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How viable would it be for the government to set up its own state-owned ISP company with minimal or no political influence?
As far as technology goes? Extremely. As far as politically? Impossible.
In short, that company would be like a less efficient Amtrak and far from being a TVA, Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae.
The government can’t even set up a tent with minimal or no political influence.
In Switzerland we basically had ISP monopolies back in the day on cable (DOCSIS) and on the phone (xDSL) networks. Prices were ok, but not low. Then fiber optic as a viable tech came around, but neither of the large ISP was particularly eager to build out a fiber infrastructure, as it was more lucrative to just sit on their "old" tech, knowing the ohter party won't be building fiber, so won't have a better offer either
So what happend then was that munincipalities built their own fiber networks, renting them out to the ISPs, large and small ones, either as an IP service or as dark fiber for ISPs which want to provide their own equipent. Only the largest ISP still builds their own fiber infrastructure, in parallel, and they are required by law to rent out that infrastructure to other ISPs as well.
This has really leveled the playing field, brought good competition and lowered the prices.
So I think government owned infrastructure is the way to go, but it takes a long time to build out and needs the right policies and legal framework to succeed.
It’s literally illegal to do this in some municipalities here in the U.S.
That would require the government to not be bought out by billionaires. That would require the government NOT working for the billionaires that control them. That would require the government to actually give a fuck about anyone poor.
In other words it’s never going to happen.
Worked in my home town for about 20 years until they outsourced to our version of Comcast as a 'cost-saving measure'. Wow, were they stupid.
It actually worked astoundingly well before that. Hated ISP a? Make a phone call and within an hour your same gear was now on ISP c.
At a recent job I worked closely with some muni IT people. Their plan is to fibre their area and then price the backhoe access out so the ISPs have to compete over the common infrastructure and can't restrict access. City doesn't want to be an ISP; just manage the glass.
My state has it's own fiber network that they send to local governments and schools, but as far as I know is not available to the public.