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What if you could own your Internet connection?

Wednesday, July 23, 2008
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Labels: Public Policy Blog , Telecom

15 comments :

  1. DragonIJuly 23, 2008 at 11:55 PM

    OMG! Where do I signup.

    The US is getting it's head handed to it by the East, i.e. Japan and Korea specifically. From what I remember, Japanese ISP's give you 100MB up and down for only $40.

    Meanwhile in the US, providers are totally ripping people off. AT&T wants to gouge it's customers even more by experimenting cough instituting tiered service.

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  2. Wyatt DitzlerJuly 24, 2008 at 12:47 PM

    Just as some ISPs have challenged municipal ISP developments, they would probably challenge this as well.It would be interesting to see how Michale Turk over at Cable Tech Talk would perceive such a plan.

    One last point though is how do you connect your own fibre optics to the backbone? Backbones are still owned by the likes of AT&T and such, so how much of an improvement would this really be?

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  3. AnonymousJuly 24, 2008 at 1:53 PM

    Getting the incentives lined up is indeed the issue. Early cable systems were funded by local appliance store owners where broadcast signals were weak in order to sell TV sets. This was in the post WW2 economy just as TV prices came down due to mass production, TV networks co-expanded with telephone networks to meet demand for product (esp Notre Dame football!).

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  4. Ari HerzogJuly 24, 2008 at 8:10 PM

    This, and ICANN's allowing anyone to buy a top-level domain beginning next year, I wonder what's next.

    Is there anything that can't be owned? Or shouldn't?

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  5. UnknownJuly 25, 2008 at 7:29 PM

    400 homes have FTTH capability. They decide they don't need no stinkin Internet. They create a 400 home virtual world. They let the local hospital know they are open to negotiations to give access to the hospital to offer telemedicine programs in return for 4 hours of Internet access per day. They let the local grocery store negotiate for access to offer services in return for 2 hours Internet access per day. They continue to negotiate contracts with city departments, churches, and other businesses, and eventually, they have their Internet access paid for for 24 hours each day of the week. Over time, they expand their infrastructure to include maintenance costs and operating costs and royalties on their infrastructure, and the backbone boys get tossed a bone for the privilege of existing.

    There, that was easy enough.

    Want to learn what can be done with a piddly little virtual world? Visit the Wonderland Project, and let your imagination run wild.

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  6. BifferooJuly 31, 2008 at 1:08 PM

    We have a real similar concept in central Washington State. All of the electric companies are running Fiber To The Home. However, the governor mandated that the utilities cannot sell retail services over the fiber. So, all of the infrastructure is built and maintained by the electric utility, and any ISP that is interested can sell services over the fiber to anyone connected to the fiber system.

    Currently, in Chelan County, Washington, there are 14 different local service providers selling various combinations of internet, phone and cable TV over the open access system. 25,000 of the 40,000 homes in the county have fiber run to their homes, and 7,000 are using it. Customers can switch their service providers easily.

    None of the big companies (Verizon, Charter, etc) are on the system. They would rather build their own infrastructure.

    So, we do have any active system testing your theory: "If we build it, they will come". The big guys won't, but the smaller providers are able to get a fairly large market share.

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  7. AnonymousAugust 1, 2008 at 12:42 AM

    Where I live is what can only be described as a valley and a number of factors that I will be explaining below mean that communications seem to be a little bit of an issue. I have a connection to the internet but I am left asking just how fast is my internet connection.
    Swords

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  8. TrixAugust 1, 2008 at 9:54 AM

    Bring some love to the midwest!

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  9. WallyAugust 2, 2008 at 1:02 AM

    Sounds like the Japanese model.

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  10. AnonymousAugust 18, 2008 at 2:26 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  11. AnonymousAugust 18, 2008 at 2:28 AM

    Really nice post,but Japan is providing its services on cheapest rate and that a big deal for US to be there and give its services to these countries.
    Shoes

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  12. Ashley ShaunAugust 19, 2008 at 4:51 AM

    I think the Internet services which will US provide will be the better as compare to Japan






    Motorcycle clothing

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  13. NannyAugust 21, 2008 at 4:16 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  14. UnknownAugust 21, 2008 at 4:19 AM

    Japan and US both of them will have the ability to provide you the best internet service, i would suggest you to check both of them.
    Motorcycle Jackets

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  15. Liza at Fiber HighOctober 13, 2008 at 10:35 PM

    I'm not sure each household needs its own fiber but groups of neighbors or whole neighborhoods might. The biggest obstacle we've found, the cost of the physical connection, can be shared by the group.

    We implemented the group idea within our small business incubator, Fiber High, LLC. (See press release posted below.) We think this idea would work well for condos and planned communities. There are some very real advantages (e.g. lower power and air conditioning requirements) to bringing fiber into a neighborhood center with a small colocation facility and then distributing a short distance over wifi or copper.

    If you'd like to discuss these topics further, feel free to contact us.

    Cheers, Liza

    News Release:

    Fiber High Meets the Market for High Speed/Low Cost Office Space

    September 16, 2008 – Palo Alto, CA: After years of promises of multi-megabit communications from major telecommunications providers, Fiber High LLC, a local 3-person outfit, is now actually delivering. By combining low-cost, no- or short-term lease, shared office space and direct links to the country's fastest public optical fiber network, Fiber High brings serious connectivity within reach of low-budget entrepreneurs and start-ups.

    "Our fiber and copper network puts 40 to 100 Mbps on every desk," says managing partner and network designer, David Gjerdrum. "For people who need to move large graphic files or databases, speed is a necessity," Gjerdrum comments. "For others, it's just plain addictive."

    Fiber High's style is totally without bling. Its founders noticed that many of their business neighbors moved out of Palo Alto in search of lower cost square footage as landlords spiffed up their aging buildings and raised the rent. As Fiber High's first tenant, a computational chemist developing an 'in silico’ predictive toxicology tool with NIH SBIR funding, put it, "I don't need anything fancy, just a place I can afford to hunker down with my three servers, work on method development and grow my client base. Given the early stage of my business … I'm not in a position to sign a multi-year lease but want to focus on the commercialization stage with the flexibility to move on or expand based on changes in 'market' conditions.

    The Fiber High business model is to facilitate small, creative, highly-connected communities. Top capacity at the 989 Commercial St. location is twelve cubicles housing not more than thirty people. Its server room and electrical service can accommodate about 120 rack computers in addition to the desktops. "If we're oversubscribed we'll get an additional building," notes Fiber High partner, Liza Loop. She and Gjerdrum point out that fiber connected distributed computing facilities using existing HVAC equipment to handle a smaller number of machines is truly a "green" alternative to the huge collocation sites that are being built in Silicon Valley. They believe that small, collaborative workplaces will foster the kind of innovation the Bay Area is famous for.

    For more information please visit: www.fiberhigh.com or contact Managing Partner, David Gjerdrum, by phone at 650 714 7667 or email at david@fiberhigh.com

    --
    Fiber High, LLC
    Partners: David Gjerdrum, Brian Skiba, Liza Loop
    989 Commercial St.
    Palo Alto, CA 94303
    Tel: 650 964 5623
    email: Fiberhigh@gmail.com

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