I sent the following letter to Newsweek magazine after they posted an editorial in favor of letting local government offer wireless Internet access:
In your 2005, July 18 issue, Steven Levy wrote "Pulling the Plug on Local Internet."
Mr. Levy suggests that it is right for cities to offer competitive Internet services, perhaps because they can offer lower-cost options, and don't "focus excessively on the affluent." Yet at the same time, cities are actively fighting the same telcos to prevent them from offering television service. (SBC, for example, is pushing state-wide regulation to allow them to offer TV services, rather than having to seek approval from each of thousands of towns.)
Government has no business making rules that it applies to others, then "competing" in the same market. If a local government wants to establish an independent competitive entity, it should bow out of regulation. If it wants to regulate, then it shouldn't play. We wouldn't accept a football game where the referees were playing as one of the teams.
Our cities will best be served by open competition in all areas -- phone, TV, Internet, and others. Let government protect us from fraud and force. Don't let government play favorites or compete without independent regulation.
John snipped-for-privacy@jshelton.com
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Although I do not entirely agree with you, I can see the logic in what you are saying. (Here in the Digest a couple days ago, I ran that article by Levy since it came through on our RSS newswire feeds.) The problem as I see it is that SBC has for a long time tried to do the very same things they now complain about the municipalities doing; squelching the competition with very low prices and very unfair tactics. For instance, here in Independence, Kansas they have been having a price war with our 'local' phone company for more than a year now: to 'win back' customers allegedly stolen from them by Prairie Stream Communications (our local telco, SBC has been giving away their service (the entire package except for DSL) for $2.95 per month. The _only_ way you can get DSL is by signing up with SBC. They (SBC) have stalled repeatedly on things like local number portability; they have been caught in lie after lie with things like reduction in price on DSL, Lifeline rates, etc. And although they answer with a live person _immediatly_ on a special phone number set up to woo back customers who have left them, once they have you back, you (on future calls) go right into the voicemail queue with all the hassles of complicated and complex billing, etc. Although in theory you are correct, I am pleased to see them squirm a little as they begin (hopefully) to realize there is no law saying people _have_ to use their 'services'; get along quite nicely without them and there are lots of other alternatives. PAT]