Having, in India, started off with an internet which was exclusively a government monopoly and only turned over to private enterprise some years down the line, I would say that making it a utility is something that most people here, given the local conditions, would resent,
Innovations were driven by bell labs, not exactly att, some on government funded projects to be sure. But increasingly, down the line, by ISPs and their peers in the market. And by content providers, and by CDNs, and by various other entities that haven't ever received a dime in government funding of research. The Crawford and Wu model of public utility doesn't provide any sensible basis for regulation that I can see, and the model has shifted significantly from the old sense of net neutrality which once related to CLECs and unbundling of services, I have seen claims that the broadband charges in the uk are like two pounds for some insanely fast amount, but then there are surcharges of ten to fifteen pounds more for the local loop costs etc. So that unbundling certainly doesn't cost you less as it makes the pricing transparent and gives you market freedom to switch providers much easier, without the trouble of pulling fresh copper or fiber to your home each time you switch (which currently is not the case here in India, go figure) --srs (iPad) > On 06-Mar-2014, at 0:06, Heather Madrone <heat...@madrone.com> wrote: > > I'm addressing some of the links Suresh forwarded to the list. > > Bennett: > > If we’ve learned anything at all about from the history of > Internet-as-utility, it’s that this strained analogy only applies in > cases where there is no existing infrastructure, and probably ends > best when a publicly-financed project is sold (or at least leased) > to a private company for upgrades and management. We should be > suspicious of projects aimed at providing Wi-Fi mesh because they’re > slow as molasses on a winter’s day. > > I don’t see any examples of long-term success in the publicly-owned > and operated networking space. And I also don’t see any examples of > publicly-owned and operated Internet service providers doing any of > the heavy lifting in the maintenance of the Internet protocols, a > never-ending process that’s vital to the continuing growth of the > Internet. > > One of the oft-overlooked inconvenient facts about the Internet is that it > was created by the US military to meet various Cold War objectives. The US > government has poured huge amounts of cash into the Internet over the past 50 > years. Much of the early work on protocols and structures was done at public > universities on the military's dime. The Internet started as a public works > project, and public money continues to play a significant role. > > During the first decade I was online (1976-1986), it was widely understood > that the Internet was to be used for military and research purposes. It was > not open to commercial purposes. Advertising was not permitted, and it was > generally understood that we were online as guests of the military and the > universities. > > The innovations that made the Internet possible did not originate at AT&T. > AT&T, like any other monopoly, views innovation with extreme distrust and > stifles it whenever possible. Innovation disrupts their business model, and > threatens their control over our communications. AT&T fought broadband every > step of the way, and lapped up a lot of dollars from the public trough to > expand its fiber network to make broadband possible. The cable companies were > late entrants to the Internet game, once they realized that they had the > broadband cable in place already and just had to figure out the upstream > messaging part. > > The broadband providers, like the railway robber barons of the 19th century > American West, are political entrepreneurs. Much of the heavy lifting was > done for them at public expense, and now they act like they built the whole > thing by themselves and are perfectly entitled to run things just the way > they like it. They cry foul when the very government that helped them build > the infrastructure with public money wants to regulate the self-same > infrastructure. > > Sherman: > > Pursuing a public utility model while also desiring competition are > fundamentally contradictory goals. Utilities are designed not to > compete. Do you, or does anyone you know, have a choice of providers > for water, sewage or electricity? > > My second question would be: is there anyone in the technology world > who sees public utilities as a model for innovation? A 1.5 megabit > connection (T1) was an unimaginable luxury when I started in tech in > the mid-90′s. It was for well-funded companies only. Today, it is a > low-end consumer connection and costs around 80% less. Has your > sewage service followed a similar trajectory? > > A public utility is designed to be “good enough” and little more. > There is no need, and little room, for differentiation or progress. > Your electricity service is essentially unchanged from 20 years ago, > and will look the same 10 years from now. Broadband, on the other > hand, requires constant innovation if we are to move forward — and > it has been delivering it, even if we desire more. > > Public utilities exist because there are certain services where the > infrastructure leads to a natural monopoly. Having these services in private > hands created numerous disasters (the history of London's private water > companies is instructive here, as is the history of the railroads in > California). Thus, these services tend to be either publicly run or heavily > regulated. In my experience, publicly run services tend to be cheaper and > better than the privately run monopolies. Privately run monopolies are always > trying to get one-up on their regulators and the public, while public > utilities can get on with the job at hand. > > Innovation is an interesting thing. Warfare (the business of governments, > last time I checked) has been responsible for a great deal of innovation. > Public investment in basic research also tends to foster a lot of innovation. > People playing around with new toys also leads to a tremendous amount of > innovation. Monopoly corporations, on the other hand, do not tend to > innovate. They are sticks-in-the-mud heavily invested in maintaining the > status quo. Moreover, monopoly corporations often successfully stifle > innovation by others. > > Public utilities can and do innovate. I can point to wind farms and smart > meters as evidence of this. Better yet, I can take you on a tour of the City > of Santa Cruz' wastewater treatment facility and show you all the > improvements to wastewater treatment that have occurred in your lifetime. > There have been major improvements to roads, ports, and other transportation > infrastructure as well. > > Ideally, a public utility (like government itself) is responsible to the > people it serves. If a public utility is not responsive to the public, that's > a problem that needs to be fixed, but it's not inherent in the very notion of > public utilities. > > It might be desirable for telephone, cable, and Internet services to be run > as a public utility, just as it might have been desirable for the U.S. to > socialize its railroads way back when. There's no political will in the U.S. > to socialize any industry, so I think that AT&T and Comcast are safe for the > time being. Telephone and cable television service are already seen as > utilities, and the Internet fits right into that model. Thus broadband > innovation in the U.S. will be slowed and stifled to the extent that AT&T and > Comcast can manage to drag their feet. > > --hmm
