CenturyLink Won't Provide DSL, Wants To Block Competitor From Getting Fed Funds To Offer Wireless
from the if-we-won't,-no-one-can... dept
It's no secret that many ISPs prefer to have a monopoly. We've seen it over and over again in efforts to block competitors from getting into the space, while at the same time they lobby the government for more rights of way and other benefits. The latest example is CenturyLink (a combination of CenturyTel and Embarq) in North Carolina. The company has made it clear that it won't provide DSL to certain "low density" areas. And if that's what it wants to do, fine. But, it shouldn't then try to block those who do want to offer broadband, such as Electronic Solutions Inc., which Broadband Reports notes has applied for federal broadband stimulus funds to offer wireless broadband services in those areas. Yet, CenturyLink has filed a complaint with the government saying that because it offers broadband in "some or all" (see what it did there?) of the areas ESI wants to provide service in, CenturyLink is suggesting that the feds shouldn't give ESI the money it's asking for.Now, this is a case where accurate data on broadband penetration might be helpful, but when Connected Nation keeps winning contracts to provide such maps -- and Connected Nation is set up by the same broadband incumbents who don't want competition, guess how accurate those maps will be?
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Filed Under: broadband stimulus, competition, monopoly
Companies: centurylink, esi
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Nice!
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Re: Nice!
"up to"
"one size fits most"
"virtually"
"priced for less than x" (where the price is x - $0.01)
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http://www.t-racking.com and http://www.racking-shelving.com
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LIKE the USA is screwed get over it
ITS GETTING WORSE NOT BETTER
haha
what a sad country and yea i know canada aint far off
but at least with multi party ability we can have real change.
NOT THE SHAM you have down south
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Re: LIKE the USA is screwed get over it
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Re: LIKE the USA is screwed get over it
Get real, bud... at least we have a chance to get there.
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Am I the only one with a problem
I deal with this crap all the time. Some halfwit comes along and writes a grant letter and is handed a huge some on my tax money to build a business to compete with my business.
I've worked hard and invested heavily my own money in building my buisness, and some halfwit is handed tax money that was extorted from me to then turn around and compete with me. I'm sure this company has the same problem.
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Re: Am I the only one with a problem
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Re: Re: Am I the only one with a problem
'course, sometimes there's good and logical reasons for such things...
but when it comes to the USA, the more i read, the more i figure that when that sort of thing comes up, someone fucked up. or got bribed. or both.
(that said, in my own country I'd assume it's because the current service is either provided by a monopoly shown to be harmful to the public, or the current provider is unable to meet new standards or current demand, and if it's standards, somehow fails to qualify for assistance in doing so. That said, the NZ government isn't so prone to throwing money at corporations to fix it's problems. (it prefers to waste the money itself ;-) )
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Re: Re: Am I the only one with a problem
I am a small 7 man shop, I have funded 100% of my R&D and Development out of my own money. No tax breaks, no grants, no free money from anywhere. When grant money is given to my competitors it creats a very unfair market place where they are given advantages that I have worked hard to earn.
Compete with me with your own money and I welcome the competition, even from big corporatations. BUT compete with me with my own hard earned money and I have a real issue
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Re: Re: Re: Am I the only one with a problem
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Re: Am I the only one with a problem
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Re: Am I the only one with a problem
if you keep electing the same idiots over and over and never hold them accountable, this is the kind of government you get.
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Re: Am I the only one with a problem
Now let's talk competition.
I'm actually an unwilling customer of CenturyLink. I *want* to get DSL through AT&T, who has very reasonable prices, but AT&T doesn't "service" our area, it is only "serviced" by CenturyLink, so I am forced to pay their outrageously high prices for DSL. This is called anti-competitive behaviour and it should be illegal.
And before you or anyone else gives me the old line about "you have other choices, blah blah blah": Screw that. I happen to want DSL for whatever reason. I should have a dozen choices of companies to choose from; instead my choice is CenturyLink or nothing.
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Re: Re: Am I the only one with a problem
If you don't like it then move.
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Re: Am I the only one with a problem
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I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
The whole idea of providing people who live in rural areas with broadband access using tax-payer funds is repulsive. People choose where they live. All choices are about trade-offs. People who live in rural areas trade-off urban facilities for open spaces, nature, insulation from neighbors etc. That is a valid life-style choice. However, I do not have the responsibility to make their lives more comfortable.
If the some ISP wants to offer DSL to three households separated by acres of wide open spaces, it should feel free to do it. On the other hand, this is clearly not socially optimal as the total cost of providing the service exceeds the total benefits potential subscribers would derive from the service.
If it were otherwise, the ISP would not need subsidies to provide the service.
If I were operating an ISP, and I saw someone set up another operation that does not have to profit (because, uhm, taxpayers all over the country are paying their costs), I would be more than a little miffed as well.
Reminds me of the Kathleen Blanco spent something like $700,000 to bring POTS to 15 elderly people living in the bayou in February, 2005:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/01/national/01phone.html
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Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
You would be correct if it was a continuing subsidy, and it might be in this case, I haven't looked into the details very much. However, if the subsidy they are looking for is to set up and start the ISP, not to continually fund it, then it is competition. Please let me know how many federally funded small business grants haven't led to some form of competition for someone.
The whole idea of providing people who live in rural areas with broadband access using tax-payer funds is repulsive. People choose where they live. All choices are about trade-offs. People who live in rural areas trade-off urban facilities for open spaces, nature, insulation from neighbors etc. That is a valid life-style choice. However, I do not have the responsibility to make their lives more comfortable.
Nor do the farmers who raise the food you eat have a responsibility to make your life more comfortable by ensuring your easy access to food, but they do it anyway. Why shouldn't they have access to the internet? It's not like they're asking to have free internet access, they will still have to pay their bill. Furthermore, although I can't stand taxes I have to pay them, as do you. That's where your responsibility ends. How the government uses the money isn't as open to your opinions, or mine for that matter, as you seem to believe. The point of the Broadband Stimulus funds was to develop more jobs by increasing the broadband infrastructure throughout the country. Seems to me like creating an infrastructure where one doesn't exist, or is very minimal, does just that.
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Re: Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
People are free to choose not to farm. It might be hard to swallow, but no one is going to starve if all current farmers stopped farming.
And that has provided us with more food than was imaginable throughout the entire history of humankind.
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Re: Re: Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
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Re: Re: Re: Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
Name calling. Nice. Really establishes credibility, doesn't it?
No one would starve if ALL current farmers stopped farming? Pray tell just where the food would come from, then. Please, enlighten us.
From all the other people who would then become farmers in response to the market.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
> Are you stupid?
No I am not. It seems, however, you cannot read. I said current farmers. If all current farmers decided to stop farming, no one would starve because new farmers would take their places. This is pretty elementary.
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Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
Do you feel the same way about rural postal service? The post office could save a lot of money if they only served the major cities like they used to. But that changed with Rural Free Delivery in 1891. Repulsive, huh?
And then there was the Rural Electrification Act. Just makes you want to throw up, doesn't it?
But while we're talking about telco subsidies, don't forget about the HUGE subsidy the telcos receive in form of right-of-way access in cities (across both public and private properties). You think it's expensive to install lines in rural areas? That's nothing compared to what it would cost the telcos to actually lease all their urban ROWs from private urban land owners where land values are much higher. But I don't see you talking about that. For some reason, you only seem to be against rural subsidies while ignoring the urban ones. Funny, that.
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Re: Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
The same applies to the all other rural utilities.
As I remind people, there were schools waaaaaay before there were government schools. People have a way of solving problems for themselves much more effectively than a distant government office.
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Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' police protection
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Re: I do not have any obligation to pay for others' broadband access
Link to FCC page on Universal Service http://www.fcc.gov/encyclopedia/universal-service
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Re:
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Re: I tend to leave it to the business to decide what will improve their profits
If a business makes the "wrong" decisions vis-à-vis products and service, it will driven out of the market.
... Uhm, except, of course, if they are, a-hem, regulated and subsidized by the government.
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Re: Re: I tend to leave it to the business to decide what will improve their profits
Even worse is when they are, a-hem, unregulated and subsidized by the government.
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Wow
And Sinan, while I understand your POV, why wouldn't we support a company with an idea to provide them with broadband which is not currently provided? Your mentality that they choose to be farmers equates to them giving up internet service is flat out stupid.
In this case, ESI asked for $3M funding to construct infrastructure from government funds set up FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE. If you disagree with the government subsidizing infrastructure, well.. sorry about that, but that's what government does. They're not asking the government to pay for their subscription fees, or give them free cable tv - they're asking for funding to offer such services.
In a perfect world, we might all like to see this sort of thing financed by third-party VC or loans, but in poor economies, one does what one must, and if approved, this WOULD create wanted services and jobs.
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Re: Wow
The economically relevant criterion is whether the benefits from providing service to this area exceed the cost of providing that service.
Please do read the story of the $47,000 land line (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/01/national/01phone.html). Of course, those people in the bayou now enjoy being able to call their neighbors. Was it worth it? Absolutely not.
My experience and intuition tell me the $47,000 land line will be more representative of this whole broadband subsidy deal. There is no economically valid reason for there to be broadband access everywhere in the U.S.
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RTFA
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This says it all
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Re: This says it all
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dsl with centurylink
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