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The "Center for Public Integrity" has collected some examples of the robocalls, direct-mail brochures and newspapers ads that are being used by telcos and lobby groups to encourage people to vote against municipal broadband initiatives in their area.
They emphasise the "government takeover of telecommunications" and "risking taxpayers money" aspects of these proposed municipal networks. I didn't see any mention of the far greater risk, which is that these networks might work out exactly as intended and therefore take revenue away from the companies who are sponsoring these "no" campaigns. But then again, the examples posted are not the complete brochures, so I can't say for certain this wasn't mentioned.
Does anyone have real life experience with municipal broadband that they can share? Should we be thanking these companies for spending their hard-earned money warning us of the dangers?
(Score: 2) by evilviper on Wednesday September 03 2014, @12:59AM
You don't... They got overhauled when they switched to touch-tone. They got overhauled when ISDN and/or 56K modems came along. They got overhauled when they added DSL capabilities.
Just because you don't see the major changes at the plug, doesn't mean they aren't happening.
Optical fiber, like copper, comes in several ever-increasing capacities. OM1, OM2, OM3, etc. If you'd gotten upgraded to fiber back when OM1 was high-tech, you'd be maxing out its speeds, and would demand a complete overhaul, which would require a complete network teardown all over again.
Being angry and ignorant isn't a good combination.
Hydrogen cyanide is a delicious and necessary part of the human diet.