10 forgotten wonders of 1980s homes

[Chuck Guzis]

On 12/30/2015 11:59 AM, Geoffrey Oltmans wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 30, 2015 at 1:24 PM, Jim Brain <brain at jbrain.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> We were spoiled in South Dakota, as somehow (and I am sure someone
>> knows and will enlighten us/me) the rural telcos (LECs?)  tapped
>> into lots of funds from somewhere to drop fiber to all of the rural
>> homes.  50Mb was the slowest speed, as I recall, for data.  The
>> catch was that you had to buy a telephone service with your
>> Internet, probably for some legal/regulatory reason.  But, it was
>> cheap, and we bought just the basics, and 50Mb was more than one
>> could expect when you are 8 miles from the nearest town and on a
>> large acreage.  So, in markets where this type of service is
>> offered, I think telcos will thrive.
>>
>
> Probably the FCC's Connect America Fund. This is meant to do for
> broadband what the REA did for electrical power.

Probably because we're served here by one of the big outfits 
(CenturyLink), that sort of money isn't available for us.  So we rural 
folk still suffer--because it doesn't pay to deploy service to 
low-density areas.

It really is amazing that I've been living with internet service that 
wouldn't even tax a 10base2 "thinnet" LAN connection.  In the meantime, 
CL still pays an annual dividend of something like 8% to its stockholders.

--Chuck