happen, if only because the people you need to help you them can't pay their bills with warm fuzzies. So regardless if the money is the true motivator of activities it is the only enabler of most of them. Especially a big infrastructure project.
Competition could realistically happen if the main infrastructure was publically owned and any company can set up and get access to them for the same price as any other company with that access fee going back into maintaining and improving the system. That way there are enough companies to have realistic price competition and keeps the profiteering to a minimum.
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