Highway Robbery for High-Speed Internet

[marmar]

from The American Prospect:


Highway Robbery for High-Speed Internet

Paul Waldman
June 24, 2013

Our broadband is getting faster, but we're paying through the nose for it.

If you're one of those Northeastern elitists who reads The New York Times, you turned to the last page of the front section Friday and saw an op-ed from a Verizon executive making the case that "the United States has gained a global leadership position in the marketplace for broadband," and don't let anyone tell you different. "Hey," you might have said. "Didn't I read an almost identical op-ed in the Times just five days ago?" Indeed you did, though that one came not from a telecom executive but from a researcher at a telecom-funded think-tank. And if you live in Philadelphia, your paper recently featured this piece from a top executive at Comcast, explaining how, yes, American broadband is the bee's knees.

That smells an awful lot like a concerted campaign to convince Americans not to demand better from their broadband providers. Perhaps they're trying to influence the new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, who has been named by President Obama but not yet confirmed (they probably don't have to worry; the nominee, Tom Wheeler, is a former lobbyist for telecom companies). Or perhaps they just want to make sure the public isn't overly affected by the public-interest groups that for years have been complaining that compared to other advanced countries, the broadband Americans have is spotty, slow, and absurdly overpriced.

The telecoms are right about one thing: In the last few years, broadband speeds have improved. Instead of being ranked in the 20s or 30s when it comes to the average speed of their internet, America by at least one measure has cracked the top ten. We still trail Japan and Hong Kong and Switzerland and Latvia and South Korea and … well, you get the idea. But it has gotten better.

But we're paying for what we get—oh boy, are we ever paying.

There is blazing fast internet available in America—if you live in the right place. According to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, around half of Americans have access to service with download speeds over 100 megabytes per second. That's a big increase over just a few years ago; in 2010, only one in 10 Americans could access those speeds. But access is all but meaningless if the service is so outrageously expensive that only a few people can afford it. Last year, Comcast debuted its "Xfinity Platinum" service, delivering 300 megabytes per second—for an unbelievable $300 a month. Verizon's Fios Quantum gives the same speed for a mere $200 a month. If you're in Hong Kong, you can get 1 gigabit service—over three times as fast—for less than $50. ..................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://prospect.org/article/highway-robbery-high-speed-internet

[Brickbat]

1. My rural county is getting public fiber-optic broadband strung to every house. It's like rural

electrification. I can't wait to kick Frontier to the curb. We get all sorts of desperate letters talking about how nice it is to stay with a trusted partner. It's true, though -- I can trust my Internet service to bug out for hours several times a month.

[tridim]

2. Well, my Internet speed will be increasing by 100 times, and I'll be paying about 20% less...

I watched them bury the Google fiber last week and install the distribution box yesterday.

[madokie]

13. Let us know it that is the case after its all said and done

I'd like to see that. Not doubting you but that goes against the grain of what I've seen. when they've done something that increases my speed the price goes up. I'm paying 60 bucks and change for 7 mbps. Trouble is our service provider has some kind of a lock on our town to where no one else can come in to compete

[RC]

31. We'll be getting Google Fiber "This Summer".

I can hardly wait. Or Barely wait, as the case may be.
I have noticed the local Comcast and AT&T sure have increased their advertizing lately. And their services offered too.

[tridim]

33. I think we live in the same city.

"This summer" is here! I talked to the installers and they said lots of people are asking them when Google is going to actually start doing installations. So far, nobody knows.

[xchrom]

3. du rec.

[hobbit709]

4. we supposedly will get Google Fiber starting next year.

Who knows when my neighborhood will get it. If it becomes available , I will tell AT&T to shove it.

[madokie]

14. Google data center is within two miles of me right here

If it wasn't for trees in the way I could see their complex out my window. Might have to use binoculars to do that now that I'm getting so old with failing eyesight.

[kentauros]

18. Whatever happened to Google's push for Internet Over Powerlines?

They talked about that years ago, and the technology is a viable alternative with no need to lay new fiber. I never heard anything more about it since.

I guess I'll have to see if they're coming to Houston soon. I'm tired of my landline-DSL going so slow I can watch the single packets transferred!

[FrodosPet]

26. Challenges to Broadband Over Power Lines

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadband_over_power_lines

~ snip ~

Deployment of BPL has illustrated a number of fundamental challenges, the primary one being that power lines are inherently a very noisy environment. Every time a device turns on or off, it introduces a pop or click into the line. Switching power supplies often introduce noisy harmonics into the line. And unlike coaxial cable or twisted-pair, the wiring has no inherent noise rejection. The system must be designed to deal with these natural signaling disruptions and work around them. For these reasons BPL can be thought of as a compromise between wireless transmission (where likewise there is little control of the medium through which signals propagate) and wired transmission (but not requiring any new cables).

Broadband over power lines has developed faster in Europe than in the United States due to a historical difference in power system design philosophies. Power distribution uses step-down transformers to reduce the voltage for use by customers. BPL signals cannot readily pass through transformers, as their high inductance makes them act as low-pass filters, blocking high-frequency signals. So, repeaters must be attached to the transformers. In the U.S., it is common for a small transformer hung from a utility pole to service a single house or a small number of houses. In Europe, it is more common for a somewhat larger transformer to service 10 or 100 houses. This makes little difference for power distribution. But delivering BPL in a typical U.S. city requires an order of magnitude more repeaters than in a comparable European city. On the other hand, since bandwidth to the transformer is limited, this can increase the speed at which each household can connect, due to fewer people sharing the same line. One possible solution is to use BPL as the backhaul for wireless communications, for instance by hanging Wi-Fi access points or cellphone base stations on utility poles, thus allowing end-users within a certain range to connect with equipment they already have.[citation needed]

The second major issue is Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) with main parameters the signal strength and operating frequency. The system was expected to use frequencies of 10 to 30 MHz in the High Frequency (HF) range, which has been used for many decades by a variety of communications systems (military, aeronautical, amateur radio, etc.) and by international and regional shortwave broadcasters. Power lines are unshielded and will act as antennas for the signals they carry, and they will cause interference to high frequency radio communications and broadcasting. Modern BPL systems use orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (|OFDM), which allows them to mitigate interference with specific radio services by not using specific frequencies for data transmission subcarriers. A 2001 joint study by the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) and HomePlug Powerline Alliance showed that for modems using this technique "in general that with moderate separation of the antenna from the structure containing the HomePlug signal that interference was barely perceptible at the notched frequencies" and interference only happened when the "antenna was physically close to the power lines" (however other frequencies still suffer from interference).[5] What the effects of large scale deployment on PLT modems in house will do to the notching has still to be defined, however in lab tests the notches appear to fill in due to intermodulation between modems.

~ snip ~

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

The early trials were really messing with radio communications - in many cases making ham and shortwave radios unusable.

[kentauros]

28. Yeah, I just read through that earlier.

And then I read this on the same page:

Ultra-High-frequency (?100 MHz)

Even higher information rate transmissions over power line use RF through microwave frequencies transmitted via a transverse mode surface wave propagation mechanism that requires only a single conductor. An implementation of this technology is marketed as E-Line. These use microwaves instead of the lower frequency bands, up to 2–20 GHz. While these may interfere with radio astronomy {1} when used outdoors, the advantages of speeds competitive with fibre optic cables without new wiring are likely to outweigh that.

These systems claim symmetric and full duplex communication in excess of 1 Gbit/s in each direction.{7} Multiple Wi-Fi channels with simultaneous analog television in the 2.4 and 5.3 GHz unlicensed bands have been demonstrated operating over a single medium voltage line conductor. Because the underlying propagation mode is extremely broadband (in the technical sense), it can operate anywhere in the 20 MHz - 20 GHz region. Also since it is not restricted to below 80 MHz, as is the case for high-frequency BPL, these systems can avoid the interference issues associated with use of shared spectrum with other licensed or unlicensed services.{8}

Seems to me that negates all of the previous issues entirely, including any issues with ham and shortwave, as the UHF frequencies are much higher.

So, why not the UHF version? Or do we have to wait for the "Smart Grid"?

[jeff47]

37. The "transformer problem" still applies.

Transformers would still filter out the signal.

[dembotoz]

5. guess if we are lied to often enough we will begin to believe it

best deal around here is charter cable
30 down 4 up for 55 bucks

but that is not where I can get it

everything else is way more expensive and way slower

[MindPilot]

6. That's for sure. Cox is one of the worst.

Almost every month, I have to call them to get some bogus charge removed. As with any cable provider I have to buy 400 channels to get the half-dozen I actually watch.

So I figured I would do the whole dump cable and go to Netflix and HBOgo, etc. But in order for that to work, I would have to move up to the next bandwidth tier, which would actually cost more than what I have now.

[Old Codger]

7. getting robbed here

$70 a month for 1.3 on an extremely overloaded system that Frontier won't admit is overloaded.. My choices are this or satellite for about the same with low cap or dial up from frontier that is the worst dial up I have ever seen..

[HillWilliam]

8. Where I live there are exactly two choices

Either landline (antique-technology DSL) from CenturyLink or satellite. I battled with CenturyLink for nearly two years to get the bandwidth I was paying for (when the POS wasn't out completely for days on end). An endless procession of technicians show up but not one managed to either find or fix the problem. On a 1.2Mbps line, the best I ever got was .75Mbps. On a good day. With a tail wind.

I fled back to Exede satellite service which is actually pretty good. For less money than I was paying for 1.2Mbps DSL service (and getting around .7) I get a pretty reliable 18Mbps download stream. The drawback is the freight-cap you have to deal with every month. One movie can put you over your cap and they'll slow you to 1.5Mbps. (That's STILL better than what I can get for DSL.) So, I had to give up Vonage and NetFlix for the time being.

In town I had a TW Business Class line, supposedly at 1.5Mbps. Every couple of weeks I had to battle with their idiotic tech support because they firewalled up inbound ssh and sftp connections routinely or they slowed the bandwidth to a crawl.

I've come to the conclusion that all wire-based Internet providers are charlatans and liars of the worst sort, about 10 rungs below insurance and used-car salesmen (or about 5 rungs below Babdiss preachas).

[ctsnowman]

9. K & R

[orwell]

10. Point of Clarity...

Everything that reads Megabytes should be Megabits. It is a difference by a factor of 8.

Gigabytes should also be Gigabits.

That being said, most of us are getting hosed by the providers. They taunt you with everything on demand and then impose bandwidth caps. It my case I am stuck with Verizon's absurd 5GB per month limit. So much for Youtube.

Nothing like paying 50 per month to be a second class digital citizen...

Oh by the way, we're number 1!

[Apophis]

11. Oh look at that. Obama picked another big business shill for a position in the government.

I'm shocked. SHOCKED!

[tridim]

17. He should have picked someone with no experience whatsoever!!!!11

[newthinking]

24. A lobbyist? Come on, how can you defend that?

Not only will they have an extremely uneven view, but it reinforces the corrupt "revolving door" practice of moving back and forth between high position in government / conflict of interest/ payoff.

Such incredibly "good governance" there.

[tridim]

25. I didn't defend anyone.

Just stated that picking someone with no experience at all would not be smart.

[KharmaTrain]

36. Sometimes The Best Cop...

...is one who knows how to rob banks. Wheeler knows the telcom industry...was a "gun for hire" lobbyist that didn't favor one company over another (all their money is green). The FCC has been way behind the curve in enabling the expansion of wireless internet and other services and having someone with a telcom background could means speeding up the development of wide area wifi systems that will offer far more economical internet and data service, and competition.

Not defending...this is an attempt to explain. Communications by nature is a conflict of business and government...the hope is to have someone who looks at the long term rather than short term setting the policy.

[spinbaby]

12. We just upgraded our satellite Internet

We were paying $60 a month for satellite Internet that was theoretically 1 Mbps, but was so overloaded that it often simply froze in place. So we paid $300 and an extra $30 a month to upgrade to 15-Mbps service, which is still pretty slow but at least we can watch youtube videos now. Satellite is our only choice for Internet unless we want to go back to dialup and we're not even that rural.

[go west young man]

15. The real crux of the article is that

even if the cable companies increase speed we will pay 10 times more for it than other advanced nations due to no government regulation. Once again business and government bought assholes collude to screw the average American over. This is another sad example of Americans being uninformed and getting screwed all the while doing nothing to stop it.

The real way to a better life for all of us is to stop the lobbying, cronyism, collusion, nepotism, and conflicts of interest in our government. We are bought and sold to the highest worst bidder. To put it mildly our system of government is total capitalistic crap.

[pscot]

19. American exceptionalism

They own us.

[dembotoz]

16. there was an article which i can't find that said the pres of frontier doesn't think rural folks

need anything faster that 6 down.....


don't expect much support from her....

[corkhead]

20. Somebody has to pay for all that bandwidth for the NSA to piggy-back

[RC]

32. But...

That will make it easier to hack them too...

[L0oniX]

21. Predatory capitalism.

[TRoN33]

22. My friend who traveled to Switzerland...

He told me that when he sat down with his laptop at one of local cafes in Bern. He said he literally can see how fast their internet has been compared to America's, he can go from one website to next website in less than .09 seconds. He can download 30 songs in less than five minutes. He can download a movie into his iPhone in less than a minute compared to where I lives at, it takes more than 30 minutes.

Goddamn it, American government. We are #1 most technologically advanced country in the world yet we don't have the access to these...

Fucking hypocrites.

[Soundman]

29. Switzerland is less than half the size of Ohio.

Little easier to cover such a small area compared to the entire U.S.

On another note, I thought Obama had released a huge sum to update our data system a while ago?

[Auggie]

23. It's a way Comcast, Time-Warner and AT&T make up for diminished cable subscriptions ...

their direct response to streaming.

[FairWinds]

27. I saw that "Op-ed" in the NYT . .

and became suspicious immediately. They published no contrary (consumerist) views, and there was no disclosure of the writers' (ie.,PR flack's) obvious financial interests.
This is proof, if any more was really necessary, that the Gray Lady has zero journalistic integrity. She pedals utterly false corporate propaganda as news "analysis". For many newspapers the line between paid advertisements and news/analysis has been obliterated.

[kenny blankenship]

30. Life in the land of protected monopolies. Banks and Insurance Mafias benefit

Why not also the telecoms?

[Doctor_J]

34. Highest cost, lowest quality

just like our health care and, soon, our education

[Uncle Joe]

35. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, marmar.