I’m thankful for Doug Dawson’s astute observations, I’m especially thankful when I’m on vacation and can share his posts while I hike in Sedona. But his observations and reasoning are good – wouldn’t we always rather buy from people we know – be it broadband, a car or concert tickets. We’re invested in serving well the people we’re likely to run into tomorrow…

Most people in the country buy broadband from a handful of giant ISPs – The four largest ISPs serve more than three-fourths of all broadband customers in the country. But some people are lucky enough to benefit from great local ISPs in the same way that I benefit from being near to local vegetable farms.

There is a wide variety of local ISPs that includes independent telephone companies, telephone cooperatives, municipal ISPs, electric cooperatives, independent fiber overbuilders, and WISPs. Not all local ISPs are great – but from the stories I hear around the country, most people served by local ISPs feel lucky to have the local option.

He offers a recommendation for policymakers…

We’re in the process of handing out billion in federal grants to build rural broadband networks, and there isn’t one shred of localism in the new federal programs. Instead, the government is handing out huge grants that are often lucrative enough to instead attract the biggest ISPs and speculative investors to build rural broadband.

Does anybody really think that AT&T or Charter really wants to provide broadband in rural America? AT&T spent the last forty years milking the last vestiges of profits out of rural networks while making zero investments. Charter and other big ISPs are not going to like the much higher operating costs in rural areas that come from long truck rolls and increased maintenance costs to keep up with huge miles of rural miles.

The big federal grants are providing an incentive for big ISPs or speculative investors to build fiber networks because the grants make it possible to earn high returns. It’s impossible to believe that a big ISP like AT&T is going to provide the same level of customer service, repairs, and network maintenance as would be done by a local ISP. I don’t need a crystal ball to know that there will be a huge difference in twenty years between a fiber network built today by a giant ISP and one built by a rural cooperative. Without future grants, AT&T won’t invest in future electronics upgrades, and the company won’t do the routine maintenance needed to keep the network in good working order. Cooperative fiber networks will be humming along like brand new while the big ISP networks will already be showing signs of age.