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"Nothing the government does is ever done correctly or inexpensively. "

Did the government screw up DARPANET? Or is this Internet that you use to make a living something that just sprouted from industry?

Are you including in government's failures the banking and wire transfer statutes and regulations that make it possible for you to receive payments from Paypal? What about the police, prosecutors and courts that keep the bankrobbers at bay?

You just lost all credibility with that damn foolish sweeping generalization.

# posted by Anonymous 5:16 AM

1.From the beginning I have wondered by governments were rolling out wireless networks. If there is a need then private companies can fill it. It’s called capitalism.
2.DARPANET didn’t get really big until private firms were allowed to use it.
3.Lost all creditability for one generalization? – give me a break.

# posted by James Eyrich 7:16 AM

1) how about Verizon announce a specific implemenation plan for the whole city? Or are they realsoonnow going to install and then only in the wealthier neighborhoods? After all, the baby bells have done such a fine job of providing reliable high speed internet, so long as you're either less then 15k feet from the CO or can afford a T1. And my cable modem price has gone up 50% in only three years.

2) ARPAnet worked fine before the public companies got involved. And if anyone else remembers x400, there was a public protocol that allowed different private companies to exchange emails.

# posted by rg 7:39 AM

Oh Todd... "Indeed, the Internet was created by the Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to link computers at Stanford, UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, and the University of Utah so that artificial intelligence researchers at these sites could collaborate on projects funded by the military. “DARPAnet,” as the resulting network was called, ensured the safe transport of data between mainframe computers at different strategic locations by creating alternate communication routes in case of bomb attack and by decentralizing functions so that no single computer could be targeted."

So just when do you think that bomb is going to fall and how soon wil the government be asking for its Internet back?

# posted by Bill 7:41 AM

What I want to know is why the US is SO far behind other countries (japan especially) when it comes to broadband internet. From what I've seen so far it must be that the ISPs know they can get away with it. People are too busy wanting 3Gbps cable to even imagine 100Mbps fiber. I don't guess that the government should get involved, but I wish something would happen to force the industry to improve.

# posted by Anonymous 8:33 AM

Government work for the people, whereas private companies work for $$$.
If governments where screwing up everything they touch I guess roads, police and military should all be privatized. If private companies are perfect I guess Microsoft does perfectly secure softwares too, and the energy cartel has nothing but your best interrest in mind.
That said if the government build a WiFi grid in Philly I wouldn't be surprised if it is privatized after it's finished.

# posted by yanstor 8:41 AM

A few questions and comments, both pro and con...

While I am opposed in principle to the idea of the Government building a wireless network infrastructure, I would rather they spent my tax dollars on that than, for instance, paying for a new stadium so that pampered millionaire sports stars can keep more of their money in their pockets.

Sometimes the private sector cannot or will not get involved - would they have invested in DARPAnet when there was no money in it?

Why are doing this? To have something to show off? Are they trying to attract more geeks?

Then can build it, but can they run it? It will get hacked - big time. I suspect that like so many things the Gov't builds it will work, but not particularly well.

Eventually they will sell it to private business. Think about it. Something that was built with your tax dollars will be sold to someone else. Where will the proceeds go? In England in the 80s, Maggie (Thatcher) was privatizing everything that was not nailed down, including utilities that were built with public money. If anyone other than the Gov't did this it would be called burglary.

Is this something I would like? Yes! Should the Gov't be doing this with my money? Hell No...

# posted by Wizard Prang 8:50 AM

"From the beginning I have wondered by [sic] governments were rolling out wireless networks. "

Ol' Bill has been around long enough to remember the great sturm und drang over "nobody can figure out how to make money on the Internet". Wonder no more: the reason government is providing Internet is because the profits were not there. (Pardon that rolling sound, Adam Smith is spinning in his grave.)

Government responds to the need (recognizing the absence of a free market remedy) and rolls out Internet access where industry can't or won't.

Industry sees the boat leaving the dock and promptly changes the rules, courtesy of some compliant legislators and the lobbyists who feed them.

The dispute is not whether you are for or against welfare – the dispute is about who gets welfare.

Based upon economics and the efficiencies of scale, business is a much more expensive cowbird to feed. Bill, if you had said that you didn’t think government was correct when it gave money to business, I might have agreed with you – but you didn’t day that.

Talk about hypocrisy – a man making his living on the Internet, arguing that “[n]othing the government does is ever done correctly or inexpensively” while he collects his money over the taxpayer-financed, government-built Internet through the system of interstate and international money transfers that is uniquely a product of governments.

Bill, in an unregulated, free market world you would be in the group who were first against the wall when the revolution came - or else you would starve.

# posted by Anonymous 10:00 AM

The Internet is becoming as important as electricity. It's the new telephone system. The government heavily regulates the telephone industry, to the point that any phone jack that isn't physically broken from the system can call 911.

The government should rein in Comcast and Verizon, or at least have them provide service at a discount to rural and low-income communities.

As for Philly's WiFi system: I'm seriously considering moving there if I can get a ubiquitous 802.11 connection anywhere I go in the city for $15/month. That's what the city government is banking on. More geeks means more new businesses which means more tax revenue. The fact that Verizon doesn't want them doing this because it will hurt profits just shows that it's a fantastic idea.

# posted by Paul 10:12 AM

"If anyone other than the Gov't did this it would be called burglary."

Nah, burglary is done at night. This is done in broad daylight and it is just plain theft.

The market model derived from the California energy crisis (arising directly from public utility privatization) is directly analogous to providing Internet access in low income and rural settings.

A. Power generation is a natural monopoly and the hydro / coal and nuclear plants were built with taxpayers' money.
B. The Internet is a natural monopoly that was built with taxpayers' money and is supported by taxpayers' money.

A. Industry bribes some legislators and they walk in and take over the taxpayers' power generation systems - without paying the taxpayer back for the initial investment in the plant and distribution network.

B. Industry hops on board the Internet and promptly lobbies Congress for statutes that give industry big breaks and pay the taxpayer nothing for the initial investment and distribution network.

C. Business profits. Everybody else is screwed.

Consider, ENRON & ALCOA and the "energy crisis" of 2001: ENRON bid up the prices while denying service to the population. Big profits. But, what about business? ALCOA (the Aluminum Corporation of America) smelts ore with an electric arc furnace. The extrodinary power demands ought to have shut down ALCOA, but they didn't. ALCOA had purchased its power on the futures market and, when the ENRON created shortage hit, ALCOA did shut down factories - in order to sell their power at the inflated price.

Regulation of monopoly is a job for government.

# posted by Anonymous 10:15 AM

Oh Todd, the majority of your other comments are just ill-advised but this one:

"Talk about hypocrisy – a man making his living on the Internet, arguing that “[n]othing the government does is ever done correctly or inexpensively” while he collects his money over the taxpayer-financed, government-built Internet through the system of interstate and international money transfers that is uniquely a product of governments."

Well, let's just say it's about the third time I've read something similar here (for all I know, it could be you all three times) and it's getting a little tiring.

At year's end, by current accounting, Alice and I will get to divvy up about $90 from this blog. If that amount is not insufficient enough for you to feel foolish for calling it a "living," then let me add that, by then, we'll have pumped somewhere around 110,000 words into it. (The blog keeps count.) Trust me when I tell you that we typically get paid more than $0.00818 per word for our work.

This tax-payer financed, government-built Internet we're on (although only the very distant backbone could be called that by now) was a failure based on results. By the time the government was done, it solved a problem that had already seen a solution from the private sector. (Or didn't you ever wonder why the government let it loose?)

And don't you mean the "devolution?" You know, where the young and insipidly ignorant try to prove they know more about everything than the people who actually do?

# posted by Bill 10:53 AM

lol Bill. We all know you're rolling in cash because of this blog. There's no need to hide it:-P

/end sarcasm

# posted by David 1:37 PM

Let me get this straight: you earn a fraction of a cent per day running this blog? Something around $90.00/yr?

OK. Fine. Now that you have established your fiduciary bona fides it is painfully obvious that you have no knowledge or experience to draw upon when you make your Limbaughesque pronouncements.

Just because you are able to break even (that's assuming that the $90.00/yr doesn't represent a profit based upon your hourly billing) on a Blog doesn’t mean that you qualify as the Alan Greenspan (nor the Charles Ponzi) of web economics.

Bloviating about the joys of business and the failures of government may be de rigeur these days, but making that kind of overarching, imbecilic, selfish, self-contradictory mouth-breathing republican monkey-talk pronouncement really toasts my cockles.

It doesn’t matter that you are the incumbent “independent tech” blogger in this, the electoral season of the insurgent right wing partisan. What does matter is that you seek to defenestrate the sovereign by taking services from the cicadic masses. This world of yours makes as much sense as riding a bike – nay, engaging the pleoton, in a force 4 hurricane. Go listen to Limbaugh with your “right ear” and ignore the truth that you are listening to a sick and twisted puppy who has materially harmed the career of every doctor and pharmacist that he lied, swindled or prevaricated out of a script for schedule II’s.

Go ahead and toady up to the telcos who gouge you and other consumers and provide nothing of value for their “stewardship” of a limited resource that they acquired through the hard work of their lawyers. Go ahead, posit and opine that the best practice for business is to step in and take business away from small government by paying off legislators. Support the class of lawyers who have no conscience and who revel in taking money by taking it from the poor and weak.

All that we have to do is remember that your opinion is worth only a few fractions of a cent and that you don’t value your time enough to find something more valuable to do with it other than publish this.

My name is not Todd.

# posted by Anonymous 2:36 PM

Todd, you're Todd until I know differently. Perhaps you should go back and read my humorous and informative "anonymous" anecdote.

As for anything else, you shouldn't take it so personally. There's no need to resort invective and personal attacks. If you think the government should run things, fine. I'm sure you can come up with some concrete examples from the ex-Soviet Union, China, Germany during the late 30s/early 40s, Uganda, Haiti, or any other government-controlled country to make your point.

BTW: Why work for fractional cents? Did you miss the posting where we noted that we were the first runner-up in Weblog's Independent Technology Blog Popularity contest? e beat out SlashDot. And we've only been around for about a year. Sometimes you just do what makes you feel good. It feels good.

# posted by Bill 3:45 PM

David, was it my fancy-schmancy 1976 Camaro or my 5-year old Cherokee Sport that gave it away?

# posted by Bill 3:47 PM

Hey Todd, put down the communist propoganda playbook long enough to do your homework. Edison and Bell were privately funded. Any government involvement (aside from antitrust suits) stemmed from land grants/rents until the dams were built in the 1930's. Lawyers did not give them something the government built.

To say that Enron was responible for our (Califonia's) power problem is goofy. Had "Gumby" sent people that knew what they were doing to negotiate the contracts it would not have happened.

I agree that recently the government has not done a good job of maintaining the infrastructures that were built back then, but more involvement is not the answer.

Seems to me that if a commercial district wants to offer WiFi they'll hire a company to do it.

If anyone doesn't want to be called Todd: write your name in the post like this - Ward

# posted by WRM 9:28 AM

hey just saw this thread and was mortified. We have not made $90 a year, that's just the total generated by clicks since I added in Google ads. We are staying afloat (hint, hint) thanks to Payl Pal donations from kind readers (and even Todds) like yourselves. The numbers are not much better, but the donations cover the hosting bill and the domain name registrations and the new review database software, and hopefully someday will pay us and our interns for our time. So click on the Google ads at least and help get our numbers up- or make a donation today!

# posted by Alice 9:43 AM

There's a scary idea there that the government should never be allowed to do anything because they'll cost too much. Umm... the private sector is there to make money, to profit, from fleecing YOU for as much as they can possibly get away with, they have to pay off shareholders and multi-million dollar salaries for their CEO's. Lets take a look at salaries for elected officials vs. private sector heads. Maybe it just seems so clear because I'm not american but the idea that the government is there to serve YOU seems to be getting stronger and stronger in every developed nation except the US. Americans rush headlong into giving more money to the people who are screwing them over in the first place. Should every industry be there as a profit generator; schools, hospitals, libraries?

# posted by Cosine 4:01 PM

What you say may be true for whatever country is your origin (although I honestly doubt it), but the problem with government is that it emulates BIG business. The process is so complex within either construct that design and implementation is always stretched further han it could be and costs are elevated as a result of the additional procedures. Then, by the time it's done, the problem for which (whatever) was originally designed as a solution has usually been solved --or disappeared. Of course, that also doesn't cover the usual patronage, bribes, and plain stupidity that exist both in business and government but somehow seem to always be enhanced in government. (Remember, the chief job of a politician is to him/herself re-elected.)

Bottom line, whether you're talking technology or anything else, here in the USA, the framers of our Constitution wrote the Bill of Rights to limit the powers of government, to constrain it from interfering in our lives. It would seem that the government was designed simply to act as a protective framework while we served ourselves.

# posted by Bill 5:17 PM

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