Home developer built an ISP because state law restricts muni broadband

Small ISP offers $80 gigabit service on a Tennessee mountaintop.

Read the whole story

 

[BobsYourUncleBob]

BogositusMaximus[/url]":ez5geio0]As an outsider, I seriously have to ask: If the rest of the US knew what "interesting" attitudes Southerners were going to develop, would you still have had a war to keep them in the Union?

It may sound preposterous, but think of the U.S. Civil War as more along the lines of a "Family Dispute." And as is true in any national civil conflict, families were/are literally split between opposing factions.

But it's nearly always better to resolve conflicts within the context of the larger family than it is to allow allow a split to prevail. This holds true regardless of how divisive or contentious the issues in dispute are & it remains true regardless of how appealing or expedient the prospect of a split may appear to be.

Due to a litany of compelling factors, it was inevitable that any destiny or fate which lay before the U.S. would ultimately be universally shared, even if a national split had developed in some fashion. Lincoln & key contemporaries (William Seward, Salmon Chase & Edward Bates, among others), however, understood the critical long-term imperatives of maintaining national unity.

From Lincoln's House Divided campaign address:

A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new — North as well as South.

Nothing of truly good or lasting consequence could possibly have resulted from a permanent (or even temporary) national division into two separately governed territories (and as Lincoln suggested, unity in some form was almost inevitable).

To be sure, even circa 2016, we in the U.S. are still struggling to fully come to grips with, & ultimately to heal from, the legacy of devastating national wounds wrought from the Civil War.

I have no idea from what geographic locale you pose your question, but I don't think any reasonable person would suggest we'd be better off had there been a different outcome; one more akin to that of, say, India & Pakistan.

Not knowing your frame of reference, if there's any doubt that a realistic progressive viability thrives in the South, spend some time in places like Austin & New Orleans. (And stay clear of anything vaguely Disney-like; you want reality).

(The above doesn't address issues wrt Native American populations which, thankfully, are beyond the scope of your question.)

EDIT: Tightened things up a bit ... (yeah ... I know, but honestly ... I trimmed my original response)

 

[Gooberslot]

brevado[/url]":216o3sb6]How can Republicans defend this practice of protecting "private" companies when they either charge exorbitant prices for crappy service or refuse to provide any service?

You know, there were Republicans voting to repeal the anti-municipal broadband law. It looks like it's only the Republicans at the Federal level that are completely bought off, at the state level there are still some that care about the constituents they are supposed to represent.

 

[Durandul]

d4Njv[/url]":2jbfye39]No doubt the telco lawyers are warming up to "fix" this oversight.

IANAL, but what would prevent him from turning around and suing them for $1 billion in losses in a public court? I doubt the jury would jump to side with big telco.

 

[SixDegrees]

state law prevents [the nearby ISP] from expanding to nearby areas that lack fast, affordable service.

The GOP. Working diligently to prevent progress everywhere, all the time. So America can be the Third World Theocracy god intended it to be.

But I bet if an ISP promised to stream bible readings 24/7/365, they'd be shoveling money at them.

 

[variaatio]

valkyriebiker[/url]":18rv0obu]

daarong[/url]":18rv0obu]

Digitlman[/url]":18rv0obu]A $10 difference between 100MB and Gig? Does one even need time to thnk that one over?

If he doesn't throttle the 100MB for those trying to stream... then that's plenty for most households, including those trying to stream a few HD shows at once. I would be surprised if he throttled like a typical d*bag ISP.

I would also be surprised if he's still around in a year or two. I'm sure the state legislature will work with the corporations to get him shut down. After all, they're very Republican in TN, right?

The problem is the backhaul. The article doesn't say how many homes will be built, but 3,000 acres will accommodate a lot of homes assuming even a one-acre lot. Even if the backhaul was 10 gbps, that could go pretty fast if you have 1/3rd of the homes streaming every evening, not an unreasonable assumption.

Gigabit to the home is great and I can get it from my all-fiber ISP but I know for a fact the backhaul into my 900 home community is 10 gbps. Most of us choose the included 50 mbps. If all 900 homes were to hit the net every evening (I know, very unlikely) we'd avg around 11 mbps each -- just enough for a single HD stream.

In addition to competitive fiber, we need infrastructure to make it all happen, especially at the advertised speeds.

You think they are going to run this on a single 10Gpbs fiber and a single 10 gbps router? They brought in a bundle of back haul, not a single fiber. multiple fibers, possible tens or even hundreds of fibers in the cable bundle. Back haul isn't the problem, if you bring in a good back haul cable. The cost isn't the cable. That stuff is actually relatively cheap. What is expensive is digging it to the ground and getting all of the permissions, right of ways etc. So when you dig, you dig in a big cable. He probably made extra saving by being developer. He was going to dig anyway for other utilities. So if the fiber is put in at the same time with other utilities, it is pretty dirt cheap.

 

[ChickenHawk]

d4Njv[/url]":1ia7j07a]No doubt the telco lawyers are warming up to "fix" this oversight.

No, they'll use it as "proof" that the market works.

The Market is a destructive force that only cares what is most profitable, not what is actually most beneficial for society.

 

[Knoware]

I wonder if he can negotiate peering fees with Netflix?!
Kidding, but is the rise of millions of little ISPs really the future to beat the Big Evil Ones?
We're starting to hear more about people who "can't get service" going it alone.

Maybe a previous poster was right, a biz opportunity is selling an "ISP in a box", that has all the parts (except the back haul of course, but maybe instructions on how to do that too), The do-it-yourself-ISP kit.

Nah. It'll be declared illegal soon and you'll get sued into the ground

Edit: auto-correct, corrected

 

[deadaccountwalking]

Seriously, does anyone think that muni-provided access is a good idea? #nsanet

 

[i662i812r11]

This article is notable as much for what it leaves out as what was put in.

For example, the ILEC is AT&T. Presumably they are required to build at least copper phone service to the community and will offer at least DSL at some service level. Also, Charter is the local cable service provider and presumably they would also build into a community expected to have hundreds if not 1,000 homes at some point.

That is if the developer does not intend to trade one monopoly, Charter's, for another, his.

Much more information is needed to determine if this is really the force against the evil empire, as most commenters seem to think.

 

[SixDegrees]

deadaccountwalking[/url]":1c54096l]Seriously, does anyone think that muni-provided access is a good idea? #nsanet

Well, the private ISPs have rabidly fought against it. So it's likely at least as good as the services they offer. If it were worse, they wouldn't care. They might even promote it, because their own services would benefit from the comparison.

The National Highway System, National Railway System, Rural Telephony Act, and Rural Electrification Act all wound up vastly improving the nation's economy and ensuring that all had access to goods and services that were otherwise restricted to high density population areas. I see no reason to think that similar efforts on behalf of Internet service would be any less wildly successful.

 

[SixDegrees]

i662i812r11[/url]":1lgw7mzk]This article is notable as much for what it leaves out as what was put in.

For example, the ILEC is AT&T. Presumably they are required to build at least copper phone service to the community and will offer at least DSL at some service level. Also, Charter is the local cable service provider and presumably they would also build into a community expected to have hundreds if not 1,000 homes at some point.

That is if the developer does not intend to trade one monopoly, Charter's, for another, his.

Much more information is needed to determine if this is really the force against the evil empire, as most commenters seem to think.

Apparently, that's exactly what it is:

John "Thunder" Thornton of Chattanooga needed to install high-speed Internet for "his mountaintop residential development in Marion County," but was unable to get affordable service from AT&T or Charter Communications

 

[ims63]

This is present day America, home of Freedom? Now it's the "Home of Free Enterprise, except when that interferes with your profit, then you use your money to make laws that favour your profits". In the meantime the public, the taxpaying american citizen, gets NO CHOICE because of ZERO COMPETITION.

Why are the people, the american people not doing anything about it. You have elections for everything, vote out the politicians and vote down the laws that force corporate restrictions upon you.

The american people have done this to themselves, and they don't have the right to complain when they're being screwed.

It's like Tesla not being allowed to sell their cars directly, from a store front, in many states because the Auto Dealers Association have used their clout to get laws enacted that prevent it. What they are doing is preventing Free Enterprise from happening because they might not be able to compete, and yet, according to most americans if you can't compete then your business should die.

America has always been about change, and yet there are many people with power who don't want that change and are stagnating the nation.

Thanks for letting me rant, from a neighbouring friend, a Canadian.

 

[HeardItBefore]

brevado[/url]":1xpjzhd5]How can Republicans defend this practice of protecting "private" companies when they either charge exorbitant prices for crappy service or refuse to provide any service?

How? Tradition mostly.

(borrowed this quote from the movie "Charlie Wilson's War)

 

[i662i812r11]

SixDegrees[/url]"8xc8ghg]

i662i812r11[/url]"8xc8ghg]This article is notable as much for what it leaves out as what was put in.

For example, the ILEC is AT&T. Presumably they are required to build at least copper phone service to the community and will offer at least DSL at some service level. Also, Charter is the local cable service provider and presumably they would also build into a community expected to have hundreds if not 1,000 homes at some point.

That is if the developer does not intend to trade one monopoly, Charter's, for another, his.

Much more information is needed to determine if this is really the force against the evil empire, as most commenters seem to think.

Apparently, that's exactly what it is:

John "Thunder" Thornton of Chattanooga needed to install high-speed Internet for "his mountaintop residential development in Marion County," but was unable to get affordable service from AT&T or Charter Communications

OK, so you think these homes are being built without local telephone service.

Or, you don't think the $1.3MM quoted from AT&T was a request for them to bring UVerse Giga Fiber to the community instead of whatever AT&T would have to build as the local phone company.

On another forum the developer would be the bad guy for raping 3,000 acres of virgin land for McMansions and the reference to lobbyists would be the real estate industry influence.

I am just saying this is not the slam dunk everyone seems to think it is.

 

[SixDegrees]

i662i812r11[/url]":3or799xl]

SixDegrees[/url]":3or799xl]

i662i812r11[/url]":3or799xl]This article is notable as much for what it leaves out as what was put in.

For example, the ILEC is AT&T. Presumably they are required to build at least copper phone service to the community and will offer at least DSL at some service level. Also, Charter is the local cable service provider and presumably they would also build into a community expected to have hundreds if not 1,000 homes at some point.

That is if the developer does not intend to trade one monopoly, Charter's, for another, his.

Much more information is needed to determine if this is really the force against the evil empire, as most commenters seem to think.

Apparently, that's exactly what it is:

John "Thunder" Thornton of Chattanooga needed to install high-speed Internet for "his mountaintop residential development in Marion County," but was unable to get affordable service from AT&T or Charter Communications

OK, so you think these homes are being built without local telephone service.

Or, you don't think the $1.3MM quoted from AT&T was a request for them to bring UVerse Giga Fiber to the community instead of whatever AT&T would have to build as the local phone company.

On another forum the developer would be the bad guy for raping 3,000 acres of virgin land for McMansions and the reference to lobbyists would be the real estate industry influence.

I am just saying this is not the slam dunk everyone seems to think it is.

According to the article, it's a slam dunk and you're wrong.

 

[DarthSlack]

Biceps[/url]":2dw2llz1]

rick*d[/url]":2dw2llz1]

Biceps[/url]":2dw2llz1]

brevado[/url]":2dw2llz1]How can Republicans defend this practice of protecting "private" companies when they either charge exorbitant prices for crappy service or refuse to provide any service?

There are just as many corrupt asshat democrats supporting this kind of bullshit. It is one of the many reasons I am now a registered Independent, instead of being a registered Democrat.

Edit: Here is your citation, a nice story about Comcast and the Democratic party

I would not consider National Review an unbiased source when it comes to the Democratic party.

Of course it is biased. But are not going to find many articles in the New York Times or Washington Post that talks about how democrats are swayed by campaign donations with any real depth, so it is what it is. The numbers in that article are true, you are intelligent enough to read around the opinion.

Dude, the National Review is like the official publication of the Republican party.

 

[Uxorious]

rick*d[/url]":2f00ax02]

If anyone has a monopoly, it's this guy, and he's still only charging $70 - $80.

Only until he sells all 3000+ homes in his development, achieves a 97% subscription rate and gets everyone addicted to sweet, smooth gigabit, at which point he can start slowly boiling the frog by bumping rates $5 a year until he reaches Comcast levels.*

Remember the dealer's Comcast's mantra: the first hit is always free!

*This is a parody of Comcast business model and not the views of this author, who fully endorses John "Thunder" Thornton for chairman of the FCC (one can always dream).

 

[jimoase]

Our unelected government is deciding via regulations they wrote, administer and adjudicate whether we can have a service and how much it will cost. Seems pretty close to taxation without representation to me. What do you think?

 

[BobsYourUncleBob]

jimoase[/url]":2w66sqgy]Our unelected government is deciding via regulations they wrote, administer and adjudicate whether we can have a service and how much it will cost. Seems pretty close to taxation without representation to me. What do you think?

I think you don't understand much about the topic of this thread.

Unless by "unelected government" you mean "corporate sponsors." But if that were the case the result would be "extortionate rents without representation" rather than "taxation" (so I'll stick with my 1st response).

 

[AnimalMotherMF]

skicow[/url]":gb04mm69]If Thunder can afford to sell Internet service at these prices, with the very small customer base he has, how in the living fuck can huge ISPs like Comcast or AT&T say that they have to charge what they do?

Economies of scale is calling them all liars.

He is not in the ISP business, he is in the business of selling lots and homes for hundreds of thousands of dollars. He can create an ISP which loses money in the long run and is a tax write off. The ISP is not in business to make money,. it is in business so he can sell homes.

To solve the problem, Thornton "spent more than $400,000 to build his own fiber network and link it with a power cooperative

He has 150+ lots for sale

All the lots will not be sold at the same time, but it will take over 10 years. At some point within those ten years, the ISP will start becoming profitable. He would be lucky to make $12K next year on that $400k investment. Operating costs are not included in the original $400K.

TLDR; Thunder cannot afford to sell Internet service at these prices as an ISP, but as a builder he needs high speed connections to sell his land/homes.

 

[Joevsyou]

LOOK at that, the guy is selling it a very competitive price to even though he is the only ISP in the area. AT&T charges Whooping $140 for 1gb speeds in areas where google isn't. In any other city where google is they only charge $80.

Those lobbiest working hard in TN for those guys i see by blocking the cities making their own

 

[test6554]

Conservative lawmakers should hail this as a free-market victory. It meets the exploding market demand for ultra-high-speed internet without having the government step in to compete with private businesses.

Like it or not, the free market isn't supposed to prevent problems, it's supposed to let problems go on long enough that it becomes so painful that someone is able to get rich if they can solve it.

 

[rev.felix]

snowman<ca>[/url]":1t352ww9]

Statistical[/url]":1t352ww9]

Competition is a beautiful thing

Think about all the job losses among artisan bit crafters. At least I assume internet bits are hand crafted given the rates and caps imposed by most ISPs

Even if they are, ISPs are not the ones slaving away to make them, in theory they should be more like movers but unfortunatly to the ISPs the Internet is not a big truck.

Of course not, it's a series of tubes.

 

[heartburnkid]

deadaccountwalking[/url]":3gu9rnvs]Seriously, does anyone think that muni-provided access is a good idea? #nsanet

You say that as if having private ISPs has prevented the NSA from doing their thing.

 

[ScribblerG]

Once again, the failure of central planning reveals itself. Bottom up, free market responses will always yield better results in terms of providing needed services. I live in a rural area where one provider has a monopoly - Fairpoint - and as a result have 15mbps for 50 bux a month over DSL. My community is dense enough to support other means but it's prohibited by law. My only alternative is Dish and that service is a ridiculous joke.

But hey, don't let me interrupt all my fellow techworld types here from supporting Progressive, big govt, central planning addicts for office. I bet 80% of you voted for Obama and this is the result of putting planners in power like Obama.

 

[mandy2tom]

Vote with your pocketbook
Dump At&t Verizon Comcast ......
Suport the underdogs

 

[drouu]

The free market! Brought to you by monopolies.

 

[marsilies]

ScribblerG[/url]":1r0ikbey]My community is dense enough to support other means but it's prohibited by law...

Please cite the relevant law(s) that outright forbid other companies from setting up an ISP in your community.

 

[BobsYourUncleBob]

ScribblerG[/url]":2yi1ogk2]Once again, the failure of central planning reveals itself. Bottom up, free market responses will always yield better results in terms of providing needed services. I live in a rural area where one provider has a monopoly - Fairpoint - and as a result have 15mbps for 50 bux a month over DSL. My community is dense enough to support other means but it's prohibited by law. My only alternative is Dish and that service is a ridiculous joke.

But hey, don't let me interrupt all my fellow techworld types here from supporting Progressive, big govt, central planning addicts for office. I bet 80% of you voted for Obama and this is the result of putting planners in power like Obama.

Not all real-world models of government insist that you cede your humanity to "The State" & refer to party loyalists as "Comrade." An inability or unwillingness to accept this is problematic at best.

At worst, it represents a refusal to accept anything other than a strictly binary posture which assuredly yields only sub-optimal results; often extremely sub-optimal. This is because the nature of "reality" is demonstrated to be both dynamic & multi-variant.

Mock Ars readers if you wish, but most Arsians understand that much within the world functions far outside the simple states of "on or off" & beyond simple notions of "either / or." It follows they are likely to understand & accept that In practice, government actually is capable of simultaneously walking, chewing gum & rubbing it's figurative head.

Binary thought is far more the realm of the present-day Republican hierarchy & has led to many, many problems.

Republicans will flatly deny the very existence of a "head-rubbing" variable; they reject & vilify the variable of gum-chewing; leaving "walking" as the single acceptable variable to pursue. This is followed by demands that the nation acquiesce & succumb to walking the Republican path.

While Republican platforms may not reach the levels of comprehensive detail found in a typical Communist Manifesto, they remain every bit as doctrinal & proscriptive. The Republican cause is not helped by the fact that the direction they insist we "walk" is decidedly backwards. And at present, Republican policies promote the interests of unfettered capital power centers at the expense of both functioning free markets & guarantees of individual human equality.

 

[Faanchou]

marsilies[/url]":2qfrje02]

ScribblerG[/url]":2qfrje02]My community is dense enough to support other means but it's prohibited by law...

Please cite the relevant law(s) that outright forbid other companies from setting up an ISP in your community.

Bonus points for any federal laws.

 

[meyerweb]

brevado[/url]":269sls7m]How can Republicans defend this practice of protecting "private" companies when they either charge exorbitant prices for crappy service or refuse to provide any service?

Do you really need to ask that question? Ask this one instead: "How much money do these private companies donate to legislators and their PACS?" The real issue here isn't broadband or competition, it's legalized bribery and campaign finance reform. If politicians and PACs weren't allowed to accept private contributions, they'd have no incentive to favor those companies with the deepest pockets.

 

[Statistical]

Once again, the failure of central planning reveals itself. Bottom up, free market responses will always yield better results in terms of providing needed services. I live in a rural area where one provider has a monopoly - Fairpoint - and as a result have 15mbps for 50 bux a month over DSL. My community is dense enough to support other means but it's prohibited by law. My only alternative is Dish and that service is a ridiculous joke.

But hey, don't let me interrupt all my fellow techworld types here from supporting Progressive, big govt, central planning addicts for office. I bet 80% of you voted for Obama and this is the result of putting planners in power like Obama.

Things I learned today. DSL was invented, centrally planned, and rolled out during Obama's two terms. There was no possibility for say two or three decades to roll out a DSL network prior to Comrade Obama fucking everything up.

 

[Velma Velvet]

But feel free to hand out taxpayer money for stadiums, business "incentives" and kickbacks. I'm sure the constituents have no problem with that.

 

[CppThis]

Having personal experience with several Tennessee utility boards, I'm quite confident in saying that his quality of service is going to be far superior to what a muni ISP could offer anyway.

 

[CppThis]

BobsYourUncleBob[/url]":3op6bt34]Binary thought is far more the realm of the present-day Republican hierarchy & has led to many, many problems.

Republicans will flatly deny the very existence of a "head-rubbing" variable; they reject & vilify the variable of gum-chewing; leaving "walking" as the single acceptable variable to pursue. This is followed by demands that the nation acquiesce & succumb to walking the Republican path.

While Republican platforms may not reach the levels of comprehensive detail found in a typical Communist Manifesto, they remain every bit as doctrinal & proscriptive. The Republican cause is not helped by the fact that the direction they insist we "walk" is decidedly backwards. And at present, Republican policies promote the interests of unfettered capital power centers at the expense of both functioning free markets & guarantees of individual human equality.

While I don't expressly disagree with this, I would point out that the very same set of accusations can be leveled against the Democratic party too, especially in urban areas. This is why Trump and Sanders are both doing so well despite being totally bonkers and not in good standing with their respective parties.

I would further note for those who, unlike me, are not from Tennessee and thus lack historical context, that the state really is a poster boy for the failure of central planning. Pretty much everything in TN was built by the government (New Deal, Manhattan Project, and later the LBJ stuff) and everyone's either a DOE plant worker, subcontractor, or on welfare. Even with all the massive public spending, the state still didn't accomplish anything. Most cities own and manage the water/sewer/gas/electric lines, and these muni utility boards are notoriously dysfunctional and (in rural areas) carry more than a whiff of inbreeding. One of the things I most noticed when I moved away from the area is that Xcel and Sempra power grids don't go down for 12+ hours because there was a thunderstorm. It was also one of the first states to attempt public-sector health insurance, and TennCare was an unmitigated disaster.

 

[berrardo]

In the state of Washington, in a little town in Grant County called Ephrata, the residents enjoy the highest average data rates in the country. It was brought to them by county government.

http://www.dailydot.com/technology/ephr ... ternet-us/

The county Utility District, unable by law to sell to individual customers, built the pipe and sold access to ISP's wholesale. Ephrata's iFiber sells over 100mb/sec access.

http://www.ifiberone.com/news/grantcoun ... 0f31a.html

The county also happens to have $0.03/kWh electric rates, so it has become an important data center for many big-name companies.

http://www.grantpud.org/customer-servic ... ed-network

 

[ascagnel]

maxp0wer[/url]":34isiejh]I hope more developers do this. And also cable homes with Cat 6, putting drops in all rooms like they used to do with coax. Some things simply cannot be done using WiFi.

Freaking seriously. I moved into a brand-new apartment building a few months ago that doesn't had that, and I had to resort to the dark magic of powerline ethernet so I can stick my Plex server in a closet.

 

[johnt007871]

This man is obviously a terrorist, or something. He must be stopped! Competition or consumer welfare or something! /s

 

[Darmat]

Cities, counties and states should be required to provide fast internet service to the residents - internet is utility like water, electricity

This story nicely illustrates how some creative minds bypass corrupt political nonsense.

 

[rosen380]

altizar[/url]":15vkgrw9]The home develop realised that once you pay for the infrastructure which takes about 2-3 months, ISP are 90-95% pure profit . . .

If that is true sounds like any developer not doing it is an unbelievable moron, right? I mean you have the advantage of it being a convenient time to lay the cable underground with other cabling needing to be run anyways [and already having the trenching machinery and such on site].

If you are building out a 3000 acre development you are already in for hundreds of millions of dollars; a couple of hundred extra thousand is basically rounding error.

Guessing that it isn't nearly as lucrative as you think...