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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFrontier's Bankruptcy Reveals Why Big ISPs Choose to Deny Fiber to So Much of America
Moving on from the political features to the tech and business features of a shit hole country... from the Electronic Frontier Foundation:
The reason American Internet lags so far behind South Korea, Japan, and Norway isnt because fiber isnt profitable. It just falls under the old adage you have to spend money to make money, an anathema to American ISPs entrenched position of prioritizing short-term profit over making lasting investments.
So long as major national ISPs continue to operate with that same short-term mindset, they will never deliver high-speed fiber to the home broadband of their own accord.
Investors denounced fiber investment as a waste because Verizon would have to spend many billions more on fiber to get the same results as the cable giants would get with cable lines. Of course, these dollars-to-dollars estimates missed the real point: fiber has the vastly superior maximum speeds, while cable tops out at a tiny fraction of fiber's possible speed. Even though the superiority of fiber is obvious today, the thinking of big ISPs has not changed.
That blinkered, short-term mindset doesn't just explain America's anemic fiber rollout, it also explains so much about Frontier's bankruptcy. Frontier has filed papers explaining how it intends to escape bankruptcy, and these conclusively show that millions of Americans currently stuck in the DSL Internet slow-lanes could be upgraded to blazing-fast fiber without a dime in government subsidies.
...The revelations from Frontier's bankruptcy filings don't end there. Equally important is how Frontier cultivated, maintained, and abused its monopolies. ISPs like Frontier know exactly where they have monopolies, and therefore know exactly who has no choice and therefore is not worth spending money on.
The fact that Frontierand its competitorstreat monopolies as a bankable asset would seem a sign that there should be some oversight. Since the FCC has removed its ability to oversee this industry since 2017 under the so-called Restoring Internet Freedom Order, that oversight will have to be from the states.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/04/frontiers-bankruptcy-reveals-cynical-choice-deny-profitable-fiber-millions?fbclid=IwAR1J32e1T4Ho3UNEqe5PIBOaIRueOB4rnhP_Qg-5dbnsnEuEUAbXdr36_cc
Metatron
(1,258 posts)Thanks for posting!
JustAnotherGen
(31,815 posts)Remember - a lot of folks there were Frontier, then Global Crossing, then Citizens aka Frontier again. They didn't learn a damn thing.
CentralMass
(15,265 posts)I've been pretty happy with the service. Although I dont have a premium bandwidth package the performance seems to be pretty solid. I've noticed that while working remotely in these recent weeks that my connection seems to be performing well.
On a related note, back in the 80's I worked for an optical fiber manufacturer that produced a lot of optical fiber and cable for long haul networks and later for a semiconductor laser mfg that produced lasers and products for data transmission over optical networks. Back the in the mid to late 80's we were being told that the next big push was going to be fiber to the home. Its 35 years later and it still hasn't happened.
ancianita
(36,030 posts)Monopolies are parasites that weaken this nation's infrastructure. Without an FCC, it's downhill from here.
I've been happy with Frontier. Fast and reliable for the past 5 years. I wonder how long before Ziply (ziply, really? what, did they get a kindergartners input?) decides to raise the rates?