Chattanooga's super-fast publicly owned Internet
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@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
Actually this is probably the best situation for the citizens of that town.. .Only perhaps made better by allowing any and all ISP's to tap into that fabric to provide services (though that's probably impossible to separate out enough to not cause problems between vendors.
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@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
As it is a utility, I firmly believe that this is the only option under a free market. Any selling of public utilities to private companies has always been and logically can only be disaster. The city has a huge interest in massive success here in a way that no one else does.
Municipally owned power have been out performing private power for a century now. The model is well established.
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@Dashrender said:
@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
Actually this is probably the best situation for the citizens of that town.. .Only perhaps made better by allowing any and all ISP's to tap into that fabric to provide services (though that's probably impossible to separate out enough to not cause problems between vendors.
They could do that but it would be complex and raise the cost as they would need more infrastructure and security. Not sure that any benefit could be gained.
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They are listed as the fastest city in the Western Hemisphere. That's pretty big.
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@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
No....
Do you guys remember hearing about St. Cloud, Florida? Probably not, but they had the first (or one of the first) citywide Wifi networks. The little Podunk cow-town mismanaged the accomplishment they were so proud of and they ended up shutting it down. Chatonooga seems to know what they are doing. They sound like they aren't just throwing initial stimulus money at it, and it sounds like they are actually profiting from it.
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@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
I agree that this service shouldn't be subsidized by taxes, even so.. it should be cheaper than the open market because there's no need to make money!
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Imagine how good the VoIP is around town. The video calls from home to office. Work from home options!
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@Dashrender said:
@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
I agree that this service shouldn't be subsidized by taxes, even so.. it should be cheaper than the open market because there's no need to make money!
St. Cloud offered it free, but Chattanooga is offering a paid solution. Which in my opinion will make it work.
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I will be interested to see how this works long term.
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My hometown (Highland, IL) started a municiple Fiber project in 2010. Well that was initial build out the project started years before and included a voter referendum.
It was started because the phone companies did not want the town and the cable company never bothered to update the network. Because they had zero competition.
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@IRJ said:
@Dashrender said:
@RAM. said:
I have mixed feelings about this, its owned by the city, thus prices can be subsidized by taxes creating an unrealistically low price that the private sector has no way of competing with. Sounds good... could be good... I just don't know how I feel about the entire execution of it.
I agree that this service shouldn't be subsidized by taxes, even so.. it should be cheaper than the open market because there's no need to make money!
St. Cloud offered it free, but Chattanooga is offering a paid solution. Which in my opinion will make it work.
Both ways can work I think. Paid for levels can make sense. Although I like a free tier. Maybe just 1mb/s but something.
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we are going through this, but it's not provided by the municipality. A cell provider is building out fiber up the interstate, kicking comcast/att to the curb.
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Awesome, I hope the model works for them, and other cities try it too.
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@Dominica said:
Awesome, I hope the model works for them, and other cities try it too.
They aren't the first. One in Washington did it a decade ago. And Iceland did, if course.
