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129 Million Americans Can Only Get Internet Service From Companies That Have Violated Net Neutrality (vice.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Based on the Federal Communications Commission's own data, the Institute for Local Self Reliance found that 129 million Americans only have one option for broadband internet service in their area, which equals about 40 percent of the country. Of those who only have one option, roughly 50 million are limited to a company that has violated net neutrality in some way. Of Americans who do have more than one option, 50 million of them are left choosing between two companies that have both got shady behavior on their records, from blocking certain access to actively campaigning against net neutrality.
Aside from being a non-ideal situation for consumers like me, this lack of competition is another dock against the FCC's plan to repeal net neutrality rules later this week. In arguing against net neutrality rules, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has repeatedly cited a free market as just as capable of ensuring internet freedom as government regulations. "All we are simply doing is putting engineers and entrepreneurs, instead of bureaucrats and lawyers, back in charge of the internet," Pai said on Fox News's "Fox & Friends," in November. "What we wanted to do is return to the free market consensus that started in the Clinton administration and that served the internet economy in America very well for many years." But how can market competition regulate an industry when more than a third of the market has no competition at all, and even those that do have to choose between options that don't uphold net neutrality?
Aside from being a non-ideal situation for consumers like me, this lack of competition is another dock against the FCC's plan to repeal net neutrality rules later this week. In arguing against net neutrality rules, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has repeatedly cited a free market as just as capable of ensuring internet freedom as government regulations. "All we are simply doing is putting engineers and entrepreneurs, instead of bureaucrats and lawyers, back in charge of the internet," Pai said on Fox News's "Fox & Friends," in November. "What we wanted to do is return to the free market consensus that started in the Clinton administration and that served the internet economy in America very well for many years." But how can market competition regulate an industry when more than a third of the market has no competition at all, and even those that do have to choose between options that don't uphold net neutrality?
All they have to do is stop promising to uphold Net Neutrality precepts, and then they're totally in the clear.
The important thing here is that Trump's rich friends will milk some more money from the not-rich in return for degraded services; this is good for the average person somehow.
The real problem is not net neutrality (or lack thereof), the problem is that the wonderful power of the free market is being expected to solve a problem that it fundamentally can not solve in an efficient way.
It never makes sense to have competing physical layers of network infrastructure.
In the same way that it would be nonsensical to have competing road networks, or water distribution networks or electrical distribution networks in the same area, it is also stupid to try and have physical data networks competing. The physical media layer for the "last mile" (or however many it is from an exchange) should be in government hands, controlled in the same way that road and water networks are, but with any number of service providers being able to provide service from the end point, with a level playing field for the access to the physical media layer.
The services ON those networks should most definitely be privately held - and also made available on a level playing field.
In the same way that whether you are a country resident or a city resident, you play the same amount of registration and fuel tax, giving you equal access to roads, you should have equal access to the internet too.
If you want a parcel delivered, you have a choice of couriers available - can get FedEX ot DHL or UPS to deliver it, and they all use the same roads, with the same fixed cost for road access, competing with each other.
I live in a rural area several miles outside of a town of about 2500 people. Two different cable companies have fiber optic service at my address and the phone company has a fiber-fed DSLAM about 2 houses down so I could get good DSL if I really wanted to.
One of the cable companies is a national brand, and the other is a local company that has designs and funding lined up and ready to go for every city and town in the area that they aren't already in. Every winter they convince another town or two to ditch the monopoly, and every summer they build a brand new cable plant or two from scratch, right alongside the incumbent's wires.
The monopoly franchise may have been necessary once upon a time, which I really doubt, but I can say with absolute certainty that it is not necessary today. If anyone has only one option, their problem is local, either the city is granting a monopoly, or their state is making it impossible for startups to operate.
I agree 100% that people need to fix their local problems instead of demanding that the federal government punish the rest of us so that they can keep being lazy.
One thing that I think should have abundant federal regulation is municipal ISPs. If the people of a city want to form one, I think they should be able to, and I also think that there needs to be strong rules to keep the local government from abusing their monopoly. For example, they should not be able to use taxpayer funds.
See that "Preview" button?