General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsU.S. Internet Users Pay More for Slower Service
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-27/u-s-internet-users-pay-more-for-slower-service.htmlTerry Huval is a large, friendly man with a lilting Southern accent who plays Cajun fiddle tunes in his spare time. He is also the director of utilities in Lafayette, Louisiana. Our job is making sure we listen to our citizens, he says.
In recent years, the citizens of Lafayette have been asking for speedier Internet access.
In 2004, the Lafayette utilities system decided to provide a fiber-to-the-home service. The new network, called LUS Fiber, would give everyone in Lafayette a very fast Internet connection, enabling them to lower their electricity costs by monitoring and adjusting their usage.
Push-back from the local telephone company, BellSouth Corp., and the local cable company, Cox Communications Inc., was immediate. They tried to get laws passed to stop the network, sued the city, even forced the town to hold a referendum on the project -- in which the people voted 62 percent in favor. Finally, in February 2007, after five civil lawsuits, the Louisiana Supreme Court voted, 7-0, to allow the network.
aquart
(69,014 posts)Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)and one to which we need an answer.
Fumesucker
(45,851 posts)RKP5637
(67,111 posts)the years now and as unpalatable as it may be, most Americans are willfully stupid, do not understand the issues other than the rhetoric fed to them, and allow assholes to seize and control most of what they do. Take products in stores, for example, Americans accept absolute junk in many cases and say thank you. It's a country of gullible naive marks.
It's collective willful stupidity. And most will deny it when discussed ... and will have a deer in the headlight look. In fact, just looking at some of the damn fools they vote for local/state is a good example of willful stupidity. Around here they think if they can just get more right wing, more stupid, and more religious everything will be perfect.
They wallow in their ignorance. Is curiosity is dead? People are so mindless. Always going for the cheapest option, heedless of the consequences. Never thinking twice about the fact that nearly everything they buy is made in China. Never asking why their fathers and grandfathers had better paying jobs than they do. Sometimes I wonder if this is the beginning of some sort of descent into a new dark age.
datasuspect
(26,591 posts)we deserve EVERYTHING we get.
reACTIONary
(5,770 posts)..."the current 4 Mbps Internet access goal is unquestionably shortsighted". However, it provides absolutely no rational for that assertion other than to point to a few other countries that have decided that more is better.
Maybe more is better, maybe not. I would like to see a comprehensive rational for why this should be a national goal before launching a large public works program. We have other concerns also, such as equitable and efficient health care, so it might be better to let high speed internet service take care of itself.
dembotoz
(16,808 posts)but the overlooks part is the upload speeds which in this country is pure crap.
att dsl can be what 6 down but only 1/2 uip??????
that is crap upload
as we end up doing more work at home
as we try to turn our homes into wifi hot spots so that our data plans for our phones(separate rant) does not bankrupt us.
we may not strive to be the absolute best but we should strive not to be amoung the absolute worst.
reACTIONary
(5,770 posts)...if someone needs greater upload capability, they can pay more and get it, correct? Large server oriented businesses (you tube, netflix, banks, etc.) seem to get the bandwidth they need to service their customers.
Or is there some sort of limit regardless of how much you are willing to spend?
dembotoz
(16,808 posts)big pipes are dropping in cost but my experience has been that most folks are being underserved not overserved.
Not trying to mimic upload speeds of say a netflix but as business large and small and common folks like us develop a taste
for more internet sucking tools and toys bandwidth is an issue.
madrchsod
(58,162 posts)no one can use it but the schools and government agencies. so far it`s been a financial failure in other cities around my area. maybe if the opened it up to the public it would be profitable.
dembotoz
(16,808 posts)i sell bandwidth
what i sold a couple years back is garbage today
situation today is akin to after ww2 and roads
back then we had the balls to develop the interstate system
don't see that focus today
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)We are fucking bought and sold.
nuxvomica
(12,429 posts)My internet connection went down. Ironic, right?
It is very frustrating when you read what the government could provide cheaply but the moneyed interests lobby and litigate against, just so they can gouge or exclude people to the detriment of the overall economy. Our rigged economy can't continue because it's ultimately counterproductive to commerce but how much damage will be done -- how much farther behind do we get compared to other countries --before people wake up. I still hear people say how wasteful government is compare to private industry. There is probably no bigger or more insidious myth.
Old Codger
(4,205 posts)I pay $70 a month for what is supposed to 1.3 megs it is slow it is over priced it is all I can get other than sat. service it is also over subscribed to the extent that I get those speeds about 25% of the time.. It is a ripoff for sure.
Some times I have to reload 4 or 5 times to get a page to load and then a good part of the time I just have to give it up.
They send someone out and fiddle with it and go away and it stays the same.
Frontier Net
Edited to add: across the back of my pasture lies the main fiber cable for almost all of comcast phone and internet but I cannot access it.
shanti
(21,675 posts)it sucks, but that's what i have and it is also...$70 a month. the service used to go down continually, but hasn't lately. i still feel that i'm being gouged by comcast. the only way it will go down is if i bundle it with other services, but i refuse to do that.
mwooldri
(10,303 posts)With help from certain NC state legislators, TWC and AT&T and others managed to get laws passed that local government (city, county, etc) cannot really get involved in launching and running a community Internet service, effectively making it illegal for them to do so.
I'm glad Lafayette was able to get done what local governments in NC wasn't able to achieve.
freethought
(2,457 posts)It's not really illegal per se, but the legislative roadblocks makes it so difficult that it may as well be. That particular piece of legislation had ALEC's fingerprints all over it. Governor Bev Purdue displayed incredible cowardice when that legislation came across her desk, she neither vetoed it or signed it, which made it law by default.
Egalitarian Thug
(12,448 posts)Panasonic
(2,921 posts)And costs FAR less than what I should be paying for a 40/20 line. I pay $85 to Comcast for 30/5 (and most of the time I get is 20), and Centurylink is offering a 12 month contract for $55/month. Centurylink wouldn't even upgrade until I left them early Feb. Guess they dug around and slapped in a VDSL line.
I gotta pay for the equipment, and the earliest I can probably order is Jan 3rd, and the minute I get dsl up and running (and verified) bye Comcast and their overpriced service and hello Centurylink (for at least a year)
In_The_Wind
(72,300 posts)I do see a hugh difference depending on the time I'm online.
dickthegrouch
(3,175 posts)Part of the reason for that is the NSA's data collection program can't keep up with the explosion of data transferring all over the world. "They" are shit scared that they won't be able to monitor and pacify us us if the speeds or amounts of data increase too rapidly.
Well, guess what? The more we increase the amount of data the more difficult it will be for the supposed authorities to track us. Bring it on, download a movie or 10 today.
BTW, IMHO if spam was a real problem a few years back, the NSA would have shut it down in very short order. In fact it was training grounds for NSA and others to perfect their tracking mechanisms and was barely a speck in overall bandwidth capability. Now with smart phones and You Tube and Facebook and Instagram and others, the amount of data is certainly exploding. The US is falling behind on many measures. All the banksters will have left soon is excuses and wads of useless cash.
Egalitarian Thug
(12,448 posts)the big telecoms billions upon billions of dollars. The telecoms put in cheap crap and used the rest to buy up their competition, and the government did nothing. Investigations were blocked, prosecutions were ordered stopped, and when a few municipalities tried to provide their own, telecoms had the means to keep them bottled up in court until it became too expensive to keep fighting.