

Startup Offers New Business Plan For Broadband - cwan
http://www.pehub.com/90342/startup-offers-new-business-plan-for-broadband/

======
kragen
I don't think that this would "do away with need for Net Neutrality
legislation." This is exactly the kind of thing that net neutrality
legislation is intended to prohibit — turning the open internet into a premium
service only accessible to the rich.

They say that "just 35.8% of U.S. households with annual incomes under $25,000
actually have broadband." That's 9.5% of total US households, which,
interpolating, would be all the households with an annual income under
US$10600; and many of those (if they have housing at all) presumably have
dial-up internet access, and can also go to the public library across town
when they need faster access.

(An interesting side note is that this means that at least a third of US
households under the poverty line already have broadband, and probably closer
to half.)

So, these guys are hoping to sign up all of those folks, plus a slice off the
bottom of the folks just above the poverty line, by falsely claiming to give
them internet access when what they're really selling them is a TCP/IP version
of basic cable TV, with a limited selection of corporate partners who pay for
the privilege and perhaps meet some kind of content standards as well.

If they were successful, then ISPs that currently serve the least demanding
customers would lose those customers, causing them to drop in profitability or
raise their prices, driving more of their least demanding customers into the
arms of BoxTop. This used to be a standard argument about why telephone
service had to be a monopoly, and it doesn't hold up in that strong form, but
it does tell us that BoxTop's success would mean that real internet access
would cost more, taking it out of the reach of some people who can currently
afford it. It just doesn't say how _much_ more.

So the real outcome, if BoxTop were successful, would be making internet
access less affordable to the poor.

I predict that it's not going to work, because not only are people under the
poverty line not going to sign up for Netflix, they're not going to use an ISP
that doesn't let them click on the links their friends are posting on
Facebook, and they're not going to use an ISP that doesn't let them run
BitTorrent. I admit I only know a few people under the poverty line in the US,
and they may not be a random sample, so I could easily be wrong about this.

~~~
gojomo
What if the publisher-subsidized service offers free access to everything at
some baseline slow rate – say 128kbps – and then partner sites at a higher
rate? That could bring 90s-level internet access to everyone. If lack of
affordable net access is a real problem, shouldn't this company and its
potential customers be allowed to try this mechanism?

~~~
kragen
I think I've shown above that lack of affordable net access is not a real
problem in the US — it's apparently already more widespread than adequate
housing, adequate nutrition, and adequate health care — but BoxTop, if
successful, could make it a real problem.

So, should they be allowed to try this mechanism? That's the whole net
neutrality debate. The net-neutrality position says, "No," or in its milder
form, "They should be allowed to sell crippled TCP/IP services but not
advertise them as internet access."

You're probably familiar with the arguments for net neutrality already, so I
won't repeat them again.

~~~
kragen
Even though this lowers my average comment score, I think it's worthwhile
linking to this just-issued FCC report, "Internet Access Services: Status as
of December 31, 2009":
[http://www.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2010/db1208...](http://www.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2010/db1208/DOC-303405A1.pdf)

It seems to contradict the BoxTop statistic of 90.5%; it shows only 60
residential fixed connections per 100 households faster than 200kbps in at
least one direction in 2009 (p.11).

I find it deeply disturbing that in 87 pages of statistics about access
speeds, there is not one single mention of whether these connections include
publicly-routable IPv4 addresses, static IP addresses, or IPv6. (Unless I
missed something?)

------
zcid
FTA: _Second, the proposal runs headlong into the Net Neutrality debate.
Sachson said BoxTop will do away with need for Net Neutrality legislation. But
if Internet companies pay for simple access, it might only be a short step
away from advanced tiers of service with greater levels of performance–exactly
what Net Neutrality wants to prevent._

This is what I see happening. If business models like this become popular,
they will only accelerate the demise of net neutrality.

------
adelevie
So companies like Netflix will subsidize net access for the poor for charity,
or can they somehow make money from this?

~~~
wmf
If Google is willing to pay for the development of multiple Web browsers, why
not this? I would expect that you'll see a _lot_ of ads when browsing on this
system, though.

