
Finland makes broadband a 'legal right' - xaverius
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10461048.stm
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barmstrong
Great intentions - completely wrong way to make it happen.

Regulating the broadband internet market will just make people in metropolitan
areas subsidize the cost for people in rural areas. If it ended there...sure
it wouldn't be fair, but at least it would be a zero sum game (some win, some
equally lose). But with regulation that's never the case because:

1\. you introduce additional costs for government oversight

2\. you discourage new entrants to the market, thereby reducing competition

As Milton Friedman said, you can never judge a government program by it's
intentions, only the results it gets.

Free markets and unbridled competition have a much better track record of
driving prices down, making new technologies available to the masses.

Cost of flat panel TV's (unregulated) have cut in half every 18 months since
they came out. What was once a toy for the rich is now available even to poor
people.

Cost of health care (regulated, and increasingly a technology product) has
steadily increased each year.

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w1ntermute
_Free markets and unbridled competition have a much better track record of
driving prices down, making new technologies available to the masses._

In industries with a high barrier to entry, the market naturally tends away
from competition. Broadband is one such industry, due to the enormous initial
infrastructure costs.

~~~
dantheman
I don't think so, if you look at the united states the broadband industry is
heavily regulated.

~~~
_delirium
That's partly because it's nearly impossible to build a telecommunications
network in the private sector, due to the fact that you don't have eminent
domain power, can't dig up roads, etc. And if we're going to have the
government assisting private businesses, granting them local monopolies, etc.,
then sure, they should be regulated.

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alanstorm
It's nice to see some governments recognizing that something which was once a
luxury is now becoming a necessity as offline alternative for mandatory
services (paying bills, job searching, etc) get stripped down or removed
entirely.

~~~
tkahn6
A car used to be a luxury, now it's a necessity.

Do you think owning a car is a legal right?

~~~
abstractbill
Irrespective of whether you believe governments should play a role, this is
the wrong comparison to make. Governments don't provide the cars, they provide
the _roads_.

Similarly Finland's government isn't proposing giving everyone computers -
they want to make sure everyone has access to the _infrastructure_.

~~~
prawn
This is also important in Australia where the population is mostly clumped in
cities along the coasts. Without similar thinking, broadband in "the bush"
would simply be unavailable or prohibitively expensive.

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walkon
This really implies other rights for the requirements to access the broadband
connection. Shelter, electricity, computer, etc, would all be needed for
someone to realize this legal right. Will these also be provided by Finland to
its citizens?

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starnix17
Not necessarily related to this article, but doesn't Finland also require
every citizen to enlist in their military for a few years?

I remember reading about it in some Linus Torvalds interview, seems like an
interesting policy.

~~~
yason
In Finland, all _men_ are subject to a mandatory service. Women can join in
voluntarily but the numbers have been really low number, to no surprise.

The service can either be military training (at least 6 months) or civil
service (pacifist option but it's twice as long, which is criticized
internationally by Amnesty). About ten percent of young men are dismissed each
year: some for a real reason (medical, psychological, other), some for "other"
reasons.

While officially never admitted, the system is heavily geared towards re-
enacting Finland's WW2, that is, defence against Russia, Finland's eastern
neighbour. It's a collective wartime trauma in constant replay.

It's an archair system that will turn into something more modern in a couple
of generations or the coming decades, if not for anything else then for the
lack of funding.

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yason
If they just stopped censoring the internet as well, too, we could be talking
about something likening a "right".

~~~
yason
Why was this downmodded? There's active internet censorship in Finland, see
<http://www.effi.org/blog/kai-2008-02-18.html> or google for more information.

I think it brings a quite striking contrast to the way the "internet rights"
were bragged about in the news.

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vishaldpatel
Interesting. I wonder if every Finn has the right to food, clothing and
shelter.

~~~
Kliment
Yes. Finns who cannot afford the above get government support that is
equivalent to an estimated minimal reasonable cost for such expenses.

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natmaster
I keep telling people it's my legal right to have a spaceship, but noone seems
to believe me. :(

