Every metro area that does not have a "cable TV" local utility monopoly has lower consumer cable bills, and many times competing cable providers.
So what's so hard about fiber to the home? Nothing but getting local governments out of the way.
When the demand/supply lines cross, and providers can charge what it costs to put fiber in the ground (or overhead, who cares?) they will do so.
ADSL provides the same functionality as this short-run plastic fiber, on existing copper. Why waste money with plastic fiber?
Community fiber projects exist, providing mini-metro distribution over fiber. A "gated community" is a perfect candidate for this sort of service, so is a small town, development or an apartment building. All it takes is personal initiative. And how about one 802.11 hub feeding multiple "homes" as an ad-hoc co-op to one ADSL or cable-modem link? Cheaper still, and nothing to run in or above ground.
If one answer is shoved down everyones throat by the local governments, however, it will just cost more and not give the service anyone wants.
As mentioned, it's not the cost of the end points, it's the fiber itself that needs to be run before it can be used. My personal opinion is that the vast majority of users have no use for that kind of speed and they are not served by paying the overhead for optical repeaters, multiplexors, and high-speed routers.
So I fully expect that the power of government will be used by the service providers to provide them with a shortcut to profits anywhere they can be convinced to do so.
Personally, I like the community co-op fiber distribution answer.
Tell your government to use, and enforce the contracts utilizing, the two-letter country code of their own country.
That's it. No need for ICANN at all. The US has control over.us, South Africa over.za, France can enact all the francophobia it wants to over.fr, etc. etc etc.
Alternative NIC's have and do exist. Root name servers take very little resources compared to a major corporate web site, and there are many thousands of those.
The AlterNIC.net ran fine for many years, and has recently morphed into another name which I am not going to bother to look up at the moment. Anyone who wanted to reach their sites merely pointed their name server to them. Gee, that was hard. But it was also not tollerated by the ICANN.
Governments already have full control over their own name space..US is alive and well, but very few people use it. If the US government wants to set a good example, just retire the.GOV domain and start using.GOV.US like the rest of the world does.
That's right, NO TOP LEVEL DOMAINS AT ALL. Just use the country codes for official real names.
Anything that doesn't use the official country code is not official nor controlled by government. If you want to point to.SPAM, go right ahead.
All bureaucracies will try to survive, regardless of their usefulness. The ICANN is no different, as can be seen by this proposal.
The difference between the two is compultion. That's the same as between any other "system" and Anarchy.
Everyone already cooperates and compromises every day. You deal with the people you wish to deal with, in the ways you wish to deal with them, or you ignor them and go on your way.
That is the essence of Anarchy!
Communist, Socialist, Democrat, Republican, all depend on FORCE to achieve their ends. Each and ever one of them differs only in the ways they rationalize the use of force to achieve the ends which the people in power want. They are mearly different ends which all use the same means.
To those who equate "Anarchy" and "Chaos", I would suggest a few of the articles and texts on the Ludwig von Mises institute web site until you can understand how they're fundimentally different. Human Action may be a little difficult, but do give it a try.
The first thing that sprang to mind when I read this was, "Microsoft cannot compete, since Windows depends on the GUI."
Remember that one of Microsofts contentions in the anti-trust trial is that they cannot unbundle Internet Explorer from Windows, that the system is so interdependent that no elements can be left out and still function.
So they cannot compete on price, since all other things being equal a Windows machine must have a video graphics card.
They cannot compete on performance, since all other things benig equal a Windows machine must spend resources on storing and running the GUI.
Yesterday, I was showing a very happy WindowsXP owner (who also happens to be a somewhat savvy computer consultant with Unix and Linux experience) the beauty of Debian's apt and dselect packages. He was so happy with the granularity of not installing anything that he doesn't want, that I gave him my Debian 2.2r4 CD. (I'm running Woody anyway)
No different than "The Mark Of The Beast", this is yet another example of exclusionary practices by licensing boards. This is the evil of licensure, of restricting an individuals libery not because of their actions, but only because someone has the authority to create the restriction.
It's their rule, they win. Pay the money, or get out.
Which leads me to wonder, what about the use of other software? If they have a Windows PC, does Microsoft have such a license?
Just wondering how obviously hypocritical they licensing board is.
Edmond, if you had actually read my post, you would have noticed that I do not listen to Limbagh. Thus your repeated protestations about my having learned of this from him are falicious on their face.
If you had spend the time providing any actual data to demonstrate the foundation of your knowledge, rather than merely making a fool of yourself, you wouldn't have to be concerned with being modded down.
The application isn't in the electronics of what the author calls "silicon chips", it's the mechanical elements that have been created by using the methods of electronic chip manufacture, specifically etching and overlaying.
One question that had come to mind for me was lubrication. If you have two surfaces at any scale that are moving against each other, you will get friction.
This "force" allows for mechanical elements to interact without contact, effectively eliminating friction and wear. The scale seems too small to be directly useful for such things as disk-drive heads, but who knows?
It's an interesting exploration, but I don't expect WD-40 will lose market share to it in the near future.
How limited a mind you must have, to think there is only one place to get information that disagrees with your opinions.
I caught one Rush show, a long time ago, and realized he was no different than any other person who believes in big powerful government. Just like you.
Oh, his ends are different, but his means of using force to make others act as he sees fit is no less reprehensible.
I am not liberal or conservative. It is you who cannot imagine a world beyond your own views.
The reality is that the KGB was stealing American computer designs from the beginning. As Glastnost was coming into being, and the "west" was getting a look into how things worked inside the Soviet system, they discovered that they were running clones of the IBM 360's.
I've seen an interview recently with an ex-KGB big-wig who said he realized how bankrupt the Soviet system was as he learned how little they developed "in house" rather than copied from the west. The Soviets were always one or two generations of technology behind simply because they weren't inventing it.
You might have missed where last week, the leader of a violent terrorist organization, which has taken credit for many bombings and destructive acts in the United States, was questioned before congress under oath.
The leader "plead the fifth" on everything.
The violent terrorist group? Earth Liberation Front (or something like that), a bunch of ecological extremists that the media happens to approve of.
It isn't that the media is deliberately biased, just that they tend to report what they support, and ignore as "not news" those things they disagree with.
Another example is defensive uses of firearms. 300 different stories published about the latest "school shooting", 2 of them accurately reported that the shooter was stopped by two other students (it was a college) who had their own firearms. The rest just said the perp was "tackled".
Consider how quickly the funding for Mir, the Apollo program, the "fleet" of space shuttles, dried up after initial investments.
The "public sector" has no gurantee of funding what so ever. Programs are picked up or dropped on the whim of a single election cycle.
Worse yet, that funding depends on coersion in the form of taxes. There is also the opportunity for vast quantities of corruption, the American space shuttle program is a perfect example of that in action.
If you want "guranteed funding", put the contract in writing. No government will give you such a contract.
Golly gee, people keep voting for candidates who promise bigger, more intrusive government, and have the gall to act SURPRISED when they themselves end up looking at the business end of the governments restrictions.
Anyone who voted Democan or Republocrat is a hypocrite if they dare to object. You asked for this.
Bob-
The American system is socialized, just less.
on
Movie Review: John Q
·
· Score: 2
Anyone who thinks the American system isn't socialized hasn't looked. Licensing, regulation by locality, state and federal agencies, restrictions of what may or may not be "provided", insurance regulation, etc etc etc.
Just because it's *less* regulated than many other places, that it's still possible to choose who to see and when, that does not make it non-socialist.
Prices are driven up because of government interference. Remove that interference, and prices will (again) drop. The problem is with trying to compete with government, who has already taken your money in taxes in order to offer "free" services.
Like any organization, government acts to crush competition. Government does so with guns and prisons.
Want a direct comparison? The British recently did a study comparing their health system with Kaiser Perminente, an American "Health Management Organization". The Kaiser costs were consistantly lower than the British system, because Kaiser has incentive to reduce peoples use of the system.
In a government run system, the incentive is to increase customer use, in order to justify bigger staffs, bigger budgets, and more importance of their department over other departments.
Anyone who thinks "health care" in American is bad
on
Movie Review: John Q
·
· Score: 1
...hasn't tried it in a country where the government runs it even more completely than the American one does.
Yes, getting the government out of health care in the US would be an improvement.
World leaders, the wealthy, anyone who can already comes to America for the "messy" health care. It's amazing what the profit motive can do in providing all those wonderful bits of technology that make up modern health care.
But don't worry, with ever greater involvement by bureaucrats preventing people from being able to choose what procedures/processes they want, or are allowed to offer, the American status will predictably fail.
So if you're all fired-up about how bad American health care is, try going somewhere else for a while, and I don't mean third-world contries. Try Japan, Britain, Canada.
Just as with anything else, I have the right to try to acquire Internet service.
The problem with calling "connectivity" a right is because it creates an obligation on someone else to provide it to you.
If someone is obligated to provide you with their labor, that is called slavery.
Freedom means that you might not get what you want all the time. That's your problem, you must provide for your own success. If you don't, and you loose "connectivity", don't blame someone else for your lack of foresight.
($Cost of purchase)-($Assumed Cost of electricity not purchased from the electric company)?
Or as you imply, ($Cost of Manufacture)-($Assumed Cost of electricity not purchased from electric company)?
Maybe you're not finding the answer to the question your asking. Or maybe you are. I can't make that judgement, not knowing you, a lacking on my part you do not seem to share.
Bob-
I find it interesting the change in definitions.
on
Raisethefist.com Raided
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I find it interesting that espousing violent resistance to violations of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights has been redefined as "violent overthrow of the constitution."
Time to put bomb making instructions on my own web site too. I figure a reprint of the GPO's own pamphlet on how to remove stumps by using the 6 to 1 by weight ratio of amonium nitrate and diesel fuel would be sufficient. Or is that ratio by volume? Hmmm, time for a test on a stump or two out on the back 40.
Government is the one monopoly everyone should fear, and fight against every infringement of their rights.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, another anti-government scree from Bob.
Every metro area that does not have a "cable TV" local utility monopoly has lower consumer cable bills, and many times competing cable providers.
So what's so hard about fiber to the home? Nothing but getting local governments out of the way.
When the demand/supply lines cross, and providers can charge what it costs to put fiber in the ground (or overhead, who cares?) they will do so.
ADSL provides the same functionality as this short-run plastic fiber, on existing copper. Why waste money with plastic fiber?
Community fiber projects exist, providing mini-metro distribution over fiber. A "gated community" is a perfect candidate for this sort of service, so is a small town, development or an apartment building. All it takes is personal initiative. And how about one 802.11 hub feeding multiple "homes" as an ad-hoc co-op to one ADSL or cable-modem link? Cheaper still, and nothing to run in or above ground.
If one answer is shoved down everyones throat by the local governments, however, it will just cost more and not give the service anyone wants.
As mentioned, it's not the cost of the end points, it's the fiber itself that needs to be run before it can be used. My personal opinion is that the vast majority of users have no use for that kind of speed and they are not served by paying the overhead for optical repeaters, multiplexors, and high-speed routers.
So I fully expect that the power of government will be used by the service providers to provide them with a shortcut to profits anywhere they can be convinced to do so.
Personally, I like the community co-op fiber distribution answer.
Bob-
Alternic.net did this for many years.
Bob-
Tell your government to use, and enforce the contracts utilizing, the two-letter country code of their own country.
.us, South Africa over .za, France can enact all the francophobia it wants to over .fr, etc. etc etc.
That's it. No need for ICANN at all. The US has control over
Anything more is abuse of power.
Bob-
Alternative NIC's have and do exist. Root name servers take very little resources compared to a major corporate web site, and there are many thousands of those.
.US is alive and well, but very few people use it. If the US government wants to set a good example, just retire the .GOV domain and start using .GOV.US like the rest of the world does.
.SPAM, go right ahead.
The AlterNIC.net ran fine for many years, and has recently morphed into another name which I am not going to bother to look up at the moment. Anyone who wanted to reach their sites merely pointed their name server to them. Gee, that was hard. But it was also not tollerated by the ICANN.
Governments already have full control over their own name space.
That's right, NO TOP LEVEL DOMAINS AT ALL. Just use the country codes for official real names.
Anything that doesn't use the official country code is not official nor controlled by government. If you want to point to
All bureaucracies will try to survive, regardless of their usefulness. The ICANN is no different, as can be seen by this proposal.
Bob-
This kind of message is exactly what they need to hear, and also exactly the kind of message that will never make it through the bureaucracy.
Seriously, bureaucracy never tollerates the message that they are not needed. Bureaucracies always expand and extend their power, not restrict it.
As needed as this message is as a "reality enema", the ICANN and the governments whos force the ICANN thrives on will never officially "hear" it.
Bob-
The difference between the two is compultion. That's the same as between any other "system" and Anarchy.
Everyone already cooperates and compromises every day. You deal with the people you wish to deal with, in the ways you wish to deal with them, or you ignor them and go on your way.
That is the essence of Anarchy!
Communist, Socialist, Democrat, Republican, all depend on FORCE to achieve their ends. Each and ever one of them differs only in the ways they rationalize the use of force to achieve the ends which the people in power want. They are mearly different ends which all use the same means.
To those who equate "Anarchy" and "Chaos", I would suggest a few of the articles and texts on the Ludwig von Mises institute web site until you can understand how they're fundimentally different. Human Action may be a little difficult, but do give it a try.
Bob-
The first thing that sprang to mind when I read this was, "Microsoft cannot compete, since Windows depends on the GUI."
Remember that one of Microsofts contentions in the anti-trust trial is that they cannot unbundle Internet Explorer from Windows, that the system is so interdependent that no elements can be left out and still function.
So they cannot compete on price, since all other things being equal a Windows machine must have a video graphics card.
They cannot compete on performance, since all other things benig equal a Windows machine must spend resources on storing and running the GUI.
Yesterday, I was showing a very happy WindowsXP owner (who also happens to be a somewhat savvy computer consultant with Unix and Linux experience) the beauty of Debian's apt and dselect packages. He was so happy with the granularity of not installing anything that he doesn't want, that I gave him my Debian 2.2r4 CD. (I'm running Woody anyway)
Bob-
No different than "The Mark Of The Beast", this is yet another example of exclusionary practices by licensing boards. This is the evil of licensure, of restricting an individuals libery not because of their actions, but only because someone has the authority to create the restriction.
It's their rule, they win. Pay the money, or get out.
Which leads me to wonder, what about the use of other software? If they have a Windows PC, does Microsoft have such a license?
Just wondering how obviously hypocritical they licensing board is.
Bob-
Edmond, if you had actually read my post, you would have noticed that I do not listen to Limbagh. Thus your repeated protestations about my having learned of this from him are falicious on their face.
If you had spend the time providing any actual data to demonstrate the foundation of your knowledge, rather than merely making a fool of yourself, you wouldn't have to be concerned with being modded down.
Bob-
The application isn't in the electronics of what the author calls "silicon chips", it's the mechanical elements that have been created by using the methods of electronic chip manufacture, specifically etching and overlaying.
One question that had come to mind for me was lubrication. If you have two surfaces at any scale that are moving against each other, you will get friction.
This "force" allows for mechanical elements to interact without contact, effectively eliminating friction and wear. The scale seems too small to be directly useful for such things as disk-drive heads, but who knows?
It's an interesting exploration, but I don't expect WD-40 will lose market share to it in the near future.
Bob-
How limited a mind you must have, to think there is only one place to get information that disagrees with your opinions.
I caught one Rush show, a long time ago, and realized he was no different than any other person who believes in big powerful government. Just like you.
Oh, his ends are different, but his means of using force to make others act as he sees fit is no less reprehensible.
I am not liberal or conservative. It is you who cannot imagine a world beyond your own views.
Bob-
The reality is that the KGB was stealing American computer designs from the beginning. As Glastnost was coming into being, and the "west" was getting a look into how things worked inside the Soviet system, they discovered that they were running clones of the IBM 360's.
I've seen an interview recently with an ex-KGB big-wig who said he realized how bankrupt the Soviet system was as he learned how little they developed "in house" rather than copied from the west. The Soviets were always one or two generations of technology behind simply because they weren't inventing it.
Bob-
You might have missed where last week, the leader of a violent terrorist organization, which has taken credit for many bombings and destructive acts in the United States, was questioned before congress under oath.
The leader "plead the fifth" on everything.
The violent terrorist group? Earth Liberation Front (or something like that), a bunch of ecological extremists that the media happens to approve of.
It isn't that the media is deliberately biased, just that they tend to report what they support, and ignore as "not news" those things they disagree with.
Another example is defensive uses of firearms. 300 different stories published about the latest "school shooting", 2 of them accurately reported that the shooter was stopped by two other students (it was a college) who had their own firearms. The rest just said the perp was "tackled".
Bob-
Quinto,
Consider how quickly the funding for Mir, the Apollo program, the "fleet" of space shuttles, dried up after initial investments.
The "public sector" has no gurantee of funding what so ever. Programs are picked up or dropped on the whim of a single election cycle.
Worse yet, that funding depends on coersion in the form of taxes. There is also the opportunity for vast quantities of corruption, the American space shuttle program is a perfect example of that in action.
If you want "guranteed funding", put the contract in writing. No government will give you such a contract.
Bob-
Golly gee, people keep voting for candidates who promise bigger, more intrusive government, and have the gall to act SURPRISED when they themselves end up looking at the business end of the governments restrictions.
Anyone who voted Democan or Republocrat is a hypocrite if they dare to object. You asked for this.
Bob-
Anyone who thinks the American system isn't socialized hasn't looked. Licensing, regulation by locality, state and federal agencies, restrictions of what may or may not be "provided", insurance regulation, etc etc etc.
Just because it's *less* regulated than many other places, that it's still possible to choose who to see and when, that does not make it non-socialist.
Prices are driven up because of government interference. Remove that interference, and prices will (again) drop. The problem is with trying to compete with government, who has already taken your money in taxes in order to offer "free" services.
Like any organization, government acts to crush competition. Government does so with guns and prisons.
Want a direct comparison? The British recently did a study comparing their health system with Kaiser Perminente, an American "Health Management Organization". The Kaiser costs were consistantly lower than the British system, because Kaiser has incentive to reduce peoples use of the system.
In a government run system, the incentive is to increase customer use, in order to justify bigger staffs, bigger budgets, and more importance of their department over other departments.
Bob-
Don't fund it through government.
Bob-
...hasn't tried it in a country where the government runs it even more completely than the American one does.
Yes, getting the government out of health care in the US would be an improvement.
World leaders, the wealthy, anyone who can already comes to America for the "messy" health care. It's amazing what the profit motive can do in providing all those wonderful bits of technology that make up modern health care.
But don't worry, with ever greater involvement by bureaucrats preventing people from being able to choose what procedures/processes they want, or are allowed to offer, the American status will predictably fail.
So if you're all fired-up about how bad American health care is, try going somewhere else for a while, and I don't mean third-world contries. Try Japan, Britain, Canada.
Bob-
Just as with anything else, I have the right to try to acquire Internet service.
The problem with calling "connectivity" a right is because it creates an obligation on someone else to provide it to you.
If someone is obligated to provide you with their labor, that is called slavery.
Freedom means that you might not get what you want all the time. That's your problem, you must provide for your own success. If you don't, and you loose "connectivity", don't blame someone else for your lack of foresight.
Bob-
Good. I'm glad to know the technology has surpassed these solar voltaic pannels being just expensive batteries.
I really like the idea of running the meter backwards. Too bad the electric companies tend to get unduely hostile about it...
Bob-
What is the definition of "payback"?
($Cost of purchase)-($Assumed Cost of electricity not purchased from the electric company)?
Or as you imply, ($Cost of Manufacture)-($Assumed Cost of electricity not purchased from electric company)?
Maybe you're not finding the answer to the question your asking. Or maybe you are. I can't make that judgement, not knowing you, a lacking on my part you do not seem to share.
Bob-
I find it interesting that espousing violent resistance to violations of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights has been redefined as "violent overthrow of the constitution."
Time to put bomb making instructions on my own web site too. I figure a reprint of the GPO's own pamphlet on how to remove stumps by using the 6 to 1 by weight ratio of amonium nitrate and diesel fuel would be sufficient. Or is that ratio by volume? Hmmm, time for a test on a stump or two out on the back 40.
Government is the one monopoly everyone should fear, and fight against every infringement of their rights.
Bob-
How very interesting. I'm glad to know that.
Could you please send a note to Home Power magazine, then? I'm sure they'd like to update their statistics.
Careful with the name calling, buster. Leave that to Microsoft.
Bob-
It doesn't cost several billion dollars to get into space, just a few million. Many times that was spent on silly speculative dot-com ventures.
Of course it's easier to be a government program, look at how much money and lives you get to waste and keep your job.
I really do recomend you read Kings of the High Frontier.
Bob-
Manned interstellar exploration will require exactly what manned intercontinental exploration did: Time and opportunity.
As long as governments have a monopoly on space, we as individuals have no opportunity.
Get government out of the way, and someone will try it. Then it's just a matter of time.
Remember how much hostility NASA reacted with when told that the Russians were going to let a paying customer go into space? That's a hint.
I suggest you read Kings of the High Frontier by Viktor Komen for a good discussion of the matter.
Bob-