Your ISP May Prevent You From Getting Free Internet Access

[Canadamus Prime]

Interesting.

If there does end up being a government supported network, I suspect we'd find a lot more sites banned and censored as they'd finally have the reigns of control.

On the other hand, that might make private services try claim back customers by promising to not support such bans.

It could end up a win-win.

Or it would force ISPs to start offering unlimited Internet access in order to compete with this. I wish the CRTC or someone would set up something like this up here in Canada.

 

[Kirov Reporting]

Great, that'll save me £10 a month for a service which I have a complaints line for, and multiple competitors to threaten to move to if things go wrong. With any luck, the frighteningly expensive replacement infrastructure will cost more than that in taxes, be of poor quality, and greatly diminish what can be shared on it!

Wait..

 

[Waaghpowa]

Or it would force ISPs to start offering unlimited Internet access in order to compete with this. I wish the CRTC or someone would set up something like this up here in Canada.

Bell Canada has started offering unlimited for an additional 10 dollars a month. There are also other services, not Bell or Rogers, that already do.

 

[Storm Dragon]

Well, since Google (aka: the Future Overlords of Earth) supports it, free internet is pretty much inevitable now.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Or it would force ISPs to start offering unlimited Internet access in order to compete with this. I wish the CRTC or someone would set up something like this up here in Canada.

Bell Canada has started offering unlimited for an additional 10 dollars a month. There are also other services, not Bell or Rogers, that already do.

Yeah, except I shouldn't have to pay extra for something that should be standard.

 

[Waaghpowa]

Or it would force ISPs to start offering unlimited Internet access in order to compete with this. I wish the CRTC or someone would set up something like this up here in Canada.

Bell Canada has started offering unlimited for an additional 10 dollars a month. There are also other services, not Bell or Rogers, that already do.

Yeah, except I shouldn't have to pay extra for something that should be standard.

You wouldn't be paying extra with the "Other guys". We have Distributel. 40 bucks a month, 28 mbs down, 10mbs up, unlimited cable.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Or it would force ISPs to start offering unlimited Internet access in order to compete with this. I wish the CRTC or someone would set up something like this up here in Canada.

Bell Canada has started offering unlimited for an additional 10 dollars a month. There are also other services, not Bell or Rogers, that already do.

Yeah, except I shouldn't have to pay extra for something that should be standard.

You wouldn't be paying extra with the "Other guys". We have Distributel. 40 bucks a month, 28 mbs down, 10mbs up, unlimited cable.

Well that's not what their website says, still looks interesting. I wonder if they're available in my area.

 

[Albino Boo]

This sounds pretty damned far-fetched to be honest. I want to know where they're going to get the money for this. I'm also not entirely sure I am comfortable with the government directly controlling my access. Look at the censorship public broadcast and AM/FM radio has to deal with for a good example of what I mean.

As for the corporations. This isn't a death sentence by any means, but it'd definitely require them to adapt.

That's the thing. The FCC *wants* us all to have free internet, and they want to free up the bands to allow it to happen, but that's pretty much where their involvement ends. The FCC won't be out building towers or anything, they're kind of just paving the way for someone else to do it, but it's a pricey proposition to build a giant free wifi network and not expect revenue from it. I mean, could Google or MS (or both) bankroll it? Would it pay off for them in the long run? Who knows.

The phone companies paid the FCC a combined total of $19 billion for the right to use the 4G spectrum for 10 years. Now the FCC wants to spend their money on buying another part of the spectrum and giving it away for free, to a competitor of 4G. Do you really wonder why they are against it? Even if they go ahead with it, the airspace cannot go to an American company or the German government (T-mobile is German) will be screaming illegal state aid faster than you can say WTO.

 

[Your Gaffer]

I still don't know how so many sites got this waaay wrong. Its the White Spaces proposal, that hopefully will go through so more services can get up and running and more local services.

 

[MrPhyntch]

Just want to point out a side of the story no one's talking about:

I am taking a class at my college from the guy who runs the college's PBS (Read: Public or Free) station, and HE believes it is a disaster. Due to FCC buybacks and distributions of bandwidth, there is literally no place left for him to go. If this plan goes through, he and his colleagues throughout the state have no place to go, meaning that at the very least our state will be completely devoid of public (again, read as free) broadcast, and will severely hamper if not shut down the television and radio divisions of our state's colleges.

But at least everyone has free access to porn, right?

 

[Redd the Sock]

The government feels that access to the information superhighway (yes, I pulled that term straight out of 1999) is necessary, and that you shouldn't have to hand out cash each month for the privilege.

That's a pretty bizarre thing for the government to feel. Access to water, electricity, food, roads, education, healthcare, telephones, postal service and the aqueduct are all considered necessary, but no-one seems to feel we should have free access to them all. Even in countries where some services are free at point of access, we still have to pay for them at some point. And many of those things are significantly more necessary than pretty much anything else. What exactly is so special about the internet that makes it so important for everyone to get it for free when a significant portion of the population can't even afford to see a doctor?

My guess would be commerce. Yeah, I have to be the guy thinking that there's little to no altruism behind the idea and a lot more corporate agenda pushing. My boss goes nuts that there are people that want paper bills and don't want to pay online. That all costs stamps, paper, extra prcessing time, and that's just a simple example. As comapnies try to move to the efficient paperless office, they get held back by people that live in the digital stone age. The same holds true on the content end as digital sales can get held back by people without the wifi for their wireless device (that has no wire port) or are held back from downloading by bandwidth caps. No doubt there's similar concern about maintaining wired services that become out of date very quickly and they want to move to full wifi instead of laying out fibre optic cable.

I've actually been expecting movement in this direction for a while now as the more everything became digital only the more we'd have to deal with people that couldn't keep up.

 

[Doctor Proctor]

I still don't know how so many sites got this waaay wrong. Its the White Spaces proposal, that hopefully will go through so more services can get up and running and more local services.

Yep, I said as much up above. However, I think everyone is just too enamored with the idea of free internet to look closely at the facts here. Oh, and hey, just for kicks, here's a different article debunking the whole thing, this time from Slate: http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/02/05/fcc_super_wifi_plan_there_is_no_plan.html

Escapist Staff: Can you PLEASE either pull down or correct this article? Even with the minor update earlier today it's still far afield of what's actually going on here.

 

[SlamDunc]

Microsoft could do this in a very pro-Windows way. Just make it so only authorized Microsoft made devices could connect to the free network. That would be a pretty good reason to by Windows software. It could also be done with each individual copy of the OS having a code with it that you must give to someone with the company, in store or online, to be able to actually activate it on your system so Pirated copies of Windows means no free internet.

 

[RicoADF]

Just want to point out a side of the story no one's talking about:

I am taking a class at my college from the guy who runs the college's PBS (Read: Public or Free) station, and HE believes it is a disaster. Due to FCC buybacks and distributions of bandwidth, there is literally no place left for him to go. If this plan goes through, he and his colleagues throughout the state have no place to go, meaning that at the very least our state will be completely devoid of public (again, read as free) broadcast, and will severely hamper if not shut down the television and radio divisions of our state's colleges.

But at least everyone has free access to porn, right?

Isn't PBS already assigned a frequency/channel to use? Although one could argue free internet basically replaces PBS as he could do a webcast or have forums everyone can reach.

 

[1337mokro]

GET YOUR DIRTY SOCIALIST CRAP AWAY FROM ME FCC!!!

I will have no part in this communist idea of a RIGHT to information and communication. You disgust and sicken me that you would rob honest companies like AT&T, who have lied about the bandwidth they're selling you for as long as they exist. HOW DARE YOU!

Unsurprisingly, most internet service providers doesn't feel the same way

Don't?

Nice idea, but even if it were to happen, the service quality would no doubt go to crap with that many more people all jumping on once it was free.

90% of the country is already on it AND most providers have bought roughly twice the bandwidth they need. So no, unless we have 600 million Americans tomorrow it won't slow down one bit for you.

 

[ThunderCavalier]

While this sounds neat, I can so see the 3G and 4G Internet plans established by the major wireless handlers immediately crashing as a result.

They aren't gonna like that.

 

[waj9876]

Oh, look at that. Big companies not caring about the future of mankind, and are just whining about how they'll lose money if "those damn poor people" are able to access (INSERT SERVICE THAT SHOULD BE FREE HERE) without having to pay for something they couldn't afford in the first place.

I'm not even complaining about any specific companies. You can literally make this argument about every big company ever, at some point.

 

[nexus]

If you need internet because yours is out, or you're on the go, great.. That would be neat to have all over the United States. But for the love all that is sacred, do not trust the FCC or the US Government to provide you your internet service.. Just.. wow.

 

[bananafishtoday]

Great, that'll save me £10 a month for a service which I have a complaints line for, and multiple competitors to threaten to move to if things go wrong. With any luck, the frighteningly expensive replacement infrastructure will cost more than that in taxes, be of poor quality, and greatly diminish what can be shared on it!

Wait..

Internet in the UK is vastly superior to internet in US. Most of us in 'Murrica pay the equivalent of 20-30gbp for much less bandwidth. You'd know the specifics better than I would, but it has to do with some law y'all passed in the 2000s forcing competition into the market (maybe local loop unbundling.) Iirc the immediate result was a proliferation of cheaper internet service of a much higher quality.

US ISPs basically operate as monopolies--the big ones have gentlemen's agreements not to encroach on each other's territory, and new network buildout is unfeasible for upstarts--so the uncompetitive market allows them to charge much more for much less.

OT: Yeah, as others have pointed out, the source article isn't accurate.