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The south-eastern Tennessee town of Chattanooga has some of the fastest internet connection speeds in the world, thanks to a fibre-optic network installed by the government-owned electric company, EPB.

The town, with a 2012 population of just more than 171,000, has used its internet speeds of over 1 gigabit per second to attract new businesses, including five venture capital funds with 2014 investment capital of more than $50m (?30m), according to the Guardian.

Chattanooga's success is a testament to the power of government infrastructure investment, writes Daily Kos blogger Steven D.

It's also, he says, a threat to the private telecommunications monopolies, which are content to offer lower levels of service, "slowly draining the lifeblood out of our nation even as they steal whatever is left in our pocketbook".

He contends that private-sector malaise and greed are part of the reason why US internet speeds currently ranks behind 30 countries, including South Korea, Romania and most of Europe.

"Uruguayans have better internet service than citizens of the 'greatest nation on earth,'" he writes. "Pretty damn embarrassing, if not a big surprise."

Companies like Cox and Comcast are trying to prevent public utilities like EPB from competing directly with private internet providers, he says.

The companies argue that government-supported entities have an inherent competitive advantage over private businesses when they succeed and are a drain on government coffers when they fail.

Currently 20 states have laws placing limits on municipal broadband networks, according to Ars Technica, including strict prohibitions in Texas and Nevada.

Private telecommunications companies are also fighting to prevent Federal Communications Commission regulations that would make it easier for municipalities to circumvent these state rules.

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It's obviously  much easier to provide internet to denser countries - especially when they are less than 2% of the land area. Also average speed dones't take into account how many people actually have a connection - Uruguay probably has less wired coverage.

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Sounds like a socialist threw up all over his keyboard. I'm all for the government stimulating competition in stagnant markets where the corporations are happy to spend as little as possible on upgrading infrastructure and actually providing a better product. I would argue though, that if we didn't have the FCC/FTC regulating everything there wouldn't be stagnation in the first place.

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Sounds like a socialist threw up all over his keyboard. I'm all for the government stimulating competition in stagnant markets where the corporations are happy to spend as little as possible on upgrading infrastructure and actually providing a better product. I would argue though, that if we didn't have the FCC/FTC regulating everything there wouldn't be stagnation in the first place.

When a government is run my competent people with good intentions, then you'll get good results. But when the current FCC chairman is a former lobbyist for the cable and wireless industry, you can hardly expect things to improve. A far bigger issue is that several states have passed laws that effectively eliminate competititon in these markets, so you get a corporation like Comcast which has the worst customer service satisfaction ratings of any industry.

 

While technically too much regulation would be a bad thing, I'm not convinced that it's a major issue in our society. If anything, there's too little regulation in many industries and those that state "corporations will regulate themselves" is the weakest argument I've heard over this whole issue.

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Sounds like a socialist threw up all over his keyboard. I'm all for the government stimulating competition in stagnant markets where the corporations are happy to spend as little as possible on upgrading infrastructure and actually providing a better product. I would argue though, that if we didn't have the FCC/FTC regulating everything there wouldn't be stagnation in the first place.

 

It would still be stagnant because corps don't want to spend money on infrastructure. Just look at virtually any infrastructure and it's falling apart in this country. 

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Sounds like a socialist threw up all over his keyboard. I'm all for the government stimulating competition in stagnant markets where the corporations are happy to spend as little as possible on upgrading infrastructure and actually providing a better product. I would argue though, that if we didn't have the FCC/FTC regulating everything there wouldn't be stagnation in the first place.

I'd sure love some of whatever you're smoking as it seems particularly strong. . It's precisely the lack of regulation that's allowing the ###### cable companies to get away with the monopolies they have. 

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I'd sure love some of whatever you're smoking as it seems particularly strong. . It's precisely the lack of regulation that's allowing the ###### cable companies to get away with the monopolies they have. 

It doesn't sound like you understand the reasons why these companies have become the monopolies they are. Would you not agree that if cable companies were not prohibited, by your savior the government, to intrude on the territory of their competitors there would be MORE competition?

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you don't seem to understand the historical reason why cable companies got monopolies in many communities: they wouldn't spend the money to lay down the infrastructure without assurances from government that they'd get them.  It's extremely expensive to build out the infrastructure in low-density areas like we have in the US, and it really has nothing to do with a 'free market' and everything to do with the guarantee there won't be one.

 

Years ago, I had trouble with Charter.  I came home from work 4 times to meet them and they never showed up.  I complained to them without success.  Finally my father, an attorney, told me I was wasting my time with Charter, and if I wanted assistance to contact my city's attorney.  He laid it all out for me.  And because they'd been granted monopolies, the only people they really answered to were the municipalities that granted them.  They had to get approvals for rate increases (usually granted) from the municipalities, and nothing put a wrench into that more than lots of ######-off consumers.

 

So I did contact my city's attorney.  And Charter fell over themselves trying to help me, it was unreal and eye-opening at the same time.  They literally put in a temporary repeater and ran cable from a junction box quite a ways from my house to my house.

 

I've noticed over the years that nobody fights to prevent a truly free market more than the dominant businesses that would have to compete in it.  Why do they care if municipalities decide to run their own Internet?  Why did the big banks fight like hell to prevent Wal-Mart from opening its own bank?  Why are the car dealers fighting Tesla's plan to sell cars direct?  Why are cab companies fighting Uber?  Because it's serious competition!

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I'm fairly a fairly conservative leaning libertarian, and THIS is a good use of government money, I applaud Chattanooga their government stood up to COmcast and the other monopolists, Washington is in no hurry to stop them, they need the campaign money, and they took back the people's infrastructure back and did better than the monopolists would ever allow to happen

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