this post was submitted on 24 Oct 2023
910 points (99.1% liked)

Technology

59086 readers
3431 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
L3s@fry.gs
L4s@fry.gs
L4s@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
910
Tired Of Being Ripped Off By Monopolies, Cleveland Launches Ambitious Plan To Provide Citywide Dirt Cheap Broadband (www.techdirt.com)
submitted 1 year ago by L4s@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
53 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Tired Of Being Ripped Off By Monopolies, Cleveland Launches Ambitious Plan To Provide Citywide Dirt Cheap Broadband::Cleveland has spent years being dubbed the "worst connected city in the U.S." thanks to expensive, patchy, and slow broadband. Why Cleveland broadband sucks so badly isn't really a mystery: consolidated monopoly/duopoly power has resulted in a broken market where local giants like AT&T and Charter don't have to compete on price, speeds, availability, customer…

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 28 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Sure there is. They are natural monopolies that form in the free market. The free market isn’t a good thing. It’s what gives us things like child labor and corporate owned towns.

[–] BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lol, so all the regulation protecting them is "natural"?

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

No, those come after they gain a monopoly. Those regulations weren’t there when the “free market” turned them into a monopoly.

There are certain products and services that form a monopoly naturally when they operate in a free (or even relatively free) market. Those are referred to as natural monopolies, ISPs are among them.