By that reasoning, I'm using the "Public right of way" to make this comment. Therefore, I'm a defendant.
Listen, I get it. They want some compensation from Netflix, Hulu and Disney+ eating up all their local bandwidth. But that's where the money was.
They need to skate where the money is going, not where it was. The money was in broadcast TV and cable. And most of it is still there. But it's rapidly being sucked away by individual creators.
And at some point advertisers are going to wake up and realize the premium that broadcast and cable operators are charging per 1000 viewers is not really worth that much more than what YouTube pays Jake Paul.
> Listen, I get it. They want some compensation from Netflix, Hulu and Disney+ eating up all their local bandwidth.
I don't get it. Presumably the companies involved are already paying for the bandwidth they're using, as are their customers. How are they any different from other internet users sending around video?
> And at some point advertisers are going to wake up and realize the premium that broadcast and cable operators are charging per 1000 viewers is not really worth that much more than what YouTube pays Jake Paul.
Tangential: I was watching free to air last night with my 7 year old (we both never watch TV) and she innocently asked “does everyone watching this show see the same ad”. I said yes and the look on her face said it all. Even at 7 she knew that non-targeted ads are stupid
The only discussion if current laws /FCC guidelines allow this taxation. There's no logic in a lot of taxes, they just add them cause they need revenue. If one day we all move away from home internet, they'll tax mobile internet to make up for the loss.
It's the capitalistic viewpoint that these people have that grieves me; internet should be considered a utility, everyone should have access to it, it should be affordable, and net neutrality should be guaranteed.
I mean you don't get multiple water lines for different purposes... actually don't quote me on that, they could have a 'grey' water line to use for flushing toilets and the like. But my point is, you get a connection to the water mains, as long as you don't use excessive water (and even if you do, you "just" pay for your usage), what you do with it is nobody's business. Same with electricity.
This reminds me of the DR (Denmarks Radio - which is also a Public TV sort of like the BBC) license, you used to have to pay it for TV. I didn't have a tv so I stopped paying. Then a year or two later they passed a law that if you had a computer you had to pay.
I guess lots of European countries have a similar license.
They are phasing the license out in the next couple years, but it used to really piss me off because I never watched anything on DR but I still had to pay for it (ok I did accidentally see things if I was over at people's houses, it was nothing impressive). The assumption being of course that it was a public good.
NHK in Japan has a similar scheme. If you have a TV you have to pay. If you have a phone that can receive TV signal, you have to pay. They'd even send people in person to "check if you have a TV". I believe they recently lost a court case on this.
In Finland there is a media tax that is taken out of everyone's salary. I don't think it's optional. I've never paid close enough attention to care. I think it subsidises our state broadcaster YLE and perhaps some other things. Maybe a Finn can chip in and explain...
> The public broadcasting tax, also known as the Yle tax, replaced the license fee in 2013. The tax ranges from 50 euros to 140 euros per person and per year, depending on income. Minors and persons with low income are exempt from the tax.
Yeah, France has the "redevance télé". You have to explicitly refuse any cable service from your ISP in order not to pay it. Otherwise you're screwed. And its cost is significant, I will never pay for such thing.
I just wanted it to be financed through taxes as it used to be.
It was completely ridiculous; after switching to a licensing model, DR’s costs for raking in money went up by about 15 million DKK just in fees to lawyers, if memory serves correctly.
Because of the shift in how people use TV and public access channels, in the Netherlands they simplified the whole scheme, got rid of the TV license entirely and just pay the public broadcasters through the regular state budget - e.g. "regular" taxes. It just saves a ton of headaches and complexity. I'm not "smol government" or whatever, but I do think laws and the like can be simplified by a lot.
In a similar vein, they simplified tax brackets for last year, instead of four brackets, there's now just two, and most people ended up paying less taxes (see https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/belastingplan/belas... for an infographic; keep in mind that while the lowest incomes do pay a little more taxes, they also get more money back from the government in stipends and subsidies for e.g. rent, health insurance, and a fixed 'discount' on taxes)
In Swedish 90s, there was a public information campaign series with vigilante kids putting a snail on the eye of people who don't pay their TV license.
I think everyone who was around then recognize the reference "Do you want a snail on your eye?"
That is still the case in Ireland. It’s called a TV license. It’s an annual fee, that you have to pay as long as you have a TV, regardless of whether you use it for watching terrestrial TV or not. They even have a crew of inspectors who go around randomly knocking on doors to check if people are paying it.
Germany had TV or Radio, (every car got a radio...). Today it is per household, independent what you own.
As a student, unemployed or otherwise paid from the state it isn't a problem, you let them pay it. But if you are single, you have to pay the 210€/yr on your own.
Up until two or three years ago or so we used to have to pay a public TV license for the public TV and radio broadcaster in Norway if we had a TV or tuner capable of receiving TV signals. Some people just opted to not having TVs or disabling any receiver capabilities.
Then they simply moved the collection of the license to your taxes so you don't see it explicitly, and of course now it does not matter if you don't have a TV.
Everyone pays the TV tax regardless, but it is somewhat progressive with low income residents paying somewhat less than higher income ones. I don't really mind paying for the public broadcaster as they serve as a guarantee for public, independent news.
What does annoy me is that they compete for the rights to broadcast super expensive sports and culture events (olympics, various football leagues, eurovision, etc). This greatly increases their budgets while not providing essential news value to the public not equally well served by private media broadcasters. Some of their own tv-series productions are well made and would not get the green light at private broadcasters and channels, so I would rather they focus on those.
Kinda reminds me a bit of how Milwaukee wanted money from Pokémon Go because the players was playing in the local park and some even went off the path so they were arguing the app is responsible for plants and stuff being damaged. The city lost but had to pay $83,000 in attorney fees. I think it's a bit of a overreach that a city in Indiana is trying to regulate a company in California.
I know Ohio cities can have franchise fees for cable too, wonder if the regulation is city by city or all based around the same state law... If Netflix had to follow that, I guess they'd have to have a army of lawyers review each city one by one keeping a database, filing paper work, etc. 50 states, multiplied by hundred of cities. Sounds like a massive mess. Maybe if you are the only person in a town of a few thousand watching Netflix, wouldn't be worth all the extra administration work. So wonder if maybe only the big cites would get Netflix then?
Satellite has also faced the problem of being treated differently too. I know in Florida Satellite they charge a higher tax rate compared to cable but that's state wide from my understanding, since they don't have the local equipment and as many employees to maintain the infrastructure. Well both cable and satellite has installers, etc but they could very well be contractors but still putting people to work locally.
Then I know some areas try to require a permit for satellite TV and the FCC sued cities over that because of the Over-the-Air Reception Devices (“OTARD”) rule or limit the number of satellites to 1. I have Dish at home and for some reason they installed 2 satellite dishes pointing at a slight different angle than the other one. I guess some cities and HOAs think satellites are ugly too. Some still have these ordinances on the book, so surprised cities haven't removed them... Then again in some states same sex marriage is still illegal on the books too like Ohio and Tennessee, but you know they can't enforce that anymore either because of the supreme court. I guess the problem is in Ohio marriage is defined in the state constitution, so it'd take a convention to change it but I guess not a priority even though it's kinda symbolic even if no longer law. Virginia did the same, but 2020 they passed updates at least - 5 years after the ruling.
This can only be the first step. Since this is a political move, why not change the law and restructure taxes? It's difficult for cities to tax value creation if that value is created globally, in a data centre, somewhere on the planet.
Why should the city that just happens to host the data centre be able to tax the profits that are created in that data centre? Or worse, why should a company choose any city for its headquarters and pretend that the value is created there?
On a global scale, which society or political entity should have the right to tax profits that are created on the internet? How should cities be financed if most of the commerce in the city happens on the internet, outside of the city limits?
Any specific suggestions for how technology can cut municipal costs?
Most of the fat in municipal spending tends to be political (pork) or criminal (public corruption and/or organized crime), rather than due to process inefficiencies that could be remedied through better use of technology.
Municipal spending tends to be dominated by the kinds of inherently labor-intensive services that can't readily be automated. Automation isn't going to have much of an impact in the number of people needed for firefighting, garbage collection, or to run and maintain urban water, sewer, electrical, and road networks anytime soon. Automation in policing is another huge civil liberties problem best left untouched.
Urban government costs money and municipal tax grab attempts like this are either evidence of greed (and/or corruption) or inadequate funding models. These are political, rather than technological, problems.
It seems to me that government doesn't want you to figure out how much taxes they are actualy charging, so they split it up as much as possible. Also, when they want to increase taxes, they prefer to tax something new instead of increasing existing percentages.
Here in Belgium it goes as far as taxing for "surface water". I'm waiting for the day when they start taxing the air we breathe.
Yeah, what next Spotify tax for music broadcast? Freaking city mafias and the politicians running them, tax anything that has revenues. A political upheaval is impending.
Ars doesn't seem to have a good analysis on this. They have a quote from the lawsuit that says nothing about Netflix being a cable operator. Then Ars goes and says that Netflix is not a cable operator. They link to the relevant Indiana law, which again, says nothing about cable TV.
Here is what the law in question says:
> IC 8-1-34-14 "Video service"
Sec. 14. (a) As used in this chapter, "video service" means:
(1) the transmission to subscribers of video programming and other programming service:
(A) through facilities located at least in part in a public right-of-way; and
(B) without regard to the technology used to deliver the video programming or other programming service; and
(2) any subscriber interaction required for the selection or use of the video programming or other programming service.
(b) The term does not include commercial mobile service (as defined in 47 U.S.C. 332).
So really, the question hinges on part (A). If Netflix delivers video to the residents of these cities and at least part of it goes through a public right-of-way, then Netflix provides a Video Service in the state of Indiana and is subject to the taxes on video services. That's really it.
Now, a quick web search shows me that at least one of the cities in this lawsuit operates a municipal dark fiber network that businesses can rent access to. So if I get my home internet from Comcast and Comcast uses this municipal fiber network (why wouldn't they, if it's cheaper than doing it on their own?), then all of a sudden Netflix is a Video Service. And if I'm Comcast, I'm thrilled to stick it to them!
Is it like video watching tax? So what about people watching personal videos, and those shared through messaging apps or any video. The cities are looking for pathetic ways to tax its citizens, next what Anyone listening to music on radio or Spotify would be taxed?
Traditional cable TV you would sit on a sofa and flip through channels with a remote control, yes, but your typical Comcast/Charter/Wave/RCN type cable multiservice operator is morphing into a DOCIS3/DOCSIS3.1 or GPON fiber based last mile DIA ISP.
The cable tv operators care about their municipal franchise agreements and aerial pole+underground right of way very much, since it gives them an incumbent ISP operating position over a large geographical area.
I should note that cable TV operators in a given city might have many different types of last mile architecture. Some of which can be taxed by the city, and some of which cannot. There's cable TV operators with their wholly-owned wood utility poles installed in the ROW (right of way), there's operators where they occupy a strand on a municipal electrical grid operator's poles, there's operators which are on poles shared 3-way between electrical grid operator, local telco, and cable TV. In newer housing developments some might occupy their own fully underground ducts between handholes and manholes with the ducts in the ROW. Or the ducts might be in land owned by HOAs. It depends very much on the history of how the analog cable TV system in a city got built out in the 1970s and 1980s and other factors.
In places that are unfortunate enough to lack real competition between the cable TV operator and the local phone company for last-mile, it can give an operator a near monopoly advantage. For instance you might be able to get 200 Mbps downstream service from Comcast while the local phone company can only offer 10Mbps ADSL2+.
Some smart people at the local phone company probably have your area on a map targeted for a single-strand to the home GPON FTTH overbuild, but accomplishing that in the near future is either limited by budget concerns or lack of manpower/bucket truck, lineman and splicer crews to accomplish it.
On the part of the city that might be bringing in 450,000 dollars a year in cable TV franchise tax revenue, it's such a short sighted move. Yes, maybe your cable TV franchise tax will continue to drop, as more people disconnect cable tv (taxed) and move to pure internet services (not taxed).
But the economic benefit to a city of having multiple, overlapping competing gigabit-class services to the end user is greater than the tax revenue. For instance the parts of Seattle right now where you can work from home and have your choice of centurylink (telco ILEC) GPON 1Gbps FTTH, or 1Gbps DOCSIS3.1 or GPON from Wave or Comcast.
It probably depends on the type of ISP you have and whether or not they use the public right-of-way. I'm going to guess that most ISPs pay it in the US simply because most folks get their internet from the phone or cable company. If you happen to have satellite internet of any sort, though, or another form of wireless, probably not.
It seems on HN, that a lot of people are in favor of municipal owned last mile fiber as opposed to ISPs. However, this case makes me wonder if that becomes the case, would we eventually see more shenanigans like this with cities and towns trying to charge internet services for access to their citizens. Without competition, I could see them becoming even worse than AT&T and Comcast.
I guess it all comes down to the intention behind the action, and then what opportunities are offered as a result of the action down the track. Do you trust them now? Can you trust them in the future? Are they more or less likely to screw you than the big comms mono/duo-poly?
Municipality A may have initiated ISP infrastructure contract for the actual benefit of it's constituents against the comms mono/duo-poly. Hurrah for Municipality A sticking it to the man and looking out for the constituency.
X years down the track, Municipality A needs funding for corrupt members yacht or office chesterfield reupholstering. Hey, we're practically giving away broadband compared to the comms mono/duo-poly and prices have increased way below CPI the last few years, let's bump it up to (artificial) market-competitive, woo!
> It seems on HN, that a lot of people are in favor of municipal owned last mile fiber as opposed to ISPs.
Yes, and this is really quite silly when an independent fiber co-op would serve the same function with a very similar governing structure and responsibility toward its members without the obvious conflict of interest that comes with having the municipal government as your ISP. The only "advantages" a government-run ISP has over a co-op have to do with abusing their monopoly over the local right-of-way and powers of taxation to favor their own service over any potential competition.
Citation needed; cable / internet companies LOVE the idea of them being able to get money from both consumers and content providers like Netflix. Facebook wanted to make its own internet in areas with low internet penetration where people had to pay for non-Facebook traffic. I'm sure it's the same with a lot of other tech companies.
[+] [-] eric4smith|5 years ago|reply
Listen, I get it. They want some compensation from Netflix, Hulu and Disney+ eating up all their local bandwidth. But that's where the money was.
They need to skate where the money is going, not where it was. The money was in broadcast TV and cable. And most of it is still there. But it's rapidly being sucked away by individual creators.
And at some point advertisers are going to wake up and realize the premium that broadcast and cable operators are charging per 1000 viewers is not really worth that much more than what YouTube pays Jake Paul.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
I don't get it. Presumably the companies involved are already paying for the bandwidth they're using, as are their customers. How are they any different from other internet users sending around video?
[+] [-] alfiedotwtf|5 years ago|reply
Tangential: I was watching free to air last night with my 7 year old (we both never watch TV) and she innocently asked “does everyone watching this show see the same ad”. I said yes and the look on her face said it all. Even at 7 she knew that non-targeted ads are stupid
[+] [-] onetimemanytime|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adrianmonk|5 years ago|reply
This is the city governments suing, so I don't think they're concerned about the ISPs' bandwidth being used up. That's not really their problem.
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|5 years ago|reply
I mean you don't get multiple water lines for different purposes... actually don't quote me on that, they could have a 'grey' water line to use for flushing toilets and the like. But my point is, you get a connection to the water mains, as long as you don't use excessive water (and even if you do, you "just" pay for your usage), what you do with it is nobody's business. Same with electricity.
[+] [-] andy_ppp|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bryanrasmussen|5 years ago|reply
I guess lots of European countries have a similar license.
They are phasing the license out in the next couple years, but it used to really piss me off because I never watched anything on DR but I still had to pay for it (ok I did accidentally see things if I was over at people's houses, it was nothing impressive). The assumption being of course that it was a public good.
Anyway - sub-regional pricing for Netflix etc.
[+] [-] hkmurakami|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deanclatworthy|5 years ago|reply
> The public broadcasting tax, also known as the Yle tax, replaced the license fee in 2013. The tax ranges from 50 euros to 140 euros per person and per year, depending on income. Minors and persons with low income are exempt from the tax.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yle#:~:text=Yle%20tax,-Main%20....
[+] [-] aikah|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] undreren|5 years ago|reply
It was completely ridiculous; after switching to a licensing model, DR’s costs for raking in money went up by about 15 million DKK just in fees to lawyers, if memory serves correctly.
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|5 years ago|reply
In a similar vein, they simplified tax brackets for last year, instead of four brackets, there's now just two, and most people ended up paying less taxes (see https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/belastingplan/belas... for an infographic; keep in mind that while the lowest incomes do pay a little more taxes, they also get more money back from the government in stipends and subsidies for e.g. rent, health insurance, and a fixed 'discount' on taxes)
[+] [-] Legogris|5 years ago|reply
I think everyone who was around then recognize the reference "Do you want a snail on your eye?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yK0R-N0w8-Q
[+] [-] woadwarrior01|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bebna|5 years ago|reply
As a student, unemployed or otherwise paid from the state it isn't a problem, you let them pay it. But if you are single, you have to pay the 210€/yr on your own.
[+] [-] srg0|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] snorremd|5 years ago|reply
Then they simply moved the collection of the license to your taxes so you don't see it explicitly, and of course now it does not matter if you don't have a TV.
Everyone pays the TV tax regardless, but it is somewhat progressive with low income residents paying somewhat less than higher income ones. I don't really mind paying for the public broadcaster as they serve as a guarantee for public, independent news.
What does annoy me is that they compete for the rights to broadcast super expensive sports and culture events (olympics, various football leagues, eurovision, etc). This greatly increases their budgets while not providing essential news value to the public not equally well served by private media broadcasters. Some of their own tv-series productions are well made and would not get the green light at private broadcasters and channels, so I would rather they focus on those.
[+] [-] Keverw|5 years ago|reply
I know Ohio cities can have franchise fees for cable too, wonder if the regulation is city by city or all based around the same state law... If Netflix had to follow that, I guess they'd have to have a army of lawyers review each city one by one keeping a database, filing paper work, etc. 50 states, multiplied by hundred of cities. Sounds like a massive mess. Maybe if you are the only person in a town of a few thousand watching Netflix, wouldn't be worth all the extra administration work. So wonder if maybe only the big cites would get Netflix then?
Satellite has also faced the problem of being treated differently too. I know in Florida Satellite they charge a higher tax rate compared to cable but that's state wide from my understanding, since they don't have the local equipment and as many employees to maintain the infrastructure. Well both cable and satellite has installers, etc but they could very well be contractors but still putting people to work locally.
Then I know some areas try to require a permit for satellite TV and the FCC sued cities over that because of the Over-the-Air Reception Devices (“OTARD”) rule or limit the number of satellites to 1. I have Dish at home and for some reason they installed 2 satellite dishes pointing at a slight different angle than the other one. I guess some cities and HOAs think satellites are ugly too. Some still have these ordinances on the book, so surprised cities haven't removed them... Then again in some states same sex marriage is still illegal on the books too like Ohio and Tennessee, but you know they can't enforce that anymore either because of the supreme court. I guess the problem is in Ohio marriage is defined in the state constitution, so it'd take a convention to change it but I guess not a priority even though it's kinda symbolic even if no longer law. Virginia did the same, but 2020 they passed updates at least - 5 years after the ruling.
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|5 years ago|reply
Parks are public spaces and they should both applaud and put a bit more money into them for what Pokemon Go managed to achieve.
[+] [-] mvn9|5 years ago|reply
Why should the city that just happens to host the data centre be able to tax the profits that are created in that data centre? Or worse, why should a company choose any city for its headquarters and pretend that the value is created there?
On a global scale, which society or political entity should have the right to tax profits that are created on the internet? How should cities be financed if most of the commerce in the city happens on the internet, outside of the city limits?
[+] [-] shidima|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MattGaiser|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bleepblorp|5 years ago|reply
Most of the fat in municipal spending tends to be political (pork) or criminal (public corruption and/or organized crime), rather than due to process inefficiencies that could be remedied through better use of technology.
Municipal spending tends to be dominated by the kinds of inherently labor-intensive services that can't readily be automated. Automation isn't going to have much of an impact in the number of people needed for firefighting, garbage collection, or to run and maintain urban water, sewer, electrical, and road networks anytime soon. Automation in policing is another huge civil liberties problem best left untouched.
Urban government costs money and municipal tax grab attempts like this are either evidence of greed (and/or corruption) or inadequate funding models. These are political, rather than technological, problems.
[+] [-] onetimemanytime|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] koonsolo|5 years ago|reply
Here in Belgium it goes as far as taxing for "surface water". I'm waiting for the day when they start taxing the air we breathe.
[+] [-] Solocomplex|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dr-detroit|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] chmod600|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] boring_twenties|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smabie|5 years ago|reply
Sounds kind of pathetic, tbh.
[+] [-] pankajdoharey|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] OldHand2018|5 years ago|reply
Ars doesn't seem to have a good analysis on this. They have a quote from the lawsuit that says nothing about Netflix being a cable operator. Then Ars goes and says that Netflix is not a cable operator. They link to the relevant Indiana law, which again, says nothing about cable TV.
Here is what the law in question says: > IC 8-1-34-14 "Video service" Sec. 14. (a) As used in this chapter, "video service" means: (1) the transmission to subscribers of video programming and other programming service: (A) through facilities located at least in part in a public right-of-way; and (B) without regard to the technology used to deliver the video programming or other programming service; and (2) any subscriber interaction required for the selection or use of the video programming or other programming service. (b) The term does not include commercial mobile service (as defined in 47 U.S.C. 332).
So really, the question hinges on part (A). If Netflix delivers video to the residents of these cities and at least part of it goes through a public right-of-way, then Netflix provides a Video Service in the state of Indiana and is subject to the taxes on video services. That's really it.
Now, a quick web search shows me that at least one of the cities in this lawsuit operates a municipal dark fiber network that businesses can rent access to. So if I get my home internet from Comcast and Comcast uses this municipal fiber network (why wouldn't they, if it's cheaper than doing it on their own?), then all of a sudden Netflix is a Video Service. And if I'm Comcast, I'm thrilled to stick it to them!
[+] [-] pankajdoharey|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 2squirrels|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] walrus01|5 years ago|reply
The cable tv operators care about their municipal franchise agreements and aerial pole+underground right of way very much, since it gives them an incumbent ISP operating position over a large geographical area.
I should note that cable TV operators in a given city might have many different types of last mile architecture. Some of which can be taxed by the city, and some of which cannot. There's cable TV operators with their wholly-owned wood utility poles installed in the ROW (right of way), there's operators where they occupy a strand on a municipal electrical grid operator's poles, there's operators which are on poles shared 3-way between electrical grid operator, local telco, and cable TV. In newer housing developments some might occupy their own fully underground ducts between handholes and manholes with the ducts in the ROW. Or the ducts might be in land owned by HOAs. It depends very much on the history of how the analog cable TV system in a city got built out in the 1970s and 1980s and other factors.
In places that are unfortunate enough to lack real competition between the cable TV operator and the local phone company for last-mile, it can give an operator a near monopoly advantage. For instance you might be able to get 200 Mbps downstream service from Comcast while the local phone company can only offer 10Mbps ADSL2+.
Some smart people at the local phone company probably have your area on a map targeted for a single-strand to the home GPON FTTH overbuild, but accomplishing that in the near future is either limited by budget concerns or lack of manpower/bucket truck, lineman and splicer crews to accomplish it.
On the part of the city that might be bringing in 450,000 dollars a year in cable TV franchise tax revenue, it's such a short sighted move. Yes, maybe your cable TV franchise tax will continue to drop, as more people disconnect cable tv (taxed) and move to pure internet services (not taxed).
But the economic benefit to a city of having multiple, overlapping competing gigabit-class services to the end user is greater than the tax revenue. For instance the parts of Seattle right now where you can work from home and have your choice of centurylink (telco ILEC) GPON 1Gbps FTTH, or 1Gbps DOCSIS3.1 or GPON from Wave or Comcast.
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] qppo|5 years ago|reply
If so the court is probably going to frown on double dipping.
[+] [-] Broken_Hippo|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RcouF1uZ4gsC|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] BLKNSLVR|5 years ago|reply
Municipality A may have initiated ISP infrastructure contract for the actual benefit of it's constituents against the comms mono/duo-poly. Hurrah for Municipality A sticking it to the man and looking out for the constituency.
X years down the track, Municipality A needs funding for corrupt members yacht or office chesterfield reupholstering. Hey, we're practically giving away broadband compared to the comms mono/duo-poly and prices have increased way below CPI the last few years, let's bump it up to (artificial) market-competitive, woo!
[+] [-] nybble41|5 years ago|reply
Yes, and this is really quite silly when an independent fiber co-op would serve the same function with a very similar governing structure and responsibility toward its members without the obvious conflict of interest that comes with having the municipal government as your ISP. The only "advantages" a government-run ISP has over a co-op have to do with abusing their monopoly over the local right-of-way and powers of taxation to favor their own service over any potential competition.
[+] [-] amelius|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amelius|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ketzu|5 years ago|reply