Muni Fiber and Politics

Mon Jul 21 19:29:17 UTC 2014

----- Original Message -----
> From: "William Herrin" <bill at herrin.us>

> On Mon, Jul 21, 2014 at 10:20 AM, Jay Ashworth <jra at baylink.com>
> wrote:
> > Over the last decade, 19 states have made it illegal for
> > municipalities to own fiber networks
> 
> Hi Jay,
> 
> Everything government does, it does badly. Without exception. There
> are many things government does better than any private organization
> is likely to sustain, but even those things it does slowly and at an
> exorbitant price.

Sure it does, Bill.  

Retake civics, will you?  Read about The Public Good, and tell me how
profit-driven corporations -- especially public ones -- are the orgs
best suited to protect and support it.

> Muni fiber is a competition killer. You can't beat city hall; once
> built it's not practical to compete, even with better service, so
> residents are stuck with only the overpriced (either directly or via
> taxes), usually underpowered and always one-size-fits-all network
> access which results. As an ISP I watched something similar happen in
> Altoona PA a decade and a half ago. It was a travesty.

Did you miss, perhaps, the 2 month long thread I started end of 2012,
concerning building out a L1/L2 fiber muni?

> The only exception I see to this would be if localities were
> constrained to providing point to point and point to multipoint
> communications infrastructure within the locality on a reasonable and
> non-discriminatory basis. The competition that would foster on the
> services side might outweigh the damage on the infrastructure side.
> Like public roads facilitate efficient transportation and freight
> despite the cost and potholes, though that's an imperfect simile.

I guess you didn't.

May 6 fiber installers dig up the street in front of your house over 
the next 2 years.

> Can I solve your unusual networking challenges?

Possibly not.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                  Baylink                       jra at baylink.com
Designer                     The Things I Think                       RFC 2100
Ashworth & Associates       http://www.bcp38.info          2000 Land Rover DII
St Petersburg FL USA      BCP38: Ask For It By Name!           +1 727 647 1274