First, its an ad hominem attack on credibility which while sometimes useful does not refute the central points that Pai made. "If there's something wrong with the senator's argument, you should say what it is; and if there isn't, what difference does it make that he's a senator?"[1]
Second, I have no clue who funds them or why.
Third, they really do have a great podcast about the intersection of technology and policy (Uber, AirBnb, self driving cars). Specifically the one on bringing back supersonic airplanes is really cool. [2]
"First, its an ad hominem attack on credibility which while sometimes useful does not refute the central points that Pai made."
First, your messaging on this is confused.
Since how is it both ad-hominem and "sometimes useful". By definition, ad-hominem is not useful. So it's one or the other.
Second, I believe i directly refuted each one, actually. We should in fact, be subsidizing 1/3rd of the households broadband if that's what it takes to get broadband for the categories of people i listed. Especially when Pai's alternative is "encourage investment", aka give AT&T or whoever another 100 million to do nothing with. He doesn't actually give a real plan, just a magic thought that we'll somehow "encourage investment", ignoring that literally none of these companies want to be investing.
Heck, they even say that in their investor filings, which he apparently doesn't bother to read. Nowhere do they say "hey, we really want to provide rural broadband, but are held back by regulation". Instead, they said "We don't think rural broadband is worth it for us, but we want to make sure no one else gets a foothold, so we are going to do what we can stop them from doing it any other way than paying us high prices".
Don't worry though, i'm sure magically, his "investment encouragement" will change the literal written down plans and presentations of the large telecoms.
Also, it doesn't seem to apply to municipalities, since he's strongly against any of these rural communities being self-supporting by starting their own rural networks. How strange that is. you think he'd be all for it, since it means the government doesn't subsidize them anymore. That's what he said he wants! Apparently people investing is not okay, but companies, that's awesome!
It's also strange techfreedom don't seem supportive of this, for an organization dedicated to "tech freedom", it apparently doesn't mean for people.
Meanwhile, Pai lives in a mythical world where they are desperately trying to provide large scale broadband at low prices, and sadly stymied at every turn simply that doesn't exist.
But really, he's not an idiot. He knows this already. He's not even really that malicious. He just wants something he can do that is business friendly so he can declare victory and go be a million dollar telecom lobbyist like all the others. I just wish he didn't play the game along the way. Because that's what would make me really respect him.
But hey, you can classify my argument however you want, because i already knew i wasn't going to convince you.
