Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
After a lengthy court battle with broadband industry lobbyists, New York will soon start enforcing a law that passed in 2021. The state law requires ISPs, like Verizon, to offer $15 or $20 per month internet service plans to low-income households.
Although ISPs got an initial win by blocking the Affordable Broadband Act (ABA) in June 2021, this ruling was reversed in April 2024 after the case went to the US appeals court. Last month, the Supreme Court decided not to hear the broadband industry’s challenge, which means the appeals court ruling is the final word on the issue. ISPs will now have to comply with the ABA, which will start being enforced on January 15.
As reported by Ars Technica, New York-based internet providers will now need to either offer a $15/month plan with at least 25Mbps download speeds, or a $20/month plan with 200Mbps download speeds. Included with the price are “any recurring taxes and fees such as recurring rental fees for service provider equipment required to obtain broadband service and usage fees.” Prices can be increased, but increases are capped at 2% per year and state officials can decide if the minimum speeds need to be raised. If a company is non-compliant with the law, it could be fined up to $1,000 per violation.
An ISP can obtain an exemption from the ABA if it serves 20,000 households or fewer and the Commission deems that compliance would have an unreasonable or unsustainable financial effect on the business. With the law going into effect tomorrow, these ISPs will be given a grace period of one month if they file their paperwork by Wednesday claiming that they meet the threshold. They’ll be able to get longer exemptions if they file detailed financial information by February 15.
Earlier this year, the FCC’s attempt to restore certain net neutrality rules was shot down by a federal appeals court. The enforcement of ABA shows how states can regulate ISPs even if the FCC can’t.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @08:06PM (16 children)
Internet connection is pretty much as necessary as water, electricity, heat. Almost everyone and everything happens through Internet websites (portals), email, etc., certainly including government and healthcare.
It needs to be strongly regulated.
I would much prefer ISPs to be a fully non-profit entity.
Problem is, it's generally piggy-backed on the cable TV companies and their HUGE profits. So it would be difficult to split it apart from them.
But, that has been done with electricity generation and distribution, it's just going to take some bold governing.
Getting rid of lobbying would be a strong start in the right direction.
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @09:15PM (6 children)
"bold governing" *cough*
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @09:49PM (4 children)
That smug arrogant smart-ass flippant negative attitude is largely why government is what it is.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @10:09PM
That "troll" mod is why this place has devolved into another reddit, slashdot, etc.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23, @12:09AM (2 children)
:-) Yeah, well, I guess you didn't notice all the cynical crooks and sycophants that were just reelected, did you?
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23, @01:45AM (1 child)
More of the trash talk. Very high-brow you are. Asshole.
I've heard enough about the past 4 years of corruption, I'm ready for a change. Let's wait and see.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23, @02:06AM
:-) Not nearly as high as you!
The past 4 years were just a warmup. These aren't the "changes" you're looking for
(Score: 5, Insightful) by SpockLogic on Wednesday January 22, @11:25PM
C'mon man, we have the best government money can buy.
Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by ChrisMaple on Wednesday January 22, @10:41PM (7 children)
This is much more than just "internet service". It's premium service priced at what 56k service would have cost in 2000, without even accounting for the dollar having lost more than half its value.
This is not necessary for the poor; it's an incentive to have the poor stay poor and spend their days streaming video. Email, instructional youtube videos, and other stuff that might be considered necessary can all be done at 1.5 Mbit/sec. Set the price at $30/month and index it to the CPI.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @11:27PM (3 children)
You're missing the point.
It's meant to be subsidised by the other subscribers. It's specifically for low-income -- those considered too poor to afford a standard, minimum living. If the carriers need to do so, then it's fair game to raise the price on the other subscribers - who can afford a bit more (than the standard base living expenses).
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, @11:30PM (1 child)
I didn't take your point in full, but
1. the US government defines a minimum "broadband" (or the states will)
2. there are minimum *possible* levels of service -- you probably can't even buy 56k service any longer (not least because just about *all* lines are VoIP at this point, which can't sustain the necessary electrical signals), and 25Mb seems about right.
3. 200Mb seems about a minimum viable level of service, too, if that's the minimum that the ISP can do, then they can charge a little more. It's really about providing a minimum - subsidized by the subscriber base. It's the carriers choice what "minimum" is -- A or B.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Reziac on Thursday January 23, @02:34AM
Ya know, before giving the urban poor 200Mbps service at a fraction of what everyone else pays, how about fixing rural so-called broadband? Lessee, I have these choices. $45/mo. for 3Mbps DSL, or if I happen to be in range of fixed wireless (which few are) I can top out at 50Mbps for $100/mo., and hope it works when the weather is bad.
Second point, why is a relatively premium service being mandated, unless the objective is to get 'em to stay home and stream 4k video all day?
Better would be get-what-you-pay-for tiering, maybe five bucks for each 5Mbps, which might also incentivize the ISPs to improve some of the shit access (because if it's too poor, it's not worth as much, whereas now they can charge just as much even when it's crap).
And I assure you, one can scrape by on less than 5Mbps. I do so every day.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Thursday January 23, @04:38AM
Not indexing to the CPI means the burden of the mandate increases as the government damages the value of the dollar. If the law was just when it was passed, It becomes an unjust law in proportion to the CPI. Justice is more important than charity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23, @12:55AM
There are 30Mbps fiber packages for about USD20.
It's far from the cheapest Internet in the world and based on the annual reports the Telcos and ISPs are still making lots of money from this.
So in theory the costs of giving the US poor such packages won't really be that high.
But hey maybe it's not your Telcos being greedy but because y'all are forced to buy more expensive US backdoored[1] Cisco gear instead of cheaper Chinese backdoored Huawei gear? 🤣
[1] Cisco has had many actual CVEs implying backdoors (e.g. undocumented accounts with privileged access, no workaround other than apply patches). In contrast it's harder to find as many similar CVEs for Huawei.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday January 23, @04:19PM (1 child)
Just recently, many school systems in the south east had to contend with impassible roads due to snow. Some counties just closed schools. Others announced "virtual learning days" which I believe include internet based video conferencing to the classroom. Since school attendance is (and should be) mandatory, sufficient bandwidth for that shouldn't be considered a luxury.
Due to technology improvements, the cost of providing the service is a fraction of what it cost to provide 56K service back in the day.
Consider, in the '90s if you wanted gig fiber in the rack, the connections had to be fiber and and the switch cost north of $1000 for a mighty 8 ports. Now you can get gig over inexpensive copper and the 8 port switch costs $50.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 25, @02:56AM
But maybe they're using Huawei and "it's subsidized by the Chinese Government"? 🤣
(Score: 2) by ledow on Thursday January 23, @08:28AM
The Internet is a utility and it needs to be recognised as such in the developed world.
Tell your kid's school that you can't complete the homework because he doesn't have the Internet at home.
Tell your boss that you can't check emails at home, even on the company laptop, because you don't have Wifi.
Try and organise any kind of benefit, bill, form, etc. without having access online to either the form or the necessary documentation to help you complete it.
Hell, the UK are about to move your driving licence onto your smartphone... guess what that needs in order to set it up.
We need to just declare that an Internet connection is as much a utility as a telephone line once was.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Frosty Piss on Wednesday January 22, @09:50PM (2 children)
Let's see how this shakes out with the new Junta in DC...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 23, @05:43PM (1 child)
Interestingly modded "troll" for pointing out the reality.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Thursday January 23, @05:52PM
It received 3 downmods and 1 upmod. I suppose that indicates that most people did not accept it as relevant to the discussion and moderated it accordingly. That is what the moderation system is for.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by stormreaver on Thursday January 23, @01:36AM
AT&T saw this as a problem to solve, and solved it by stopping service to everyone.
(Score: 0, Troll) by DadaDoofy on Thursday January 23, @11:17AM (3 children)
Way back in the 1970s, the government decided oil companies were making "too much money". The answer was for the government to set the price of gas. They even went so far as to dictate which days of the week each person could buy gas. Of course, this created shortages and mile long lines at the pumps, crippling the country.
In NY, they decided rents were "too high". The answer was "rent control". This created slums and amplified the misery they thought they could legislate out of existence with the stroke of a magic pen.
All this will do is create a shortage of internet service, or an internet slum if you will. Why would providers remain in NY when they aren't allowed to do what business does - make a profit? They wouldn't, and they won't. Good luck with that NY.
(Score: 4, Informative) by epitaxial on Thursday January 23, @02:57PM (2 children)
Are you bad at trolling or just a lead paint chip enthusiast? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1970s_energy_crisis [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by DadaDoofy on Thursday January 23, @07:35PM (1 child)
Where have you been? According to the moderators here, I'm an expert troll.
(Score: 3, Touché) by cmdrklarg on Thursday January 23, @08:01PM
Correct! There's a reason for that too.
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.