View From a Height

"What's Wifi?"

In a debate on Senate Bill SB05-152, which would prevent municipalities from directly building telecom networks and competing with private companies, committee chairman Sen. Deanna Hanna was heard to ask one opponent of the bill, "What's Wifi?" Way to do your homework, Senator.

Glenn Fleishmann has written eloquently and persuasively about the need to keep open the option of municipal wifi networks, and the attempts by various state legislatures to foreclose the option.

My own inclination is that governments shouldn't be competing against private industry where it's at all avoidable. The inherent regulatory conflicts of interest are too obvious. DU Professor Ron Rizzuto reiterated his study that municipal telecom networks almost never pay for themselves, but that the temptation to mix in funds from, say, the electric utility, is too tempting. In the long run, such services tend to benefit from relaxed treatment, and deliver substandard service at a high, hidden cost.

That said, a blanket ban on municipal or county telecom networks is probably a mistake. The argument comes down to what a utility is, and what the government's role in providing that utility should be. I do believe that wifi will quickly become a utility, just as cellphone service has in the last decade or so. Such a utility could be quite profitable in a large city like Denver or Boulder. But small towns and rural areas might want access, as well. There, the co-op model already provides electricity and water, and in some cases phone service, without competing with an non-existent incumbent.

In the end, my main goal is to get all the phone poles torn down, and have us all using VOIP, anyway, so whatever speeds that transition has my ear. Locking out an option on principle rather than experience seems a little hasty.