December 18, 2013

//IG: "stimulus" rural boradband push had no mechanism in place to measure its outcome
— Purple Avenger

BIP - Broadband Initiatives Program
RUS - Rural Utility Service
BCAS - Broadband Collection and Analysis System

This is from the Aug 2013 IG Report. So here we are, years after the initial "stimulus" and nobody knows if this rural broadband money was effectively spent or not.

Billions were tossed around without measuring how many people actually benefited (from p.13 of PDF)

Finding 1: Performance Measures Do Not Effectively Show BIP Outcomes

While BIP primarily financed last mile projects that provide service to end-users, such as households and businesses, we found that RUS does not have adequate controls to measure and transparently report how effectively BIP is meeting its subscribership goals. Specifically, RUS does not have controls in place to measure how many BIP subscribers are in rural areas and were previously unserved or underserved or to measure performance (subscribership) of BIP projects on an individual basis. Second, RUS does not have adequate controls in place to ensure that awardees submit reliable performance data or to compare actual performance to projected results. This occurred because RUS did not anticipate the need to report on actual rural subscribership. RUS is also hesitant to invest its limited resources in further revising its information management systems, policies, and procedures for BIP—a one-time program. OIG recognizes the consideration of investing additional limited resources for a one-time program. However, without these controls in place, there is less assurance that BIP awards helped accomplish the goals of the Recovery Act by providing broadband to rural residents who would not otherwise have sufficient access to this service

While there undoubtedly were many underserved rural customers, there would also be a number of them who already went with alternatives like Hughes sat internet service and DirectTV internet/VoIP. In fact, for the remotest of the rural areas, where there's not even land line phone service, simply giving people the Hughes/DirectTV sat packages would be far more cost effective and dramatically faster to install than running hundreds/thousands of miles of cable/fiber based solutions.

With no means to establish the effectiveness at the subscriber level, you'll probably not be surprised to find out there was no means to establish effectiveness at the provider/installer level either.

RUS established a goal for BIP projects to provide new or improved broadband service to 359,450 subscribers. However, we found issues with how RUS collected data regarding this performance measure and how RUS
reported on the program outcomes.
...We found that RUS controls did not ensure awardee-reported BIP performance data distinguished between individual awards, rural and nonrural subscribers, or subscribersÂ’ previous status (unserved, underserved, or other), or that the data were reliable....

...First, we found that the data captured in BCAS did not provide key information necessary to determine project performance. Specifically, while awardees quarterly report on the number of “new” and “improved” BIP subscribers, they are not asked to distinguish whether subscribers are rural or nonrural, so the number of rural subscribers benefiting from BIP projects
cannot be determined from the data, and there is no explanation as to how the “new” and “improved” categories correlate to subscribers who were previously
unserved or underserved...

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 07:28 AM | Comments (229)
Post contains 543 words, total size 4 kb.

1 Well hello...

Posted by: HH at December 18, 2013 07:28 AM (XXwdv)

2 Maybe they should run some ads.  Like the Post Office.  Since no one really knows what, exactly, the Post Office is.

Posted by: Dang at December 18, 2013 07:29 AM (MNq6o)

3 Stomp!!

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:29 AM (teMpq)

4 I got disappeared. Stomp

Posted by: traye at December 18, 2013 07:29 AM (nCg/E)

5 FRESH AIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:29 AM (fWAjv)

6 the proper question is, how well rewarded were Obama fundraisers, bundlers, donors, etc? Think Solyndra

Posted by: Mallfly at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (bJm7W)

7 It's safe to assume the money benefited friends of Obama.

Posted by: Lizzy at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (ruxvM)

8 If you like your money, you can keep...ah screw that. Ima gonna take your money

Posted by: Bruce at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (v+HXt)

9 I saw Boradband open for Phish in 86.

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (fWAjv)

10 There is nothing to fear as long as blah blah blah

Posted by: maverick at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (nCg/E)

11 Metrics schmetrics. We're the government, bitches!

Posted by: The Government, Bitches at December 18, 2013 07:30 AM (RD7QR)

12 Step One: Spend Billions Step Two : ????? Step Three : Profit Success!

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 07:31 AM (Po8ff)

13 "cannot be determined from the data, and there is no explanation as to how the “new” and “improved” categories correlate to subscribers who were previously
unserved or underserved..."

Wait.
Is this about internet, or previously uninsured people for healthcare?

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:31 AM (teMpq)

14 If you like your money, too bad, my friends get it. F you very much.

Posted by: jef at December 18, 2013 07:32 AM (nCg/E)

15 "In fact, for the remotest of the rural areas, where there's not even land line phone service, simply giving people the Hughes/DirectTV sat packages would be far more cost effective and dramatically faster to install than running hundreds/thousands of miles of cable/fiber based solutions."

No, in fact, the best solution under this kind of administration will always be the solution that spends the most money. Kind of like the way the teachers union is more interested in spending per pupil than, say, testable results.

Posted by: Mallfly at December 18, 2013 07:32 AM (bJm7W)

16

This is the government we're talking about.  Outcomes are irrelevant.  Intentions are everything. 

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 07:32 AM (DrWcr)

17 >>"Specifically, while awardees quarterly report on the number of “new” and “improved” BIP subscribers, they are not asked to distinguish whether subscribers are rural or nonrural, so the number of rural subscribers benefiting from BIP projects cannot be determined from the data...."

Must've been a couple of lone wolf employees out of the Cincinnati office messing with the numbers.

Posted by: Lizzy at December 18, 2013 07:32 AM (ruxvM)

18 And these are the people telling businesses what to do.

Posted by: Dang at December 18, 2013 07:33 AM (MNq6o)

19 Well, there's another IG that can expect to get fired and/or audited.

For no political reason whatsoever, nosiree.

Posted by: RoyalOil at December 18, 2013 07:33 AM (VjL9S)

20 The important question:


Can you get streaming pr0n over satellite without any lag?


Posted by: EC at December 18, 2013 07:33 AM (GQ8sn)

21 So long as cronies got their payoffs the program worked as intended.

Posted by: Mikey NTH - Death Capades - ObamaCare on Ice! Sponsored by the Outrage Outlet at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (hLRSq)

22 simply giving people the Hughes/DirectTV sat packages would be far more cost effective and dramatically faster to install than running hundreds/thousands of miles of cable/fiber based solutions.
............
You, Sir, do not understand how the government works! 

Cost effective?  Ha!  I laugh at your suggestions of cost effectiveness!

Posted by: Chi-Town Jerry at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (f9c2L)

23 No one is more shocked and outraged to hear about this in the news than me!

Posted by: Barack the Magnificent at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (ruxvM)

24 for the remotest of the rural areas, where there's not even land line phone service, simply giving people the Hughes/DirectTV sat packages would be far more cost effective and dramatically faster to install than running hundreds/thousands of miles of cable/fiber based solutions.

Insufficient opportunities for graft, as Glenn Reynolds likes to say.

Posted by: Sandra Fluke at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (B/VB5)

25 It's almost Christmas, and still there are yoga pants and yoga pants and yoga pants all over my town today. God bless the South. (And the guy who invented yoga pants)

Posted by: traye at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (nCg/E)

26 Ladies and gentlemen, I'll be brief. The issue here is not whether we broke a few rules, or took a few liberties with our government spending - we did. But you can't hold a whole Stimnulus responsible for the behavior of a few, sick twisted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn't we blame the whole Stimulus system? And if the whole Stimulus system is guilty, then isn't this an indictment of our governmental institutions in general? I put it to you, Greg - isn't this an indictment of our entire American society? Well, you can do whatever you want to us, but we're not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America. Gentlemen!

Posted by: Eric Stratton, DOJ lawyer at December 18, 2013 07:34 AM (MMC8r)

27 >> So here we are, years after the initial "stimulus" and nobody knows if this rural broadband money was effectively spent or not. Ooh, ooh, pick me. I have a guess.

Posted by: Andy at December 18, 2013 07:35 AM (YBN0Y)

28 O/T

" A vagina is more desirable than a mans anus"

Stuff Phil Robertson said, Volume two, chapter 7.

Go to Drudge, follow the link to the comments.
Seems that a lot of people on the CBS website prefer vaginas.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:35 AM (teMpq)

29 25 It's almost Christmas, and still there are yoga pants and yoga pants and yoga pants all over my town today. God bless the South. (And the guy who invented yoga pants)

Posted by: traye at December 18, 2013 11:34 AM (nCg/E)


Ass men the world over rejoice at their popularity.

Posted by: The Government, Bitches at December 18, 2013 07:35 AM (RD7QR)

30 The hell, you say!

Posted by: blindside at December 18, 2013 07:36 AM (WzWmY)

31 *crickets*

Posted by: Hillary Clinton at December 18, 2013 07:36 AM (GjPnA)

32 Due to illness, the missus has underserved me the past few weeks.  It's time to run out some  cable  to the rural area!

Posted by: Lurking Canuck at December 18, 2013 07:36 AM (BrQrN)

33 I get the feeling Rural Broadband consists of Oprah and Ogabe beamed into your mind.

Posted by: sven10077 at December 18, 2013 07:36 AM (9jfyN)

34 Barack Obama is a stuttering clusterf*ck of a malignant traitor.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:36 AM (PYAXX)

35 Sock fail of the day.

Posted by: joncelli at December 18, 2013 07:37 AM (RD7QR)

36 This is horse shit. Next thing you will tell us is these fuckers can't program a website. What? Oh, never mind.

Posted by: Nip Sip at December 18, 2013 07:37 AM (0FSuD)

37 The question that will be answered ruthlessly by the free market is: are there enough rural customers to sustain the maintenance costs of those cable plants.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 07:37 AM (4JkHl)

38 BION this is the BS program where the Obamaphone came from. It was supposed to be a small program targeting a select group of people.


Instead what we have rampant fraud and abuse.  The last report I saw on this said that an estimated 50% of the phones in the program were fraud.



Kill and and drive a stake through it.

Posted by: Vic[/i] at December 18, 2013 07:37 AM (T2V/1)

39 If only there were some way to measure the profitability of an infrastructure project. Say, like having private companies decide on their own initiative to undertake them- and then looking at the private company's balance sheet.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:37 AM (PYAXX)

40 16 This is the government we're talking about. Outcomes are irrelevant. Intentions are everything. Posted by: Insomniac

Unfortunately, 100% right. In fun news? Monday I got my car out of the shop after almost 2 weeks, 3 grand poorer.
The main heater in the house shut down on the coldest nite of the year- 35F, and this Victorian pile is normally like a meat locker in winter, anyway. Finally figured out, "Well, the Dead Miss Emily will never need the one in her bath again!" and swapped them out....

Posted by: backhoe at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (ULH4o)

41 I've worked in the private sector! They expect results! Jesus fuck I have truly chosen poorly re: what to do with my life. I mean, when I am multishirking, I end up staying late to get the crap done that needs to get done. I could be working for the government, making a shitton more money and that won't be an issue ever. So poorly have I chosen. So poorly.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (VtjlW)

42 Shocking!  Top. Men.

Posted by: Anna Puma (+SmuD) at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (IzrCU)

43 I strenuously object to one penny of my tax money being wasted on Boradband. That dog don't hunt.

Posted by: ontherocks at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (6SwWu)

44 There is less assurance that BIP awards helped accomplish the goals of the Recovery Act by providing broadband to rural residents who would not otherwise have sufficient access to this service See wingnuts. If they had actual access to the non-functioning O-care website it would have worked beautifully. More spending for broadband!

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (fWAjv)

45 Mom says we can get broadband if I get a job and health insurance. So I guess it's dial up for the next couple of decades. Sigh.

Posted by: Pajama Boy [/i] at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (6Nqkf)

46 *Fast forward to May 2014*

I'm tired of the media's false story about misspent stimulus funds. This is nothing but fake outrage to boost the ratings of a certain hateful 24 news channel. The American people expect better from their media.

Posted by: Barack the Magnificent at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (ruxvM)

47 Posted by: joncelli It's okay, the government bitches loves asses too.

Posted by: traye at December 18, 2013 07:38 AM (nCg/E)

48 I'll take buy off of democrat district voters, aka Iowa, for $1000, Alex.

Posted by: Nip Sip at December 18, 2013 07:39 AM (0FSuD)

49 That dog don't hunt. Posted by: ontherocks at December 18, 2013 11:38 AM (6SwWu) Don't worry, I got your back.

Posted by: Universal Service Fund at December 18, 2013 07:39 AM (fWAjv)

50 "no mechanism to measure outcome"

Is this somehow atypical? I don't recall mechanisms to measure outcome as being a feature of the vast majority of government programs. There have been a few rare exceptions, e.g., 1960s NASA. The stated and measurable outcome was: get to the fucking moon before 1970.

For that matter, a lot of the private sector haven't figured out that they have to have those things either. I've seen endless idiotic restructurings, initiatives, and so forth, and it's vanishingly rare for any to have explicitly stated evaluative criteria for success or failure.

The difference is that if a private sector company wastes too much capital faffing about with unproductive ideas where there's no way to measure the merit thereof, the firm runs out of money and goes away. Whereas the federal government NEVER runs out of money and goes away. Not when more money can be taxed, borrowed, or printed with sovereign prerogatives.

Posted by: torquewrench at December 18, 2013 07:40 AM (gqT4g)

51 helped accomplish the goals of the Recovery Act

The goal was to hand out money to friends of the regime.

So I'm pretty sure it succeeded.

Posted by: HeatherRadish™ needs a beer at December 18, 2013 07:40 AM (ZKzrr)

52 Disclaimer, I actually proposed a terrestrial broadband radio for some of these projects and was told that our system didn't cost enough and they had to spend the money faster. I offered to jack up my price, but they didn't want to deal with the FCC delays associated with licensure - it had to be shovel ready.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 07:40 AM (4JkHl)

53 Is satellite internet any good?  I heard it sucked.

Posted by: Jeanne of the North at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (GdalM)

54 But, let's get real: There is no fucking reason anyone NEEDS internet.

It's nice, it's useful: But if I'm living on Shitkicker Road 30 miles out of Sticksville, internet ain't exactly going to make my life better.

Fucking hipster douchebags spinning solutions 'round the tops of their dicks in some muddy water coffee bar figuring the whole world is just like them.
That brand of asshole infects this regime from top to bottom.

I'm beginning to wonder if I hate metrosexual hipster douchebags more than hippies.

Where's my Canyonero so I can run all those fuckers over and crush their little shitbox cars?

Posted by: RoyalOil at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (VjL9S)

55 Openrange was one of those companies started with the stimulus $, providing wimax internet to rural areas.  Free money=crappy business plan, they blew through the cash then promptly went out of business. 

Posted by: chellep at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (7Pnkf)

56 Is satellite internet any good? I heard it sucked.

Posted by: Jeanne of the North at December 18, 2013 11:41 AM (GdalM)



Bad weather = no reception.


Posted by: EC at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (GQ8sn)

57 I thought Sherriff Joe was going to police every dime of that Stimulus money?

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (Po8ff)

58 I strenuously object to one penny of my tax money being wasted on Boradband. You don't get a choice, comrade. Part of the ComCast NBC merger agreement was Comcast would charge their customers an extra ten bucks a month to go into the pool for poor customers. Reason #243,278 why I have Verizon.

Posted by: Regular Moron [/i] at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (6Nqkf)

59 I'll take buy off of democrat district voters, aka Iowa, for $1000, Alex. Rural Iowa is redder than Texas or Utah. It's the cities where the blue is.

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:41 AM (i2Lsf)

60
" A vagina is more desirable than a mans anus"

Stuff Phil Robertson said, Volume two, chapter 7.

Go to Drudge, follow the link to the comments.
Seems that a lot of people on the CBS website prefer vaginas.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 11:35 AM (teMpq)

 

The comments surprised me.  I was exepecting a lot more of the "cis-gendered heteronormative h8!" nonsense.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 07:42 AM (DrWcr)

61 "no mechanism to measure outcome" Ballots created or saved.

Posted by: t-bird at December 18, 2013 07:42 AM (FcR7P)

62 But, let's get real: There is no fucking reason anyone NEEDS internet.


Then get off this blog!


Posted by: EC at December 18, 2013 07:42 AM (GQ8sn)

63 I've seen endless idiotic restructurings, initiatives, and so forth, and it's vanishingly rare for any to have explicitly stated evaluative criteria for success or failure. The only "success" metric that matters in the private sector is this: "Am I still in business." If you want to go beyond mere survival, the question is "Did I make a higher profit this year than I did last?"

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:42 AM (PYAXX)

64 Next time, let's just pile the money in the road and set it on fire.

Posted by: Circa (Insert Year Here)-also drooling imbecile incapable of doing algebra or something at December 18, 2013 07:42 AM (659DL)

65 >>I thought Sherriff Joe was going to police every dime of that Stimulus money?

And boy, did I! Got a shiny stack back in my office.
It's just the dollars I didn't keep track of....
...
Who wants a muffin!?!

Posted by: Joey Choo-Choo Biden at December 18, 2013 07:43 AM (ruxvM)

66 Next time, let's just pile the money in the road and set it on fire. I like where your head is. This way will be cheaper, because we don't have costs down the road. Get it? Get it?

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:44 AM (i2Lsf)

67 If you want your money..... too fkn bad.

Posted by: Dumbassprezzy at December 18, 2013 07:44 AM (T2V/1)

68 The question that will be answered ruthlessly by the free market is: are there enough rural customers to sustain the maintenance costs of those cable plants. Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 11:37 AM (4JkHl) I saw an article earlier this week about reaching the remotest of the remote with sat phone service. More or less people showed up at some remote jungle tribe, chucked a sat receiver up in a tree and got some phone service in the Netherlands (I think) to provide phone numbers and BAM. Phone service. I'm thinking it didn't take billions to set that up.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 07:44 AM (VtjlW)

69 I thought Sherriff Joe was going to police every dime of that Stimulus money? And boy, did I! Got a shiny stack back in my office. Lemme guess, he got the dimes from Luap Nor.

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:45 AM (i2Lsf)

70 55 Openrange was one of those companies started with the stimulus $, providing wimax internet to rural areas. Free money=crappy business plan, they blew through the cash then promptly went out of business. Posted by: chellep at December 18, 2013 11:41 AM (7Pnkf) WiMAX was a bad fit technically. Verizon's LTE at home service is crushing that near rural market. My stuff was for the 50mi radius, I originally used it on DoD test ranges out west and oil fields. Satellite service is tricky, it can be done right - but your installer has to be good and those little shit antenna need help.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 07:46 AM (4JkHl)

71 I'm thinking it didn't take billions to set that up. No. But it will take Billions in advertising dollars to let the indigenous peoples know which tree the sat phone is in.

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 07:46 AM (Po8ff)

72 Why not just measure the number of hits to bestiality porn sites?

Posted by: Roy at December 18, 2013 07:46 AM (VndSC)

73 >>I'm thinking it didn't take billions to set that up.

Hey, those 77 satellites weren't cheap.

Posted by: Iridium at December 18, 2013 07:46 AM (ruxvM)

74 57 I thought Sherriff Joe was going to police every dime of that Stimulus money? Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 11:41 AM (Po8ff) Shot the dimes out of his shotgun.

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:47 AM (fWAjv)

75 I'm beginning to wonder if I hate metrosexual hipster douchebags more than hippies. No contest. Hippies, I can live and let live (so long as I'm upwind). Hipsters should be hunted into extinction, all traces of their pitiful existence obliterated from even the fossil record.

Posted by: Brother Cavil at December 18, 2013 07:47 AM (naUcP)

76 53 Is satellite internet any good? I heard it sucked.
Posted by: Jeanne

Actually the aforementioned Dead Wife of mine had that at her office- way out in the sticks- and was quite happy with it. Prior to that only dial-up was available there.

Posted by: backhoe at December 18, 2013 07:47 AM (ULH4o)

77 But, let's get real: There is no fucking reason anyone NEEDS internet. This. 100X this. I like my internet, but it's not a necessity. Since it is not a necessity, then if I want internet service, I should pay for it. There are sections of the country that can't even get satellite internet- but I don't really think the people who live there are going to complain about not being able to look up LOLCATS. The real thing is this: the Leftists want to control the internet, but to do that it can't be "private." Since only private companies were providing internet service, that was a problem. So now we have "public internet" allowing the Government (at least in those areas that bought into the stupid idea) with a hand on internet traffic (bad touch! bad touch!). To see where that ends up, look at China.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:47 AM (PYAXX)

78 No. But it will take Billions in advertising dollars to let the indigenous peoples know which tree the sat phone is in.

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 11:46 AM (Po8ff)

And the advertising will be required to be published in 68 different languages and braille.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 07:47 AM (DrWcr)

79 Satellite internet is not broadband and anyone who says otherwise has never used it.
VOIP over satellite? Are you fucking kidding me?
The satellites are 23,000 miles over the equator.  That's a 46,000 mile round trip.  The speed of light in a vacuum is 186,000 miles per second, so it takes roughly one quarter of a second (or 250 milliseconds) for the signal just to make the first hop.  And that's on a good day with perfect conditions and not even taking into consideration various earth-based delays.
My ping on Wildblue was usually in the 600-1000 ms range.
Then you have to account for bandwidth caps.   Someone was bitching to me about Comcast's 300 GB monthly cap.  They shut up when I told them that Wildblue's was 17 GB, and that was for the platinum package.
How is satellite internet like broadband? It's always on.
How is it different? In virtually every other way. 
The Vermont government was crowing about how they've gotten broadband to 99% of homes.  Well, they're counting satellite, so that's just a bullshit claim by people who have decent Internet connections.

Posted by: Fart at December 18, 2013 07:48 AM (2aB+q)

80 Head Start is an abject failure, even with metrics.  That money isn't going to spend itself.

Posted by: Grampa Jimbo at December 18, 2013 07:48 AM (V70Uh)

81 Ha, how do you advertise to people that don't read, listen to the radio, or watch TV? Billboards (pictures only) in the canopy? Shave messages into monkey's backs?

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:48 AM (i2Lsf)

82 Alex, yeah. Not broadband data, but doable. There are open source call direction software packages that can duplicate a full back office for billing. Give me 10K and travel expenses, and I'll set one up anywhere between 65N and 65S. Gets a little harder at higher latitudes.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 07:48 AM (4JkHl)

83

" A vagina is more desirable than a mans anus"Stuff Phil Robertson said, Volume two, chapter 7.<<<

 

 

 

I would rather go see The Vagina Monologues than listen to an Obama speech, so I get his point.

Posted by: Roy at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (VndSC)

84

But, let's get real: There is no fucking reason anyone NEEDS internet.

It's nice, it's useful: But if I'm living on Shitkicker Road 30 miles out of Sticksville, internet ain't exactly going to make my life better.

 

-------------

 

Well, "need" in the sense of food and water being needed, OK.  But if you're in a very rural area, internet can be more necessity than not I think. 

 

Being able to see what's up in the world without relying on the big three networks, being able to communicate without having to deal with your rural post office, etc etc.  There's real utility there that I don't think is easily discounted.

 

Posted by: Baby Herman at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (eytER)

85 Frame 1: Dogbert: I'd like a job where I can telecommute every day. Frame 2: Dogbert: It should be high-paying yet have goals which can't be measured. Frame 3: Pointy-haired boss: So, you'd stay home and we'd mail you checks ? Dogbert: I wa hoping for direct deposit. One of my favorite Dilbert cartoons. Now we're running our government that way.

Posted by: sock_rat_eez at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (SwHqo)

86 "The comments surprised me. I was exepecting a lot more of the "cis-gendered heteronormative h8!" nonsense."

Yup, same here. That's why I suggested reading them.
To me it was out of the expected norm to see so many people basically supporting him.
Or at least saying that they prefer Hooters over Dicks. (Insider Jacksonville joke)

It may tie in with my comment yesterday that I am seeing face to face push back known liberals when someone says "Happy Holidays"
More than any year in recent history, I am having people pause, and give a genuine "Thank you, and Merry Christmas to you too"  when I greet them in the Christianormative manner.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (teMpq)

87 I used to work for Hughes Network Systems.  We had VIOP ten years ago.


Posted by: Grampa Jimbo at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (V70Uh)

88 Isn't satellite still faster than dial-up?

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:49 AM (i2Lsf)

89 I'm skeptical of the argument that giving people in the sticks faster internet access is going to improve their economic lot. How many jobs actually require broadband? To the extent that I use the innertubes for work, there's very little that cannot be accomplished with a dialup connection. Is the rural economy really being held back because people can't email large files quickly? Transmitting a 1MB file over dialup is an annoyance but it wouldn't seem to be a dealbreaker.

Posted by: Masturbatin' Pete at December 18, 2013 07:50 AM (xN1DB)

90 64 Next time, let's just pile the money in the road and set it on fire. Posted by: Circa (Insert Year Here)-also drooling imbecile incapable of doing algebra or something at December 18, 2013 11:42 AM (659DL) Yep. Our .gov basically re-enacts the Joker scene every single day. http://tinyurl.com/mwckhol

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:50 AM (fWAjv)

91 Being able to see what's up in the world without relying on the big three networks, being able to communicate without having to deal with your rural post office, etc etc. There's real utility there that I don't think is easily discounted. Okay, let's set "need" aside. Give me a good reason my taxes should pay for someone else's internet service. For that matter, give me a good reason my taxes should pay for their food, water, shelter, or clothing (which are all "real" necessities).

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:51 AM (PYAXX)

92 Hughsnet SUX.    I'm ok with direct tv, but having to deal with Hughsnet is honestly like being stuck in the stone-age of internet. Between the slow speed, and the bandwidth limits, it's like having dial-up.

I pay $110 a month, and have a daily limit of next to nothing.

Posted by: c at December 18, 2013 07:52 AM (NUMNK)

93

Or at least saying that they prefer Hooters over Dicks. (Insider Jacksonville joke)

In Orlando, there's a Dick's near a BJs. 

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 07:52 AM (DrWcr)

94 Give me a good reason my taxes should pay for someone else's internet service. So they can sign up for Obamacare?

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 07:52 AM (i2Lsf)

95 Isn't the rural broadband expansion plan funded through a portion of our cell phone bills? Wait, I think it may be the Obama phones.

Posted by: Mainah at December 18, 2013 07:53 AM (659DL)

96 No. But it will take Billions in advertising dollars to let the indigenous peoples know which tree the sat phone is in. Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 11:46 AM (Po8ff) I'm sensing a business opportunity for the Horde.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 07:53 AM (VtjlW)

97 Can't these people just go to the local library, download the porn to a thumb drive, then go home and wail away?

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:53 AM (teMpq)

98 Lizzy and Mallfly have the gist of it...

Think about how many bureau-drones, consultants, and 'smart people' could feast off a pile of that size.

Does anybody still wonder why the 5 richest counties in the US can be found around the Beltway???

And that's only one heap o'money being talked about... I suspect there's a whole lot new rich, and 'more' rich folks out there... small wonder why the 'the economy's going great' poll numbers haven't sunk below a certain floor.

(Hint: just poll the right areas, and everybody's happy...)

Posted by: CPT. Charles at December 18, 2013 07:53 AM (lJaja)

99 YOU WANT THE METRICS???

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE METRICS!!!!

Posted by: Tex Lovera at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (wtvvX)

100 Okay, let's set "need" aside. Give me a good reason my taxes should pay for someone else's internet service. For that matter, give me a good reason my taxes should pay for their food, water, shelter, or clothing (which are all "real" necessities). Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 11:51 AM (PYAXX) That's pretty heartless of you.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (VtjlW)

101 Scary, but internet has become so integrated into business that even small businesses and farms must have a connection to get shit done. That EMP is going to fuck up a lot of stuff.

Posted by: Nip Sip at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (0FSuD)

102 There is no fucking reason anyone NEEDS internet.

It helps people who grow food.  Anyone NEED food?

http://holsteinworld.com/new/story.php?id=4648


Of course, this indicates that they already have access to the internet, which would belie the "underserved" bit, and why are we pretending this was ever meant to help anyone?  It was never about anything but funneling money.

Posted by: HeatherRadish™ needs a beer at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (ZKzrr)

103 Isn't the rural broadband expansion plan funded through a portion of our cell phone bills? Pretty sure that was funded via porkulus. Wait, I think it may be the Obama phones. That does (putatively) come from taxes collected via cell phone bill.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (PYAXX)

104 @86 - I, too, have noticed a lot more "Merry Christmas"es this year than in years past.  I must admit I was taken aback in a few instances.

Posted by: bicentennialguy at December 18, 2013 07:54 AM (vg8iE)

105 That's pretty heartless of you. Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 11:54 AM (VtjlW) I know. But I'm heartless, so I really don't care.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:55 AM (PYAXX)

106 And, I'm not asking for a handout - but I'm sure there are some federal regulations slowing down service improvements.  

While DVDs are disappearing everywhere - movie choices for home viewing are disappearing, because I can't fricken download anything.   Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone.  

Not to mention that I have to download my music now.   I can do a couple songs a day w/o blowing through my bandwidth.   A movie is completely undo-able.

Posted by: Car in at December 18, 2013 07:55 AM (NUMNK)

107

Give me a good reason my taxes should pay for someone else's internet service. For that matter, give me a good reason my taxes should pay for their food, water, shelter, or clothing (which are all "real" necessities).

 

------------

 

I have no good reason why government should subsidize such a thing, because there is no good reason. 

 

But that isn't where I was coming from.

 

I'm simply saying that Internet access is becoming more and more necessary.  Whether that is a dire "need" or not is subjective, but in no case should I be read to say I think government should be paying for it.

 

Funny thing about "needs."  If they're genuine, people usually find a way to pay for them on their own.

Posted by: Baby Herman at December 18, 2013 07:55 AM (eytER)

108 "In Orlando, there's a Dick's near a BJs."

Now that's funny.



Almost got Mrs VIA the "I prefer Dicks over Hooters" tee shirt.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 07:55 AM (teMpq)

109 I've got my own little microwave relay and awesome broadband... god bless the sticks.   Didn't get it from no gummint tho.

Posted by: Richard McEnroe at December 18, 2013 07:55 AM (XO6WW)

110 Boradband? Should that be Borat-band? Any ways, I saw Boradband open for Pezband, Wollman Skating Rink, Central Park, 1977.

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (7ObY1)

111 Whoa, whoa, whoa ! Hold it right there. "The Sherriff" Joey Choo Choo Biden was watching over this. What could have went wrong ?

Posted by: The Jackhole at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (nTgAI)

112 F them. I don't have internet.

Posted by: traye at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (nCg/E)

113 Posted by: Richard McEnroe at December 18, 2013 11:55 AM (XO6WW) That is clearly racist.

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (fWAjv)

114 It may tie in with my comment yesterday that I am seeing face to face push back known liberals when someone says "Happy Holidays"
More than any year in recent history, I am having people pause, and give a genuine "Thank you, and Merry Christmas to you too" when I greet them in the Christianormative manner.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 18, 2013 11:49 AM (teMpq)

 

I've been making it a point to wish people a Merry Christmas, and I've pretty routinely gotten the same wish back.  It's a good thing. 

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (DrWcr)

115 Is satellite internet any good? I heard it sucked.>>

I have satellite internet at home. The speed is good and weather issues are rare. The thing that sucks is I'm limited to 10 gig which means I can't my free Amazon prime movies and other video. Unless I want to pay a healthy charge for more data.

Posted by: Buzzsaw at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (tf9Ne)

116 Objective metrics are racist.

Posted by: The State Media at December 18, 2013 07:56 AM (P3U0f)

117 Isn't the rural broadband expansion plan funded through a portion of our cell phone bills? Pretty sure that was funded via porkulus. *facepalm. Scrolls back up and reads headline. It's been a long morning. This week needs to end.

Posted by: Mainah at December 18, 2013 07:57 AM (659DL)

118 As an amateur radio operator, I was very concerned about Broadband Over Powerline (BPL), as there was absolutely going to be interference with certain bands allocated to amateur radio operators. It was pie-in-the-sky to begin with, and certainly represented a threat to emergency communications. It seems to have died a narural (and predictable death, though there may be twitches here and there). In spite of that, tens of millions of taxpayer and ratepayer dollars were pissed down that hole. Bureaucrats always know what is best right? And did that money simply disappear? Why, no. It simply went into cronies pockets.

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 07:57 AM (aDwsi)

119 Isn't satellite still faster than dial-up? The raw speed is better, but the latency would, I imagine, make life miserable.

Posted by: t-bird at December 18, 2013 07:57 AM (FcR7P)

120 "The only 'success' metric that matters in the private sector is this: 'Am I still in business.'"

That's the overall metric, surely.

But within any large and complex business, there are questions about how well the business gets certain things done. And there are internal programs and initiatives and whatnot which are specific to those certain things. It's necessary, but not always done, to gauge how well those internal programs have accomplished their intended goal.

Example from life: back in the 1990s, I worked with a firm who sold a technically complex product. Their sales staff were almost entirely nontechnical and often found themselves in over their heads dealing with customers, giving wrong answers to technical questions. This resulted in a certain number of lost sales as frustrated would-be customers hung up and went elsewhere.

Management said, eureka, we have a problem, and we, management, have a solution. The sales staff need TRAINING on the product. So, management spent a metric fuckton of money on "training" via an outside consultant, and declared the problem solved.

Was the problem actually solved? Well, that could have been checked and measured in various ways. The staff who had been put through "training" could have been tested afterward to determine how well the training imbued them with new understanding. The sales managers could report on the percentage reduction in lost business due to improved technical savvy.

However, none of those obvious evaluations were done. If they had been done, what would have been revealed was that management's brainstorm was actually a shitstorm. The "training" was expensive, but confusing and of low quality, and the sales staff all privately told me that they had emerged from it even more baffled about key technical points than they had been before.

Merely tracking overall profitability of the firm isn't of sufficient analytical depth or fine granularity to reveal lower level operational deficiencies such as the one discussed here.

Posted by: torquewrench at December 18, 2013 07:57 AM (gqT4g)

121 Thee are a lot of other ways this could have been done: 1. Tax credit for expensive current broadband service based on the number of employees and geographic area 2. Direct the FCC to have different band plans for sparsely populated areas so wireless broadband could optimize for distance instead of density 3. Some sort of partnership deal to supplant local first responder networks with tower space for commercial users, imagine FirstNet with an actual plan for put year funding. I could go on, but someone would have to pay me

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 07:58 AM (4JkHl)

122 "Little Lion Man"

Weep for yourself, my man,
You'll never be what is in your heart
Weep, little lion man,
You're not as brave as you were at the start
Rate yourself and rake yourself
Take all the courage you have left
And waste it on fixing all the problems that you made in your own head

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I, my dear?

Posted by: Neville Chamberlain at December 18, 2013 07:58 AM (e8kgV)

123 I'm simply saying that Internet access is becoming more and more necessary. I admit that it has great utility, but the vast majority of people don't "need" internet access even as a utility. The majority of people don't do much of utility (as opposed to "of entertainment") on the internet. Inasmuch as you do "need" internet for utility purposes, virtually every website you'd use for utility (say- your bank, your web-mail, etc.) has a "low bandwidth" option you can use- meaning broadband itself is absolutely not necessary- however nice it is (and it is nice, I'm not disagreeing there at all).

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 07:59 AM (PYAXX)

124 No broadband no peace!!!

Posted by: dananjcon at December 18, 2013 07:59 AM (wmU4G)

125 Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone. Posted by: Car in at December 18, 2013 11:55 AM (NUMNK) Wait, what? I still get dvds from Netflix via mail. As in, I got some yesterday.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 08:00 AM (VtjlW)

126 Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone. What, I just put a couple back in the mailbox.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 08:00 AM (4JkHl)

127 I'm a rural resident and get internet via satellite. There is a government mandated bandwidth cap of 17,000 Mb per 30 day period. In a family of 4 we have to limit daily usage to around 500 Mb/day to hedge against the frequent rogue autoplay video. That's 200 Mb each for me and the Beach Bunny and 100 Mb for the kits to squabble over. That's not a lot. My hutch isn't that far from town either but it is far enough, around 20 miles. The phone lines aren't set-up for DSL and Line-of-Sight services can't reach me between the ridgelines. If this was supposed to be a project for rural residents across the nation I couldn't imagine a more prime candidate community than my warren yet we heard nothing of this. But we still paid taxes for it, which brings me to my real point: If this were a private concern I could sue them for breach of contract.

Posted by: SGT Snugglebunny at December 18, 2013 08:01 AM (51bPZ)

128 Funny thing about "needs." If they're genuine, people usually find a way to pay for them on their own.

Not in my lifetime.


Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone.

I still have it.

Posted by: HeatherRadish™ needs a beer at December 18, 2013 08:01 AM (ZKzrr)

129 This kind of thing has always pissed me off. Why should urban and suburban taxpayers get hit up so that people who choose to live out in sticks have service? The argument was a little bit stronger for basics POTS voice service, allowing things like summoning an ambulance out to an isolated farm. The very existence of satellite service (or point to point microwave relay, etc.), however, makes it questionable to spend vast sums to pull copper or fiber out to some remote location, so that people who appear to favor isolation can be less isolated.

If the intended recipient of the service is financially able, satellite or wireless relay should suffice. If they are impoverished, as many out in most rural areas are, internet service is not going to improve their lives much. Motivated students do just fine with plain old fashioned books that require nothing more than light to read by, and access to Amazon isn't going to do much for people who see the poverty line as a distant summit above them.

Posted by: Epobirs at December 18, 2013 08:01 AM (bPxS6)

130 WTF? Should I get on the dole, too? I want me some stimulus. I don't have cable. I pay for a mobile phone that is my only internet connection. Have you ever tried reading here on a phone? Or commenting for that matter? Especially after Mike Hammer blows out the margins with a link...

Posted by: shredded chi at December 18, 2013 08:02 AM (V6E6P)

131 Here's more on BPL, from 2009. The headline is, "It's Alive!" http://gigaom.com/2009/02/18/its-alive-broadband-over-power-line-may-get-boost-from-stimulus-bill/ Now, in 2013, it should read, "It's Dead!" In spite of all of the well reasoned counter-arguments, the government pressed ahead..., kinda like Obamacare.

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:02 AM (aDwsi)

132 Shredded - Mea culpa, mea culpa. My apologies..., twice.

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:03 AM (aDwsi)

133 boy this shit seems real fucked up

Posted by: Bam Bam at December 18, 2013 08:04 AM (QNrKP)

134 Why should urban and suburban taxpayers get hit up so that people who choose to live out in sticks have service?

Same reason the people who choose to live out in the sticks have to pay for your urban mass transit?

Posted by: HeatherRadish™ needs a beer at December 18, 2013 08:04 AM (ZKzrr)

135 Have you ever tried reading here on a phone? Or commenting for that matter? Especially after Mike Hammer blows out the margins with a link... Posted by: shredded chi at December 18, 2013 12:02 PM (V6E6P) Special kudos to the morons that do that. I tried it and it was terrible. Reading was ok, but posting was so damn frustrating.

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 08:04 AM (fWAjv)

136

I need to start a government.  Every school I've been to and job I've had has always measured performance, which is annoying, and adhered to consequences for poor performance, which is just bullshit.

 

Gonna get me a government and just let the goodies roll in.

Posted by: Frumious Bandersnatch at December 18, 2013 08:05 AM (A0sHn)

137 A computer, cell phone, broadband, are all 'Human Rights' now, or something.

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:05 AM (aDwsi)

138 134 Why should urban and suburban taxpayers get hit up so that people who choose to live out in sticks have service? Because Iowa has the first primary, and more the fifty Senators think they would make a great President.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 08:06 AM (4JkHl)

139 134 Why should urban and suburban taxpayers get hit up so that people who choose to live out in sticks have service? Same reason the people who choose to live out in the sticks have to pay for your urban mass transit? Posted by: HeatherRadish™ needs a beer at December 18, 2013 12:04 PM (ZKzrr) jobs! We need the gov'ment for jobs!

Posted by: Bam Bam at December 18, 2013 08:06 AM (QNrKP)

140 Wait, what? I still get dvds from Netflix via mail. As in, I got some yesterday.

Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 12:00 PM (VtjlW)

Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone.

What, I just put a couple back in the mailbox.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 12:00 PM (4JkHl)


*


Net-Flix by mail???  That soooo 2010!!

Lulz....


Neo-Luddites...the lot of yas!!

ヅ




Posted by: dananjcon at December 18, 2013 08:06 AM (wmU4G)

141 About this 'blowing out the margins. That never happens to me, i.e., I never see that.

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:07 AM (aDwsi)

142 All in good fun, Mike. I hope you know that.

Posted by: shredded chi at December 18, 2013 08:07 AM (V6E6P)

143 Totally being a geek, but I spent years working with those Hughes guys.

The Spaceway satellites they are using are a technical marvel that no one has come close to replicating.  They are layer 2 Ethernet switches in space and can handle 100,000 concurrent users.

I worked on a program that was going to leverage the concept and fly layer 3 routing in space for the military, until Obama killed the program in his first month in office.  We had a tested design, and were ready to move into production.

I guess folks like Comcast were heavy doners and wanted to kill off competition.

Posted by: Dave in Fla at December 18, 2013 08:08 AM (oByn4)

144 Just count the number of hook ups at farmersonly dot com.   Duh.

Posted by: Sandra Fluck at December 18, 2013 08:08 AM (KQp38)

145

I admit that it has great utility, but the vast majority of people don't "need" internet access even as a utility. The majority of people don't do much of utility (as opposed to "of entertainment") on the internet.

 

--------

Well, entertainment is a kind of utility.  It's someone getting use out of the service.  I'm looking at utility as if someone finds it useful in general, not  limited to only  doing non-entertainment stuff.

 

That said, I'm not saying every rural household should get a T1 or something.  But dialup in rural areas is often pretty damned spotty too...those lines get static and such that makes connections pretty unreliable.  My FIL had dialup in his rural house and it just wouldn't work well.

 

And again, this is light years away from saying government should be paying for it.  But that doesn't mean I don't agree with the idea that internet access, in and of itself, can arguably be considered a necessity.

 

 

Posted by: Baby Herman at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (eytER)

146 When are they going to give me a damn house to get broadband.

Posted by: LIV RWC at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (fWAjv)

147 Vanity Fair claims that Dubya is a hipster icon now (and they are not happy about it.) Is this a Thing?

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (7ObY1)

148 shredde - Objective criticism is always appreciated. Malicious flaming is relished. But, really, I've never seen anything that I've posted widen the margins. Is it a browser function?

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (aDwsi)

149

I have a coworker who works in Loudon, NH.   Loudon is the home of the NH Motor Speedway and is right next door to our state capital, Concord,  so it's not exactly the back of beyond.     Nevertheless, because of the topography  of her home, she has to use satellite internet because of the infeasibility of stringing any kind of cable or fiber optic (snort!) internet connections across the swampy land around her property.  

 

 

For satellite internet and phone, she pays probably $100 something per month; maybe $200 something at the most.

 

 

To have cable installed, it would have been approximately the same per month, but with a one time $10,000 fee for installation of the cables and necessary poles.   You get one pole free; any additional poles needed to reach the    property were coming out of her pocket.

 

 

Now multiply that across God only knows how many rural communities that are ACTUALLY   rural,  all across the country,  many of them far more remote than Loudon, NH.

 

 

Yeah.   Exactly.

 

Posted by: MWR, Proud Tea(rrorist) Party Assault Hobbit [/i][/s][/u][/b] at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (4df7R)

150 Why not just measure the number of hits to bestiality porn sites?

Posted by: Roy at December 18, 2013 11:46 AM (VndSC)

 

Because we're talking about rural America, not the Middle East.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (DrWcr)

151 Give me a good reason my taxes should pay for someone else's internet service. For that matter, give me a good reason my taxes should pay for their food, water, shelter, or clothing (which are all "real" necessities).

Rayciss.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 08:09 AM (xm1A1)

152 Billions were tossed around without measuring how many people actually benefited... Can't go wrong assuming the beneficiaries are somehow politically connected, being as that's how things seem to work these days...

Posted by: Blacque Jacques Shellacque at December 18, 2013 08:10 AM (AsEOB)

153 Peggy Noonan, who must still have the taste of Zero's dick in her mouth, has a lot of gall talking about Zero's incompetence.

Posted by: maddogg at December 18, 2013 08:10 AM (xWW96)

154 140 Wait, what? I still get dvds from Netflix via mail. As in, I got some yesterday. Posted by: alexthechick - SMOD. Now with extra taunting. at December 18, 2013 12:00 PM (VtjlW) Netflix - by mail - was awesome, but that's gone. What, I just put a couple back in the mailbox. Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 12:00 PM (4JkHl) * Net-Flix by mail??? That soooo 2010!!Lulz.... Neo-Luddites...the lot of yas!!ヅ Posted by: dananjcon at December 18, 2013 12:06 PM (wmU4G) There is no way I am letting my kids get close to accessing the FIOS pipe. It comes in by mail, thru daddy's tight fist.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 08:11 AM (4JkHl)

155 Vanity Fair claims that Dubya is a hipster icon now (and they are not happy about it.)

Is this a Thing?

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 12:09 PM (7ObY1)

 

When and how did this happen?

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 08:11 AM (DrWcr)

156 When are they going to give me a damn house to get broadband. Posted by: LIV ---------------- The deal is done. Your home is..., uh..., ready. Your new ZIP is 48235

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:11 AM (aDwsi)

157 Peggy Noonan, who must still have the taste of Zero's dick in her mouth, has a lot of gall talking about Zero's incompetence. And notice that her problem is with his "competence." Hell, his incompetence is the one thing I like about him. Imagine if he were competent!

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 08:11 AM (PYAXX)

158 Don't worry, the trickle down from all the Acornites and other cronies who got the cash will stimulate...something.

Posted by: PJ at December 18, 2013 08:12 AM (ZWaLo)

159 There is no way I am letting my kids get close to accessing the FIOS pipe. It comes in by mail, thru daddy's tight fist.

Posted by: Jean at December 18, 2013 12:11 PM (4JkHl)



Buuuuuuut daaaaaaad!!!!!



Posted by: Jean's kids at December 18, 2013 08:12 AM (GQ8sn)

160 Isn't satellite still faster than dial-up?

Normally it should be, but I've had to deal with customers with sat connections and I could swear I was getting the data at 9600 baud.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 08:12 AM (xm1A1)

161 I was supposed to be connected to a fiber optic line by now but the deal fizzled out in 2012. And when I go to see if anything is happening it's radio silence.

http://www.rsfiber.com/

Posted by: Buzzsaw at December 18, 2013 08:12 AM (tf9Ne)

162

maddogg: Right?   This bit especially ticks me off.

 

"I would add that in recent weeks I have begun to worry about the basic competency of the administration, its ability to perform the most fundamental duties of executive management..."

 

Oh really, Peggy?   You've begun to worry in recent weeks?   That's it?   Where the fuck have you been for the last five years?

Posted by: MWR, Proud Tea(rrorist) Party Assault Hobbit [/i][/s][/u][/b] at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (4df7R)

163 Why not just measure the number of hits to bestiality porn sites? Posted by: Roy at December 18, 2013 11:46 AM (VndSC) well farmers watch cows, etc. fuck for free durring the live show at their farm daily

Posted by: Bam Bam at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (QNrKP)

164 This was a windfall for all the rural electrical coops, which received the subsidies to run the program and then turned their newsletters into paens to the Democrat party- if they weren't already.  The biggest beneficiaries were sites like Netflix,  Hulu, Amazon prime, the music download sites etc. because the casual rural internet user could now download and stream large entertainment files.

Those rural Americans who needed the speed for business already used satellite internet. My architect neighbor had satellite internet for years because he needed it to to send gargantuan design files. On phone lines they took hours to transmit.  Yes, it works great except during heavy rainstorms and during snowstorms you may have to clean the dish off once in a while. 

Posted by: NC Mountain Girl at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (ETTxR)

165 Hell, his incompetence is the one thing I like about him. Imagine if he were competent!

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 12:11 PM (PYAXX)

 

He would have already liquidated the Kulaks.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (DrWcr)

166 153 Peggy Noonan, who must still have the taste of Zero's dick in her mouth, has a lot of gall talking about Zero's incompetence. The Palace Guards can try and backtrack all they want, they won't fool me. Or anyone here. Their names shall go down in infamy when the history books are written. May every one of them be remembered as Leni Riefenstahl is remembered. That goes for every damned one of their traitorous asses. Every JournOlister, every turncoat "Republican" every damned one of them. May they rot in hell.

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (7ObY1)

167 Why not just measure the number of hits to bestiality porn sites? Posted by: Roy at December 18, 2013 11:46 AM (VndSC) Because we're talking about rural America, not the Middle East. Besides, you don't have to go to pr0n sites when you can just go out to the barn......

Posted by: rickb223 at December 18, 2013 08:13 AM (qc7at)

168 I was getting the data at 9600 baud.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 12:12 PM (xm1A1)

Wow....that's pretty good.

Posted by: AOSHQ Technology Associates at December 18, 2013 08:14 AM (QFxY5)

169 Hell, his incompetence is the one thing I like about him. Imagine if he were competent!Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 12:11 PM (PYAXX)
No one escapes from Stalag 13.

Posted by: Wilhelm Klink at December 18, 2013 08:14 AM (VpMO0)

170 Vanity Fair claims that Dubya is a hipster icon now (and they are not happy about it.) Is this a Thing? Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 12:09 PM (7ObY1) The BDS comments should be hilarious.

Posted by: RWC at December 18, 2013 08:15 AM (fWAjv)

171 #127

Check out AdBlock on Firefox to kill a lot of video using ads before they initiate. I assume you are using setting that prevent any multi-media content from starting without being selected directly by the user.

Changing your browser to report itself as a mobile version will make a lot of sites automatically use a low bandwidth version, typically a headlines only format that switches to fuller content if you go into a specific article.

I realize it is a real hassle having to accept such limits if you don't want to live close into the hive. My brother also has a great preference for lower density regions but this makes it difficult to get good work in his field. The town we grew up in was very close to Los Angeles but had abysmal TV reception until the early 70s. It became one of the first places in the country to get a cable deployment after it had proven successful in Colorado. I'm sure the local city government did everything they could to help it along but as far as I can recall nobody who didn't reside within the town was expected to help pay for it. The only people who should have felt any motivation to do so were the big network affiliates in LA whose broadcasts' commercials were not being appreciated by our growing community.

Posted by: Epobirs at December 18, 2013 08:15 AM (bPxS6)

172 I downloaded Idiocracy, but I didn't understand it, Sir.

Posted by: Jeantel at December 18, 2013 08:15 AM (JQuNB)

173 Billions were tossed around without measuring how many people actually benefited...

Thomas Sowell had a gov't job many years ago where he asked the question, how do we measure whether the money we're handing out is actually helping the people we claim it is. He was treated as a heretic.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 08:15 AM (xm1A1)

174 I was getting the data at 9600 baud.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 12:12 PM (xm1A1)

Wow....that's pretty good.

Posted by: AOSHQ Technology Associates at December 18, 2013 12:14 PM (QFxY5)



I remember plugging in my 300 baud modem into the back of my Commodore 64 and marveling how awesome it was to connect to a "BBS", one user at a time.  Then my friend got a 1200 baud modem and me with my jaw dropping at how much faster it was.



Oh, and get off my lawn.

Posted by: Jean's kids at December 18, 2013 08:16 AM (GQ8sn)

175 you may have to clean the dish off once in a while. Posted by: NC Mountain --------------- *sensing business opportunity* Hey..., my dog can do that

Posted by: Mike Hammer at December 18, 2013 08:16 AM (aDwsi)

176 When and how did this happen? Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 12:11 PM (DrWcr) Apparently, it was his paintings (which turned out to be pretty good) and that letter to the Alabama kicker. The VF writer is so obviously pained by this. If you don't want to give VF a click, the Daily Caller among others has the story.

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 08:16 AM (7ObY1)

177 He was treated as a heretic.

Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 12:15 PM (xm1A1)

Well...Sowell IS a racist, so it's not surprising.

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at December 18, 2013 08:17 AM (QFxY5)

178

Independent of any government initiative, I can say there are plenty of rural communities here in Texas in the 3,000 to 20,000 range that would be served by high speed broadband via fiber if we had not spun the telecom utilities out of their monopoly status.

 

Once they have to show a profit, then infrastructure investment is near zero.  A monopoly telecom would have been guaranteed a profit, and therefore strung the lines connecting all these communities.  I'm talking about dozens of rural towns within 100 miles of Houston, within 50 miles of the Houston suburbs.

Posted by: Advo at December 18, 2013 08:17 AM (7vbG1)

179 >>Oh really, Peggy? You've begun to worry in recent weeks? That's it? Where the fuck have you been for the last five years?

No kidding! Like Barbara Walters, they have zero self-awareness of the extent to which they've been played, and that they are only continuing to embarrass themselves now that they're "shocked" their god bleeds.

Posted by: Iridium at December 18, 2013 08:18 AM (ruxvM)

180 This is kinda off topic but still related because it deals with the Obama administration's incompetence. It also makes me feel good and I'm selfish like that. My sister is very liberal and voted for TFG twice. Between the disaster that Obamacare has turned into and my talks with her she now feels very differently. This is her response to the blog article about owing Medicaid for its "services": I feel I must apologize to all of my fellow Americans for voting for this man. In my opinion, while trying to remain civil, Obama has spun an intricate web of untruths, 1/2 truths, fabrications and fibs, please feel free to change the words to suit your personal vocabulary. This man mesmerized an audience who wanted a better future and we became 'believers.' I never thought I was stupid enough to drink the kool-aid. Obamacare was the straw that broke Obama's back but every new story about Obama's incompetence helps harden the ill will towards him. The best are the ones that even LIVs can understand. So conservative blogs need to keep pushing news about all the fuck ups perpetrated by Jugears & Co. Judging from the poll numbers our message is finally getting through to more than a few people. Being a pessimist I figure it's probably too little too late, but enough torpedoes finally sank the Yamato. It's up to us now and nobody else. The GOP leadership is more interested in visiting the Democrats whorehouse than fighting them. I'm finally feeling a tiny bit of solace from Obama's drop in the polls. And as little as it is, it feels really damned good.

Posted by: Ed Anger at December 18, 2013 08:18 AM (tOkJB)

181 Posted by: Advo at December 18, 2013 12:17 PM (7vbG1)

Huh?

This is a joke....right?

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at December 18, 2013 08:18 AM (QFxY5)

182 Don't know what the deal is, Mike. But sometimes we have to expand the page to see all of it (me only?). Um... A really long link is usually the culprit, but when Ace or a cob posts a video that is large (the view of it, not the file) I have to expand the page and the text gets smaller. Unfortunately, my eyes don't get bigger when I have to do that. Hard to explain - as I read that, it doesn't make much sense...

Posted by: shredded chi at December 18, 2013 08:18 AM (V6E6P)

183 I was getting the data at 9600 baud. Posted by: OregonMuse at December 18, 2013 12:12 PM (xm1A1) Wow....that's pretty good. Posted by: AOSHQ Technology Associates Real men use 3200 baud. Anything else is just showing off.

Posted by: rickb223 at December 18, 2013 08:20 AM (qc7at)

184 Does it ever occur to these douchenozzles that maybe some people who live in the hard-to-reach areas do that for a reason?

Posted by: David Hodges at December 18, 2013 08:20 AM (NXg/k)

185 Shovel Ready http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHYFONbT8EM

Posted by: gumble at December 18, 2013 08:20 AM (HgcNF)

186 There will be no broadband with 404Care.

Posted by: Prez'nit 404 at December 18, 2013 08:21 AM (Dwehj)

187 Proof that the HQ is on the cutting edge: Both Rush and Dennis Prager opened their shows talking about the Great Santa Claus Controversy, which we beat to death yesterday.

Posted by: rickl at December 18, 2013 08:22 AM (zoehZ)

188 Posted by: Mallfly at December 18, 2013 11:32 AM (bJm7W) ------- Quite close. Installing and maintaining those miles and miles of utility poles and wires and fibre optic transceivers are all *union jobs*. 'nuff said. Mew p.s. Walker 2016.

Posted by: acat at December 18, 2013 08:22 AM (4UkCP)

189 Once they have to show a profit, then infrastructure investment is near zero. A monopoly telecom would have been guaranteed a profit, and therefore strung the lines connecting all these communities. And how is that profit "guaranteed?" Well, it can't be by subscribers, since the costs for providing the service (that is: infrastructure improvements) to those rural and semi-rural communities aren't going to go down appreciably. So it must be because the Government is subsidizing them (either by allowing them to overcharge for the service- which is what was happening, or by a direct subsidy). So I'll ask again- why should my tax dollars be spent to provide anyone internet access?

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 08:22 AM (PYAXX)

190 Wait... SHRINK the page is what I have to do. Yeah. I really should have gone for the bloody Mary instead of the coffee this morning, I guess.

Posted by: shredded chi at December 18, 2013 08:24 AM (V6E6P)

191 I'm gonna take us back to the stone age, come hell or high water.

Posted by: Prez'nit 404 at December 18, 2013 08:24 AM (Dwehj)

192 Ed Anger, tis good your Sis is salvagable. Rejoice!

Posted by: maddogg at December 18, 2013 08:25 AM (xWW96)

193 We'll make up for it in volume.

Posted by: Mega at December 18, 2013 08:26 AM (hHFOx)

194 I'm talking about dozens of rural towns within 100 miles of Houston, within 50 miles of the Houston suburbs. Towns in Iowa, between 300 and 5,000 people, have made their own co-ops, and they have high speed internet. this was before this program, and those companies are still in business. It can be done, and has been done.

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 08:26 AM (i2Lsf)

195 http://www.metc.net/ Look up the population of these towns in Iowa.

Posted by: Jay in Ames at December 18, 2013 08:27 AM (i2Lsf)

196 I know they dropped at least 15 Million sending me junk mail about this bullshit.

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 08:27 AM (Po8ff)

197 Huh?
This is a joke....right?
Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at December 18, 2013 12:18 PM (QFxY5)

I hope so.
I worked at a company called Midwec (which made capacitor/inductor assemblies for the olde analog lines), and we spun off a company called Linatel due to the breakup of the Ma Bell monopoly.

Success forced us to relocate from Scottsbluff, NE to the Boulder/Denver area.

We got so profitable our parent company sold us off.

Part of the operation was bought up by one of the first "digitizing" voice companies.

Posted by: jwb7605 [/i][/u][/s][/b] at December 18, 2013 08:27 AM (3Tv+N)

198 Proof that the HQ is on the cutting edge: Both Rush and Dennis Prager opened their shows talking about the Great Santa Claus Controversy, which we beat to death yesterday. You killed.........Santa????

Posted by: rickb223 at December 18, 2013 08:28 AM (qc7at)

199 It looks like Twitter killed Slublogs Biden tweet. "That page does not exist..." Asswipes.

Posted by: Ed Anger at December 18, 2013 08:28 AM (tOkJB)

200 ...and whoever is in charge of getting Queen Alex her tea - the oatmeal cookies should be ready in 5 minutes.

Posted by: garrett at December 18, 2013 08:28 AM (Po8ff)

201 Yeah, but Hughes satellite internet sucks ass and is enormously expensive. Feeding a gaming habit that depends on having a clear view of the Southern sky sucks, yo.

Posted by: Oilfield Dude at December 18, 2013 08:28 AM (Yl4yE)

202 You didn't build that router.

Posted by: Prez'nit 404 at December 18, 2013 08:29 AM (Dwehj)

203 You didn't build that router. Posted by: Prez'nit 404 at December 18, 2013 12:29 PM (Dwehj) Apparently neither did you or your flunkies.

Posted by: AllenG (DedicatedTenther) Ah, F It. at December 18, 2013 08:29 AM (PYAXX)

204 A router is sort of like a toaster, right?

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 08:30 AM (7ObY1)

205 My broadband service was an Act of God.  I live in a rural area and have had it through my landline phone for years now because lightening took out the local switching box.  The phone company had to upgrade with equipment that could handle broadband.  We were an island in a sea on nonservice, so much so the customer service people didn't knowhe had it unless you called to their attention that some users on the XXX exchange now had access. 

It just doesn't pay for the phone companies to upgrade still functional equipment just to allow some users to get broadband.

Posted by: NC Mountain Girl at December 18, 2013 08:30 AM (ETTxR)

206 You killed.........Santa????

Posted by: rickb223 at December 18, 2013 12:28 PM (qc7at)

 

I heard something coming down the chimney, so I stuck my double-barrel shotgun up the fireplace and fired two blasts.  I thought it was a squirrel or something!

Posted by: Joey Biden at December 18, 2013 08:30 AM (DrWcr)

207 A router is sort of like a toaster, right?

Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 12:30 PM (7ObY1)

 

It's harder to f*ck a router.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 08:30 AM (DrWcr)

208 204 A router is sort of like a toaster, right?
Posted by: BlueStateRebel at December 18, 2013 12:30 PM (7ObY1)

Only the 404Care ones.
The other ones direct your internet requests efficiently.

Posted by: jwb7605 [/i][/u][/s][/b] at December 18, 2013 08:31 AM (3Tv+N)

209 As one who was involved with a rural broadband company when this funding came out, I want to point out that many were shocked when the rules committee defined the structure of the funding such that the only entities that could qualify for the funds were the existing monopoly phone carriers (ILEC - independent local exchange carriers).

We tried to get Senator Tom Harkin (Democrat, Iowa) to deal with this matter given these ILECs were the problem, not the solution. They were already in the communities and were refusing to provide broadband, or at best, were providing terribly poor service. Competition would help the communities and would likely encourage the ILEC to step up their offerings as well.

Harkin's office did nothing and we realized, as did many others in our situation, that the ILEC lobby was buttering Harkin's bread as well as many other Senators who were involved with the legislation. We eventually got out of the business as these funds became used by the ILECs to impede competition, engaging in illegal cross-subsidies to dump service and have illegal bundles (e.g. jacking up basic rates by 25% for voice phone service where the ILEC is a monopoly, then using the increases to offset and offer below-cost DSL).

If you're rural and have crappy Internet, blame the Democrats in the Senate.

Posted by: Multitude at December 18, 2013 08:31 AM (N7l30)

210 #134

Not if I can help it. I don't like paying for those boondoggles myself. After all of the money they've spent on the trains in LA the number of occasions when it was of any use to me has been limited to a single period of several weeks in 2007, because the contract was located within a short walk of Union Station. It is the sole time I've ever had work that was both within useful distance of a train or bus stop, and didn't require me to have so much with me as to make public transport unviable.

I'm sure thousands of people are commuting by the local train system every day but to make this happen required taking tons of money away from the building and upkeep of the highways in the same region. So those of us who have no option but to drive get screwed. The number of cars removed from commuter traffic is vanishingly small for the money spent.

Posted by: Epobirs at December 18, 2013 08:31 AM (bPxS6)

211

"In fact, for the remotest of the rural areas, where there's not even land line phone service, simply giving people the Hughes/DirectTV sat packages would be far more cost effective and dramatically faster to install than running hundreds/thousands of miles of cable/fiber based solutions."

 

 

There are so many government programs like this, where an Occam's Razor approach would be cheaper.   Poor people don't have transportation to jobs?   Buying them cars is probably cheaper than setting up a "public transportation" system, either with buses or light rail, which will have administrative costs out of proportion to the number of actual riders.   Some people don't have health insurance?   I guarantee you once the idiocy of Obamacare flushes through the economy, it will have been exponentially cheaper just to buy people health insurance.   Etc.  

Posted by: The Regular Guy at December 18, 2013 08:32 AM (qHCyt)

212 A router is sort of like a toaster, right?

Yes. At 404Care, we bake our packets in them.

Posted by: Prez'nit 404 at December 18, 2013 08:32 AM (Dwehj)

213 If you can't measure it, you can't manage it.

Posted by: yoda at December 18, 2013 08:32 AM (f/qE7)

214 OT Chik-fil-A enters Santa controversy by introducing Santa Cow

Posted by: thunderb at December 18, 2013 08:33 AM (RUDlQ)

215 last year I live several miles outside of Baltimore and could only get 3G wireless broadband and it was spotty at best ... not even DSL available ... forget rural ... how about we get suburban coverage first ...

Posted by: JeffC at December 18, 2013 08:33 AM (294xP)

216 Being the Santa Cow is spotted, he is both black and white

Posted by: thunderb at December 18, 2013 08:34 AM (RUDlQ)

217 New post up.

Posted by: Insomniac at December 18, 2013 08:35 AM (DrWcr)

218 >>Chik-fil-A enters Santa controversy by introducing Santa Cow.

Q: Is a Holstein cow black or white?
A: Racist!

Posted by: Lizzy at December 18, 2013 08:37 AM (ruxvM)

219 But the Santa Cow may be female based on the udders

Posted by: thunderb at December 18, 2013 08:37 AM (RUDlQ)

220 #201

Unless the games are of the slow and placid sort, you aren't going to use satellite for that. Latency is very high and deadly to most online gameplay that calls for anything close to real-time interaction.

We once got an emergency call to set up our Tachyon.net rig at the location where Sony was holding their E3 Press Event. Their T1 had a meltdown only hours before they were scheduled to do a live event with Madden being played both in LA and NYC. We made it work but they had to pretend it was enjoyable to play. I was kind of surprised the software even allowed it instead of giving an error indicating latency was too high. Pings in the four digit range are a real problem.

Posted by: Epobirs at December 18, 2013 08:39 AM (bPxS6)

221 Until recently, I ran an Internet business from as rural a place as you can imagine: Five miles down a dirt road, 13 miles from the nearest power pole; we generated our own electricity (solar). We leased remote servers that we communicated with via satellite modem for seven years, then switched over to DirecTV's Internet service to save money (and achieve better speeds). Downloading via satellite is fast, but it takes a while for the data to get up to the satellite and then back down, so no Call of Duty multiplayer for me (the thrill of freezing and being killed multiple times quickly lost its charm). BTW: We never got a government dime for solar power or satellite Internet in all that time, and the business survived.

Posted by: jwpaine @PirateBallerina at December 18, 2013 08:40 AM (2oU2+)

222 #211

Obamacare originally had a provision for a government insurance program that was laying the ground work to be the last man standing after the existing insurance companies died off. Single payer by attrition, just as the architects intended. But to buy Joe Lieberman's vote they had to remove that section. Why Lieberman thought this fixed anything is a bit of a mystery. But this is the same man, when he was the VP candidate, stated in an interview that it was terrible that the NASDAQ was at its lowest level since the Depression.

The NASDAQ was founded in the 1960s and didn't start trading until the early 70s.

Posted by: Epobirs at December 18, 2013 08:44 AM (bPxS6)

223 Phone companies are being ordered to provide it. Run fiber to remote areas at a big loss etc. In my state they were offered some regulatory benefits in more populated areas, but I'm not sure what those are.

I suspect the stimulus broadband money simply went to waste or went to cronies and community organizers.

Posted by: forest at December 18, 2013 09:10 AM (stMuz)

224 ping

Posted by: toby928© insists on talking about robots at December 18, 2013 09:23 AM (QupBk)

225 Woot! I'm back baby!

Posted by: toby928© insists on talking about robots at December 18, 2013 09:23 AM (QupBk)

226 Heh. The same thing happened in Australia - a massive government programme to bring broadband to everyone. What could possibly go wrong? Everything. The Opposition, now the Government, favoured "fibre to node" (i.e. to an exchange), filling in gaps in current fibre broadband coverage, with customers deciding for themselves whether they wanted to complete the fibre connection the whole way. The Government (now the Opposition) wanted fibre to the home for everyone. And they started RIPPING UP THE COPPER PHONE LINES to ensure lack of competition. Billions of overspent dollars later, the connections to this brilliant system are a handful of what they should be. The whole thing will probably have to be scrapped and started over.

Posted by: perturbed at December 18, 2013 10:37 AM (TXq4O)

227 Multitude, ILEC stands for Incumbent Local Exchange Carrier. The alternative to an ILEC is a CLEC, which stands for Competitive Local Exchange Carrier. The ILEC's were supposed to provide access to the "unbundled network elements" (or "UNEs"--telephone techno-speak for "wires") for the CLEC so that the CLEC could sell telephone services like "dial tone" and DSL, but in practice it never worked out that way. So, after declaring the ILEC's to not be monopolies in Texas, what wound up happening was the regulation went away but the monopoly practices stayed. The source of the monopoly, Advo, isn't the PUC of Texas, but the franchise fees that are required in order to access the public right of way. You have to pay per person in the metropolitan area no matter how many or few customers you have. Want to run a wire across your back fence to split Internet with your neighbors? Well, if your back fence is a utility easement like mine is, then you owe a BUNCH of money to the government wherever you live. I was working with small ISP's in Texas to bring high-speed Internet to small towns, and it all went to crap because the government stepped in and blocked everybody but the ILEC's from playing. One other thing, the ILEC's are proof of the old saw about how when buying and selling is regulated, the first thing to be bought and sold are the regulators. The PUC of Texas is owned by SBT. Not officially, but in a very real way, and it's because SBT has a ton of employees, all of which belong to the same union. It turns out that having a ready source of protestors is handy if you want to control a regulating agency that's ostensibly responsible to the people. SBT and Verizon and Comcast are all politically connect to the Nth degree. It's part of the territory.

Posted by: JonathanG at December 18, 2013 10:46 AM (twiRb)

228 but Hughes satellite internet sucks ass and is enormously expensive.

I guess you didn't click the link, eh? 

Posted by: Purp[/i][/b][/s] at December 18, 2013 12:51 PM (70Unk)

229 I live out in the sticks where DSL isn't available. Back when the "North Florida Broadband Authority" was formed with all of that "free" stimulus money, we were all promised that we'd have (one day) access to DSL, just like the city people. Well, I've been paying for Hughesnet for years--and yeah, it's OK, but it's limited. No Netflix or movies on demand or even Youtube or CSPAN for us out here...so I was excited.  The first head of the "Authority" was apparently "retired" shortly thereafter for a bunch of money going missing. They hired a new one.

I also own a newspaper. A year or so later, NFBA did HUGE ad buys....half pages, quarter pages, telling us all to go sign up for internet...they even paid for the ads...for a while. What they were selling turned out to be microwave based internet that (now get this) was ONLY AVAILABLE WITHIN A MILE OF TOWN....where AT&T DSL is available and what most folks use. NOBODY signed up for it. Nobody. Which didn't matter, because the little "feeder" companies providing the actual service seemed to just disappear.

After a few months, the checks stopped coming on the ads. I called to find out why; and was told that the staff were all fired, were closing up shop THAT DAY, and that all of my unpaid invoices (About $4K worth) would stay that way.  Tough for you, he said. No, there was no one above him to call; they had apparently all fled the country or something. I've been waiting....to no avail...to see some prosecutions or charges or anything against the people in charge.

All of the multi-millions of dollars to bring DSL to the boonies went into some bigwigs pockets....and the folks who paid the taxes to fund it...still don't have internet that their kids can use to watch a school-required video. No matter how much money we offer to pay, the satellite companies will NOT increase our bandwidth allowances to the virtually unlimited DSL everyone else has. It's not that anyone wants anything free...we just want access to the 21st century like everyone else.

All AT&T has to do is flip a switch and I could have DSL....but they won't...I'd be happy to pay for them to do it...but they won't...

Posted by: Kathy in FL at December 18, 2013 02:30 PM (ZufZo)

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