Stimulus Bill Includes $7.2B for Broadband

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The new stimulus bill includes $7.2 billion for broadband grant and loan programs. Hopefully they use the money wisely because $7.2B for broadband is about $25 each for every man woman and child in this country.

The bulk of the funds directed at broadband--$4.7 billion--will be distributed through a program run by the Commerce Department, while $2.5 billion will fall under the jurisdiction of the Agriculture Department, giving particular emphasis to broadband deployment in rural areas.
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this has me very hopeful, rural areas need it badly.....now we just have to wait and see....

though i have a feeling the guy that mentioned ceo's getting new jets and going on vacation is probably more accurate
 
7.2 billion will hardly do anything for infrastructure, this just points out to say how out of the loop politicians are.

A good line across the Atlantic or pacific would eat 7.2 billion up with no problem... and thats an open sea.

Rural areas are pretty much still SOL.
 
well a good portion, will end up being eaten in administrative costs, before it even leaves the government...

With the size of the government, you can count out on any real efficiency in it.
 
Stimulus this, stimulus that.

Next thing you know Obama is going to be out in the street giving hand jobs. Atleast that would be a better use of our taxpayer money. Better than stealing from us, wasting most of it, then "saving" us by handing a fraction back with a smile.
 
Really, that is a drop in the bucket for what is needed. What they should have done is created a plan similiar to the one to get telephone access across the country. This would have created jobs on both ends; people to install the infrastructure and people to manufacture the parts/equipment required. The only way we will ever get Internet everywhere will be when government steps in and makes it a priority....
 
farscapesg1 said:
Really, that is a drop in the bucket for what is needed. What they should have done is created a plan similiar to the one to get telephone access across the country. This would have created jobs on both ends; people to install the infrastructure and people to manufacture the parts/equipment required. The only way we will ever get Internet everywhere will be when government steps in and makes it a priority....
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You mean sweatshop kids to manufacture the equipment.
 
Wshmaster0 said:
You mean sweatshop kids to manufacture the equipment.
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:p

Well, as long as it was in the US, I'd be fine with it. Kids nowadays need to learn how to really work :) The government would just have to require the equipment to be manufactured in US borders.... yeah right, like that would ever happen.
 
Our government at its best. Forgetting it authorized a $5 charge on every single phone bill, for the purpose of funding conversion to "fiber to the home" back after the phone company splitup. It ran for over twenty years. That's roughly 100,000,000 phone bills, times $5, times 12months a year, times 20 years.... or $120 BILLION that we the people already paid the phone companoes to replace all the overhead wires with fiber to the home.

They didn't do jack shit, and pocketed the money. So here we are going to pay THEM to run a little wire to "rural" and "poh folks" homes so they can connect the intrawebnet to the computer they can't afford. Cough. :eek::rolleyes::p

Instead, grow a ball, and make them run fiber to the home, every single home, on thier own dime, or we will nationalize them and do it ourselves... and the stockholders lose 100% of thier investment.

Remember... in "time of war" the president has nearly infinite power.... or so says Dick Cheney. :cool:
 
Ockie said:
A good line across the Atlantic or pacific would eat 7.2 billion up with no problem... and thats an open sea.
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What is the point in running a line across the ocean? Let overseas nations get their own damn internet.
 
Xaero_toast said:
What is the point in running a line across the ocean? Let overseas nations get their own damn internet.
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You don't know how the internet works do you? Peering is critical to access, performance, uptime, and cheaper bandwidth. You need to peer to all your neighbors for quicker and better routes.

Lastly, you missed my entire attempt to compare how they want to run over land, which is ten fold the expense.


They would not even be able to bring broadband fiber to all the empty foreclosed homes in the US, let alone get broadband to everyone... and we're not even talking about backbones.
 
xX_Jack_Carver_Xx said:
Our government at its best. Forgetting it authorized a $5 charge on every single phone bill, for the purpose of funding conversion to "fiber to the home" back after the phone company splitup. It ran for over twenty years. That's roughly 100,000,000 phone bills, times $5, times 12months a year, times 20 years.... or $120 BILLION that we the people already paid the phone companoes to replace all the overhead wires with fiber to the home.
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what he said.
 
ir0nw0lf said:
Give it to Verizon so they can get me some damn FIOS to my house!! :p
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Good luck with that they are more likely to take money and then cash out of the state like they did in New England. NH, VT, Maine all got screwed because the retarded governments in those states let Verizon walk away. Now we have Fairpoint which has crap for TV and Internet, or Comcast who bends us over and then throttles their shitty network.
 
dr.stevil said:
:( x2 I don't understand how this will stimulate anything.
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It will stimulate Government interference in the Internet… with money comes strings. Look for this to be used as a level for eventual content control.
 
dr.stevil said:
:( x2 I don't understand how this will stimulate anything.
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While I don't disagree w/ some of the responses stating this may lead to more governement intervention, this comment it just silly.

Things don't build themselves. Somebody has to do the work. Currently lots of people need work to do. You don't have to agree with 'what' they're building, but seriously, it's really not that complicated.

You can disagree w/ it, fine, but to say 'i don't understand' is just stupid.
 
supaspoon said:
While I don't disagree w/ some of the responses stating this may lead to more governement intervention, this comment it just silly.

Things don't build themselves. Somebody has to do the work. Currently lots of people need work to do. You don't have to agree with 'what' they're building, but seriously, it's really not that complicated.

You can disagree w/ it, fine, but to say 'i don't understand' is just stupid.
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ok then, it's a retarded way to spend our money. I guess I'll be proven wrong in 4 years (hopefully)
 
Wshmaster0 said:
You mean sweatshop kids to manufacture the equipment.
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And? Do they not need jobs? I'm sure the ones starving on the street just love the people that get sweatshops shutdown. :rolleyes: Guess what? If the person in the sweatshop is making jack-shit, and the American company is selling their product for a huge margin, guess who gets most of the profits?
 
I'll agree to disagree.

I think $7.2B is better than nothing. Providing it is actually used to increase the U.S.'s internet coverage.
 
WesM63 said:
I think $7.2B is better than nothing. Providing it is actually used to increase the U.S.'s internet coverage.
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while I do agree with you, I'm not holding my breath. Maybe living in upstate NY has just turned me into a cynic... they keep taking from us (tax payers) and never get anything in return except for a state heading towards bankruptcy and more taxes :(

It's disgusting
 
Would anyone honestly see a benefit of this money being stuffed into the phone companies hands....not likely, wave good bye to your tax money....it's not like the phone companies don't make enough money from their over priced billing really is it (especially cash pig, I mean Comcast)!?
 
Stimulus my ass. It'll take a few years for the money to even make it out of government hands and by then there'll be much less of it thanks to bureaucratic idiocy.
 
Ockie said:
You don't know how the internet works do you? Peering is critical to access, performance, uptime, and cheaper bandwidth.
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No, I get it. I don't make it a habit to look up the location of all the servers my network traffic goes to, but of the ones I have looked up, they were all domestically located, for which an overseas line will not help. I really don't care if the driver I'm downloading from abit.com.tw only goes 25kb/sec. If I'm in that big of a hurry, I'll find it somewhere else.

Ockie said:
You need to peer to all your neighbors for quicker and better routes.
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Neighbors does not = overseas

Ockie said:
Lastly, you missed my entire attempt to compare how they want to run over land, which is ten fold the expense.
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Even going back and looking for it, I don't see where you said that. I would have thought the overseas line to be more expensive. I have no actual first-hand knowledge of what that costs, but I will take your word for it. I'm sorry, I didn't get your point that it was just for cost comparison. I thought you were actually suggesting it.

Ockie said:
They would not even be able to bring broadband fiber to all the empty foreclosed homes in the US, let alone get broadband to everyone... and we're not even talking about backbones.
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It would make more sense spent to bring broadband access to rural areas that still currently only have dial-up access, than to bring fiber to areas that already have broadband access anyway.
 
so this 7.2billion now the internet providers can't bitch about how they don't have the bandwidth for the "ultra-leaches" and everyone can download again without worries!
...har har har.
 
sfsuphysics said:
so this 7.2billion now the internet providers can't bitch about how they don't have the bandwidth for the "ultra-leaches" and everyone can download again without worries!
...har har har.
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Oh how I wish I don't sense a dash of sarcasm. :p
 
Glad we're spending our way out of debt.
Remember all these "stimulus packages" are in addition to the normal Federal Budget.
 
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