jaminus
join:2004-10-14
Arlington, VA | reply to morbo
Re: McDowell uses what (usually) works: FEAR McDowell's language was surely inflammatory, and probably unjustifiably so. But in the net neutrality debate, everybody--from the "public interest" groups like Free Press to the telcos themselves--is using powerful language to describe complicated concepts to the masses.
In a sense, McDowell does have a point, though. Look at the history of regulation as it applies to private infrastructure. Once politicians start meddling with competitive forces, the status-quo is entrenched at the expense of progress. Consider Plain Old Telephone Service, which remained largely stagnant for decades on account of Ma Bell's entrenched monopoly status.
Will the Internet "grind to a halt" if the FCC rules against Comcast? Not likely. But if providers lose the right to run their networks as they see fit, it's highly likely that investment will decrease and the expansion of networks will be slower than it would otherwise be. Why spend billions laying fiber across the nation if regulators are going to swoop in and tell you that your pricing model is "unfair??
Progress happens because firms develop and implement new products, new pricing models, and new ways of doing business. If you curtail experimentation on account of a single company's mistake, you just might lose "good" experimentation, too. |
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| said by jaminus:In a sense, McDowell does have a point, though. Look at the history of regulation as it applies to private infrastructure. Once politicians start meddling with competitive forces, the status-quo is entrenched at the expense of progress. Consider Plain Old Telephone Service, which remained largely stagnant for decades on account of Ma Bell's entrenched monopoly status. Do you even know what you're talking about - The Feds were the ones responsible for disassembling Ma Bell back in the 80s. Do you think for one microsecond that if that had not happened the Internet would have had a snowball's hope in hell of ever becoming what it is today? |
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 tschmidtPremium,MVM
join:2000-11-12
Milford, NH
kudos:5
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| reply to jaminus
said by jaminus: Look at the history of regulation as it applies to private infrastructure. Once politicians start meddling with competitive forces, the status-quo is entrenched at the expense of progress. Consider Plain Old Telephone Service, which remained largely stagnant for decades on account of Ma Bell's entrenched monopoly status. The initial deal was in response to rivalry between competing phone companies that refused to interconnect with one another. During the early days you could only call subscribers if there were customers of your phone company.
Then in the 1980's when it became clear monopolist regulations were stifling innovation Telecom Divestiture occurred.
said by jaminus:Progress happens because firms develop and implement new products, new pricing models, and new ways of doing business. If you curtail experimentation on account of a single company's mistake, you just might lose "good" experimentation, too. There is always a trade-off. I'd argue there is little to no competition in first-mile access space. What little there is is not focused on maximizing social value it is, as it should be, focused on maximizing profitability. In some cases maximizing profitability is good social policy in other it is not.
The Net Neutrality debate is about how to strike that delicate balance.
/tom |
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| reply to SilverSurfer1
Um, no. Ma Bell agreed to split up after fighting it for 14 years.
And exactly how did that have anything to do with the CABLE INDUSTRY coming in and basically creating the HSD industry in the US by providing people with affordable home HSD?
EVERY phone switch installed for the last 30 YEARS has been capable of ISDN, yet the phone companies REFUSED a general roll out of it, until it was to late and the cable companies made ISDN speeds look silly (and expensive). EVERY RBOC had ZERO plans to sell affordable HSD to consumers, until the cable companies jumped in.
Thank the CABLE COMPANIES for bringing competition and INNOVATION to HSD, without them you would still be paying $80 a month OR MORE for ISDN (if you could even get it).
Do you even know what you're talking about - The Feds were the ones responsible for disassembling Ma Bell back in the 80s. Do you think for one microsecond that if that had not happened the Internet would have had a snowball's hope in hell of ever becoming what it is today?
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| Actually, if wikipedia is to be believed, Silver Surfer is right:
The rest of the telephone monopoly lasted until final settlement of a 1974 United States Department of Justice antitrust suit against AT&T on January 8, 1982, under which AT&T ("Ma Bell") agreed to divest its local exchange service operating companies, in return for a chance to go into the computer business (see AT&T Computer Systems). AT&T's local operations were split into seven independent Regional Bell Operating Companies known as "Baby Bells".
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Note: Bold mine.
Source: »en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_T···elegraph
So the US government did disassemble AT&T. Unless Wikipedia is wrong (which it could be)...then it needs some editin'... |
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