New York Times editorial: cities should push for muni Wi-Fi
Today’s NYT editorial surprised me. Not only did it bring to our attention, again, the continuing inability of rural communities and low-income households to obtain inexpensive broadband, but it also asked cities to push for municipal wireless deployments that really address this problem:
Broadband service is no longer a luxury. It has become a basic part of the infrastructure of education and democracy. EarthLink should fulfill the commitments it made. Even in these tough economic times, cities should keep pushing municipal Wi-Fi and looking for partners and plans that can make it a reality.
I do not think there is a simple way to fix the problem of expensive (and unavailable) broadband throughout the US. Certain measures at the local level can help: (a) subsidizing the cost of broadband per low-income household; (b) deploying Wi-Fi networks in areas where there is no wired broadband infrastructure (e.g. in small rural towns).
But the broadband issue needs to be tackled at the highest level — the federal government. There needs to be more competition and that means forcing incumbents — cable and telecom — to open their network to competitors, as well as spending public funds to build out fiber networks to meet bandwidth demands. Those fiber networks must be open to all service providers. The local governments do not need to build and run those networks themselves; they can partner with private companies to do that. There are already enough examples around the world where this is happening. Government is not crowding out private investment; it’s laying down the infrastructure together with private companies and opening it up to competition, which in turn benefits everyone: individuals, small businesses, municipalities and new service providers.
As for the Times’ plea that cities find a way to make muni Wi-Fi a reality, we are already seeing some models, such as anchor tenancy, that appear to work in the sense that they give the provider an incentive to invest in the network. But again, these networks are at their early stages.
US Internet just launched their Minneapolis network; AT&T is finishing up Riverside, California. These networks will continue to evolve as the providers and cities find new ways to use wireless technology and in the case of the provider, new ways to make money (from the iPhone perhaps?).
No network is ever finished. What needs to exist is a continuing incentive for the provider and the city to keep improving the performance of the network so that it meets the needs of the end users (municipal employees, individuals, businesses).
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[...] an article in the New York Times seemed to indicate that muni wireless was dead. This week, the NY Times editorial board urged cities to find ways to deploy wide-area Wi-Fi networks and to work with private companies to ensure that [...]
Highly uninformed editorial by the Times. First, it makes it sound like a “fiscal” decision, which implies cities invested lots of money. The fact that they did not is one of the points of failure in muni-Fi.
Second, they state that EarthLink paid nothing to Philadelphia for utility poles, which is both factually incorrect and grossly misstates the complexity of the deal.
Third, it states that most of these deals involved free or low-cost access, which is not correct. The vast majority involve or involved $20 per month Internet service, which has since been undercut as a “low-cost” option (it was never particularly low cost) by incumbents reducing prices, and very slightly by the growth of Wi-Fi service elsewhere, and some growing free Wi-Fi in airports and other venues (Starbucks soon).
And it’s conclusion is utter bullshit. The writer obviously doesn’t know that EarthLink had similar commitments in various stages with nearly 20 cities. To single out Philadelphia, and hector an essentially failing firm (see their SEC filings) over a failed business model is absurd.
The Times didn’t understand the facts of this issue, and thus it’s hard to believe they understand any of the benefits, either.