Comments

1
I'm surprised they have such a socialist thing there. Chattanooga is so right wing that they make Colorado Springs look like San Francisco.
2
SOCIALISM!!!!!!!!! BENGHAZI!!!!!!!
3
Great part of the article is how it's spawned gentrification in Chattanooga. You know, white techies pushing out the poors.

So yes, this is a great idea. It's sh*t white college techies like and they're good for my property values.
4
fuck the fucking internet.
5
"Since the fiber-optic network switched on four years ago, the signs of growth in Chattanooga are unmistakable. Former factory buildings on Main Street and Warehouse Row on Market Street have been converted to loft apartments, open-space offices, restaurants and shops. The city has welcomed a new population of computer programmers, entrepreneurs and investors. Lengthy sideburns and scruffy hipster beards — not the norm in eastern Tennessee — are de rigueur for the under-30 set."

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/04/techno…

Yeah gentrification!

Yep, socialism alright, for the well off.
6
...but of course, some of it will trickle down to the poors in the form of tips and shoe shines.
7
Fuck Comcast. Fuck Wave. Fuck Centurylink. Fuck CondoInternet. And fuck all of their lobbyists.
8
They offer 1Gb up/down, not 1 GB up/down. That's bits, not bytes. There are 8 bits in a byte. This error overestimates their speeds by 8x.
9
Originally they charged $300 a month.

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Chatt…

Why? Because they could.
10
Instead of huge amounts of bandwidth, that no one really needs, for too much money/month ($70 is still too much), how about offering 1-2Mb for $10/month?
11
"how about offering 1-2Mb for $10/month?"

Because that's what the 'MySpace' community needs. White boy techies need higher speeds. Allows for faster downloading and gentrification. Socialism for techies. I love it as a home owner in Seattle.
12
My comcast internet, which supposedly gets 20Mb, does exactly that as long as you are using it at odd off hours. Surfing at 2am is a joy!

But around 8-9 pm on a weeknight it is more like 1MB or less. I've complained several times, and when I do they refund 1 day of service for each complaint! Yet nothing gets better. I hate them so much. But I have no viable alternative. I would love a municipal option.
13
That's odd Comcast. I've asked for 100Mbps service only to be told it's not available in my area.....
14
@12 sucks to be you. Where I lived on First Hill (Boren Ave) or in Kent (East Hill), Comcast has always been consistent in the speeds. 20 down / 5 up. And because I dont have 3 TVs streaming Netflix at the same time, I really dont have a need for anything faster.
15
"You know that idea I recently pitched about piggybacking a municipal high-speed fiber-optic broadband service on top of Seattle City Light's coming smart meter rollout?"

You mean the idea SCL pitched in 2007 and 2008, with a rustling study in 2009?

http://www.seattle.gov/broadband/docs/Se…

Yes, I've been aware of it for half a decade.

As the study notes, there isn't a business case for SCL to pay for it on their own with the efficiencies they would gain.
There is a cost offset here, SCL should save some money here, and pass that savings to rate payers in some form.

And then there was this gem from a Comcast shill in the Seattle Times, patting Seattle on the head, telling you that they already provide broadband.
http://seattletimes.com/text/2022840437.…
16
Is there any organized effort to get municipal broadband here? It doesn't seem like it would take that much pressure to get this done. And it seems like it would be easy to rally support because, seriously, fuck Comcast. I want municipal broadband now.
17
@12 LUXURY! Our DSL (Verizon land line, but not Verizon ISP) often grinds down to under 100 Kbps at peak usage periods.

I always imagine that there is a node somewhere in Ballard in a brass and mouldering black leather case next to a coal gas lamp.
18
@17,

I imagine it surrounded by sparking electrical wires.

My DSL in Ballard was always the worst on Sundays. I guess that's when Ballardites stay in.
19
@16, yes, the mayor's office was already looking at this, and the 2009 study, before Goldy "pitched" this idea.

Dear Michael Baker,

Thank you for the note. We've been reading the report, and are interested in the option of a municipal internet utility.

Sincerely,
Bennett Barr
Office of the Mayor
600 Fouth Avenue
PO Box 94749
Seattle, Washington 98124-4749

http://manywordsforrain.blogspot.com/201…
20
@12 You're getting exactly what you're paying for: speeds "up to" 20 Mbp/s. You have another option, and that's to pay more for a business circuit that comes with a speed guarantee. Yes you can do this at a residence, I believe it's $15-20 more per month.
21

Latency is also a factor.

You can have very high bandwidth, but terrible latency that makes it impossible to do real time gaming for example.
22

#14

Currently streaming movies really only need about 2Mbps, and short of file downloading, which is going the way of the dinosaur, streaming video is probably the biggest bandwidth hog for a home user. Add a family of five, streaming non-stop all the time (unrealistic) and that brings it to 10Mpbs.

So the 20 Mpbs optical fiber which CenturyLink offers (here in Kent) at the incredibly low price of $29 a month, no contract (but must get phone service too) is the deal of the century and more than enough for most.
23
I heard through the rumor mill Comcast was only offering 100mbit speeds for people who also have television packages. Hurray "free" markets, hurray for monopolies on services, hurray for no competition, I sure do love this "capitalist" society we live in where we get to choose between a single company that offered uncapped internet. Wouldn't want to do anything to fuck up this utopia unless we also get 1gbit up with our "only" 1gbit down.

State law forbids us being responsible for ourselves, just like Supply Side Jesus foretold! Love live our Comcast mayor!
24
So the government should have a monopoly on internet too? Why not make all restaurants government owned too? And all movie theaters, and book publishers so that no one can ever again publish a book that criticizes the state and with state owned internet, even ebooks that have bad things to say about socialism can be censored...
And I'm sure Chattanooga's internet is not just 69 a month. Add on the taxation (i.e., theft of working people's money by the corporate owned state) that keeps it funded and it probably costs a lot more.
Want to lower the cost of internet? Get rid of the regulations that keep competitors from arising and lowering the prices. Socialism will only result in more power to the corporate-owned government and the elites in control, and less power for us the people.
25
@22: Wrong as always.

https://support.netflix.com/en/node/306

0.5 Megabits per second - Required broadband connection speed
1.5 Megabits per second - Recommended broadband connection speed
3.0 Megabits per second - Recommended for DVD quality
5.0 Megabits per second - Recommended for HD quality [720p]
7.0 Megabits per second - Recommended for Super HD quality [1080p]
12 Megabits per second - Recommended for 3D quality

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