 RadioDoc
58ef2c0
Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Plan? What plan? We don't need no stinking plan.
At least that's what they'll finally conclude at the end of the year. | |
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Varlik
Without Honor You Will Never Be Free
Premium
join:2002-01-06
Anderson, SC
4 edits | Re: Plan? What plan? said by RadioDoc  :We don't need no stinking plan. At least that's what they'll finally conclude at the end of the year. Knowing our Government and its bureaucracy it will be a simple plan consisting of.
1. Economic broadband stimulus packages to providers to speedup and enlarge roll outs etc. Without any real specifics or requriments on the providers part.
2. Encouraging HSI competition by encouraging HSI competition. This will amount to nothing more than having everyone and their Mother saying that they encourage HSI competition and that they encourage the HSI providers to compete and to encourage each other to compete.
3. Some newer but still skewed, flawed and downright misleading means of counting those with HSI and calculating overall HSI availability. One probably endorsed and campaigned for by the Telco's and Cable compainies.
4. Agreeing to a new standard definition of what speeds constitute Broadband this speed will still amount to setting the bar low and still be considered an overall joke.
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"Sir SIR! We don't use DHCP servers. We only use IBM & Microsoft servers." From there my call to tech support went steadily downhill.
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Or... you get something like Amtrak.
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Blagojevich / Madoff 2012! | |
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KrK
Heavy Artillery For The Little Guy
Premium
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Amtrak can't do what nationwide FTTH could do. | |
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TigBitties
@charter.com
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by KrK :Amtrak can't do what nationwide FTTH could do. What do you think would nationwide FTTH do? | |
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| | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Help with getting rid of the corporate entitlement complex that pervades american culture by forcing competition. | |
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
 ·Comcast
·Patriot Media
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by Angrychair :Help with getting rid of the corporate entitlement complex that pervades american culture by forcing competition. What about the personal entitlement that becomes corporate entitlement. If anything the best solution is government getting out of way of business. | |
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join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
 ·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Personal entitlement is always going to exist. That's why we have government. To wrestle some money out of the hands of the privileged class to make sure that everyone can have a basic quality of life available to (theoretically) stop the country from turning into a land of indentured servitude and serfdom.
More regulation is always better in the long run. Without someone waiting to kick you in the ass for stepping out of line the world quickly spirals to the lowest common denominator. That is, if you're even alive to see it when it gets there. | |
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
·Comcast
·Patriot Media
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by Angrychair :More regulation is always better in the long run. Without someone waiting to kick you in the ass for stepping out of line the world quickly spirals to the lowest common denominator. That is, if you're even alive to see it when it gets there. So forcing banks to loan to people who wouldnt or cant pay is good regulation in the long run. Did you learn nothing from the last year. I hope you make so serious money, so i can have some.
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Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff - Frank Zappa
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| | | | | | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by DaveNJ :said by Angrychair :More regulation is always better in the long run. Without someone waiting to kick you in the ass for stepping out of line the world quickly spirals to the lowest common denominator. That is, if you're even alive to see it when it gets there. So forcing banks to loan to people who wouldnt or cant pay is good regulation in the long run. Did you learn nothing from the last year. I hope you make so serious money, so i can have some. You seem to be confused about what good regulation is. Good regulation is making sure things like credit default swaps are publicly disclosed.
I don't even know what you're talking about. The problem the country is in now has nothing to do with banks being forced to make bad loans (regardless of what rush might be telling you every afternoon) the problem the country has now is that mortgage lenders were way too eager to make bad loans and then pawn them off on someone else as solid mortgage backed securities.
But you're going way off topic. This is a discussion about national broadband and the advantages of a national infrastructure as opposed to the regional providers that provide substandard service right now. | |
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
·Comcast
·Patriot Media
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by Angrychair :said by DaveNJ :said by Angrychair :More regulation is always better in the long run. Without someone waiting to kick you in the ass for stepping out of line the world quickly spirals to the lowest common denominator. That is, if you're even alive to see it when it gets there. So forcing banks to loan to people who wouldnt or cant pay is good regulation in the long run. Did you learn nothing from the last year. I hope you make so serious money, so i can have some. You seem to be confused about what good regulation is. Good regulation is making sure things like credit default swaps are publicly disclosed. I don't even know what you're talking about. The problem the country is in now has nothing to do with banks being forced to make bad loans (regardless of what rush might be telling you every afternoon) the problem the country has now is that mortgage lenders were way too eager to make bad loans and then pawn them off on someone else as solid mortgage backed securities. But you're going way off topic. This is a discussion about national broadband and the advantages of a national infrastructure as opposed to the regional providers that provide substandard service right now. Regulation is regulation, regardless of what your college professor told you. Why is that people are defaulting on home loans? Because they didn't pay.. See Community reinvestment act which removed banks abilities to decline loans to bad payers.
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Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff - Frank Zappa
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| | | | | | | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... The community reinvestment act isn't what caused the federal reserve bank to hold down interest rates in the face of a massive housing price bubble, and it isn't what caused lenders to give out massive no income no asset loans to people who didn't even have to prove they had any ability to pay a loan back. However, once again all of the loans wouldn't have caused the global meltdown if regulation were in place to stop companies from selling off bad loan commodities as if they were good loan commodities.
No matter what conservative talk radio may be telling you, regulation was the answer to solve what happened, not the culprit to blame. | |
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Fox McCloud
Crazy like a fox.
join:2006-07-23
·Embarq
 ·Sprint Mobile Broa..
|  Re: Nationwide infrastructure company....
said by Angrychair :No matter what conservative talk radio may be telling you, regulation was the answer to solve what happened, not the culprit to blame. actually, no it's not; regulation got us into this mess as did not adhering to contractual agreements.
People are also ignoring the elephant in the room in regards to the current mess; ultimately it goes back to the regulator of all regulators in the US economy; the Federal Reserve System. Bad legislation in combination with artificially low interest rates, set by the Fed, is what caused this crisis; there's been a plethora of artificial wealth generated off of this mess, and when it started disappearing, the government rushed in to attempt to re-inflate the bubble (and the government, from recent statements is apparently wanting to continue to re-inflate the housing bubble). Then there's the whole system of banking to contend with, whereby the banking system, collectively, can generate 9x more money than as was originally put into circulation by the Federal Reserve System...all in all, you have a recipe for an extremely volatile and unstable monetary structure that (when combined with regulation of any sort, whether 'good' or bad) creates the booms, busts, recessions (and coming) depression....it's called the business cycle, I'm sure you're aware...and it only exists thanks to hindrances of the market-place. | |
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| | | | | | | | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| said by Angrychair :No matter what conservative talk radio may be telling you, regulation was the answer to solve what happened, not the culprit to blame. And I suppose that the liberal talking points are accurate? I'm neither liberal or conservative.. I know that's hard to sheeple to understand becuase there is not simply two ways to think. However, on the liberal side of the isle right now, I've not seen SO much CRAP in my life spewing out of Queen Pelosi and Price Reed's mouth right now. I feel for Obama since he can't even do his job becuase he's a lame duck already to those two morons. Anything he tries to veto will only get passed into law by the majority vote! I am just curious, AngryChair.. in 2001 to 2009, how many times did YOU use the word "RUBBER STAMP CONGRESS" when describing congress to Bush?
Your arguments that you make here truly show just how clueless your points are. Even Democrats know that Barney Frank was part of Freddy and Fanny.. own up already and stop your ignorance to the facts.
Actually, fox is very right but also missed something.
It was the regulation that put us in this mess.. AND, consumer greed! WOW!! I went there.. YES,... greed is able to come from the consumer sector too! God forbid! | |
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KrK
Heavy Artillery For The Little Guy
Premium
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK
·AT&T Yahoo
·AT&T DSL Service
·Cox HSI
·AT&T Southwest
3 edits | Contrary to what many conservatives say, bad sub-prime loans weren't the cause of the recent collapse on Wall St. They were a symptom, not the cause. In 1999 Congress repealed the Glass-Steagall Act as part of the Republican push on deregulation and "getting the Government out of the way of business." The Glass-Steagal act, among other things required separate roles for commercial banks (which for example were lenders and mortgage holders) and "Investment Banks" which dealt with things such as stocks and derivatives.
Prior to the repeal, commercial banks couldn't take high risks with the money that customers deposited, and these deposits were backed by the FDIC which guaranteed our deposits. Investment Banks (such as the failed Lehman brothers) could take risks for people who wanted to gamble on the Stock market and other investments. After the repeal, commercial banks were allowed to operate like and merge with Investment banks (and other financial companies too).
Then, in 2004, under guidance from the Administration, with the eager backing of Republicans in Congress and with the blessing of Alan Greenspan and others at the Fed, the Securities and Exchange commission changed the rules on how much money investment banks could use to buy and sell bundles of mortgages on the market.... previously, they'd been allowed to offer mortgages and buy/sell bundles based on 12 times the amount of deposits they had in their banks, a 12 to 1 ratio. The new rules expanded this to 30 to 1. Overnight, the mortgage financiers and lending companies had more then DOUBLE the money to lend then previously.... This isn't exactly printing money, but damn close..... If anything, IMHO this one single thing is the largest cause of this whole mess----- Massive, massive influx of $$$ to lend and the desire to make big profits by gambling with this "borrowed" money inflated the housing bubble--- there is no doubt. The SEC and Alan Greenspan argued that "Banks could be trusted" to invest wisely and self-regulate with removal of existing oversight. Greenspan now admits he and the SEC were wrong. The political agenda of deregulation, "Self-Regulation" and "Keep Government out of the 'free-market' agenda of the Republicans landed us squarely in this mess and that's why the same argument can NOT be trusted now.
This "The Government FORCED banks to make bad loans and caused the collapse" is a red herring and not accurate.
You can't simply "trust" companies and people to "do the right thing" or "Invest wisely". You have to regulate and monitor.
As for the "sub-prime" market:
Property values were soaring, banks didn't even care if the people they were loaning money to had a solid credit history because even a foreclosure wouldn't result in a loss with property values going up so strongly, and they had a red hot market for selling off the loans after they were made anyway.
Our current woes all have their roots in the Ideological agenda of the "Contract for America". De-regulation, removal of oversight. That's why we are here today. That and the fact we keep borrowing money like it's free....
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"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... That's right. Capitalism is supremely evil and it failed. We need to just have the government run everything so it can never fail again. We just gotta totally demonize capitalism!
Capitalism would have fixed this banking "crisis" overnight had the banks that chose to make the bad loans simply been allowed to fail. The remaining banks would have learned to not do the same things the failed banks did, and life would continue.
I do agree with you that the current "crisis" isn't entirely the fault of things like the CRA... simply because there were many banks that did not lend money to people who were incapable of paying it back. However, capitalism swiftly and severely punishes companies which continually make bad business decisions. Now that we bailed out the failed banks, we can expect an even worse lending crisis.
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by KrK :Uh oh. Ran into a problem with being able to counter the facts and logic, eh? So have to result to extreme hyperbole?  But that's exactly what you and your pals are doing. You continue to insist that capitalism is a failed institution and only the government can fix it.
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Blagojevich / Madoff 2012! | |
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KrK
Heavy Artillery For The Little Guy
Premium
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK
1 edit | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Now where did I say that?
I don't think Capitalism overall is the problem. I guess if I had to narrow it down I would say that "Un-restrained self-interest" is really the main problem. | |
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uid1307457
Premium
join:2005-12-30
Tempe, AZ
·Qwest.net
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| said by pnh102 :That's right. Capitalism is supremely evil and it failed. We need to just have the government run everything so it can never fail again. We just gotta totally demonize capitalism! Capitalism would have fixed this banking "crisis" overnight had the banks that chose to make the bad loans simply been allowed to fail. The remaining banks would have learned to not do the same things the failed banks did, and life would continue. I do agree with you that the current "crisis" isn't entirely the fault of things like the CRA... simply because there were many banks that did not lend money to people who were incapable of paying it back. However, capitalism swiftly and severely punishes companies which continually make bad business decisions. Now that we bailed out the failed banks, we can expect an even worse lending crisis. unless your being sarcastic, which I hope, you have no idea about any political systems. | |
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| | | | | | | | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| "I don't even know what you're talking about. The problem the country is in now has nothing to do with banks being forced to make bad loans (regardless of what rush might be telling you every afternoon) the problem the country has now is that mortgage lenders were way too eager to make bad loans and then pawn them off on someone else as solid mortgage backed securities."
Then if you don't know what he's talking about, maybe you should remain quiet.
Fanny and Freddie were train wrecks. It most certainly played a HUGE part in the melt-down of the credit market. I won't even give you the benefit of an education, but it does make me sick to see people spewing talking points that were generated by people that were clueless.
I'll just write you off as someone that's friends with Barney Frank..
DaveNJ is not off topic.. it ALL has everything to do with 'national broadband' becuase it more of government trying to be the solution when it is ALWAYS the problem when it tried to get involved in the free market.
There is nothing sub-standard about what's being pushed out right now. If you want to know why they are tightening down, ... just think about when it started and what helped back it. The Government started to get involved and they did exactly what I'd expect them to.. control their interests.
What you are missing here is that you and your cronies somehow think that broadband is a right, it's not. You think that you're entitled to speeds 10 times faster by now in the short period of time the internet has been around, for far less. You've got spoiled brat mentality is what you have.. sounds like a harsh way to say it, but it's the only way to describe your mentality.
Repeat after me.. "BROADBAND IS NOT A RIGHT!" | |
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| | | | | | | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Personal insults won't win any debates. Honestly your post isn't worth replying to. If I got under your skin so badly try not to let the world know it. | |
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| | | | | | | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... More personal insults. If just goading me into posting is your goal then congratulations, feel better about yourself. However, if convincing anyone is your goal you're not going to get it done with lines like this one:
It's not uncommon for a liberal to take such little things so personal. My bad for recognizing your ad hominem attacks for what they are.  | |
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| | | | | | | | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... You need thicker skin. When pointing out the obvious becomes an insult.. well. 
... so, clarify one thing for me.. are you liberal? or are you conservative? If you are liberal, (which you sound like it) then I pointed out the obvious.. and the only way you could take that as an insult is if you're ashamed.
My hair started thinning.. to say I'm going bald isn't an insult.. it's a fact. I shave my head now and move on.
I'm not "goading" you into posting.. you're choosing to reply on your own. | |
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Insider
@cavtel.net
| said by fiberguy :Fanny and Freddie were train wrecks. It most certainly played a HUGE part in the melt-down of the credit market. I won't even give you the benefit of an education, but it does make me sick to see people spewing talking points that were generated by people that were clueless. Umm no -- Fannie and Freddie were not train wrecks, thanks. The vast majority of subprime loans were not purchased by Fannie or Freddie. They were purchased, packaged and peddled but Wall Street investment banks looking to cash in on the markets that Fannie and Freddie created.
To the extent that Fannie and Freddie owned subprime mortgages, you can thank HUD for a good deal of that. HUD, as you may not know, was one of the agencies regulating Fannie and Freddie. Among other things, HUD pushed both agencies to make at least 50% of their loans to folks who were in lower socio-economic strata. Banks, knowing that HUD would do this, would hold back mortgages until the end of the year when both agencies were up against the wall time-wise; the intent was to get both Fannie and Freddy into a bidding war so that they could make their numbers as determined by HUD. As you may guess, this is not a good way to make money. Subprime loans initially looked like a way out of this trap. Even then, both agencies purchased much more conservatively than Wall Street.
Yes, both have been taken over. However, at the time of the takeover, both agencies were still able to sell into the debt market at reasonable prices, and were still able to sell their bonds backed by mortgages since, unlike Wall Street, both guarantee the investor that, even if loans default, full principal amounts will be repaid. Both agencies had tightened credit standards, and both had "raised prices" -- i.e. paying less for the loans they were purchasing. Bush and company, however, wanted cheaper money to be available to keep housing prices from collapsing further. Having the government tell all and sundry that they were engineering a takeover actually killed the ability of the agencies to raise money on their own in the debt market. | |
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| | | | | | | | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20 | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... "Explain the regulation that forced banks to make bad loans. (Secret: There wasn't any.)"
Talk to Barney Frank.. seriously, banks were not forced? What do you think Freddy and Fanny were for? | |
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| | | | | | Desdinova
join:2003-01-26
Gaithersburg, MD
| "What about the personal entitlement that becomes corporate entitlement. If anything the best solution is government getting out of way of business."
The problem with that position is the assumption that the market won't make harmful choices, which is often not the case. Given a choice (which de-regulation allows) the market will pretty much make choices that ONLY favor the profit stream. I'm all for capitalism and profits but not when they're earned at the expense of slave labor wages, forced child labor, or poisonous and contaminated food products (all of which were conditions that government regulation reversed). | |
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major marco
Res Firma Mitescere Nescit
Premium
join:2003-02-13
Stepford, CA
clubs:
| said by DaveNJ : If anything the best solution is government getting out of way of business. Riight. Because that has worked so very well for banks & mortgage companies....we need less oversight and more blind trust. | |
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
·Comcast
·Patriot Media
1 edit | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by major marco :said by DaveNJ : If anything the best solution is government getting out of way of business. Riight. Because that has worked so very well for banks & mortgage companies....we need less oversight and more blind trust. But the banks DIDNT want to loan to these people, because it goes against good business practices, the problem was regulation.
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Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff - Frank Zappa
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major marco
Res Firma Mitescere Nescit
Premium
join:2003-02-13
Stepford, CA
clubs:
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by DaveNJ :But the banks DIDNT want to loan to these people, because it goes against good business practices, the problem was regulation. Didn't want to and were forced by regulation - LMAO. That's a good one. The 1930 Depression era regs that were in place to prevent clusterfucked housing meltdowns such as the one we are currently in were null & voided. It is the absence of those regs that enabled banks & mortgage companies to lend to buyers who shouldn't have been considered in the first place.
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The Toll
Tracking Lord Stanley
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
·Comcast
·Patriot Media
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by major marco :said by DaveNJ :But the banks DIDNT want to loan to these people, because it goes against good business practices, the problem was regulation. Didn't want to and were forced by regulation - LMAO. That's a good one. The 1930 Depression era regs that were in place to prevent clusterfucked housing meltdowns such as the one we are currently in were null & voided. It is the absence of those regs that enabled banks & mortgage companies to lend to buyers who shouldn't have been considered in the first place. »www.city-journal.org/html/10_1_t···lar.html
The Act, which Jimmy Carter signed in 1977, grew out of the complaint that urban banks were "redlining" inner-city neighborhoods, refusing to lend to their residents while using their deposits to finance suburban expansion. CRA decreed that banks have "an affirmative obligation" to meet the credit needs of the communities in which they are chartered, and that federal banking regulators should assess how well they do that when considering their requests to merge or to open branches. Implicit in the bill's rationale was a belief that CRA was needed to counter racial discrimination in lending, an assumption that later seemed to gain support from a widely publicized 1990 Federal Reserve Bank of Boston finding that blacks and Hispanics suffered higher mortgage-denial rates than whites, even at similar income levels.
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Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff - Frank Zappa
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LazyLuke
@musc.edu
| said by DaveNJ :said by Angrychair :Help with getting rid of the corporate entitlement complex that pervades american culture by forcing competition. What about the personal entitlement that becomes corporate entitlement. If anything the best solution is government getting out of way of business. While I typically would agree with you, I wonder if it would be better to have allowed business to maintain our roadways that the state gov. | |
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S_engineer
join:2007-05-16
Chicago, IL
·Comcast
| said by Angrychair :Help with getting rid of the corporate entitlement complex that pervades american culture by forcing competition. that mentality gave us the TCOM act of '96. That didn't exactly work out as intended. | |
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| | | | | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... I'm having trouble seeing the parallels between having one great nationwide infrastructure allowing competition between backend providers and a piece of legislation that didn't go far enough and was never properly enforced in as far as it actually went. | |
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| | RadioDoc
58ef2c0
Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11
·AT&T Midwest
| Amtrak is not a good analogy...it would be more like a national ISP riding on others pipes since it doesn't own much of the infrastructure it uses.
A return to good old common carrier regulation would go a very long way to resolving this mess.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by RadioDoc :Amtrak is not a good analogy...it would be more like a national ISP riding on others pipes since it doesn't own much of the infrastructure it uses. A return to good old common carrier regulation would go a very long way to resolving this mess. Kinda like UTOPIA or other government-run internet ventures... almost all of them cost far more than they bring in.
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Blagojevich / Madoff 2012! | |
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jsz0
join:2008-01-23
Jewett City, CT
·Comcast
| Divorced from access & content companies. Married to government regulation & taxes. I can only imagine how much trouble we'd be in if this type of project existed during the Bush presidency. I will take the (sometimes) greedy private sector over the government for my Internet access any day. At least greed is mostly free of personal ideology. It's only a matter of time before some radical right winger wants to block access to medical information (birth control, abortion), pornography, maybe violent video games. The scary part is it's not just the radical right. A number of liberals would be on-board with it too.
Any government money used for broadband infrastructure has to be done in the form of a one-time grant. No strings attached. No possibility for government oversight outside of the original intent of improving broadband access. | |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
 ·Skype
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by jsz0 :I will take the (sometimes) greedy private sector over the government for my Internet access any day. I'm with you on rejecting the government-controlled option, but you don't get a "public-sector" choice either. You have a "Comcast-sector" choice. If you don't like them, you MIGHT have one other choice (mine is the "Verizon"-sector) depending on where you live. That's not "public sector," that's one or two companies, both of which paint you with a big red target.
SOMETHING has to free this up into a highly-competitive market. That's really all I want from the government, some design that allows many competitors to work for my business. With that, we won't need the government to run the Internet.
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Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
... Do something! ... | |
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NOCMan
Verizon Fios User
Premium
join:2004-09-30
Flower Mound, TX | agreed, it would be far cheaper for the national telecom infrastructure to be incorporated into a single company to maintain and expand ACCESS, and seperate competing companies pay for ACCESS to COMPETE across a standard infrastructure. | |
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| | RadioDoc
58ef2c0
Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Didn't we all decide that one company controlling everything was a Bad Thing back in the 80's?
I reiterate my call for true common carrier access and regulation.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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| | | Angrychair
join:2000-09-20
Jacksonville, FL
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... Sure we did. The problem is the reaganites didn't go far enough, and basically turned one big monopoly into a bunch of regional monopolies which has led us to where we are now.
If things had been done in the 80's the way the OP suggested we would be much further along when it comes to competition and infrastructure now.
Sometimes the government has to tell people what's good for the country because too many of the people being ruled are just too stupid to understand which side their bread really is buttered on. | |
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major marco
Res Firma Mitescere Nescit
Premium
join:2003-02-13
Stepford, CA
clubs:
| said by DaveNJ :Here is another one... Banks forced to loan to high risk loan takers. » www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/di···125.html
Consequently, banks in every community in America have been forced to hold a portfolio of bad loans, euphemistically referred to as "subprime" loans. In order to compensate themselves for the added risk of extending these loans, many lenders have increased the lending fees associated with mortgage loans. This is simply an indirect way of doing what banks always do – and what they must do to remain solvent: charging effectively higher rates of interest on riskier loans.
Again fault lies with deregulation. Government sponsored entities, such as Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac were not reigned in by Congress. Had Congre$$ not been asleep at the wheel and gorging themselves on lobbyist largesse representing financial/banking entities, the subprime mortgage clusterfucker would not be happening today.
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The Toll
Tracking Lord Stanley
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by major marco :Government sponsored entities, such as Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac were not reigned in by Congress. Had Congre$$ not been asleep at the wheel and gorging themselves on lobbyist largesse representing financial/banking entities, the subprime mortgage clusterfucker would not be happening today. Wasn't it Barney Frank who said that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were doing just fine?
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Blagojevich / Madoff 2012! | |
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DaveNJ
No Fear
join:1999-09-01
New Jersey
·Comcast
·Patriot Media
| Re: Nationwide infrastructure company.... said by pnh102 :said by major marco :Government sponsored entities, such as Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac were not reigned in by Congress. Had Congre$$ not been asleep at the wheel and gorging themselves on lobbyist largesse representing financial/banking entities, the subprime mortgage clusterfucker would not be happening today. Wasn't it Barney Frank who said that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were doing just fine? And didn't Bush call 17 times to reign in Fannie Mae, in Freddie Mac. Oh wait he had an "R" next to his name...
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Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff - Frank Zappa
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| fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| said by KrK :...divorced from access and content companies. Open access. And, this will work how? .. again, another pipe dream.
You can't over come the free market place. There was something said today that made great sense. There is NOTHING wrong with capitalism.. it works. What DOESN'T work are when the players don't participate, or simply play the system.
The moment you try to have a internet connectivity that is an unlimited plan, all you can eat and do, you run into capacity issues and rates are going to go up. If you think rates are too high now, and many people do, wait till you try to put controls on it and say "anything goes".. becuase you're going to pay for it.
The moment you let a nationwide program come in, assuming you mean government ran, you're going to have every bureaucrap out there telling you what you can and can't do or see on it and it will become political, and "all about the kids".. no thanks. Its been tried on city/county basis in CA and it started to become a mess.
What you have now is fine compared to what you THINK you want.
I'm all for letting something like that build out, so long as you don't call for an end to what we have becuase I, and MANY who enjoy freedom and liberty, do not care for the life you advocate.
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VerizonCynic
join:2006-10-25
Lakewood, CA
 ·Verizon FIOS
| lets put the stim money into this
I really do think that between the financial crisis, global warming and this little internet problem (see link above) we have the makings of a 9/11 x100...but of course as always we only shut the barn door AFTER the horse is out...
We should just turn off the internet for a few days and see what happens to our economy | |
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| RadioDoc
58ef2c0
Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11 | Re: lets put the stim money into this Productivity would probably skyrocket.
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Toolmaster of La Grange. | |
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PapaMidnight
join:2009-01-13
Baltimore, MD
| Probably one of the most useful things in this bill... Any entity is eligible to apply for a grant, including municipalities, public/private partnerships, and private companies, so long as the entity can comply with the grant conditions. Applicants must put forth 20% of the proposed project’s total cost, subject to a financial hardship waiver.
Probably one of the most useful things in this bill. Now if only we could get one placing limits on the amount of BS companies could spout to keep other companies from starting up. | |
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jimbo2150
join:2004-05-10
Youngstown, OH
| Policy... quote:
That's in part thanks to a lack of broad competition, which in turn is because, unlike the majority of other countries, this well-lobbied nation has lacked a broadband infrastructure and policy plan (unless you consider doing nothing and bad science a policy).
Unfortunately, even if they implement a policy it may not be done right. Writing a policy that says curriers can charge whatever and form large corps and prevent others from "impeding on their territory" would do absolutely nothing.
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- "Techie" Jim | |
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TigBitties
@charter.com
| Stimulus Bill - Provisions on Broadband Infrastructure Bill Summary
AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT BILL OF 2009 (ARRA)
Energy & Commerce Provisions on Health Care, Broadband,
and Energy
On February 12, 2009, House and Senate conferees approved the economic recovery
package. The following are detailed summaries on the health care, broadband, and
energy provisions.
...
Provisions on Broadband Infrastructure
The Conference agreement creates a new Broadband Technology Opportunities
Program within the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (“NTIA”)
of the Department of Commerce. The new grant program will distribute $4.7 billion to
fund the deployment of broadband infrastructure in unserved and underseved areas in
the country, and to help facilitate broadband use and adoption. An additional $2.5
billion in loans and grants will be administered by the Rural Utilities Service.
The Conference agreement combined portions of both the House and Senate bills. The
main provisions of the NTIA program include:
• Grant Recipient Criteria. Any entity is eligible to apply for a grant, including
municipalities, public/private partnerships, and private companies, so long as the
entity can comply with the grant conditions. Applicants must put forth 20% of the
proposed project’s total cost, subject to a financial hardship waiver.
Grant recipients must agree to abide by a set of conditions, including adhering to
a build out schedule, to interconnection and non-discrimination requirements as
established by NTIA, and to the principles contained in the Federal
Communications Commission’s Broadband Policy Statement. The Conference
agreement does not require that grant recipients meet certain broadband speed
thresholds, although the NTIA is expected to consider and support the highest
possible broadband speeds in awarding grants.
• National Broadband Plan. The Federal Communications Commission is required to
develop a national broadband plan within one year. | |
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jmn1207
Premium
join:2000-07-19
Reston, VA
·Verizon FIOS
| I Have a Scheme The government should put together a large team that would be tasked to evaluate the feasibility of a department responsible for implementing a US Broadband Plan, and to estimate the costs that might be incurred over a set period of time.
Naturally, a small task group would be needed to make preliminary queries and perform fact-finding missions prior to going forward with any potential team that might be built to deduce the possible creation of any government-based research panel that would look into a US Broadband Plan.
The results from this investigation would, of course, only be pertinent for a short duration and any solutions found would eventually become obsolete and a new team would have to be assigned to provide updated statistics. At which point the data becomes obsolete should be a concern to be investigated, preferably by a unique panel not directly involved with any of the other teams previously discussed. | |
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nutcr0cker
join:2003-04-02
Chandler, AZ | A dumbed down version of human intellect For the last decade we have peddled to impose a creationism policy on the nation rather than increase our technological prowess. Nice top see some change there. I am pretty sure Rush listeners out there would be against this form of change | |
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alchav
join:2002-05-17
Palm Desert, CA
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| Nationwide Infrastructure Plan! | |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| Re: Nationwide Infrastructure Plan! said by alchav :What we need is a plan where the Home Owner is responsible for their own Infrastructure Plan. This Plan should lay out a FTTH Infrastructure where 100 or 200 Homes are connected with Fiber to a POP (Point of Presents.) Then from this location Service Providers can connect their Services depending on the Customers needs. So the Fiber Infrastructure to the POP is paid for by each Home Owner. Now to maintain these POP's it will be either the Community or City. I think a Plan like this should be able to work. I like this idea very much.
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Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
... Do something! ... | |
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TigBitties
@charter.com
| Re: Nationwide Infrastructure Plan! said by funchords :I like this idea very much. In this utopian idea who takes care of the fiber and equipment between home and POP? Does the city/county hire fiber techs and make purchase agreements for equipment? What if the city doesn't have the money to support such a plan? Who builds to the POPs, end user ISPs or some other entity?
Are POPs passive or active? Will they support additional powered equipment inside?
What happens to all the existing companies (Comcast, Charter, Quest, Utopia, AT&T, Verizon, etc.) servicing the area? Are they allowed to use the network or are they kept off unless other companies are there to compete?
This plan has a HUGE number of issues that have to be resolved before it's anywhere near workable. | |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| Re: Nationwide Infrastructure Plan! said by TigBitties :
This plan has a HUGE number of issues that have to be resolved before it's anywhere near workable.
Of course it does, including all of the ones that you mentioned.
If there was a national effort to build local network co-ops, entire industries to build and maintain these for the co-ops would be created.
As to the existing companies, that's similarly another detail. The local authority will have to decide. I personally have no interest in old cable or copper telephone technology. If it's not fiber, it's old tech. No need to change anything there -- let them serve their customers via both their old infrastructure and the new infrastructure. But if there is FTTH, then the local authority can buy it or build right along side it.
The way to solve a HUGE number of issues is to solve them; Not to run away from them.
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Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon -- KJ7RL
... Do something! ... | |
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asdfdfdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| I don't think alchav was suggesting that a one paragraph post on a forum was a completed plan.
"who takes care of the fiber and equipment between home and POP?...Who builds to the POPs..."
There would have to be big differences in how this is handled depending on whether we were talking about a private subdivision where the roads and right of way was controlled by the homeowners association or whether the neighborhood had public roads controlled by the state.
In a private community the community contracts to have the local fiber network maintained just as it contracts out with a company to lay the fiber. Just as it contracts out to have roads maintained/snow removal etc. Many subdivisions own and maintain their roads and have yearly assessments. Maintenance could be included in the assessment to the homeowner. An up front cost would be incurred for the initial laying of the infrastructure.
In other neighborhoods the local government would have to be pressured to contract out to lay fiber along right of way, maybe similarly to the way sewer lines are installed and treated(except that the government wouldn't own the facilities on the end of the connection like they run and own the sewage treatment facilities.
"What happens to all the existing companies (Comcast, Charter, Quest, Utopia, AT&T, Verizon, etc.) servicing the area? Are they allowed to use the network or are they kept off unless other companies are there to compete?"
In a private subdivision of course they aren't allowed to use the network unless the neighborhood decides to make a contractual arrangement with a company. The local network is the private property of the individual homeowners. The collection point and runs from the individual yards to the collection point would be controlled by the homeowners association, as are roads, lights, etc.
In areas where the city owns the roads this would become more complicated but no company would or could be given special preference. The local government might allow any company to access the local shed that would collect the fiber runs for the neighborhood, if any homeowner wanted service by that company, but the individual homeowner would own the wires in his house and yard and could not be compelled to contract with any particular company. There shouldn't be any government granted monopoly in a region trying to force homeowners to contract out to a specific company.
As to this being utopian there are places like a neighborhood in ulmea sweden which has done something like this.
»www.bjornerback.com/tomas/mattgrand/
I don't know what the market and regulatory environment is like in sweden. It would seem to be significantly different from that of the US. The uncompetitive nature of our broadband market and the stranglehold the incumbents have over government means that such a thing would be considerably more difficult here and we lack a market in companies that would handle the building and maintenance of private neighborhood fiber. Proper government action could, however, create conditions which could facilitate the development of such a market.
I have not looked at it yet but a brough turner gave a presentation on activities in quebec and sweden(which is probably the ulmea development)
»www.slideshare.net/eComm2008/bro···omm-2008
»itc.conversationsnetwork.org/sho···719.html
I don't think there is anything utopian about it, if by utopian you mean unrealistically dreaming. It can be done but it requires us to think outside the very limited framework with which we approach questions of infrastructure. We assume that infrastructure must have concentrated control and ownership by large corporate entities. This is rubbish but we have been so conditioned to think that nothing else is possible.
There are also other possibilities that aren't fully ripe yet but could avoid much of the turmoil of digging and laying fiber, such as community wireless mesh networks where the state could contract out to have access points seeded from neighborhood utility poles and then individual homeowners would buy and own their own local area network. As homeowners added their own networks the interconnectedness of the mesh would increase and ulitmately some of the seed points might become unnecessary. | |
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| Skippy25
join:2000-09-13
Hazelwood, MO
| So your plan would exclude pretty much all those that the current bill is intended to help: Those that live too far or remote to be served and those that probably can't afford broadband now.
As pointed out before.. there should be one fiber network nationwide built and regulated by the government that serves every home and business that any provider can lease from the non content/service providing network maintainer(s) to gain access to any customer that wants their service(s). | |
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nOLhd12
@cox.net
| FREE Nationwide Broadband what would be affordable would be if the gov built a 10GB up/down FTTH network for the entire nation . or TB if affordable.
then a wireless network as well. wireless would be deployed in rural areas that wouldnt get ftth just yet, and fiber would go to all the major cities in every state within 12-18 months.
this would include free lan phone service, and the national wireless infrastructure could compete with the cellphone market to an extent.
this would be for residential customers only. companies on a business plan could get a paid service from current providers.
all the cable and phone companies would be forced to compete on a level playing field
att, comcast, verizon, cox and the like would be able to compete in the cell phone market and voip market as they choose, as well as tv, but must provide the services for the entire nation, for any internet services such as voip or tv or video streams/downloads
this also puts amazon, netflix and blockbuster as equal competitors with the above companies.
while
A. the big telco companies would be forced to lose customers from current residential services
B they will at the same time be able to reap potential rewards of the WEB with new services and investing in new internet tech to compete.
these companies have enough financially to go into a new direction. They will no longer be forced to deal with a private network, but can upgrade the network for premium internet services in markets at their own will provided they pay a license | |
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| fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20 | Re: FREE Nationwide Broadband WOW!
... JUST ... WOW!
I don't know how many times my jaw just bounced off the floor reading this Cheech and Chong hallucination. | |
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MalibuMaxx
join:2007-02-06
Chesterton, IN
·Comcast
| Curiosity? We were able to get copper to every home in america? How in the hell did we do that?
Why cant we swap that with fiber... copper is expensive... so is fiber I see no difference...
Now take that copper and melt that down... and use it to subsidise the price of the fiber replacement... I think thats where verizon went wrong with their fios... | |
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| fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| Re: Curiosity? said by MalibuMaxx :We were able to get copper to every home in america? How in the hell did we do that? Why cant we swap that with fiber... copper is expensive... so is fiber I see no difference... Now take that copper and melt that down... and use it to subsidise the price of the fiber replacement... I think thats where verizon went wrong with their fios... The copper network was not only built over a century of time.. and, during that time, much of it's been rebuilt, etc.
And, simple as that huh? Melt down the existing copper and subsidize the build out? REALLY?!? ... (takes a second look) REALLY? I wonder if the money the copper would being in on the so-called reclaim would even pay for the removal and clean up of tearing down an old network wired in nationwide much less make any amount of difference on an overly expensive fiber build out.
In that fiber build out, that is costing an arm and leg to Verizon, at a HIGH gamble to their stock price, you, like so many others, forget that not only do you have to outfit every mile of cable with fiber, you also need to outfit EVERY home with an ONT as well and then install each of them.
Considered that copper/twised pair service was wired over a period of a century, do you think it's just going to be a twitch of a nose to just 'swap that with fiber'..? | |
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MalibuMaxx
join:2007-02-06
Chesterton, IN
·Comcast
| Re: Curiosity? I only said it would "help" with the process. Right now verizon is trying to do both... thats not very progressive.
And yes, I know it would only pay for a small fraction of the build out...
Excuse me but its a better plan that what we have now... no plan at all... nor did I say it was going to be an overnight process.
However, companies like verizon have given up on their copper lines and make a good penny off of them. Took verizon all last week to get my copper line up and running again because they dont have any employees to repair phone lines after drunk people on the weekend hit polls...
Just saying... | |
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| | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| Re: Curiosity? said by MalibuMaxx :And yes, I know it would only pay for a small fraction of the build out... It wouldn't pay for any portion.. it would cost. It would cost more to pull the network out and process it down to recycle than it would pay back anything. (Recycling doesn't always make money.. it can often cost money!)
Excuse me but its a better plan that what we have now... no plan at all... nor did I say it was going to be an overnight process. I respect your eagerness to come up with something, but with all due respect, the same thing has been said on capital hill about "this tax and spend bill is better than no plan at all".. In this case, I'd rather have no plan at all. The other small problem is that in the spirit for everyone to come up with these plans, saying "my plan is better than no plan at all" it's because they think other people don't have THE right plan so they shut them out and up from talking. Broadband isn't something that needs to be "rushed" into.. people make it sound like we're having a broadband crisis.
Some people are telling us that were in a crisis.. for what? ... so we can't download a movie from Netflix on line fast enough? Get those linux distros downloaded at least 30 times in a month? What?
However, companies like verizon have given up on their copper lines and make a good penny off of them. Took verizon all last week to get my copper line up and running again because they don't have any employees to repair phone lines after drunk people on the weekend hit polls... Yes, they do have the employees out there. However, they ARE trying to SAVE money so they can put as much effort into their 'unregulated' (very important word) FiOS market builds. Companies like Verizon and even AT&T and Qwest are trying to hold on while these fly by nights like Vonage and the others, came in, unregulated, and picked off customers for a quick buck in the economy while tearing the market place to hell.
Isn't competition wonderful? I just wished people knew the price of this incredible open and free market in unregulated competitive services called utilities. Ask California how well it worked for them.
And sorry.. I had to pick your post apart a little becuase it sounded so similar to what Obama has been saying lately.. to which the stock market, as I type this, is down to 7552.60, down another -297.81. | |
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asdfdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| In response to claims about the cra and banks forced to lend I'll link to a previous post where I link to a speech given by a member of the federal reserve board of governors discussing a couple of federal reserve studies presented to congress dealing with the question of what effect the community reinvestment act had on the present crisis.
I also have a post toward the bottom of the thread that quotes some of the pertinent passages. I would ask those who are really interested in understanding these things, and may be influence by posts above claiming that the sad little bankers were forced to hand out loans to poor people who couldn't afford them, to read my posts and the speech I link to there.
I would also ask you to keep in mind what you have seen on the news about foreclosures. Just last night, for example, there was a piece on the lehrer news hour about a family in a house valued at over 400k that is now worth under 200k. He stood outside his home and pointed to 3 or 4 different houses surrounding his that are in foreclosure as well.
Also keep in mind that some of the worst hit areas for foreclosures are states like california and florida and are upper middle class neighborhoods. Understand that these loans were not made to poor people under the cra. The speech I linked to discusses the myth that subprime loans to poor minorities perform worse than subprime loans to others outside of the purview of the cra in the unregulated areas of the financial sector. In short, they don't.
Then consider whether this claim that loans to poor minorities is the problem is very plausible within the context of what you are seeing and have been seeing.
Here is the speech:
»www.federalreserve.gov/newsevent···203a.htm
Here is the previous thread, with the links and discussion toward the bottom:
»And Here Come The Broadband Industry Job Cuts | |
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bhawk77
@sbcglobal.net
| First: Clean the Repub Plants Out of Government Agencies... Starting with this FCC stooge:
»thumbsnap.com/v/gH4VMlCE.jpg
When government doesn't work or doesn't work for the benefit of the majority of citizens, 70% of the time it's because of Republican interference, incompetence or outright sabotage.
Corporate Welfare is Communism. | |
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Keith A
join:2009-02-19
Austin, TX
| Competition or Regulation? The reason we don't have a broadband policy is that we as a country cannot decide if we want competition or regulation in telecommunications. Trying to combine the two has not worked well in the past.
The cost of providing communications is distance-sensitive. We want people who live in rural areas to have broadband without paying the high fees a carrier would need to make back its money to serve these high-cost customers. But, if the rural customers don't pay for it, someone else will have to, either through higher taxes that then go to the carriers in some sort of incentive or through higher fees paid by the carrier's other customers, either in the form of higher monthly service bills or some sort of "universal service" tax that gets added on. Nobody living in an area that already has broadband wants to pay more, though, so neither one of these looks appealing. I don't see anyone who already has broadband offering to pay more to help out is bandwidth-deprived country cousins.
As far as a national infrastructure company is concerned, we tried that back in the 80s with the regulated Baby Bells and decided we didn't like that and wanted competition instead. The Baby Bells were supposed to have the franchise on local telephone service but were restricted from providing long distance and information services, much in the same way that people envision a local infrastructure company that would provide access only to Internet service providers today. The problem is, every business has areas where it makes lots of money and others where it loses money. Once you set up this national infrastructure company everybody will immediately want to take away the parts of its business where it makes money and leave it stuck with the money-losing parts of the business.
This is what happened to the Baby Bells when some small startups (like Metropolitan Fiber) started offering "bypass" services in high-dollar metropolitan areas, taking away the parts of the business where the Baby Bells made money but leaving them stuck with the money-losing parts. The government allowed bypass, and soon after the long distance companies got into the game. Only by getting into the long distance and information services business were the Baby Bells able to fight their way back.
I foresee a similar fate for a national infrastructure company. It will of course have to be created with restrictions in place that prevent it from competing with the service providers that will offer their services over that infrastructure and will likely in turn have to be given a franchise on the broadband access market to accept those restrictions. Inevitably, though, someone will chip away at the franchise of the national infrastructure company and it will have to get into the Internet services business to compete and get the revenues it needs to grow. You will end up with what we have now. History will repeat itself. | |
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2009: U.S. Finally Decides It Needs Broadband Plan
Nationwide infrastructure company....
