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Too Poor to Afford the Internet (nytimes.com)
145 points by danso on Aug 12, 2016 | hide | past | favorite | 149 comments



Can I just say how much I love the way public libraries have navigated themselves into the digital age?

They are, as this piece points out, very popular places to access computers and the Internet, and many libraries offer a wealth of digital content. I can check out and instantly download e-books and audiobooks and movies from my library.

It's certainly conceivable that they might have transitioned less well. There is, after all, a healthy amount of government bureaucracy in the public library system, and that tends to stymie innovation. And then there's just the pain of transition. Bookstores have felt those pains hard; it's not that people don't want content, but they want content in different forms, and a lot of bookstores just couldn't move fast enough.

But I'm really glad to see libraries continue to be generally healthy, and important community resources.


Replying from the NY Public Library in Nolita. Couldn't agree more, the crowd here is a real melting pot. Students, kids, old folk, rich, poor.

I also like the opportunity to get on with work in a quiet place without feeling obliged to buy a coffee.


In New York you have access to lynda.com, just need a library card and pin. https://www.lynda.com/portal/patron


Jersey St? I love that street. Very picturesque. So many photo shoots and movies filmed there (like the intro to Jarmusch's Permanent Vacation).

The front in 1980 https://youtu.be/eAc59a90PBc?t=157


Public libraries are amazingly accessible, but university libraries remain complicit in the ongoing racket of pay-to-read academic literature. Although many university libraries allow guest access during the day, you cannot access their academic subscriptions unless you're on the secure wifi.


They have to be, as a condition of their journal subscriptions. Librarians generally want to extend access as far as possible, but they are terrified of pissing off a publisher and getting a journal taken away from their entire university's community of researchers who need it to do their work.


If the universities really cared about open access, they could unionize against the publishers. Imagine the top 20 schools, which also happen to be the ones producing the research, refused to abide by the publisher rules. Would they all have their access revoked?

It's never made sense to me why, despite billions of dollars budgeted toward scientific funding, private companies make money charging for journal access. Why can't all that public funding also go toward funding the peer review, editing, and publishing?


> If the universities really cared about open access, they could unionize against the publishers.

If universities really, really cared, they could band together and set up their own journal publishing organization (many universities do have their own academic publishing arms, but a single-university journal publisher probably would be harder to establish respect for than one sponsored by a broad coalition of major universities.)


It's not enough to set up new journals. Until you convince everyone who matters (in your area of research) to use only the new journals, you still need the subscriptions to all the old journals as well, until (if!) they are abandoned and lose all status.


Aaron Swartz alredy wrote about that in his Guerilla Open Access Manifesto (https://archive.org/details/GuerillaOpenAccessManifesto; https://archive.org/stream/GuerillaOpenAccessManifesto/Goamj...):

"There are those struggling to change this. The Open Access Movement has fought valiantly to ensure that scientists do not sign their copyrights away but instead ensure their work is published on the Internet, under terms that allow anyone to access it. But even under the best scenarios, their work will only apply to things published in the future. Everything up until now will have been lost."


I am surprised piracy has not solved this problem.


"really cared about open access" doesn't mean caring about it above everything else, especially above their primary mission of doing research, which requires ability to publish in every particular research niche community globally (for every research area, the "top 20 schools" are different 20 schools, with only minor overlap), and the ability to read all this communication. Boycotts have been discussed and haven't succeeded because they directly harm researcher short-term interests; a slow migration is in process with some research communities switching to e.g. arxiv or other open access resources, but until all or most research areas worldwide have done so, every university still needs these subscriptions. Open access is desired, but having the subscriptions (and taking part of the publications) is mandatory.


> Would they all have their access revoked?

Yes, I imagine they would. They would also probably be taken to court for breach of contract, and the courts would fine them a substantial amount. I would certainly hope that this would be the case - even the top 20 universities have to obey the law, and producing research has never been a valid excuse for choosing to ignore a law you don't like.

Criminal activity is not the answer here - nor should it ever be.

What the universities can do, if they cared, is re-negotiate their contracts with the publishing houses. Of course, this requires assigning a monetary value to the amount they care, which must be greater that the inevitable price increase they woulld incur for the change in access restrictions.


This doesn't have to be the case: the libraries of public German universities are often called "University and State Library" and are open to anyone living in the state.


There are plenty of public-access university libraries. What they're restricted from doing is extending journal access to users who are neither attached to the university or physically present in the library.


Most universities have a proxy service that allows you to access journals and other digital databases from anywhere in the world.

My previous university has one that I have lifetime access to (UAE University) and my current university has an even better collection (GATech).


In Finland many public libraries nowadays have even 3D printers and film slide scanners, and arrange training sessions for their use. It's really a wonderful system, and probably not even that expensive considering the learning potential for even the disadvantaged citizens.


This is even popular in the Southeastern US, which is pretty incredible.


Plus having a library card often gets you access (even remote access!) to lots of expensive services - I use the OED, J-stor, etc. from home with gusto. I will say there's a small dark side to having gone digital, many libraries have culled a lot of their holdings, and/or can't afford to buy as many books as they once did (have to pay for those licenses somehow...). It's likely that there's less demand, but it still makes me a little sad.


I haven't noticed any reduction in catalog size or variety over the years (US), maybe I've lived around well-funded systems? If anything it's become more varied with time. The only annoying thing is having to filter out eBooks every time searching the catalog.


RE: culling, Yeah, there is stuff (I notice manga not reprinted since the 90s, they didn't hold up physically that well and they loaned mainly to teens) that I remember being common that has been culled.

e.g. My library system doesn't have a copy of any of the volumes of "Please Save My Earth," and that was a title that many libraries had if they had any manga at all, in my experience.


Yes, I discovered this myself far later than I should have!

The SF central branch has a really good selection of programming/tech books. Also, having a library card enables access (as you note) to a wide selection of ebooks[1].

(I note, however, that the interface that you can use them through could use some redesign.)

[1] http://sfpl.org/index.php?pg=2000005001


More importantly, bookstores have to turn a profit.

Libraries don't.


Your average bookstore makes like 5% profit (if they're not losing money). Barnes and Noble could become a non-profit tomorrow and prices would go down so little you wouldn't notice. It's not profit versus non-profit that means the difference between "affordable" and "unaffordable." It's the ability to use tax dollars to offer a service for a fraction of what it costs.


>Bookstores have felt those pains hard; it's not that people don't want content, but they want content in different forms, and a lot of bookstores just couldn't move fast enough.

I'd say rather than people preferring digital, its the browsing and buying experience of the same old printed matter that needs to change for them to stay competitive. Bookstores have until now been little more than warehouses that store books, and let people walk in and buy them. That same function is done better by Amazon.

What an updated bookstore needs to be about is the experience: Curation and recommendations so that you can find books that you didn't know you'd love (this is invaluable), a nice environment that makes you want to go there and makes books feel exciting. It should also hold events - launches, readings, discussions, exhibitions, workshops. It has to be more than a warehouse, basically.

This encompasses retail for all industries: Experience, service, novelty.


> Experience, service, novelty.

And a price close enough to that found online that you can get the close. Or you're going to get showroomed.

An alternative to having the price close enough is to have the price in the ballpark and have a sense of urgency such that the consumer will buy now. I have walked into Barnes and Noble and bought a book because I wanted it right then and I was out and about. Perhaps I could have had it for $5 cheaper on Amazon, but saving that $5 wasn't worth the wait.

Another alternative is to have (at least some of )the physical experience be purchased--hence the coffee shops in the bookstore--you can't get hot coffee via Amazon. (Yet?)


While it's not just a bookstore, I think Fnac is a good example of this: many stores have a kind of coffeeshop inside where you can read the books (for free) and where they regularly host small concerts and discussions with book and movie authors.


the shocking truth is that the government red tape proved to be less detrimental to knowledge sharing than DRM.


Can I just say how much more civil the comments are here on HN re: libraries as opposed to, say, the last article I read on reddit[0] re: the subject. Seems the only thing they could do is complain about the homeless.

[0]https://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/4txauf/internet_cant...


Are you suggesting that it's not a legitimate grievance? Unless people are lying about, for instance, people watching porn in libraries, it does seem like there's a problem with the civility of that discussion. I haven't seen anything like that in my area, but I have seen lines of 16 or so desks being used as arcades, which can be okay so long as people remain quiet. But I've seen people have to ask gamers to leave in order to do something presumably more in-line with the goals of the library, which many people, especially kids, will be too shy to do.

In theory, public libraries have been meant for people from all walks of life since their inception. But computer media have made them useful for a lot more things than intellectual pursuits, and it does seem reasonable that this would concern people. It's their taxes paying for it after all.

It would be nice if people on reddit would reflect on why it bothers them that people come to the library on drugs and watch porn, but reddit doesn't have a culture of people writing out three-paragraph justifications for their opinions. I thought that it was pretty clear, though, what people are actually bothered by from the comments you uncharitably labeled "complaining about the homeless".


They said it was civil. The subject shouldn't be talked about because it could offend someone, not that it wasn't legitimate.


I have web access at my cities public library, but that's it. They have a fiber connection, wifi, and lots of working space but you can't even access github, Dropbox, or most vps's


[flagged]


This seems like an unnecessarily jaded/cynical view.

I'm sure there are lewd incidents that every librarian has had to deal with but I'm also sure that the vast majority of visitors/members are civil and better because of the institution.


> Can I just say how much I love the way public libraries have navigated themselves into the digital age?

Yes, but at the slight risk of sounding ridiculous. Libraries were computerized long before the "Internet age".


He said "digital age" not "Internet age" and then he mentions access to computers, the Internet, e-books, etc. Were you just looking for a comment to criticize?


> and then he mentions access to computers, the Internet, e-books, etc

From that, I inferred that "digital age" is being used to denote "Internet age".


Another huge aspect of poverty and internet access is the increasing number of households who don't have wifi but use only their phones for internet access. ("one-quarter of those earning below the median income and one-third of those living below poverty level accessed the Internet only through their mobile devices." https://theconversation.com/many-low-income-students-use-onl... and if you want more http://qz.com/580024/more-americans-are-relying-exclusively-... )

The world really looks different if you only have a handheld device -- it's more read-only and because of caps and expensive mobile plans, you will use it less.

In cities there's a chance that libraries can help, but with rural poverty it's really a trap!


Karen McGrane gave a great talk about just this issue. She made the very valid point that many employment portals are neglected backwaters and don't have mobile friendly or responsive designs, making them unusable on phones. That effectively cuts off employers from huge chunks of potential employees and verges on not being equal-opportunity employers.


I'm a little bit surprised: Raspberry Pi 3, say, 40$ (current price on Adafruit). Let's say 70$ for RPi + power adapter + enclosure + mouse + keyboard + SD card. You surely have a TV. Use your mobile phone to set up a hotspot - problem solved. If this is still too expensive: There are lots of hobbyists having old RPi lying around. Or companies that have old mouses and keyboards lying around that aren't used anymore and are happy to give them away for a symbolic sum.


Learning how to set all of that up is a massive barrier to entry for the technically average or below-average person. With a modern phone, all you have to do is turn it on and you're good to go.


There are lots of people that you can simply ask and are often willing to help (for example at hacker spaces or maker spaces).


Let's say you're an unemployed single mother, struggling on public programs, looking for work, occasionally selling food stamps to handle emergencies. You worry about how you're going to afford to commute to work before your first paycheck comes in if you CAN find a job, but you can't find a job because your Internet access is so limited, potential employers turn you away because they can tell exactly what your situation is the moment you step in the door (Maybe your shower stopped working, or you've been sleeping on a friend's floor, you can't afford to get your hair done, you only have one old and badly-fitting "interview outfit," you're out of breath after running from the nearest bus stop).

But now you're supposed to go and spend $110+ on a Rasberry Pi and some computer equipment, and find a local hacker space full of rich white dudes and hope that they help you set it up rather than awkwardly avoiding you and quietly wondering how you got in? Class, race, and educational barriers aren't imaginary things that can be solved by the "maker spaces" with friendly utopian facades. In my experience, they're extremely judgmental, fad-driven, and can be overwhelming and demoralizing for those without basic technical knowledge or who don't check at least a few of the "are you one of us?" boxes.

Sure, there are a lot of old people at these meetups and maker spaces, sure there are a lot of women, sure there are a lot of ethnic minorities, people with kids, poor people, people with extremely unprivileged backgrounds, people who don't wear the typical "t-shirt jeans/khakis" uniform, and a lot of people who are just starting out and learning. But you start piling on too many of these "minority statuses" at once, and all of a sudden, it's a very different experience. Even if someone DID have the ability and knowledge to pull this plan together (I mean, I have a master's in software engineering and have been programming professionally for 10 years, but even I would have to do some serious Googling to set up a Rasberry Pi with my TV), why would they willingly put themselves in a potentially ostracizing and embarrassing situation? Very few people want to be the odd one out, or be the subject of speculation, or have their skills and worth questioned while they're in unfamiliar territory, outside of their comfort zone. Questioning why poor people aren't "taking advantage" of these opportunities that are so clearly available to you is just contributing to the problem.


So these lower income people are expected to a: know there's low cost ARM devices that can use their HDMI TV as an input, b: know hackerspaces exist and think they aren't for "hackers", c: walk in to one and say "set this up for me"?

That's highly, incredibly, improbable. Anyone meeting such criteria probably always got a device.


I know low-income people (living from unemployment benefits) who meet these criteria (thus surely not "highly, incredibly, improbable"). The example with the hacker space was just one illuminating example (though I don't consider it as strange: In the city where I live the hacker space organized some public technology tinkering project in the past). There are of course lots of other ways how you can find people who can explain how to set one up.


And have you given them an rpi yet?


For some I set up one, some prefer other ways to access the internet (for example a used computer that they got cheaply from who-knows-where).

I just gave the RPi as one example of a cheap example of a non-mobile-device for accessing the internet - there are of course lots of other ways, too.


Interesting. I live in a country with a minimum wage of $58 a month (Ukraine) and yet the internet is one of the few things that pretty much anyone can afford: high speed connections (50-100mbps) cost about $2-4; rarely more.

Are american high prices the result of scummy pricing on the corporations' side or is it an actual infrastructural issue that prevents the ISPs from providing cheap connections to everyone?


It is 100% a corporate issue.

In the US, many people have only one choice for an Internet/TV/phone provider. Some have two choices. It is exceedingly rare to find a place with three choices.

Telecoms are typically granted local monopolies. As a result, they can charge pretty much what they want. And they do. Even in markets with a duopoly, companies very rarely attempt to beat each other on price, it's not in their best long-term interest to (but I doubt they are outright colluding).

The only places where it is more expensive than the norm to build out is in more rural areas... but the telecoms sometimes don't build out there at all, so some people are stuck with whatever they can get with a copper phone line, or satellite Internet if they can afford it (that's very expensive as well).

In my area - Optimum wants $50 for 60/25, plus $10 to rent a modem monthly, plus other taxes and fees (most of them made up) that are nigh impossible to find out beforehand. For TV and phone as well, $90 plus rental fees for the router and required boxes for each TV However, Optimum is terrible at my particular house, but we're one of the lucky ones who can choose Verizon as well. Verizon wants $70 for 100/100, reduced TV service, and phone, plus all the fees above. The telecoms push the bundles very hard.

As you can see, this shit's expensive (adds up to $130).


It can't be a 100% a corporate issue if, as you point out, telecoms are granted local monopolies. Governments grant those monopolies.


Which isn't true anyway.


The vast majority of the cost of any kind of infrastructure is labor, which scales with local wages.[1] A New York subway ticket is about $2.75. That's about 11x more than the cost of a ticket on the Kiev Metro. And it's not like the New York subway makes a profit--fares cover only about half the system's operating costs.[2]

In Baltimore, I paid about $50 for a 50mbps connection, or about 20x more than a subway ticket. Sounds like the ratio is about the same order of magnitude in Ukraine.

[1] A telecom field technican in the U.S. makes about $6,000-$7,000 per month, plus benefits. That's about 20x what the average Ukrainian in Kiev makes (according to the Internet).

[2] Fares on D.C.'s metro, which similarly cover only about 50% of costs, range from $1.75 to $5.90(!).


"The vast majority of the cost of any kind of infrastructure is labor, which scales with local wages."

I'm not sure that's true. Let's say it costs VeriCast $500/year to maintain a single home's landline and broadband connections (including the stuff in the street), for which they charge the customer say $700 per year. Do they really have one employee per 200 connections (assuming $100k full-loaded cost per employee)? That would be 500,000 employees in the USA, if 83% of households have broadband. That's about the total number of employees of ComCast, Verizon and AT&T. But those folks provide other services (like cellular service). Where is my math wrong?

Even we accept that it is true, it's not relevant, because the price paid by the customer is as much about the willingness of customers to pay, as it is about the running costs.

Even if we believe it's relevant, because the price customers are willing to pay vary with local incomes, experience tells us that local incomes don't tell us the whole story. People in London pay less for broadband (~$300 per year for phone and broadband, including taxes[0]) than those in San Francisco. I don't see how that is explained by labour costs.

[0] http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/phones/cheap-broadband


If the strategy of the company is not to compete - there is very little incentive to pursue efficiency. So talking about labor costs or expensive equipment in the absence of competition is pointless, they don't care about it themselves.

Furthermore, labor costs are not about maintenance, but rather about investing in the infrastructure. And this doesn't translate directly into the price. They make way more money on that infrastructure in the long run.


> That's about the total number of employees of ComCast, Verizon and AT&T. But those folks provide other services (like cellular service). Where is my math wrong?

Well for one you aren't adding in contractors. The people actually building the network aren't typically direct employees. The usual pattern is spend a ton of money to build out the network, earn it back through a number of years and then use the added cash flow to expand once more. Wireless networks are what the money is going to right now.

Regardless, you can look through all the various telecom quarterly reports to see where the money is going. They are for the most part profitable endeavours, but not especially lucrative (AT&T's latest quarter had a 8.67% net profit margin compared to 22.68% for Google).


How did you get that $50/50Mbps deal in Baltimore? Was this part of a bundle for cable television?


It was remarkable how much the price per Mbps dropped in the area once Verizon FIOS entered the market. Just one real competitor to Comcast made a substantial difference.


That's what Verizon charged for FiOS in my apartment.


The minimum wage in US would be $1200 per month. So if the average price in the US is $55, that's about 4.5% of a monthly salary.

Given your quoted numbers, the price in Ukraine is actually higher at 5% of a monthly salary.

Of course the US doesn't have a monthly minimum wage (not sure how that works in Ukraine) so many people in the US might only have part time jobs paying the minimum hourly wage, hence they make considerably less than $1200 a month.


I could be wrong but I think it's actually lower in the US if you're only making minimum wage. Years ago it qualified you for a subsidized $19.99 plan.

UPDATE It seems to be even less today at $5-10: http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/22/technology/access-from-att-d...

It's strange that the article doesn't mention this.


Uh, yeah about that.. I have an aunt on permanent disability. She haggled with AT & T in Austin for months trying to get that service. They make it extremely difficult to actually sign up. I believe she finally just switched to the $300 one time cost Google Fiber plan when they came to town.


Why am I not surprised? I wonder if there's a way to put a spotlight on that practice? Medium post?


It is classic regulatory capture. US telecom, historically, basically owns the regulators. Occasionally, like now, the FCC pushes back a bit.

Combine that with large regions of low population density and a lot of land, and we have very little competition in the vast majority of the country.


Many countries benefited from having a government owned telecom monopoly.

In the US, we get the downside legacies of a monopoly without the benefit of government control.

The last mile and regional infrastructure (poles, mostly) is owned by private interests, who tend to be dicks about sharing. There's also a regulatory tension between the Federal government and state governments.


They also benefited from starting later which means they could start with newer, better technology. If you were going to start a wireless data network in the US from scratch, you wouldn't design it the way the current US hodgepodge has evolved.


Now I understand why Russian-speakers dominate many gaming communities. I pay around 20$ for an 8mbps connection, with a monthly download limit of about 50GB. Now you know why there won't be Indians competing in global e-leagues for a long time to come.


Do you pay about 1500 INR and still cap out at 50GB a month? I'm sure you get unlimited access for around that


About 1200 INR, which I rounded in USD. To the best of my knowledge, only Hyderabad has unlimited options.


I, for one, look forward to the day I can learn to swear in languages other than Russian and Tagalog.

But why is it relatively more expensive? Have Indian companies rigged the rules such that they don't have to compete with each other? I thought Indian labor was relatively inexpensive.


I have no idea if net connectivity is rigged now. Back in the day when cable TV operators ruled the roost, I had heard of existing operators of a neighbourhood ganging up against new entrants. With ISPs, even the last-mile connectivity is handled by major ISPs, so that seems unlikely.

Overall, I don't understand what's going on with Indian ISPs. For example, my traceroute to qoo10.sg (hosted in Korea) reveals traffic going from Bangalore to Delhi to London to Fremont (US) to Japan to Korea. For various other places that are supposed to be close by, I see traffic going all the way to Delhi and then coming back.

I think the demand for broadband is still very low here, and so, unoptimal strategies (from a network packet's POV) are good enough for our ISPs.


Russia is also in the same category of cheap high-speed internet access. Romania is there too. In the rest of Eastern Europe it's a bit more expensive, but still below $20.


Corporate and local government bureaucracy.

I've lived in very affluent neighborhoods that have access to a single, shitty, ISP. So even when you can afford the inflated and outrageous prices you're still at the mercy of an incredibly corrupt and poor preforming corporation.


Proportionally, the price may be comparable. For example, in Massachusetts, the current minimal wage is $10 per hour which translates into about $1700 monthly. 50-100 Mbps in Comcast can be had for about $40-60. Now, a monthly subscription of $2 out of $58 is 1/29, and $1700/29 = $58.

Of course, not all components of the prices translate proportionally. Salaries probably do, equipment probably does not.


1) it costs a great deal less in salary to pay construction workers to install aerial or buried fiber in ukraine. Or to aim point to point microwave.

2) A network engineeering position that might cost a company $115,000/year in the US could be filled for $35,000/year in Ukraine.

3) Eastern european ISPs are much more "Adventurous" in terms of the low cost network equipment they use for core infrastructure. $1500 Mikrotiks in the same role where a US ISP would use a $15,000 Ciscos or Juniper. Building five to six nines uptime core router POPs with fully redundant -48VDC A and B power is not cheap.


> Eastern european ISPs are much more "Adventurous" in terms of the low cost network equipment

Well, unlike US ISPs, they try to compete on price and there is a lot of competition. They kind of have to be much more adventurous in terms of cutting down costs of network equipment. But they also compete on quality, so it has to satisfy that too or you are out.


Be it as it may the quality of service is way better then what I can get with Comcast at about 1/10th the price :)


Your shitty last mile DOCSIS3 connection over 20+ year old coaxial copper is not a reflection of the quality of an ISP backbone... I realize that from a customer perspective the two are indistinguishable, but if you look at the quality of the router/switch equipment used by the top 50 ASNs (ordered by CAIDA ASRank) for major north american ISPs, it's vastly more expensive than what's used in countries where ISPs don't have the budget luxuries for $100,000 routers.


What benefit is it to me :)? In all seriousness we run things in US and Ukraine and while in theory you would expect there would be some tangible differences given the concerns you outline in reality they are not there. Major backbone providers also use cisco and juniper gear and are about as reliable as stateside providers. Residential providers due to intense competition offer way better service at a small fraction of the cost.


Rather than home internet access. I'd create safe study places for these kids to do their homework and even just hang around in.

Children in poverty often suffer from dysfunctional families that disrupt their studying and lack of life mentors to motivate them to pay attention in school.

If you could have supervised after school hours just for these kids to do their homework and maybe engage in a bit of self learning it would be much more useful than having home internet access.


My Librarian friend did indeed do a lot of social work while working for Houston area Public Libraries. If you want to engage in outreach in a location like that, then provide internet, clean bathrooms, air conditioning, and entertainment/activities.


Many / most schools have after school programs for this reason.


I have limited experience with these, but don't they tend to be like 45 minutes to an hour? You need to go at least as far as dinner time if you want kids to actually complete assignments there, not just start them.


You need water to be a productive member of society. (Or to survive at all, but that's a prerequisite.) You need food to be a productive member of society. (Or to survive at all, but that's a prerequisite.) You need shelter to be a productive member of society. More often that not, you need electricity to be a productive member of society. Increasingly so, you need internet to be a productive member of society.

In every case, the person consuming these resources either:

[a] pays for them on their own

[b] is provided them but paid by someone else, possibly in aggregate (family, government services, charity)

[c] not provided them at all, in which case they are no longer a productive member of society (or worse, near-starving, starving, or dead)

Ethics and economic systems notwithstanding, the first few are 'hard problems' that humanity has struggled with for millennia. Internet access is comparatively easy, because the marginal costs of distribution are low, but just like other 'utilities' and 'necessities', the capital cost is high.

One way to offset this is to create a market like for electricity, where multiple players, some private, some government-owned, compete at the supply-side and distribution-side, to provide capacity at prices that are close to the cost of (production+transmission) for the area.

Luckily, unlike electricity, water, food, or shelter, information can be duplicated, format-shifted, batched, compressed, time-delayed, and the like. If fixed-fiber-based Internet to arbitrary endpoints is too expensive despite the presence of a market, cache or store more content closer to the consumer on CDNs. If last-mile distribution is too expensive, switch to a different last-mile distribution paradigm -- this latter one is what public libraries (and public hotspots) currently accomplish. If bi-directional communication is desired, investigate peer-to-peer solutions. There's so much potential in LANs, WANs, sneakernet, (TV/radio/data) broadcast that goes untapped.

We're stuck here because right now telcos are a terrible market and the monopolies are granted at the wrong level; but also because we're assuming that getting direct, end-to-end connection from one of the big telcos is the only way to digitally communicate.


Is it really $50 per month for basic internet in New York?

In the UK https://www.uswitch.com/broadband/packages/ shows the cheapest broadband package - which includes telephone line rental - to be £18 per month (average across the contract when delivered router is included). That's around $25 (you can get "free" with a telephone service).

What struck me was the kid in the header image has a swanky new laptop, the story confirms the kids bring their laptops with them. Could they pay their neighbour $10 to leech the neighbours wifi? Do they need swanky laptops or just an internet appliance (my work computer is a 3rd hand toshiba on WinXP! - good enough for net+email)?

Do people in the USA tend to go to libraries for wifi rather than [near] to a cafe or other private business leaking free wifi?


The kid's Macbook Air looked like a loaner or library machine (according to the stop sign sticker on the bottom). I doubt anybody that can't afford internet would buy a $899 machine.


I bought my cousin an 11" Macbook Air for $300 (refurbished, mid 2011 model) She's a bright kid, but living with her grandmother (not a great home situation) in rural Utah, and only had Internet access through her phone. Phones are usually more important than a computer, if you have to choose between the two (and don't have reliable Internet, or the skills/knowledge to set up Google Voice, or, say, VOIP software on your laptop), but a MacBook doesn't have to be more expensive than a smartphone.


Is have thought that too, just IIRC that the article noted the kids being their own laptops and the image is titled as if an exemplar.


I live in Albany, NY and pay TWC $80 for a 50/5 connection. $50 gets you 25/1. Our stupid state government gave them more money to make 50/5 100/7.

Our library gets a lot of Internet patronage. In our city the library has done a great job of transitioning into a third place. People like to use the "think of the poor children" card, but I see all walks of life there. It's a great place.


Does TWC have different prices in different places?!! This seems so wrong. I'm paying $45 for 50/5 TWC connection in Raleigh, NC.


Totally. My brother in law lives in the burbs where Verizon deploys FIOS 5 miles away (they don't like cities). He can pay $39.99 for my service from TW, or $69 for 100/100 from VZ.

TWC is less noxious than Verizon though -- they don't block Netflix, etc in my area.


Some school districts in my area give students laptops. They have the specs of chromebooks, valued around $150. Various brands are part of this program: Apple, Lenovo, HP. The districts are in suburban areas that you don't think of as poor, but there are still a lot of kids who get laptops from the program who don't have internet at home, or have sporadic internet because their parents can pay for it some months and not others, and/or would otherwise not have a family computer.


People do share wifi all the time. More so in densely populated areas, of course.


I live in NYC and pay $35/month from TWC for 50/5. It's an introductory yearlong rate, and goes up to $45/month after a year. But if you ask really really nicely, they'll let you keep the $35/month rate :)


> They’re there during the school year, too, even during the winter — it’s the only way they can complete their online math homework.

Why is there homework online? Has this been shown to be better in any way for children learning math or just a cop out by lazy teachers to be able to automatically grade the assignments?

I can't imagine learning math with anything besides a pencil and paper (yes even calculators are mostly bullshit).


School systems and colleges love these online services because they do most of the legwork (grading and grade management) completely automatically, which allows the instructor to have much larger section sizes (without having to hire grading staff). Pearson, the leading provider of these, likes to market them as better for teaching but everyone in education understands that what they're actually better for is bottom-line cost.

It's an extremely frustrating trend, particularly since on the whole students seem to uniformly despise these services, but education is highly budget-constrained and this is one of the areas where it really shows. It's either online homework or pay more in taxes/tuition.

Edit: while I'm making Pearson sound vaguely evil, I should mention that the cost of these services is usually mostly offset onto the students, as the textbooks come with a one-time-use activation code for the online service that effectively eliminates the used textbook market. Of course in K-12 public school systems, the taxpayers still end up footing the bill.


Don't worry about making Pearson sound vaguely evil. The level of hate for Pearson, Wiley, and the like on my campus would make Hitler blush.

I do not use the word "hate" lightly. It is a strong word.


Don't forget McGraw-Hill.


If this were any other profession, you would not say "lazy teachers" but rather "efficient teachers."

The whole point of a productivity improvement is to free up time to spend in other ways. Maybe it's a false efficiency, but it's very cynical to assume than any time teachers can free up by being more efficient at grading will be simply wasted. Generally speaking, teachers have a lot of other things they could do.


Do you actually believe the public school system's goal is to educate children? More like freeing up parents to go to work (and tax), and employing teachers and administrators. It's nearly impossible to fire teachers, thanks to a public sector union who's got their back.

School is like a prison for kids. One form of punishment is detention - more school.

Also, "In the 2000 report, commissioned by the American Association of University Women, surveyors asked students between eighth and 11th grades whether they had ever experienced inappropriate sexual conduct at school. The list of such conduct included lewd comments, exposure to pornography, peeping in the locker room, and sexual touching or grabbing. Around one in 10 students said they had been the victim of one or more such things from a teacher or other school employee, and two-thirds of those reported the incident involved physical contact." - http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/20...

So, asking if something the public school system is doing is student focused betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of its purpose.


John Taylor Gatto, the NY State Teacher of the Year in 2000-ish (not sure of year), wrote "Dumbing Us Down" from years teaching in some of the worst (and best) NYC classrooms, and doing wonderful things for his kids all the while.

His thesis is that the public school system is pretty much doing what it was founded to do in the 19th century: to hone down kids to be good, obedient, unthinking factory workers and military, to the lowest common denominator.

His "Underground History of American Education" expands on that quite a bit.

Most definitely worth reading.


> Do you actually believe the public school system's goal is to educate children?

Absolutely. It doesn't work out perfect every time in every place, but it does a pretty amazing job of that given the poor level of funding and constant bashing from the entitled anti-union right. Freeing up parents is a wonderful side effect that has worked out pretty well for contemporary society.

If you're surprised that kids going through puberty are engaging in sexual activity, you must be living under a rock.


> given the poor level of funding

Do you have a source for this? According to an OECD study I found, the US spends among the most in the world per pupil on education.

https://data.oecd.org/eduresource/education-spending.htm http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2015/apr/21/jeb...


From your link:

> Traditionally the United States spends big parts of its educational budget on non-instructional items such as security -- more so than some other nations.

Whenever I read about the US I'm absolutely terrified


That quote is really without context. When I look at the "security" of the schools my children have been enrolled in, I see minimal security. Facilities security isn't like a prison by any stretch, and the cost can't be that high. The dominant cost factor for education is labor costs, not equipment/facilities costs.

And the "--more than some other nations." tag is just poor journalism without added context. I'm sure that the US spends more money on metal detectors than a lot of the small countries in the world. But that doesn't tell us anything useful.


> Do you actually believe the public school system's goal is to educate children? More like freeing up parents to go to work (and tax), and employing teachers and administrators. It's nearly impossible to fire teachers, thanks to a public sector union who's got their back.

They do a shitty job of that as well. To solve that problem school should be year round, start at 8am and end after 5pm. That way a parent can have a full time job without having to take their kid to school after their job starts and picking them up before it ends.

> So, asking if something the public school system is doing is student focused betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of its purpose.

It's implementation that's flawed, not the idea. Public schools are a grand concept and can work. They just need to fix the hours, get rid of the teacher's unions (don't like it? Great, go work somewhere else!), and hire proper teachers. While you're at it replace defined benefit plans with defined contribution one's so the full costs are accounted for rather than passed on to the kids in the classroom.


Very few institutions are single-purpose. An uneducated populace is detrimental to growth, but as you note, the 'daycare effect' of schools is also a valuable benefit. Your arguments don't negate the possibility that schools are run by good actors who believe their work benefits students in the objective sense.


It allows the teachers to utilize online services built for education, which allow other "features" that online grading does not do.

- It provides feedback on how long students are doing each section, so they can identify if students are spending too much time on homework.

- It makes it interactive, which for primary school children helps keep education fun. They can even receive awards (gold medals, virtual stickers in their collection, etc) to keep them motivated.

But yes, pencil and paper are used for these as you can see the problem and write the answer, but do the work on your own, as needed.


A math course without a computer is not a modern math course. Humans are not going to advance the field, or even keep up to date, when it is insisted that students do everything their equally intelligent predecessors did plus new things. Something has got to go, and top of my list is a vast amount of pen and paper bullshit.


> A math course without a computer is not a modern math course.

Why does it have to be a modern math course and what part of elementary school math is "modern math"? Counting, arithmetic, algebra, geometry, and trigonometry, and even calculus are hundreds of years old.

> Humans are not going to advance the field, or even keep up to date, when it is insisted that students do everything their equally intelligent predecessors did plus new things.

I'm not saying don't use advanced technology, I'm saying you don't need advanced technology to learn anything from 1 + 1 = 2 through differential equations. It's a hindrance, not an asset.

> Something has got to go, and top of my list is a vast amount of pen and paper bullshit.

The idea that technology can solve everything is what needs to go. At some point people need to sit down and put the time and effort into learning. You can't automate and gamify everything.


I'm assuming you don't have experience with this sort of computer integration. It's just using web portals to give problems with varied values (so students don't all have the same answers) and grading. It changes little about the problems, except in that the websites can be extremely frustrating when the right answer is 0.2 and 1/5 is wrong (without asking for a decimal.) You're still solving manually, but the grading is automated.

I also tend to think you should know the underlying math before you apply it on a computer. It seems like you're just learning which buttons to click on the program without that underlying comprehension. I can't imagine trying to understand calculus without being grounded in algebra first.

Then again, maybe what I've described is just a learning weakness in me.


I'm familiar with the systems, I programmed one in high school. (Fortunately it didn't get used beyond some demos.) I liked Khan Academy's software when I looked at it years ago, though. But that's not what I mean by having a computer be a major part in the math classroom and ideally in homework, I was mainly addressing the weird idea of learning math with just pencil and paper. I was trying to remember a quote writing the last comment, found it now from http://theodoregray.com/BrainRot whose good first half (before the violent video games talk) is where I probably first developed the sentiment: "A math classroom without a computer is a joke."

Math builds on other math, and some amount of rote memorization and tedious by-hand work can sometimes be necessary to reach that 'aha!' moment where you understand the thing and its uses abstractly, and some of it can be useful to retain since you can do things by inspection. But so much could be cut. For instance, partial fraction expansion (mathematicians feel free to correct me) might just be wholely useless outside the group of people who enjoy such manual manipulation -- just have your computer do the inverse Laplace transform and get on with what you really want to do. Or have your computer do the expansion at the very least. More students could even reach the concept of Laplace transforms (my bet would be before high school) if they weren't slowed by so much tedium in earlier material.


I can see the huge cost savings from doing it this way, you can print far smaller textbooks that aren't loaded with questions, you can grade assignments much more quickly and have one teacher do more subjects or classes.

I don't know if that's any better on an academic level as I personally loved puzzling out math problems on pen & paper (which I suppose you could still do in your notebook), but I definitely see the cost savings.


I took an online college math course, and I'll back up such courses for kids learning. It was the best math course I took.

I had trouble in 'traditional' courses. I completely missed algebra one year. Simply didn't get most of the concepts. I'd listen in class, I'd take notes, read the book, and do the homework nearly every night (Heh. Teenager). And I generally would do poorly on the homework, despite thinking I had done the process correctly.

With the online program, I still used pen and paper. Entered in an answer. The difference was I'd get immediate feedback on whether the answer was correct, and then get the option to try again.

The program had a system that would walk me through the problem, having me solve step by step, explaining on the way. It would repeat this process with similar problems as much as necessary. Then give a similar problem for me to answer for the homework.

In addition, there were study tests. These did not have the help feature (like the actual tests), but did give immediate feedback and suggested certain things you needed improvement on.

These things were really key to my being somewhat confident in math and passing the course. Of course, i'm pretty sure they could be software instead of online which would solve a single problem.

Now, I might be unique. I think I'm mildly dyslexic - I still mispell some simple words, get times tables mixed up, and have to think about right and left, for example. But the computer software (and calculators, to a lesser extent) help me know where I commonly have mistakes, much like spellcheck helps me out greatly.


What they don't talk about is the real struggle the less-literate face, even when they have access to computers.

I tried to teach a class on computers in my local library and that was often the hurdle. Adults who want 'computer training' are most excited about getting a job. But while it's easy to teach them to move the cursor and click on the browser, that doesn't do any good when they can't write enough to search, or read job descriptions, or write their resume.


The road to Internet connectivity for the nation's poor originates in Detroit. I know that I've posted this before so forgive me.

https://www.alliedmedia.org/dctp/digitalstewards

A group of volunteers in Detroit are the pioneers in setting up mesh networks to provide connectivity to the poor. The recipe is to get some benefactors to sponsor one or two fiber connections, campaign with local businesses to open their connectivity and build a mesh network throughout the neighborhood.

I've met these people and have come away impressed and a little in awe of what they've done on - little or no money. They've also got some mean technical chops and have setup networks in other cities around the world like Brooklyn, Washington D.C. and India.


If you know anyone who is too poor for the Internet, if they live in public housing, please let them know about http://everyoneon.org/

This is a program that gives people in subsidized section 8 housing super cheap broadband. It's a bout $5 per month and gets you top quality broadband, such as a cable modem. Very similar to the old lifeline phone lines.


In Seattle you can borrow a 4g hotspot from the library: http://www.spl.org/library-collection/spl-hotspot


I'm genuinely curious as to why the kids aren't availing the FCC lifeline program. Can someone explain how and why a mechanism built to solve this exact problem isn't working, given that $7B was attributed to 3 communications related welfare programs by the FCC.


My local library is trying out a pilot program to loan out hotspots[0] the same way they loan out books. The hotspots have unlimited data and it looks like the only real restriction on them, beyond the usual stuff you'd get from a normal ISP, is that you bring them back after the loan period is up. Hopefully the pilot project results in a permanent program. Library cards are now free, so cost isn't a barrier anymore.

The City of Edmonton provides free WiFi[1] in a number of places[2], albeit with more restrictions. These mainly seem to be at rec centres and LRT stations, but there are also some parks included.

If someone in Edmonton didn't have internet access and needed it, it's available without too much trouble.

[0] http://www.epl.ca/hotspots/

[1] http://www.edmonton.ca/programs_services/open-wifi.aspx

[2] https://data.edmonton.ca/Facilities-and-Structures/Open-City...


I'm torn about this. On the one hand it's clear that access to the Internet is almost as important as other utilies, such as clean water and heating oil.

On the other hand regulation is exactly how broadband rollout has been stifled in the past and present by incumbents, and is at least partly to blame why it's so expensive right now.

I want it deregulated and opened up to very serious competition. I also want our government to build reliable infrastructure (fiber) as much as is possible.


> I want it deregulated and opened up to very serious competition. I also want our government to build reliable infrastructure (fiber) as much as is possible.

I'm not surprised that you feel torn. Those desires are in direct contradiction with each other.

Even if you're referring to splitting infra from service, there will still be regulation. You'll also see law enforcement becoming very interested in the fact that interconnects and the last mile are now government property.


I wish we could have more separation of government entities.

Community internet could/should be owned by the community, separate from the government.

It could be structured as a private company, where shares are only owned by people within the community and then they have voting rights. Still community owned, but very separate from the more general government.

Interestingly this would also allow community members to invest in their own internet infrastructure directly.


This is how many municipal electrical utilities are operated. Essentially as independently run entities. It's actually worth pointing out that many government bodies are overseen by politically appointees (library boards, parking commissions, liquor control boards, etc.) creating a space in which civil servants are working with much more direct civilian oversight. As lampooned as this is in comedy (see Parks and Rec or Yes Minister), it's generally a fairly effective check against what you are speaking of. My library, for example, has a fairly robust law enforcement inquiry policy set by its board.


I question the premise. I cannot think of anything I do online at home that is essential to my being a productive member of society. 90% of my internet use at home is for entertainment. It's today's cable TV. It's not essential.


How do you think your life would be if you couldn't access the 10% that is not entertainment? I'll argue this stuff will at times be a large quality of life issue especially if you are poor.

Like others have said, governments are moving things online. Some things, though available in person, are too far for travel and telephone hours are short. If you are working a couple of jobs, you might miss some work just to do basic things, which is really detrimental. Even simple tax returns give money sooner, which might be the difference between someone having housing and not.

Utility companies have started to charge people more if they get a physical bill instead of online billing. Reduced or witholding installation charges if you sign up for internet, cable, or whatnot online.

Maybe you just need a phone number. Increasingly phone books are becoming rarer, so you might not have access. Or the number changed, or you need some governement phone number that isn't listed. Maybe you simply need hours or a doctor's phone number. Internet provides this more readily.

More and more companies are using online only applications. I worked for a pharmacy that simply did not take paper applications or CVs. They did not have a kiosk in the store.

Libraries are great for access, until they are out of your range or you don't have one in your township and have to pay for a card. Many smaller libraries have too few computers, a short time limit (30 minutes), and a lack of privacy. Plus there are transportation costs.

Such transportation costs actually are most detrimental to the poor.

Now, most folks will have the biggest gain in entertainment. But really, this helps you be more productive as well. You can make small talk at work, you can relax after the day, interact with family, and other such things. It is good for mental health in some respects.


This reminded me of the following exchange from Bujold's "Barrayar":

“Poor?” said Cordelia, bewildered. “No electricity? How can it be on the com network?”

“It’s not, of course,” answered Vorkosigan.

“Then how can anybody get their schooling?”

“They don’t.”

Cordelia stared. “I don’t understand. How do they get their jobs?”

“A few escape to the Service. The rest prey on each other, mostly.” Vorkosigan regarded her face uneasily. “Have you no poverty on Beta Colony?”

“Poverty? Well, some people have more money than others, of course, but . . . no comconsoles?”

Vorkosigan was diverted from his interrogation. “Is not owning a comconsole the lowest standard of living you can imagine?” he said in wonder.

“It’s the first article in the constitution. ‘Access to information shall not be abridged.’ ”


Many government services are offered over the Internet. My county government has an app I use to request services. I find information about state government services such as motor vehicles. The school system has an extensive online portal for parents. They post grades there.

Sure you can do all this with no Internet. But it will take much longer, requiring phone calls or in person visits.

Plus, want to try applying for a job with no Internet?

A person with no Internet at home (or on a phone, etc.) is doomed to be much less productive.


I'll counter your anecdote with my own: internet access allows me to be paid handsomely for being a productive member of society.


>online at home

>my internet use at home

I'm guessing you're able to use the internet at work or school?


I have a weird question: How come the kids congregate outside the library for the wifi? Is there a thing that you can't go in just to use the wifi? I used to do that all the time in college, didn't even have a card.


when it's closed: "All summer, kids have been hanging out in front of the Morris Park Library in the Bronx, before opening hours and after closing."


Ah, of course. Should've thought of that.


I relied on my public library for internet access for years ... luckily though, I had my own computer.

Do any libraries have some kind of persisted 'virtualized' environment that migrated between public-use machines?

For example, at the library I was at, you could not install software you needed - things were pretty locked down. And one day you may use machine #5, another day it might be machine #10.

Imagine you wanted to teach yourself programming. A few tools would need to be installed. I don't see how this would be possible in the library I was in (using public computers).


I don't recall the details, but the last time I was at the main library in Cleveland, there was a sticker advising everyone how to save to a "cloud drive" so all their files would be there the next time they came back. They had some sort of similar system for the tablets they let you use as well, pretty nifty.


Presumably the computers had a browser, that's all you need for learning JS programming.


Why should one need a library card to use a library internet connection? Last time I used a public computer in the UK they were free for everyone with a time limit. But in Raleigh, NC, only registered card holders can use them.


"Today’s technology revolution promises to provide more information, more widely than ever. Yet we have left almost two million New Yorkers in the digital dark." - That is NYC, imagine Detroit, or Athens..


It's because of stuff like this that I thought facebook free basics in India wasn't such a bad idea. At least the kids there would have been able to get Wikipedia which you can learn most stuff from.


Would it make sense to give libraries a new lease on life and turn them into mini-coworking spaces with micro-finance credit? Apart from how they serve as a conduit for free internet, there could be opportunities to use them to encourage entrepreneurship in those areas that are currently under-represented. Maybe even something worth replicating in other locales.


Just steal your neighbors wifi..


Most providers offer low income broadband which offers service for $9.95 per month with no installation/activation or modem rental fees. Cox even includes access to its Wi-Fi hotspot network.


Comcast charges $20 for its cheapest plan (10 Mbps), which increases to $50 after the first year. It's the only option on my area.


Comcast Internet Essentials

- 10 Mbps Internet service for just $9.95 a month + tax - No activation fees and no equipment rental fees - Option to purchase a computer for just $149.99 + tax - Access to free Internet training online, in print and in person - A wireless gateway, delivering in-home WiFi at no additional cost

https://customer.xfinity.com/help-and-support/internet/comca...


Oh yep, you are right. Thanks for linking.


When TWC stops providing horrible internet service for astronomical prices then maybe things will change.


What incentive do they have to do that?


That will hopefully come soon enough - https://www.charter.com/merger-twc


Doesn't reducing the number of suppliers of a product tend to reduce competition and increase prices?


Charter was the only cable company allowed to buy TWC because of their track record. Both Comcast and Cox considered it, and the FCC straight up said no, they would never approve it.

The former Adelphia areas that went to Comcast got marginally better (more uniform towards product offerings in line with existing Comcast), but are still overpriced shit, and the areas that TWC got worse to match TWC's existing shittyness.

Given how TWC is a toxic shithole of a company, and Comcast is barely any different, Charter has actually made a name for themselves for being customer oriented, not short term anti-profit like the other two, and the FCC happily allowed the merger.

Charter's pricing is generally lower, their customer support is generally better, and they actually rebuild areas they buy instead of letting them rot like TWC (and also Verizon, on the teleco side).

tl;dr if the companies refuse to compete, how is any of it considered "competition"?


Too poor for a NYT subscription :( ... actually just checked their prices, quite reasonable.




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