Redstate

Joliphant, this project, wireless not porn, has already begun. MIT has been working on it for more then a year. They were the first to make entire universities "hot spots", a term referring to free wireless Internet. Their next step is to make the entire WORLD, not just the US a "hot spot".

It's happening all around us, go to yahoo maps, put in an address near a major city. On the map is an icon you click on, it'll show you the know hot spots already in existence.

A wireless laptop is all one will need soon, isp's are an endangered specie.

Managing Editor

Theres many places that are entirely wireless. I just don't want the government stepping in to destroy or save an industry.

If the government is going to provide free internet why not free porn, free food, free movies let the government run hollywood?

you get the point.

Veritas magna est et praevalet.

Only two defining forces have ever offered to die for you:
Jesus Christ and the American G. I.
One died for your soul; the other for your freedom.

If you spent $115,000,000, lobbying in Washington I bet you'd expect something in return as well.

There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why ... I dream of things that never were and ask why not. - Robert Kennedy

Members of Congress can be bought VERY cheaply. What a waste of money.
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If "pro" is the opposite of "con", what is the opposite of "progress"...
Senior Writer

I'd say it's just the opposite. Owning American politicians is one of the most cost-effective investments anyone can make. They're so cheap that the ROI is huge.

And they're cheap because of our anti-corruption laws. There's no way for an American politician to get rich from corruption, for example, as it is in nearly every other country. Because our people aren't allowed to take money, they're left having to compete over power. As I say, exceptionally cost-effective.

Look what China got in return for Bill Clinton.

Before someone throws rocks at me for appearing to espouse corruption: no, that's not what I'm doing. I'm just recognizing human nature. The right way to solve the problem is to defund and dis-empower the government. We'll still have rampant corruption, but it won't be able to screw up our lives as badly as it does today.

Owning a CongressMoron&trade, is indeed an excellent investment. My point about "waste" was the idea that the industry might be spending $115MM.

Heck, let's say that it takes two in leadership and a dozen Members in the House, two in Senate leadership and half a dozen Senators to appropriately influence legislation.

I figure $1MM for a leader is way overly generous and $250K for a member or senator is just silly, so I'll use those numbers. Owning leaders = $4MM. Owning Morons = $4.5MM. Total = $8.5MM. Throw in 100% overhead for cushion, you're up to $17MM. Leaves $98MM down a rat hole.
___________________
If "pro" is the opposite of "con", what is the opposite of "progress"...
Senior Writer

I don't anything about that $115 million number, it was just thrown out there by flyerhawk. It may refer to campaign contributions over many years. (The telcos have been answering to Congress since early in the 20th C.) Although I confess, I don't see how you could spend such a small amount of money on comms infrastructure and get anything measurable out of it.

n/t

If we're going to give in to all the 'inevitable' things around, we might as well just disband the Republican party.

Run like Reagan!

have a real headstart on that.
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If "pro" is the opposite of "con", what is the opposite of "progress"...
Senior Writer

Run like Reagan!

figured out that sometimes "facts" are NOT your friends.
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If "pro" is the opposite of "con", what is the opposite of "progress"...
Senior Writer

Why is it so ridiculous for the private sector to solve the comms-infrastructure problem? There is one obvious deal-killer, which is the huge, ossified regulatory framework that keeps the monopoly telcos in business and sheltered from market forces. There's no real solution to this problem in the near future, since Congresscritters of both parties are in the telcos' pockets.

But what if you actually wanted to build a private wireless infrastructure? In theory, it's not a bigger undertaking than the original telephone, railroad, or electricity buildouts. (I won't accept the Interstate system as an example, because that was (and is) a noneconomic initiative intended to solve a problem perceived by the government and no one else.)

So what's different about today's capitalism that makes this project seem like such a nonstarter?

Again obviously, the impact of modern health and environmental regulations. These vastly increase the cost of taking any action that affects the physical world.

What else? The ownership structure of modern businesses. In times past, truly risky projects actually could be financed by men with vision. By far the largest form of financing was fixed-income securities, until recent decades. Today, a considerably greater share of the public's wealth takes the form of equity, which is direct ownership of earnings streams from business activity.

And when equity ownership of large businesses is considered by the public to be an investment rather than a speculation, business takes far less risk. That's because the thing people want most from their investments is a steady rate of return to fund their retirement.

This is a systemic problem with capitalism as we practice it today in the United States. And far beneath the radar, it is changing, as more and more businesses eschew public equity markets.

Public financing of a wireless infrastructure would have no beneficial effect other than perhaps diverting some of the tax-money that might otherwise go to an equally-insane "alternative-fuel Manhattan Project."

But don't lose hope yet that some bright, ambitious (and well-funded) young people will find a way to make it happen privately.

I empathize with the interest in having an "ideal telecommunications system". It would be way neat, fun, all sorts of interesting techno-cool things might come about. To you (and sure, to me too) it "sounds valuable" - it sounds like a "public good".

But you can't just look at it through your eyes. What percentage of people in America would actually benefit from 100% broadband wireless Internet service across America? What compelling features would they all utilize were this available? If we turned the switch tomorrow and coverage began, how would people's lives be made sufficiently more positive such that the costs of establishing it would be satisfied? Now, a for-profit business surveys whatever playing field they're in, and does the same kind of analysis: how big is the pie, and if we do X, how big a slice of that pie can we take? Their future depends on creating genuine value for people. Now there are a lot of odd products and services out there but one thing you have to admit, if they last any amount of time then evidently they're valuable to enough people that pay for them and keep them in business.

Contrast this with the government. They have very little riding on the "value" (or lack thereof) of what they do. People don't selectively pay the government for ala cart services, that choice isn't given to us. We throw a lump percentage their way every year, good service or bad. They tend to retain a monopoly in whatever they do. Perhaps they decide to do what you suggest, create this huge 100% wireless network - even though the pie of potential users is currently only 10% of the population and then only half of that might actually sign on to whatever government service there is. But they don't need to worry about that, do they? They can take more money from all of us (100% of us), and deliver a service that most of us don't really want or need - at least we're evidently not willing to pay for it directly. Which is why to date no private entities have attempted such a feat, although I'm quite certain there are a number of wireless Internet providers across America serving specific finite markets where the pie is large and where they stand to capture much of it.

The basic question then, is do you think it's better for consumers - the "people" - if private entities that have something to lose are the determining factor in providing services and products, or if the government, which has essentially nothing to lose, determines what products and servicces are provided? Which one of those two is more likely over repeated attempts to create genuine value for the people? And if you agree with me that it is not the government, then can you more clearly express and argue for an exception in this case - keeping in mind that your interests in technology and the Internet actually may not be shared by the great majority of Americans.

You observe that we seem to lag behind, anecdotally. Yet American universities and scientific research centers, medical research centers, large corporations, all have extremely good connectivity between themselves and other necessary entities - in other words, the people who really want fast, stable, robust service have no problem getting it and using it. Don't look at a segment of "middle America" who feel quite satisfied with their cable modem and assume they must be suffering in comparison with other country's citizens.

...of the American economy. That thought occurred to me when I was imagining how an orthodox economist would respond to my post. A person like that would look at a developing economy (China, India) and tell you that simple arithmetic drives the decision to put risk-capital there instead.

But I'm not buying it in the slightest. The very fact that this diarist is in effect asking "why does our comms infrastructure suck so much" tells you that our economy is ready for another step up.

If only the Democrats (and the Republicans) weren't standing on the brakes.

it might be more a case of our regulatory structure. As you pointed out the existing telco companies have large sunk (no pun intended) costs on infrastructure. In most places they are either a monopoly or a duopoly and heavily regulated. It makes no sense for them to innovate their capital out of existence.

Veritas magna est et praevalet.

The existence of a government-protected monopoly is a huge barrier to rationalizing our comms infrastructure. It adds greatly to the business risk that would accompany any attempt to disrupt the existing system.

But every other major private innovation in the past faced similar barriers. Are the incumbent telcos fundamentally harder to disrupt because they're pinned in place by government power as opposed to old-fashioned market power? I think that's a question worth knowing the answer to.

My totally unsupported, seat-of-the-pants wise*ss guess would be: no. I still think that large businesses face limits on their appetite for risk that come primarily from their ownership structure.