http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-15/the-case-for-publicly-owned-interne... <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-15/the-case-for-publicly-owned-interne...> Logo_post_b Print <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2012-02-15/the-case-for-publicly-owned-i...> Back to story <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-15/the-case-for-publicly-owned-interne...> The Case for Publicly Owned Internet Service: Susan P. Crawford By Susan P. Crawford - Feb 14, 2012 In cities and towns across the U.S., a familiar story is replaying itself: Powerful companies are preventing local governments from providing an essential service to their citizens. More than 100 years ago, it was electricity. Today, it is the public provision of communications services. The Georgia <http://topics.bloomberg.com/georgia/> legislature is currently considering a bill <http://www.legis.ga.gov/legislation/en-US/display/20112012/SB/313> that would effectively make it impossible for any city in the state to provide for high-speed Internet access networks -- even in areas in which the private sector cannot or will not. Nebraska <http://topics.bloomberg.com/nebraska/>, North Carolina <http://topics.bloomberg.com/north-carolina/>, Louisiana <http://topics.bloomberg.com/louisiana/>, Arkansas <http://topics.bloomberg.com/arkansas/> and Tennessee <http://topics.bloomberg.com/tennessee/> already have similar laws in place. South Carolina is considering one, as is Florida <http://www.coalitionfortheneweconomy.org/blog/2011/11/florida-pro-business-g...>. Mayors across the U.S. are desperate to attract good jobs and provide residents with educational opportunities, access to affordable health care, and other benefits that depend on affordable, fast connectivity -- something that people in other industrialized countries take for granted. But powerful incumbent providers such as AT&T Inc. and Time Warner Cable Inc. are hamstringing municipalities. At the beginning of the 20th century, private power companies electrified only the most lucrative population centers and ignored most of America <http://www.baller.com/library-art-history.html>, particularly rural America. By the mid-1920s, 15 holding companies controlled 85 percent of the nation's electricity distribution, and the Federal Trade Commission found that the power trusts routinely gouged consumers.
