Muni broadband sucks (was: New minimum speed for US broadband connections)

Wed Jun 2 16:12:23 UTC 2021

On Wed, Jun 2, 2021 at 5:28 AM Jared Brown <nanog-isp at mail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, May 31, 2021 Mike Hammett wrote:
> > Muni broadband does suck, but that's another thread for another day.
>   Excluding cases where muni broadband doesn't suck, why does muni broadband suck?
>
>   Personally I wouldn't mind more access to dark fiber à la Stokab, much like the dry copper pairs of yesterday.
>
>   If the default state of muni broadband of is suck, what is the root cause? Is it a people problem and/or can something be done to improve on the default state?

Muni broadband sucks for several reasons but the most important one is:

Competition. Municipal broadband eliminates it. If it's not obvious
why, feel free to Google how competition and monopolization impact
product quality. It's a pretty universal trait.

If you were to structure muni broadband to enhance competition rather
than limit it, you might get a different result. For example, if
municipalities installed and leased fiber optic cables to every
structure but didn't provide any services on those cables, relying
instead on third parties directly billing the customer to do so, it
could work out as well as having municipalities pay for roads and
letting people buy their own cars and trucks to use on them.

Regards,
Bill Herrin

-- 
William Herrin
bill at herrin.us
https://bill.herrin.us/