ISPs need to fucken die. Internet should be provided as a social service.
We already paid for the god damn infrastructure ourselves and the invention of the Internet itself through our tax dollars. Why the hell do ISPs get to profit from it infinitely with almost no meaningful regulation to protect you and me (who, again, already paid for this shit several times over).
Fun fact: ISPs have received almost half a TRILLION dollars in kickbacks funded by taxpayer dollars on top of everything else. Regulatory capture is a real problem.
Also, they took billions of government dollars, promising to build out infrastructure, and then…just didn’t. With zero consequences.
Not just billions, hundreds of billions.
ISPs
And because corporations aren’t people, here’s the CEOs that ran things during 2014:
Hans Vestberg (b 1965) Verizon
Randall Lynn Stephenson (b 1960) AT&T
Glen F Post (b 1952) CenturyLink
We let these people act with impunity in our society but it doesn’t need to be this way. Look at how Elon, who thrives on attention, flips out over being tracked and heckled. They stole hundreds of billions from us but we don’t even act like it.
As they exist right now, definitely. But making Internet a govermentally run service is also likely to turn out bad. The best method so far, based on what other countries are doing, seems to be public infrastructure, that any ISP can then sell service through. This prevents monopolies and creates competition in the market, which tends to result in better service for the users.
Edit: public as in anybody can use it to provide service, not as in governmentally managed. Just to force a separation to prevent monopolies.
Just think. In Article 1 of the US Constitution, the same article that creates Congress, also creates a federal post office system. Remote communication was so important that’s where it was described using the latest technology of the time.
There are so many systems today that need similar treatment. Internet. Medical. Education. Job Training.
And no, I don’t mean fed government enforced monopoly. I mean, UPS exists and competes with the USPS. But there is a minimum level of service in operation.
Just think. In Article 1 of the US Constitution, the same article that creates Congress, also creates a federal post office system.
We’ve spent the last 40 years trying to privatize the function of the Post Office and dismantle it as a federal agency.
there’s a pretty good fucking argument that mail - paper mail, not packages - should simply be all email or at the worst, scanned and transmitted electronically.
LOL @ the downvotes - you think they can’t look at your mail already?
HOW FUCKING DUMB ARE YOU CHILDREN? bwhahahaah
Sure, if you want to make it easy to digitally surveil
you don’t think they’re able to peep into your mail if they want to already?
and that the slight level of ‘security’ the service provides isn’t outweighed by the enormous savings in fuel burned as the silly truck visits every house every weekday simply to deliver a flyer from the grocery?
pffft
you don’t think they’re able to peep into your mail if they want to already?
Not at the scale of petabytes, no.
pfft
its a base requirement, like water. it should be regulated as such. zero profit motive, ubiquitous access.
Let’s add healthcare to this list
Throw it on the pile of “things Americans will never get socialized.”
never is a very, very long time
Just until America ceases existing. Could be 1000 more years, could be next January. The future is full of possibilities!
Internet is not a base requirement like water. Without food, water, shelter, you die. Without internet and electricity you are left behind, you don’t die. It should be regulated like electricity
You can survive without running water. You can survive without Internet.
Lack of Internet will make survival harder, just like lack of running water (if not to the same degree)
Keep in mind, if you fall behind too far people will kick you out of your house, disrupt any attempts to make a shelter, significantly increases rates of death for a variety of causes
Internet is not a base requirement like water. Without food, water, shelter, you die. Without internet and electricity you are left behind, you don’t die. It should be regulated like electricity
Yes because being homeless and without power will definitely ensure you can stay alive. This whole argument doesn’t make sense. Electricity doesn’t need to be regulated like water because for the most part, there can’t be tainted electricity. But you can still get your water cut off just like power so clearly the government doesn’t ensure you have ready access to it.
Oh and shelter is a base requirement but we still let people die in the streets. And for those people we aren’t supplying them with water: they can drink from what few public fountains exist in parks…if the cops don’t beat them for “loitering”.
No, internet should be a requirement to be provided to everyone like we regulate water and electricity and (used to) telephone service.
Adding to this, we aren’t being charged separately for using the bathroom, livingroom, or garage. The internet should not be divided as such.
A man wandering the desert doesn’t turn up at the edge of town asking for the WiFi password. :-)
Probably wants a sandwich too
