en102
Canadian, eh?
join:2001-01-26
Valencia, CA |  ILECs with competition
I'm sure the ILEC's will love that idea...more competition.
The USF needs proper regulation to be effective... and I don't think it will ever happen. |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| Good Idea
It's a good idea, makes nice talk, and the reform side of it is only about the 12th time I've heard this in 20 years.
Using it for broadband isn't new either--we're on about the 4th cycle for that idea in the last 6 or 7 years....
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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ColorBASIC
8-bit Fun
Premium
join:2006-12-29
Corona, CA | 'Cause we know how good the USF is
No waste there so let's throw more money at it.  |
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supergirl
join:2007-03-20
Pensacola, FL
 ·Cox VOIP
·Skype
 ·Cox HSI
 ·AT&T Southeast
·magicjack.com
| reply to calvoiper
Re: Good Idea
HOW ABOUT GETTING RID OF IT!!!
It is a rip-off!
Giving companies a reason to invest in an area is one thing; giving them money from my pocket to do it is something else. The USF is corporate welfare.
If you live in the middle of nowhere because you like nature, why do you need broadband?
How about not letting companies cherrypick? |
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BF69
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN
| said by supergirl  :HOW ABOUT GETTING RID OF IT!!! That's not going to happen to so let's deal with realty and see how we can fix the problem? The USF was intended for rural areas to have phone service. Well everywhere has had phone service for 40 years.
How about not letting companies cherrypick?
Please. Get off that. |
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hescominsoon
join:2003-02-18
Brunswick, MD
·Comcast
·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to supergirl
said by supergirl :HOW ABOUT GETTING RID OF IT!!! It is a rip-off! Giving companies a reason to invest in an area is one thing; giving them money from my pocket to do it is something else. The USF is corporate welfare. If you live in the middle of nowhere because you like nature, why do you need broadband? How about not letting companies cherrypick? since the funds you are complaining about are mostly private they can spend those private funds however they wish. Their deployment will be via the highest ROI. Lest you want to go to socialism/communism...look at the ussr for how that turned out. |
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PDXPLT
join:2003-12-04
Banks, OR
| reply to supergirl
said by supergirl :If you live in the middle of nowhere because you like nature, why do you need broadband? Or that's certainly the stereotype many urban residents have. Since that's why they would live in a rural area, they assume that's why everyone else lives there.
There are in fact lots of reasons why people live in rural areas. Most of them are job related. 'can't exactly grow crops or raise livestock in the city.
And since the FCC is mandated by law (1996 Telecomm Act) to see to it that broadband is made available to everyone, it's something they are required to do.
IMHO, the current USF, intended to make basic telephony available in high-cost areas, is mostly obselete, and should be scaled back/eliminated. Even in most rural areas, most people have more than one source for telephone service, if one includes mobile phone operators.
Not so for broadband; there are still millions without any options. Some replacement for the USF, targetted at rural broadband, is probably going to be needed if the FCC is going to comply with the Telecomm Act. They should take a look at what other countries have done; maybe there are learnings to be had, rather than just repeating the mistakes of old USF. |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| reply to BF69
said by BF69 :... Well everywhere has had phone service for 40 years. ... Not quite true. There are still large areas of California (mostly mountainous, some desert) that have no "assigned" telco and no telephone service, except satellite, is available at all.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to calvoiper
said by calvoiper :It's a good idea, makes nice talk, and the reform side of it is only about the 12th time I've heard this in 20 years. Well, for the past 28 years this country has been allowing itself to be fooled into believing that you can get something for nothing. This has resulted in a sea change in US government. Followers of this ridiculous dogma have decided to replace nuclear physicists with movie actors, great thinkers with great drinkers, and so forth.
Although there have been brief moments of clarity, any progress that was made during those moments has been wiped out by obsessive backpedaling. Still there is hope. There is an ancient but powerful form of communications known as "the letter". Although there are but a few practitioners of this lost art remaining, it is easy to master. Those who have clarity of mind, force of will and the correct postage can use the letter to communicate their wishes to people in the Capitol.
If everybody who reads this went and learned the lost art of the letter, and then used it to communicate their desires regarding the USF to people at the Capitol, those people can take all of the letters, and go forth from the Capitol to the USDA and cast mighty spells that the USDA cannot resist. If you repeat this process as faithfully as most Americans have practiced their "something for nothing" dogma, you might see more change in 20 months than in 20 years. |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| reply to PDXPLT
Let's see:
In rural areas, Internet access is often cumbersome, slow, and expensive. Although speedy high priced Internet Access is available at high cost (satellite), there is a perceived need to subsidize Internet access so more people can use it quickly.
In urban areas, automobile parking is often cumbersome, slow, and expensive. Although speedy high priced parking is available at high cost (valet), there is NO perceived need to subsidize parking so more people can use it quickly.
Why is that? And are we going to try to pass along to every rural resident the benefits of urban life, and vice-versa?
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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roamer1
sticking it out at you
join:2001-03-24
Atlanta, GA
clubs:
1 edit | reply to calvoiper
said by calvoiper :There are still large areas of California (mostly mountainous, some desert) that have no "assigned" telco and no telephone service, except satellite, is available at all. It isn't just California -- there are areas of Louisiana, Washington state, and even Michigan that only recently (as in "the past couple of years" got phone service.
-SC
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"Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today. There might be a law against it by that time." -/usr/games/fortune |
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marigolds
Gainfully employed, finally
Premium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
| reply to supergirl
said by supergirl :If you live in the middle of nowhere because you like nature, why do you need broadband? The vast majority of people live in the middle of nowhere because they have few or no ability to move.
Our country developed on rural expansion. When rural economies died in the 1980s, many people were left essentially stranded with no way to improve their economic position from generation to generation and no resources (financial or social capital) to pull up and move.
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ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher |
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marigolds
Gainfully employed, finally
Premium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
| reply to calvoiper
said by calvoiper :In urban areas, automobile parking is often cumbersome, slow, and expensive. Although speedy high priced parking is available at high cost (valet), there is NO perceived need to subsidize parking so more people can use it quickly. Parking is routinely heavily subsidized.
That is the whole point of public transit and park'n'rides.
(Not to mention public parking ramps.)
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher |
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PolarBear
The bear formerly known as aaron8301
Premium
join:2005-01-03
·CableOne
| reply to en102
Re: ILECs with competition
said by en102 :I'm sure the ILEC's will love that idea...more competition. How would it be competition? ILECs (or anyone, for that matter) do not provide broadband to rural areas. Rural broadband is a contradiction in terms.
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A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention, with the possible exceptions of handguns and Tequilla. -- Mitch Ratcliffe |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| reply to marigolds
Re: Good Idea
Wrong. Parking is subsidized in the SUBURBAN areas to encourage transit use. In the URBAN areas, it's taxed to discourage driving.
And in any event, whatever parking subsidies you may dredge up, they are LOCAL, not a huge national slush fund used to prop up parking companies with multi-state operations.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| reply to marigolds
said by marigolds :...The vast majority of people live in the middle of nowhere because they have few or no ability to move. ... That statement is both false and a gratuitous insult to the true vast majority of people in rural areas, who are living where they choose to live. Just because an area may not be the urban oasis of Manhattan (or the university/Hewlett-Packard cocoon of Corvalis) doesn't mean that all of its inhabitants find it as undesirable as you would.
Gee, if financial destitution was the reason people lived in the boonies, it would seem that they would have a large homeless population. Instead, the truly destitute seem to congregate in urban areas.
I grew up in a rural area. Both poor and not-poor people move to the city. Rural economies have been withering since World War II or before--not just since 1980. And before you call rural folks "stranded", spend some time with folks who live in urban housing projects.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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Sammer
join:2005-12-22
Canonsburg, PA | reply to roamer1
Those areas aren't exactly where most of the USF money is going are they? |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| No, and that's the point--reform, not talk, is needed.
If the abuses are so great that the program needs to be killed rather than reformed, so be it--but that doesn't justify a false argument that the program isn't needed at all because "everywhere has had phone service for 40 years", because not everywhere has.
Just because you're sure you're right doesn't mean you can conjure up facts that aren't true to support your side.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! |
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marigolds
Gainfully employed, finally
Premium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
| reply to calvoiper
said by calvoiper :said by marigolds :...The vast majority of people live in the middle of nowhere because they have few or no ability to move. ... That statement is both false and a gratuitous insult to the true vast majority of people in rural areas, who are living where they choose to live. I lived in south Chicago for 9 years and Eastern Iowa for 10 years. I also have studied Geography, including extensive population geography, for 8 years.
I think I have a better idea of what I am talking about.
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to calvoiper
said by calvoiper :In rural areas, Internet access is often cumbersome, slow, and expensive. Although speedy high priced Internet Access is available at high cost (satellite), there is a perceived need to subsidize Internet access so more people can use it quickly. In urban areas, automobile parking is often cumbersome, slow, and expensive. Although speedy high priced parking is available at high cost (valet), there is NO perceived need to subsidize parking so more people can use it quickly. Why is that? That's simple. In urban areas, a car is a luxury, not a necessity. It's quicker and easier to walk a few blocks than it is to drive. There's also a massive public transportation infrastructure in the cities. And still more people pour in every day, bringing more and bigger cars with them. The subsidy is there--it's public transportation.
Cars in cities is more analogous to the private radio systems (complete with phone patches) that wealthy farmers used back in the days when a lot of farmhouses were still on party lines, and many of those lines had a primary function of being fence wire. Today it's hard to find an analogy, because it's cheaper to erect a single cell tower to cover an entire rural county than it is to maintain land lines. Developing countries are skipping right past land lines, and are deploying wireless phone and Internet systems in places that had nothing but the occasional shortwave radio before. But rural cellular phone service doesn't have the 3G Internet that the cities have. There's not enough bandwidth coming in to support it on a scale that could be amortized before needing replacement. |
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