 Jonbo298
join:2004-01-12
Council Bluffs, IA | and they wont care... Unfortunately, this wont do much if anything. Bellsouth knows it has a stranglehold over the city and is too afraid to advance itself for the future. | |
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Unregistered user
| Re: and they wont care... You are, unfortunately, correct. What they need to do is organize something more painful to BellSouth. For example, tell everyone who has local phone service to evaluate their bills and cancel any services they don't need on a certain day. I'm talking about things like Call Waiting, Caller ID, etc. Pick a date, and ask people to cut down on anything they can live without. Not only will it make BellSouth take notice, but it will also save people a few bucks each month. It might even encourage some people to ditch their landlines altogether.
Another effort should be directed to the Louisiana Legislature to change the laws that are allowing BellSouth to obstruct this project. | |
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| ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16
Stratford, CT | Im not really understanding this , it seems most of the letter is missing. If Bell South along with all the other RBOC's are planning to provide FTTP, why wouldnt they block anyone else if they could? Its just common sense. | |
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scooby
Premium
join:2001-05-01
Schaumburg, IL | Re: and they wont care... BellSouth doesnt plan fttp. Just vdsl last i heard unless they flip flopped. | |
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| jtorre69
join:2005-12-26
Hollywood, FL | the argument at hand is that you should not have public government money competing with private business. POINT BELLSOUTH! | |
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| | Armour
join:2002-01-08
Scarborough, ON
| Re: and they wont care... well your missing a point the Citizens of that City decided in a Democratic vote that they should put in FTTP. It's on thing to have a Level of government to decide to implement a plan and have that argument. Quite another for entire city to back that plan and be smacked in the face by a cooperate monopoly. And I would like you to elaborate where is the competing? BELL HAS NO FTTP in that city.
So I have a garbage disposal firm the city better stop picking up garbage it's competing against me. Open up a pool all those city run one's better stop because their competing against me!!!! I have a private school can't have government compete against me !!!!
Would you say the same for the above examples ? The citizens have spoken and there rights should always win over a rights of a corporation. | |
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| | | jtorre69
join:2005-12-26
Hollywood, FL
| Re: and they wont care... Government entities have a place, and it's not this one.
If the citizens of Loisiana want another isp they should look towards another private firm to provide the service. I'm sure there are a lot of projects like HURRICANE PREP for one that the city should concentrate on. | |
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Fatal Vector
join:2005-11-26
| The trouble
With your statements is that there is a difference between a vote of the people that allows something that is unconstitutional, or, against federal law and a vote for something that is not and is clearly lawfull.
Voters in many states DO get to overturn "duly passed laws" and create them. It's called a ballot initiative. What bellsouth is doing is simply the standard tactic to try and obstruct/overturn such initiatives in court. It rarely works because even though there may be initial success in obstructing the vote of the people, the fact is that such ballot initiatives are written into stste constitutions and trump the courts and state legislature as long as they are legal, RE: do not violate Federal laws, or, the federal/state constitution. Inevitably, such cases go to the state supreme court where they are quashed because the court knows they really have no other choice since they themselves cannot violate the state constitution.
It is exactly because the US as a whole (which is made up of 50 individual republics) is a republic also that such things as the ballot initiative exist. It is another check and ballance. | |
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| | ominae
join:2003-05-11
Columbus, OH
| Re: The trouble it may be one of your "checks and balances", but i highly doubt that bellsouth had anything so noble in mind. it appears to me that free market is playing out in lafayette (i.e. supply and demand). problem: residents of lafayette wanted better internet service, bellsouth (and others) were unwilling to provide it. solution: build it yourself.
if bellsouth and cox are the primary isp's in the area and want to keep the citizen's of lafayette as paying customers then why don't they simply offer the services their customers want? my guess is they don't want to spend the capital needed to upgrade their existing networks. it doesn't make much sense from bellsouth's point of view to spend money building a new network if you can continue making a profit from on that's already in place (even if it's not filling your customers demands for better service).
it's simple: build it or get out of the way so somebody else can. | |
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richardpor
Fur it up
join:2003-04-19
Portland, OR
| Time to Thow In the towel. One of the problems with any form of direct democracy is the people tend to vote themselves more benefits from the public trough.
Do not get me wrong I do not like the creation of a government monopoly in what should be a private business, but there should be a way for Bell South revoke any conditions of the franchising agreement and sue for breach of contact and to recover any cost and taxes and to terminate at will any services in Lafayette. | |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
 ·Comcast
| Re: Time to Thow In the towel. said by richardpor  :One of the problems with any form of direct democracy is the people tend to vote themselves more benefits from the public trough. You're absolutely right here... Anyone who wants to rob Peter to pay Paul will always have the support of Paul.
However, if BS had bothered to offer upgraded services as a result of customer dissatisfaction in Lafayette, a vote might not have even happened. I am sure that once Verizon Fios and whatever other offerings cable companies throw at their customers will keep most of them happy enough to not opt for the socialist broadband route.
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Rove / Rumsfeld 2008! | |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| said by richardpor :...there should be a way for Bell South revoke any conditions of the franchising agreement and sue for breach of contact and to recover any cost and taxes and to terminate at will any services in Lafayette. Say what? The franchise agreement doesn't protect BS from competition--if it did, the cable guys couldn't get into the business. Besides, even those franchise agreements that pretended to grant total monopolies were tossed out by the Telecom Act of '96.
And yes, a few telcos pushed the idea that they were "entitled" to get "compensation" for the loss of their "contracted monopoly". They uniformly lost their arguments because there is no protectable property interest in government policies UNLESS they are specifically spelled out in contracts, which Bell monopolies never were.
And as for "terminating service at will", there is a little non-franchise matter of state public utility statutes to worry about, but I realize such concerns get in the way of a serious hissy fit, which seems to be what you advocate for BS to undertake....
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! | |
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DataDoc
My avatar looks like me, if I was 2D.
Premium
join:2000-05-14
Greenville, NC | Fight fire with fire The city should use imminent domain and condemn all locations of BellSouth equipment, buildings, etc. to put up their own network.
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Wake up, John Doe, you're the hope of the world. | |
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| vanDSLuser
Unimaxx for your biz
Premium
join:2004-07-28
West Vancouver, BC
 ·TELUS
| Re: Fight fire with fire Something tells me that would bring more lawsuits 
The point being, the only reason the vote was passed is BS provided subpar service that was unacceptable to the citizens. If BS spent even 1/10th of what they spent in legal fees on improving their service this entire thing would not have happened.
It's corporate stupidity at it's finest! | |
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| | GhostDoggy
join:2005-05-11
Duluth, GA
| Re: Fight fire with fire said by vanDSLuser :Something tells me that would bring more lawsuits The point being, the only reason the vote was passed is BS provided subpar service that was unacceptable to the citizens. If BS spent even 1/10th of what they spent in legal fees on improving their service this entire thing would not have happened. It's corporate stupidity at it's finest! Subpar services? Ok, time to play devil's advocate. If BellSouth provided such subpar services then what does that have to say about the thousands of BellSouth Telephone customers, BellSouth Internet Services customers, thousands of Cingular service customers, BellSouth long Distance customer, and so on and so forth?
Stupidity is on both sides of the table. People voted, sure, but they are under the belief that the vote would do something, like ignore the law, ignore court rulings, etc., etc., etc. Also, I can repeat the above paragraph for all telecommunication companies and all cable operators within the city of Lafayette.
I think you fail to really see the necessaity like all of those thousands of customers the phone and cable customers see: its a service they are willing to pay for. You may nit like it, but then again I'd like to see half of the current telephone and cable customers in Lafayette give them up on Tuesday morning. How about it?
Oh, let's start with the 911 and E911 service, too, since no one in Lafayette needs that either. 
BTW, I dislike a lot of things telephone companies do. I can say the same about the cable companies as well, and the cell phone companies, etc., but I can say one thing most of all and that is I trust politicians a lot less. And if you really think it can be done muni-style then why not find a capital venture company to back the public's desires and take it not-for-profit, but private? | |
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calvoiper
join:2003-03-31
Belvedere Tiburon, CA
| Re: Fight fire with fire said by GhostDoggy :Subpar services? Ok, time to play devil's advocate. If BellSouth provided such subpar services then what does that have to say about the thousands of BellSouth Telephone customers, BellSouth Internet Services customers, thousands of Cingular service customers, BellSouth long Distance customer, and so on and so forth? It says those thousands of BS customers were acquired by BS when they didn't have a choice, and that BS is scared $#1+less that they will leave if they have an additional choice.
It doesn't say squat about the Cingular customers, because cellular is a different service, and it says that the thousands of BS LD customers were gained by leveraging the advantages of BS's historical telecom monopoly.
calvoiper
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VoIP--the death knell of remaining voice monopolies! | |
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lawrence171
Evilly Yours - Evilness
join:2001-12-24
Canada | A Private company? Why can't the government create a private business to compete with Bell South? | |
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dcurrey
Premium
join:2004-06-29
 ·ViaTalk
| Re: A Private company? I have always wondered why the government just doesn't role out fiber and sell access to it to everyone who wants to pay. Treat it as just another infrastructure.
This would force Bellsouth, Verizion, Time Warrner, Comcast all to compete with each other might even get some better and cheaper services out of the deal. | |
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| | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Re: A Private company? Why doesn't the gov't roll out plumbers, house builders, auto mechanics, landscapers, hair stylists, cafeterias, and any thing else people deem improtant but don't want to pay for?
How many fighter jets, battleships, and tanks does the gov't build? | |
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G_Poobah
join:2004-01-17
Schenectady, NY
| Re: A Private company? "Why doesn't the gov't roll out plumbers, house builders, auto mechanics, landscapers, hair stylists, cafeterias, and any thing else people deem important but don't want to pay for?"
But, the government DOES roll out those things..
Plumbers : Need access to public water supplies, sewer systems, etc.. Those are built by the government, NOT by the plumbers..
House Builders : Sure the government rolls those out. It's called 'zoning boards', and 'subsidized house'.
Auto Mechanics : Of course! It's called the public road system. Auto mechanics wouldn't exist without our highways.
Landscapers : Yep, even those are paid for by the government. Don't you see when they mow the middle of the highway, or take care of your school lawns?
Hair Stylists : Two words : Bill Clinton
Cafeterias : Hmm.. Soup Kitchens, Welfare, etc.
Bottom line is that if people feel it's important, the government rolls it out. It's an easy concept to understand. Only a fool thinks that business is the solution to every problem. Sometimes, it just makes MORE SENSE to have a government build something (roads/internet/national defense). Sometimes it doesn't. | |
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| | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Re: A Private company? Not one of those jobs you listed takes care of the private citizen. They don't work on your plumbing, your lawn, your car, or your kitchen.
The Constitution states the gov't is tasked with national defense and public welfare. National Defense is rather obvious but if you keep broadening "public welfare" you might as well open collective farms and call the president the Premier Soviet. | |
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ff1324
Everybody Goes Home
Premium
join:2002-08-24
On Four Day
| That's exactly what they are doing. However, as a taxpayer, you would probably raise hell if your local government spent millions upon millions of dollars paying lawyers to defend lawsuits.
Unfortunately, BS has much deeper pockets than Lafayette, LA does, so in the end, BellSouth's lawyers will hold out longer than a city will. Since BS has more money than Lafayette does, they are trying to prevent having to compete in the open market by eliminating the competition utilizing lawyers that they are already paying.
In this day and age, its not the ethics or the democracy or the media bias, its who can afford to buy off the court system.
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The funny thing about firemen...night and day they're always firemen | |
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| GhostDoggy
join:2005-05-11
Duluth, GA
| said by lawrence171 :Why can't the government create a private business to compete with Bell South? They people of Lafayette want someone else to do it for them, which are the people they voted into office. They probably do not have the desire in magnitude to seek out the venture capital to create a private, not-for-profit company--then again, no VC entity will back a profitless venture. | |
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digiblur
Got Sipura?
Premium
join:2002-06-03
Louisiana | Who's BellSouth? Who's BellSouth? Ohhh....that's the company I used to get a bill for almost no service back in 2001 right? | |
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| Prhamil
join:2001-05-01
Winchester, KY
1 edit | Re: Who's BellSouth? "A Private company?
Why can't the government create a private business to compete with Bell South?"
How can it be "private" if created by "government"??? Are there a lot of private government businesses in Canada?? | |
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GhostDoggy
join:2005-05-11
Duluth, GA | Lazy in Lafayette I like to complain. I admit it. Its easier than getting off my butt and doing something physical. Takes less energy to vote then do. | |
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nasadude
join:2001-10-05
Rockville, MD
·Comcast
| The power of money As long as there are politicians to buy (at least not the case in Lafayette) or lawsuits to file, very few municipalities will be successful in putting a system in against the wishes of an incumbent monopoly or duopoly.
I must say though, BellSouth is being the biggest @sshole in Lafayette than almost anywhere else in the country. | |
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| jimahrens
join:2002-05-30
Owego, NY
1 edit | Re: The power of money Your might at first think this opinion or comment off topic but,
The elected and well paid politicians no longer run America
The big corporations control every aspect of almost everything
Big campaign bucks
big contributors to the politician's favorite charity
(providing flawless service to the politicians home/office)
etc.
back to the golden rule
He who has the gold, makes the rule
You can change the constitution if you have enough money
You can kill 2 people and walk away for little more than 10 million
And if you are president you can lie your ass off and never pay for it
Theft is free for any CEO now days (edit)
Special this year:
Oil company execs get to lie to a congressional committee and be rude at the end
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| | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here | Re: The power of money CEOs are corrupt and thieves which is why we need to entrust everything to the noble paragons of virtue as our elected representatives. | |
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Humored
@sprintbbd.net | Re: The power of money When does the franchise agreement come up again for renewal? This could be something to hang over the head of BellSouth. | |
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bigjohn
join:2005-05-26
Woodstock, GA | Dood! love your sarcasm!
Everyone is out for themselves.
Bell South, however, is an extortionist with a government approved monopoly.
»bellsouthextortion.com | |
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| | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here | Re: The power of money You can't be a monopoly when you have a competitor. | |
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| bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Re: Anyone can compete with USPS The difference here is the USPS is in short a corporation backed by the Congress. They act completely seperate from budgeting. This is more akin to a muni existing already and private corporations entering to provide the same service. The gov't creating a sorporation just to compete with business is a bad plan. It's the same reason why the US bars official gov't religion. Once the gov't has an interest in one corporation, god, or system then all others are going to suffer.
I seriously doubt the people pushing for a muni telecom will see what they wish to see develop from it. | |
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MJRudzik
join:2002-01-13
Independence, MO
| The Govt should just seize all Physical Plant I know a lot of you who worship the corporate gods will flip out at this but I for one think anyone who says all comers to broadband should have their own network are nuts. Or more pointedly I think you are hypocrites. You'll chant that mantra until it comes time for more providers to dig in your front lawn. I for one don't want 14 different networks running across the right of way. The government should seize all physical plant and create a Monopoly that is only allowed to build out physical plant and sell access to retailers. At&T bs verizon and the whole lot of them should be forced into the sole business of selling services and not be allowed to hold physical plant. They should all be forced to become CLEC's on America's Free and Open Network. | |
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| ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16
Stratford, CT
2 edits | Re: The Govt should just seize all Physical Plant quote:
The government should seize all physical plant and create a Monopoly that is only allowed to build out physical plant and sell access to retailers. At&T bs verizon and the whole lot of them should be forced into the sole business of selling services and not be allowed to hold physical plant.
What about the cable TV network and the airwaves ? Some of you are completely clueless. This all sounds a lot like communism to me. Lets let the government contol every aspect of our lives !! LOL
Sorry people but there IS telco competition these days, this isnt the 1960's. This same competition will evenutally get BS to change their network to FTTP. | |
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| | MJRudzik
join:2002-01-13
Independence, MO
| Re: The Govt should just seize all Physical Plant There we go anything you dont understand brand it communism. The argument that I am making is that network infrastructure is comparable to road and hiway infrastructure. It should be under th control of government to ensure that it is open and useable without unnecessary redundancy.
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Sorry people but there IS telco competition these days, this isnt the 1960's.
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Um yeah sure there is. A little i'll grant you there is a little but the new Merger happy environment is making sure that in as little time as possible there wont be. Which is why we should level the field make them all CLEC then there will be REAL sustainable competition. As much as I love covad and their voip when sbc/at&t is part owners you really cant call it "competition". | |
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| | | ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16
Stratford, CT
| Re: The Govt should just seize all Physical Plant Bottom line, there are and will continue to be 4 major providers in broadband competition. The RBOC tel co's, the cable companies, Satellite and Cellular. Is the government supposed to "seize" all of them? PUHLEEZ !
Just the battle between cable and the telephone co's alone have brought about incredible price slashing and network investment. The government already has their hands in the telephone co's business, its called the FCC and state PSC / PUC's.
The Cable co's , phone co's , Satellite and cell co's all maintain their own network to deliver voice and Data. In my opinion, none of them should be FORCED to resell any of their network. It doesnt make any sense, it isnt true competition. Its unfair to the workers and the stockholders of each company.
Go build out your own wire network somewhere with 10,000 of your anti Tel co buddies.. and see how you like it when the government comes along and forces YOU to let ME provide services on your property and equipment .. haha | |
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| | | | MJRudzik
join:2002-01-13
Independence, MO
| Re: The Govt should just seize all Physical Plant said by ITALIAN926 :Go build out your own wire network somewhere with 10,000 of your anti Tel co buddies.. and see how you like it when the government comes along and forces YOU to let ME provide services on your property and equipment .. haha Fine Except
A) the incumbents didnt build their own networks. The tax payers paid for it through eminent domain property seizures and gonvernment land grants and tax breaks and forgiven debts and protected exorbitant rates and lock outs of competition. So I know what is like to have to pay thourgh the nose to access equipment I subsidised. open the access or get the line out of my front yard.
B) The incumbents say its illegal for anyone to build new networks Fine one more reason the existing network should be seized through emminent domain.
c) I'm not anti telco Im anti Monopoly and any time a single company can assert control over all phases of a market then they are a monopoly. At&t is one such monopoly. | |
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seant169
join:2003-07-21
Forney, TX |  Aholes
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fiber_man
Things Happen For A Reason
Premium
join:2001-01-27
Port Saint Lucie, FL
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| Re: service Before 1984 there was one company controlled by government and destroyed by that very same government. AT&T had to provide service to everyone. It was very reliable and cheap. Thank you government for the biggest mistake in this country history. Since the break up in 1984 service has declined at all levels of the remaining companies. Still better that most cable companies that I have had service from.
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GO NOLES!! | |
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An Open Letter to BellSouth
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Guess what: courts rule and not votes