SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Ars Technica is reporting on San Francisco's initial steps to create a citywide fiber-to-the-premise (FTTP) open-access network where ISPs compete for customers.
According to Ars Technica:
San Francisco is trying to find network providers to build a city-wide, gigabit fiber Internet service with mandated net neutrality and consumer privacy protections. It would be an open-access network, allowing multiple ISPs to offer service over the same lines and compete for customers.
The city yesterday issued a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) to find companies that are qualified "to design, build, finance, operate, and maintain a ubiquitous broadband FTTP [fiber-to-the-premises] network that permits retail service providers to lease capacity on the network." The project would also involve a free Wi-Fi service for city parks, city buildings, major thoroughfares, and visitor areas. Low-income residents would qualify for subsidies that make home Internet service more affordable.
ISPs offering service over the network would not be allowed to block or throttle lawful Internet traffic or engage in paid prioritization. ISPs would also need customers' opt-in consent "prior to collecting, using, disclosing, or permitting access to customer personal information or information about a customer's use of the network."
Could this be the first major US metropolitan area to create a real free market in broadband Internet? Do any Soylentils have similar municipal networks?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by meustrus on Monday February 05 2018, @04:16PM (43 children)
This has been tried before across the US. The typical response is that the state government gets involved and pre-empts local government from doing what its citizens want to do.
Hopefully for SF that won't happen because California leans too socialist for it. It should help that the silicon valley companies (and Hollywood) hold a lot of sway in Sacramento and have a business interest in having cheap, good internet for themselves and their customers.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @04:53PM (12 children)
I think you have your terms confused. If they were acting like socialists, they'd be picking winners and losers in the state assembly and regulating the everlovin fuck out of them. They'd be showing a surprisingly capitalistic bent if they chose competition over regulatory capture.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @05:11PM (10 children)
Okay. I take back what I said here [soylentnews.org], TMB.
It seems it goes the same for you, not double. My apologies. ;)
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @09:26PM (9 children)
When ever single instance of an ideal being put into practice turns out exactly the same corrupt way, it is not unfair to declare that corruption to be part and parcel of the ideology. Yes, the same could be said for capitalism but at least in capitalism it's acknowledged as corrupt and fought back against. In pretty much every form of socialism ever tried, questioning authority is a good way to land yourself in an early grave.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @09:36PM (2 children)
Educate yourself before you reply mmmkay? Socialism != Communism.
Can you try saying that 100 times? Also, it is intellectually bankrupt to pretend that a small group of powerful educated people pulling one over on the public is either socialism or communism. Please stop replying, you just highlight the fact that you're brainwashed pretty badly by propaganda.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @10:14PM (1 child)
I most assuredly know the difference and stand by what I said.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @12:15AM
A position which marks you as an idiot.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @09:51PM (5 children)
I'll repost the link to the Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism [wikipedia.org]
on the off chance you'll decide to educate yourself in the actual fact that "socialism" isn't one thing or one set of practices.
I am, as you are certainly aware Buzzard, if you've actually read the comments i've written to which you've responded, as well as many others, very much in favor of capitalism, competition and market-based solutions, except where they don't make sense.
You and I may disagree where they do and don't make sense, but I'm certainly not a Marxist (not even a Groucho-style one -- those guys give me a headache).
I brought up socialism not as "the" answer, but as an observation that many (including you at times, but certainly not always) use the term as a general pejorative, even when it has no bearing on the discussion -- such as this one.
And so, I again suggest that you educate yourself a bit as to what "socialism" *actually* is. If you choose not to do so, it's no skin off my nose either way.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @10:17PM (2 children)
I know precisely what it is. Ownership of the means of productivity by the workers. Which, in practice, is rarely any such thing. Even when it is though, bucking the party line is a good way to become prematurely dead.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @11:06PM (1 child)
Yep. That's one way that socialist ideas have been implemented, but not the *only* way. There are many others, many of which are meldings of capitalist and socialist ideas.
Should you wish to get a broader understanding of what's under the umbrella that encompasses "socialism," you're perfectly capable of doing so without my (or anyone else's) help.
I suggested that you might like to do so, as it would likely give both your rhetorical vocabulary and your understanding of other (including capitalism) ideas more depth and breadth. Just sayin'.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @11:09PM
That's not "one way", yo. That's the definition of the thing. That's what it means, even if people want to go around misusing the word.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @11:18PM (1 child)
Sorry but I have to double reply here. I can't stand by and let a slight on Groucho go. He was quite possibly the funniest man who ever lived, even if Harpo's "hold my leg" gag always makes me laugh the hardest.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @11:24PM
I respect your opinion, Buzzard. My disdain for those guys just means more for you. ;)
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @09:08PM
I would hope that the 100th time your ignorance is pointed out for you that you'd actually do some reading and start using words properly.
NO SCHOOL FTW AMIRITE??
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @05:07PM (29 children)
You (and others) keep using that word.
I do not think it means what you think it means.
Socialism [wikipedia.org]:
Given that I am unaware of *any* "social ownership" or "democratic control" of the means of production *anywhere* in the US, I'm confused.
It seems to me that a lot of folks around here use that term as a general pejorative. Unless you can give specific examples of this, I can only assume that you have no actual arguments and simply label anything you dislike as "socialist."
Which is poor argumentation and adds nothing to this (or any) discussion. And that goes double for The Mighty Buzzard.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @05:08PM
My apologies. I did not mean to post the above as AC.
I, NotSanguine, authored the above.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday February 05 2018, @08:44PM (25 children)
"Socialism" is a "snarl word" to people like Uzzard.
Did you ever read Catch 22? Remember that little bit about the one American GI who had a dog that would go almost rabid whenever the owner said "Commies!" and would make the dog do it on command? Every. Single. Brainwashed. Idiot. Who uses "socialism" the way Uzzard does *is* that dog.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @08:58PM (8 children)
Rabid vulture of the 1% who thinks he already took the Red Pill, later he will learn he is colorblind and feel like quite a silly tart.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @09:31PM (7 children)
Afraid not. I can totally tell a PBR from a Red Stripe. Even at a distance.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @09:38PM (6 children)
Welp, there went the potential excuse. You sir are an idiot, a knave, and should probably apply for court jester.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday February 05 2018, @10:48PM (5 children)
Gods, no. He's not funny.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @11:25PM (4 children)
I made a lifelong feminist laugh her ass off at a poundMeToo joke yesterday. You just only ever see through a very narrow window into the hilarious awesomeness that is me.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday February 06 2018, @06:37AM (3 children)
Where are all you middle-age white mediocrities getting this undeserved self-esteem from? I've never understood how people can have such an outsized estimation of their own skills or value.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Troll) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:09AM (1 child)
I know it'll be a foreign concept to you but I'll go ahead and tell you anyway: we earned [dictionary.com] it. Click the link after that word confuses you.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday February 06 2018, @04:24PM
Aaaaaaaaaaahahahaha--oh wait, you're serious. Hang on, let me laugh harder: AAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA~!
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by chromas on Tuesday February 06 2018, @03:33PM
It's probably all their White Privileges—you know, the ones that allowed Whitey to get ahead of everyone else and colonize all their countries.
(Score: 0, Troll) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @09:29PM (15 children)
Socialism should be a snarl word to anyone reading it. It invariably turns anything it touches into an authoritarian shithole. If you actually knew your history you wouldn't need to be told this.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 05 2018, @09:49PM (14 children)
Ok fine, I'll take the bait.
Pleas elaborate on this history you refer to. List more than 3 instances so we have a good baseline to refer to, a quick blurb on what they countries wanted to do and how it actually turned out. The point keeps being brought up as some master stroke to end an argument, so lets review that part and see what shakes out.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @10:27PM (13 children)
Pick any three nations that have ever had "socialist" in their name or even talked about socialism as if it were a good thing. Or any three workers' unions. I'm too lazy to educate you today but it's your baby so you should have plenty of examples to hand.
Socialism, by its very nature, is tyrannical. Even "properly practiced" it can be seen as nothing but the tyranny of the majority. There has never been and will never be an instance of socialism that was not oppressive by design. Socialists cannot deal with the idea that "He has more than me because he has earned it". In their little minds "I need it more than him" gives them some form of entitlement to things they neither created nor earned. They are thieves who have rationalized their theft, nothing else.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Monday February 05 2018, @11:21PM (11 children)
Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands and every other country with some form of single-payer health care [wikipedia.org].
I'm sure I left out a bunch, like Germany [cjr.org], France and others.
Yes, I know. Western Europe [statisticstimes.com] is a third-world shithole, with each one of the above countries having failing economies on the verge of collapse, right?
You're attempting (poorly) to put Socialism in a tiny box that serves your preconceptions. Socialism (and capitalism, for that matter) takes many forms, and the most successful societies (including the US) have elements of capitalism and socialism.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 05 2018, @11:31PM (9 children)
You're misusing the word now to support a failed point. Socialism has a fixed and very definite meaning. Come up with a new word if you're wanting to support a word, because socialism does not encompass anything and everything that has ever been described as "social".
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by RedBear on Tuesday February 06 2018, @03:09AM (5 children)
I figured out why you're constantly arguing in endless circles with everyone. It's because you can't acknowledge that dictionary concepts like socialism, capitalism, communism and free markets don't actually exist in the real world. They're just ideas, or ideals. What exists in the real world are only imperfect, human implementations of these abstract, "perfectly" defined ideas. There are no "free markets" in the real world, there are only loose approximations full of holes that interfere with the theoretical functions of the perfect textbook free market. Here in the US, we aren't capitalists, we're capitalistIC. We aren't socialists, but we have socialistIC programs in place. We also have people who attempt to at least partially follow communistIC precepts, but we aren't communists. All in the same country, at the same time.
When people disagree with your view of the evils of socialism, they aren't "misusing" the word, they're just disagreeing with your assertion that the real world implementations of these abstract, tightly defined ideas are as simple as you believe. Real world implementations of these ideas inhabit a wide spectrum, many of which only loosely follow the textbook definitions. That's not misusing words, it's just reality, and reality is messy. But all you seem to care about are the textbook, black and white definitions. And so the argument never ends, and no progress is ever made in seeing another viewpoint. There is no room in your mind for the idea that an imperfect implementation of socialism might not be evil, or that an imperfect implementation of capitalism might not be good.
You could virtually be replaced by a bot that just endlessly repeats, "Nuh-uh! You're wrong and I'm right."
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday February 06 2018, @04:10AM (3 children)
No, I'm simply being pedantic about definitions at the moment. Get with the program.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @12:37PM (2 children)
Pathetic
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday February 06 2018, @12:58PM (1 child)
You know, it's a sad thing when the quality of your trolling does not measure up to that of Ethanol-Fueled on a bad day. You should practice more over on Twitter then come back and try again.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @04:01PM
Since you're all pedantic about definitions try looking up "internet troll". EF and others are trolls, simply describing your performance is not.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @10:35PM
...and some just use the words without ever actually implementing the ideas.
"Communist" is high on that list.
(Without a really tight feedback loop between The Workers and the folks making the ultimate decisions, you have a poor implementation of what Marx described.)
"Socialist" gets misused a whole lot too.
Socialism is the collective ownership of the means of production by The Workers.
The fundamental unit of Socialism is the worker-owned cooperative--or perhaps even the worker-owner.
If you don't have Democracy in the workplace, you have something--but it isn't Socialism.
Wikipedia's page makes the classic mistake of painting with too broad a brush.
Taxing and redistributing is NOT a key feature of Socialism.
That's Liberal Democracy AKA Social Democracy AKA Christian Democracy.
From the Russian Revolution of October 1917[1] to 1921, [google.com] USSR had a pretty good implementation of Socialism.[2] [google.com]
...and of course, after Lenin died in 1924 and Stalin took over, what USSR had was a dictatorship.
That's what "communist" North Korea has too.
[1] ...by the old calendar. Adding 11 days to get the new calendar puts it in November.
[2] soviet==council (workers council; town council; etc.)
.
Chavista Venezuela has about 1400 "communes" now.
Those have commandeered farmland|factories that are idle and have put them into production.
(Capitalists being able to own more real estate than they are willing|able to use rubs us Socialists the wrong way.)
So, while Venezuela is best described as Bolivarian (Anti-Imperialist), they have a nice little start on Socialism there.
N.B. Since Chavez died, Maduro isn't doing as good a job at advocating/bolstering that.
.
...and the number of people who use "Capitalist" incorrectly is legion.
If your system has profit or markets or growth or ownership of stuff, it isn't necessarily Capitalist.
The (Socialist) Mondragon cooperative (now in 40 countries on 5 continents) has all of those.
Now, if you have workers who have no say in how things are being done where they work and no say in what will be done with the profits, THAT sounds like Capitalism.
...and especially, Capitalism and Democracy are NOT synonymous--or even necessarily related.
Capitalism can and does exist under extremely repressive political regimes.
Capitalism is completely agnostic WRT governmental forms.
(Socialism is DEMOCRACY EVERYWHERE.)
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Tuesday February 06 2018, @03:57AM (2 children)
I agree with RedBear's analysis [soylentnews.org].
Only in textbooks are things as black and white as you're making them out to be.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday February 06 2018, @04:12AM (1 child)
See above. Pick whatever word you like for "social" things that fall outside the definition of socialism but don't use "socialism". It's already taken.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @05:18PM
You have the most fragile ego. If you weren't such a dick all the time I'd feel sorry for you.
(Score: 3, Funny) by turgid on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:21AM
But everyone's favourite alt-wrong stupid signaller, Nigel Farage, says that all those countries are part of a Liberal Metropolitan Fascist Elite and on the verge of collapse along with the EUSSR.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @03:17AM
Figures, go suck an egg. It is your deal not mine, and obviously your subconscious knows you have no ground to stand on.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @02:27AM (1 child)
I am unaware of *any* "social ownership" or "democratic control" of the means of production *anywhere* in the US
Here's one, typical of the lot: New Era Windows, LLC [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [libcom.org]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 06 2018, @02:49AM
Forgot to include the other link.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_worker_cooperatives#United_States [wikipedia.org]
...and here's New Era in their own words: Our Story [newerawindows.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]