The Broadband Industry Pretends To Be Worried About Your Soaring Bill In Attempt To Undermine Net Neutrality
from the who-can-you-trust-if-you-can't-trust-the-phone-company dept
On the heels of Obama's surprise support of Title II-based net neutrality rules last month, we noted that the broadband industry's anti-Title II talking points (primarily that it will kill network investment and sector innovation) not only were just plain wrong, they were getting more than a little stale. That's a problem for the industry given the increasingly bi-partisan support of real net neutrality rules and the groundswell of SOPA-esque activism in support of Title II. As such, the industry's vast think tank apparatus quickly got to work on new talking points to combat net neutrality rules that actually might do something.The first product of this renewed effort is this study by the AT&T-funded Progressive Policy Institute. The study's central thesis is that if Title II net neutrality regulations are passed, the nation will be awash in $15 billion in various new Federal and State taxes and fees:
"We have calculated that the average annual increase in state and local fees levied on U.S. wireline and wireless broadband subscribers will be $67 and $72, respectively. And the annual increase in federal fees per household will be roughly $17. When you add it all up, reclassification could add a whopping $15 billion in new user fees on top of the planned $1.5 billion extra to fund the E-Rate program. The higher fees would come on top of the adverse impact on consumers of less investment and slower innovation that would result from reclassification."Like a well-oiled machine, the cable, phone and broadband industry got to work pushing its study across all the major news outlets over the last week. AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson quickly took to NBC (skip to 1:05) to claim the average household broadband bill would increase by $19 a month under Title II (note amusingly that he got the study numbers his own company helped pay for wrong). The cable industry also not-so-subtly took to using this graphic in ads proclaiming Title II will result in vicious price hikes for everyone:
In an e-mail conversation about the study I had with Free Press Research Director Derek Turner, Turner argues that PPI is also predicting a very worst-case scenario on Federal taxation that's simply not going to happen:
"The FCC could decide to forbear from requiring federal USF contributions for one. And whether or not the FCC does that, adding broadband into the USF mix wouldn't impact the overall size of the fund. That is, if broadband revenues were assessed but the fund size stayed constant, consumers would pay on broadband but, as a result, they'd pay less on their other services like wireless and wired voice. PPI asserts that consumers would pay more on aggregate than they do now (i.e. by adding broadband to the mix, their numbers imply that the burden for the fund will shift towards consumers from businesses), but the report out today offers no explanation of why the contribution percentage would tilt that way."Of course the pretense that the broadband industry cares about how much your bills increase is also laughable, given the industry spends a large part of each day trying to figure out creative ways to pad your bill. This includes rate hikes, usage caps and a wide variety of fees imposed below the line to jack up the advertised rate post sale. These fees range from entirely bogus, non-government mandated "regulatory recovery fees" (pure-profit fees imposed to offset ambiguous government regulation despite a decade of deregulation) to new "broadcast TV fees" that simply bury a portion of programming costs below the line. They're all a variety of false advertising, but they highlight how the biggest increases to below-the-line charges and fees are coming from the industry itself.
The reality the broadband industry doesn't want to acknowledge is that very little changes for it under Title II if carriers aren't engaged in bad behavior. The broadband industry is fighting Title II solely to protect potential revenues generated from abusing uncompetitive markets. That this self-serving behavior is being dressed up as concern about the size of your broadband bill is the industry's best comedic work to date. Perhaps this slightly edited (by Mike) version of the NCTA ad is a bit more accurate:
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Filed Under: bills, broadband, faux concern, hal singer, lobbyists, net neutrality, studies, taxes, title ii
Companies: at&t, ncta, progressive policy institute
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Fair and balanced...
I have no problem with Techdirt advocacy of Title II, but the post seems to want to pretend the advocacy is fair and balanced journalism.
The fact that pushing IP networks under Title II exposes the communicating public to new taxes is not controversial or in dispute. One can argue the taxes will happen anyway and the revenue hungry taxing authorities will find ways to impose taxes.
However, Title II *is* the framework in which *all* communication taxes (and the 16.2% of revenue USF assessments) get imposed at the Local and State and Federal AND International levels.
To claim imposing Title II on the Internet has no implications for new taxes goes beyond advocacy and qualifies as simply dishonest.
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Re: Fair and balanced...
No. It doesn't. The PPI study comes out with specific, and clearly bogus, numbers based on blatant conflation of sepate issues.
I have no problem with Techdirt advocacy of Title II, but the post seems to want to pretend the advocacy is fair and balanced journalism.
This is a cheap shot that is beneath you. Techdirt has always been an OPINION site. We express our opinion. Always have. We've never suggested that the site is some sort of bogus "objective reporting of both sides" of a story, because we think anyone doing that is misrepresenting the truth. We present our opinion.
The fact that pushing IP networks under Title II exposes the communicating public to new taxes is not controversial or in dispute. One can argue the taxes will happen anyway and the revenue hungry taxing authorities will find ways to impose taxes.
Nice strawman. That wasn't what was said.
To claim imposing Title II on the Internet has no implications for new taxes goes beyond advocacy and qualifies as simply dishonest.
No, it's accurate. The framework has little impact on taxes. A new research note out yesterday from a top telco analyst made the point pretty clearly: the impact of Title II is basically nothing. While FCC regimes may at some point seek to more heavily regulate certain parts of the internet, the classification of the underlying infrastructure will have little to no bearing on what happens.
Dan, I know you've fought against Title II in the past where it was inappropriate, but you're blinded by your hatred of Title II to the point that you're no lobbing ad homs at us. Maybe, just maybe, we're not "dishonest" but merely have a different opinion based on our experiences and knowledge.
Don't be that guy.
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Re: Re: Fair and balanced...
One of the PPI's authors addresses the Free Press critique covered in this post and folks can judge for themselves.
See http://bit.ly/1sffSKN
I prefer to follow-up on how the disconnect between former opponents of Title II.
Title II serves as the telephone network policy regime from 1934 to present day.
The arrival of commercial versions of VoIP in 1995 created a policy crisis.
Did VoIP fall under Title II like all other voice services or remain an non-regulated information service like all other data/computing services.
Keep in mind VoIP/Internet were born entirely from non-regulated information services parents.
The default answer was nontheless Title II and those of us present at the time were told our efforts were illegal without government approval.
The experience of pursuing communication innovation under a presumption of Title II left me with an unshakable antipathy for Title II.
Dealing with the anti-innovation Title II pronouncements of the FCC over the next 20 years added to my conviction.
I get that everyone wants the FCC/Title II to save them from the risk of gatekeeper abuses by telco's/cableco's.
News Flash: The 80 year track record includes no examples of the FCC/Title II saving anyone from gatekeeper abuses by telco's/cableco's.
The expansion of communication services and connectivity after 1996 owes entirely to companies (including telco's/cableco's) pursuing non-regulated information services.
Pivoting to Title II at this point rewards the utter failure of Title II policies and punishes the remarkable successes of non-regulated information services.
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Re: Re: Re: Fair and balanced...
The arrival of commercial versions of VoIP in 1995 created a policy crisis.
Did VoIP fall under Title II like all other voice services or remain an non-regulated information service like all other data/computing services.
Keep in mind VoIP/Internet were born entirely from non-regulated information services parents.
I find that argument disingenuous. While VoIP and the information services were not regulated, the infrastructure was regulated - the phone lines that most people used to connect to their dial-up modems. All of the non-regulated services would never have been possible without the regulation, going all the way back to the Carterphone regulatory decision.
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Re: Re: Re: Fair and balanced...
You're mixing two different things here: VoIP is a service, the internet is an infrastructure. They are different things in kind and appropriate regulatory approach.
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Re: Re: Re: Fair and balanced...
I've outlined numerous times what I would see as a minimum requirement in order to increase competition in the US markets.
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Re: Fair and balanced...
You state twice that my story claims there will be no impact of Title II. That's not what I wrote. What I wrote is that the PPI is using worst-case scenarios and conflating some unrelated issues (the Congressional tax exemption expiration specifically) to vastly over-state potential taxation numbers and scare people, while the industry itself is being disingenuous.
Are you disagreeing with either of those statements?
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Hal Singer rebuttal of Free Press
https://haljsinger.wordpress.com/2014/12/03/flaws-in-free-presss-alternative-estimate-of-new-state-a nd-local-fees-attributable-to-reclassification/
You may remember this quote from Free Press' Derek Turner, "If members of Congress understood that the FCC is contemplating a broadband tax, they'd sit up and take notice," said Derek Turner, research director for Free Press, a consumer advocacy group that opposes the tax (http://thehill.com/policy/technology/245479-fcc-eyes-tax-on-internet-service).
Seems this fear - which echoes a regressive theme - is curiously missing in your piece. After all, if the b-band providers imposed (at least) a $4 billion fee / tax for their services, you'd be up in arms (as piece of your report hint at). But if the government does it, you go all cricket on us. C'mon.
Wonder what Turner thinks - I mean, Free Press basically admits taxes and fees are going up as a result of their reclassification push / FCC actions. BY BILLIONS!
We get in on the unfair and unbalanced stuff on your opinion page. That's fine. You have a stake in seeing Title II go through, and anything that questions those numerous assumption is hurtful to your argument. Fine.
Keep up the good work!
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Re: Hal Singer rebuttal of Free Press
Also, taking a broadband study from a think tank paid by AT&T to manipulate data as gospel -- but complaining that we're being "unfair and unbalanced" is just silly.
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Re: Re: Hal Singer rebuttal of Free Press
Thanks, Free Press.
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Re: Re: Re: Hal Singer rebuttal of Free Press
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Re: Hal Singer rebuttal of Free Press
FTFY, YW. ;D
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Title II sounded great
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Re:
Really, only an increase of $17? Even if the study was accurate (its not), an increase of $17 doesn't sound too bad when my rates keep going up, and service keeps getting worse, even without Title II.
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Re: Re: Re:
They're still screwing you over...just not in such a shady way (or an even more shady way by tacking on a fee, calling it a government tax, and then pocketing it themselves as the phone companies have done for ages with their universal service, E911 and other faux government fees that turn out to just be hidden profit lines.)
I'd much rather see the local loop become infrastructure that anyone can compete on, allowing businesses or government to lay the fiber infrastructure if they want, cutting out the cable/telecommunications company as the monopoly abuser.
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I have so many choices
(picture)
between Comcast and Dial-Up!
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Re:
I wonder how many people alive today have even seen a 300 baud modem. I once worked in a room full of them. The first time I downloaded Linux, it was over a 9600 bps modem (41 * 1.44 Mb floppies). For years, I was more than satisfied with ADSL (ca 400 K/sec).
Gb WiFi? Who needs it? The Netflix generation.
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Re: Re:
Seen one? I still own two Bell 103s that in a prior life I used regularly. Yes, I'm old.
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Re:
THUS, the rule of thumb: IF scumbag extortion artists are for something, best to be against it; IF they are against something, almost certainly better to be for it...
seriously, you almost do NOT have to do ANY legwork to figure this shit out and unravel all the rules and asterisks and bullshit figures from all sides: just see what the lying, thieving, scumbag korporations are asking for, and try to get the opposite...
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That's what real competition looks like.
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When did the cable companies care about our bills?
Suddenly it's "bad" when Title II requirements may (or may not) cause the bill to go up, but it's okay when the cable company arbitrarily raises rates? How about knocking a few dollars off the "mandatory fees" and then we'll talk.
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This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
Over the last few years, my internet service has gotten worse, rather than better. It has gone from 56Kbits to 33 Kbits. The 56 Kbit internet (v. 90 protocol) works sort of like a "poor man's DSL." When the signal reaches the telco switch, it needs to be captured and handled as data to be passed through to the ISP. Off-the-shelf DSLAM switches can do this without any difficulty, and can even provide better or worse levels of service by mere software. If someone no longer wants to pay for a given grade of service, the telephone company just keys in a command. They don't have to actually go out and dismantle anything. If you just run a voice channel through the switch, and out for a couple of miles to a computer center, then 33 Kbits is all you can do. Verizon's rent-seeking caused it to take a non-cooperative attitude with the state agency which is my ISP (*), and we dropped down to 33 Kbits.
(*) West Virginia Network for Educational Telecomputing (WVNET).
You may say that I should be dealing with the telephone company, instead of WVNET, but WVNET are civil servants, with the same standards of honor and integrity as the United States Postal Service. They do not think that they are entitled to insert advertisements in my e-mails, or to engage in any of the thousand and one other misdemeanors which automatically occur to the mind of someone like ComCast CEO Brian Roberts or AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson.
A reasonably fair adoption of new technology which didn't cost the telephone company very much (ie. DSLAM switches in the central office, two miles away) would have resulted in the new "vanilla" service being 768 Kbit DSL, on a Competitive Local Exchange Carrier basis. You can't download movies with that, but it is still reasonably useful. The telephone company would be entitled to earn higher rates by setting out switch cabinets closer to the customers. That would have been a reasonable balance between universal service, and the telephone company's desire to make many by selling most people a more expensive product. No such product has been forthcoming.
There is an optical cable which runs by the side of the building, about thirty feet from where I am sitting. I watched the workmen build it, a few years ago. BUT IT IS NOT FOR ME! It is en route to a couple of near-by office buildings.
Now, if I merely wanted to watch television, the situation would be quite different. Dish antennae are popping up on the roof-gables of the buildings like mushrooms. In fact, I think my apartment building has just been fitted for dish service.
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Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
You don't have to be out in the wilds, either. I live in a large metropolitan area, and while the speed of my internet service is faster, I am still locked into a single ISP (Comcast) that overcharges and engages in lots of nefarious activities.
I love how the major ISPs (and Mr. Berninger) focus on service speed as if that's the major issue driving net neutrality. It's not. The major issue driving net neutrality is unrelated to service speeds (and even service cost is down the list a few slots). The major issue is that the ISPs insist on messing with the traffic that travels over their pipes in various unfair and unacceptable ways.
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Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
I agree you should want and pursue an expansion of your connection to the Internet.
The argument is whether or not debating net neutrality and imposing Title II regulations on IP networks serves your cause.
A review of the 10 plus year net neutrality debate and an 80 year track record of Title II realms answers a unequivocal no.
Let's have the direct conversation about making America the most connected place on the planet.
It seems a good bet the most connected place on the planet will win the future.
Imposing new regulations on IP networks does not serve this cause.
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Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
No. Let's have a conversation about making America a place where you can have internet access without abuse and interference by the ISPs first.
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Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
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Re: Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
Hmmm "perhaps you should drop the canned PR-speak"
My PR credentials include:
MTS, Bell Labs
co-founder Free World Dialup with Jeff Pulver
co-founder VON Coaltion with Jeff Pulver
co-founder ITXC with Tom Evslin
co-founder Vonage with Jeff Pulver
and 20 years of opposition to regulation of the Internet.
Current day job involves pushing for a telecom version of the HDTV transition.
Dan
+1.202.250.3838
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Re: Re: Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
MTS, Bell Labs
co-founder Free World Dialup with Jeff Pulver
co-founder VON Coaltion with Jeff Pulver
co-founder ITXC with Tom Evslin
co-founder Vonage with Jeff Pulver
and 20 years of opposition to neutrality of the Internet.
FTFY, YW. };D
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Re: Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
Hmmm "perhaps you should drop the canned PR-speak"
My PR credentials include:
MTS, Bell Labs
co-founder Free World Dialup with Jeff Pulver
co-founder VON Coaltion with Jeff Pulver
co-founder ITXC with Tom Evslin
co-founder Vonage with Jeff Pulver
and 20 years of opposition to regulation of the Internet.
Current day job involves pushing for a telecom version of the HDTV transition.
Dan
+1.202.250.3838
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Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
Now, I would agree with you that local governments have a tendency to treat telecommunications as a slush fund. However, this is a matter of perceiving the telecommunications companies' corruption, a case of two crooks finding each other. If subscriber loops were owned and operated by the local water board, water boards have other means of finance than trying to find something expensive they could sell. For example, after an electoral referendum, they can set up special real estate tax districts to fund the construction of new storm sewers, and they supply water at an eminently reasonable marginal cost, on the order of a penny a gallon. I have heard of cases of "911" money being used to buy "police sundries," things like guns and batons and tasers. I don't think the police department would get very far if they tried that kind of thing on the local water district. The response would be: "build your own indoor swimming pool, and pay for it out of your own budget, and don't forget to pay your water bill."
Once the cost of subscriber loops is separated out, and the kickbacks suppressed, I can imagine a telephone bill being on the order of ten dollars a month, inclusive of megabit internet access and unlimited long-distance service. That is about all the "central network" parts of telephone service are worth.
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Re: Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
Having worked for a cable company, directly, for several years now, I have no faith whatsoever that they are interested in making America "the most connected place on the planet."
They are interested in two things - the bottom line, and whatever the shareholders are currently thinking.
Title II may not be the best answer, but trusting the ever larger corporate leadership with something as fundamentally important as the internet is a fool's errand.
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Re: This Is Not The Best Of All Possible Worlds, Daniel Berninger To The Contrary.
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Here's the thing. The service is worth only what I will pay for it. It doesn't have to be raised much further in cost and I will drop internet access. I like it but not THAT MUCH that I will continue to support on going price hikes.
If it were not quite so lucrative I am sure they would not be here. AT&T has the same problem as the other telcos in this. When you screw people enough, they've had enough.
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Omissions and Disclosure
The wild card is state and local taxes, which Free Press judges totally impossible and which Singer and Litan note are automatically applied to telecom services today under state and local law. These taxes will obviously be triggered by reclassification.
Bode tries to distract the reader with complaints about sneaky below the line fees that aren't affected by Title II at all.
Given that this article was dictated by Free Press - by the author's own admission - why omit their claim that Title II will increase user fees by $4B?
And for bonus points, given that the author claims the Singer/Litan study was dictated by AT&T - a claim that is offered without evidence - who pays the bills at TechDirt? Last I heard it was Google, but the tone of TechDirt's opinions suggest that Netflix and the hosting companies are in the mix now.
Can we have some disclosure please?
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TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
----------------------------------------------------
"U.S. consumers need only look at Europe, where "heavy-handed regulation has proven to deter investment and has hampered the delivery of products to customer," Marcus insisted."
-Rob Marcus (CEO Time Warner Cable)
------------------------------------------------------
I mean is it unfair to go after them when the setup is as easy as this?
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Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
What easy setup do you imagine you see in Marcus's remark?
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Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
US nationwide (except rural areas) broadband companies:
AT&T
Comcast
Time-Warner
UK nationwide (except rural areas) broadband companies:
BT
EE
Fuel
Plusnet
Post Office
Sky
TalkTalk
Virgin Media
And that's just the landline offerings, so I think my evidence is rather better than... Oh, you didn't offer any, did you? Like I said, strawman.
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Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
Now that's a strawman.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
The above statement clearly shows your obvious confusion. Care to restate? You know, being that pages load within three seconds on my Android, never mind landlines.
All the competitors are connected to BT's switches except Virgin, so they're just reselling the same service.
FTFY. You see, 'connected to' isn't the same as 'subsidiary of', so all of the true competitors I listed above are free to sell the same service for less money, which is why they're the competition. Now, are you gonna finally admit when you're just plain wrong, or are you gonna keep arguing with someone who has multiple cognitive disabilities and is still smarter than you?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
Together, BT, Sky, and Talk Talk have 90% of the UK DSL market,and it's all day same DSLAMs so that's nothing price competition. BT has asked Ofcom for a regulatory holiday for fiber, and they're not going to build without it.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
This is from an iPhone.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
152 Mbps - Virgin
76 Mbps - TalkTalk, PlusNet, BT, EE Fiber
38 Mbps - Direct Save Telecom, Sky Fiber, Zen Broadband.
17 Mbps - More then I care to count
The population of the Newcastle metro area is 1.65 million. The metro population of my market, Atlanta, is over 5 million. Here are my options
105 Mbps - Xfinity Comcast (I currently have 50 Mbps with a 300GB 'data threshold')
18 Mbps - AT&T Uverse
12 Mbps DSL - Earthlink, Verizon, Frontier, Century Link, Hughes
All my options are capped and pretty much double the price of everything offered in good old Newcastle.
Of course my personal favorite
Comcast 105 Mbps (300GB data threshold) - $89.99 per Month
Virgin 152 Mbps (uncapped) - $38.57 per month (yes in USD)
Number of providers over 18Mbps
Atlanta - 2
Newcastle -8
Just in case the link doesn't post here is the one I used to find the speeds and prices for the UK.
http://www.broadband.co.uk/checker/postcode:NE7+7FJ/sort:speed/direction:desc/limit:60/
Good day sir.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
Second, you're comparing one city to one city, which only has meaning for those two cities. If you want to compare policy models, you need to look at the databases for entire countries, such as Akamai and Cisco.
Third, you may or may not have caps in the UK, but in either case the amount of data transferred by the typical UK user is less than half the volume the typical American transfers. This reduces ISP cost in the UK.
Fourth, UK cities are more densely populated than US cities, so the costs of providing service are lower still in the UK.
The bottom line is that more Americans have access to speeds greater than 25 Mbps than do Britons, as a percentage of population. And yes, Americans do pay more for higher speeds, but that's largely because we can get them without building our own networks as they must do in rural Britain.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
Honestly it seems pretty far fetched that even on a bad day Virgins 152Mbps service would loose out to Comcast's 105Mbps (who is also very prone to 'bad days') or that 76Mbps would loose out to the 50Mbps service I get from Comcast (once again prone to bad days).
Finally I'm going to have to ask for the data usage statistics that require that data caps be practically mandatory stateside while completely unnecessary in the UK due to differences in average data consumption.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
Other parts seem to rely on using the pedestrian 4Mbps broadband standard to boost feel good wired US metrics, particularly for adoption rates.
The closest I found was mobile data usage which per your report between the US and UK certainly wasn't anything to write home about (1.8 vs 1.4 GB). Though much more substantial once you go towards the Germany, France portion of the graph which once again focuses on mobile data. In fact a significant portion of favorable statements in regards to US broadband focus heavily on mobile. Which would be encouraging if mobile was a viable candidate to replace wired connections in the near future but the laws of quantum physics is proving to be quite an opponent for such a crusade.
Most of all though your organization AEI seems to have a credibility problem. You've declared yourselves nonpartisan yet looking at your front page suggest an organization that is anything but. Honestly I had never heard or looked into your group specifically until today but your headlines from 2012 means I can't claim to not be familiar with your work. I could certainly respect right leaning but most definitely not nonpartisan.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
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Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
As for Europe there are more then enough stories out particularly those from wide eyes Americans shocked at how they were able to buy uncapped high speed internet from various providers at a fraction of what we pay stateside. Even more saddening when you see more of those stories coming from the former Soviet Bloc with each passing day.
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Re: Re: Re: TWC: Pot calling the kettle black
There's also no reason to be sad about the fact that some former Soviet bloc nations who never had cable or even decent telephone networks are finally getting their act together and installing some modern networks that use fiber, as everyone does in new networks today. But if you look closely you'll find the each of these networks is fast when it's brand new and has few users, but gets progressively slower as more people sign up and begin to actually use it. The quarterly Akamai measurements show this pattern in spades.
You're basically whining about US broadband because you're been wound up by blogs going after clicks with alarming headlines.
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Can the BS
Those large monolithic companies would never do anything to hurt their customers, right?
This is America, the authorities would never condone this right?
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Re: Can the BS
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