For the most part, due to limitations in both the hardware and the service contract, you probably won’t be downloading much directly from the Internet to the phone itself.  There are a few beta Android applications that claim to allow for eitherBittorrent or Usenet downloading, but I have not been successful in getting them to work, either with 3G or Wi-Fi connections.  AndroidTorrent can open .torrent files, but does not actually get the download started, while the Groundhog Usenet reader can download the headers from binary newsgroups, but it cannot, as far as I can tell, actually download files in a binary format, much less handle the more complicatedunrar and par operations.  Rapidshare and Megaupload also proved to be unworkable from the built-in Android browser.  And it should be mentioned that large-scale downloading would almost assuredly create problems of bumping into the actual limits to the supposedly “unlimited” data plans (rumored to be around 5GB a month).

Despite those unfortunate limitations, Android-powered phones can be very useful for members of the downloading community, just in the role of portable dashboards for remote operation.  Torrent-fu for Bittorrent, and NZBdroid for Usenet allow users to control downloading from where ever they are via the Android phone, queuing up files to be enjoyed later, but also in the case of Torrent-fu giving users the ability to scan commercial goods via their barcodes, search major Bittorrent portals like BT-Junkie and IsoHunt, and then initiate downloads, all remotely.  And, of course, those files could be accessed by the Android phone if the remote computer is set up to serve files as well (although video files, for instance, would likely have to be re-encoded before they could be watched on the phone itself, but that’s a different article).

Torrent-fu is a free application available from the Android Marketplace and works on all variety of Android phones.  It acts as a client application for uTorrent (or Transmission) when the latter program is set up for control via its Web UI.  A bit of knowledge about port forwarding will be necessary, but without too much hassle you can leave uTorrent running on your home computer, and then both manage and add .torrent files to it completely from your phone.  Downloaded .torrent files, integrated search from within Torrent-fu, or most inventively, via the scanning of barcodes, can all generate downloads.  As a test, I scanned an old Big Lebowski DVD, and Torrent-fu did an excellent job of providing me with a number of different options for download.  Overall, Torrent-fu does an excellent job of giving any Android phone owner the power to amass a large media collection, while entirely away from their main computer.

NZBdroid is also available from the Android Marketplace, for either free or a $.99 donation, whatever the user decides.  It is very similar to Torrent-fu in concept, except that this app remotely controls a user’s SABnzbd+ downloading from Usenet.  As a huge fan of Usenet (and SABnzbd+) I truly love this application.  Since SABnzbd+ is essentially designed for a web-based interface anyway, NZBdroid is a bit easier to set up than Torrent-fu and really just operates in the background, only appearing when an .nzb file is downloaded from the web to the phone.  At that point the NZBdroid icon pops up allows for the information contained in the .nzb file (which is essentially just an XML file anyway) to the SABnzbd+ instance running on the home computer for eventual download.  All the options presented to control SABnzbd+ from the web are present on the phone as well.  NZBdroid is simple, powerful, and is absolutely worth the suggested $.99 donation for anybody seriously into Usenet downloading.

We are still very much in the early days of smart phones, as they continue to evolve from merely portable telephones into what are essentially small but relatively powerful computing devices.  Their processing power, storage limitations and most crucially data transmission bottlenecks (both physical and financial) prevent them from being used currently up to their potential for downloading from Bittorrent, Usenet and direct download sites, but there are some very cool applications like Torrent-fu and NZBdroid that already give them some very interesting functionality.  And in the future we are likely to see even more powerful phones with greater storage and even cheaper bandwidth capabilities that will let users fully take advantage of portable computing.

Have any of you tried out these programs?  Other Android apps for Bittorrent or Usenet?  How do the iPhone or the Pre compare in this regard?  I’d love to hear any other experiences Zeropaid users have had with mobile downloading.

Back in July, there were interesting reports coming out of Vancouver Canada where a price war was raging. Some suggested the Shaw move to charge a mere $9.95 per month for high speed internet, phone and TV was little more than an attempt to destroy a local fibre ISP. From the report at the time:

Canadian cable operator Shaw has dropped a bit of a pricing bomb on consumers and competitors in Vancouver. The operator is offering some unheard of deals, including 15Mbps service with a 100GB cap for $9.95 ($9.13 US), 200 channels of TV service (with 25 high-definition channels) for $9.95, or digital phone service with free installation, also for $9.95 a month. The catch? You have to live in an area served by Novus Entertainment, a Canadian fiber to the home operator that’s currently wiring Vancouver apartment buildings.

Novus offers symmetrical 10Mbps service for $37.50 a month (110GB cap), 30/10 Mbps service for $89.95 (200GB cap), or 50/10Mbps service for $179.95 (360GB cap). Given Novus’s small size of just 9,000 subscribers, Shaw can essentially give service away in Novus markets and just eat the losses.

Unfortunately, if you’re a Shaw customer in any other area, such amazing deals aren’t available to you. In fact, in some instances, you’re paying nearly $150 per month more.

At the time, Novus was unsurprisingly upset over this and launched a campaign saying that Shaw users from across the country should be allowed the same deal of ten bucks a month. It ultimately sparked a lawsuit in the B.C. Supreme Court as well as a complaint in the Competition Bureau.

Shaw had even sent “street teams” to the residents asking if they were Novus customers, and if they were, tell them about the Shaw deal.

The CBC is now reporting that Shaw has responded to the accusations of anti-competitive practises and sued Novus for defamation.

Calgary-based Shaw, which has more than two million customers, mostly in Western Canada, has fired back by filing a defamation lawsuit against Novus in B.C. Supreme Court.

Shaw president Peter Bissonnette said Novus is spreading misinformation. The offer isn’t just targeted at Novus customers but residents of West Vancouver in general, which is a “highly competitive” market.

“They’ve publicly stated in the past that they’re going to become the bane of the life of Shaw,” Bissonnette said. “True to their word, they’ve embarked on this defamation campaign.”

It’s clearly a sort of David and Goliath sort of situation. Shaw is one of the three large ISPs stretched across Canada while Novus is a smaller Vancouver based company. Already, North American markets have been notorious for monopoly-like problems in the ISP industry. Many Canadians were reminded of this problem when an OECD report ranked Canada as having the 3rd worst cellphone rates in the world only outranked by Spain (2) and the United States (1). Some have argued that Canada’s landmass is the biggest problem for these prices, but given that the United States has a smaller landmass and a higher population density and still outranked Canada, that left that particular argument in limbo.

It’ll be interesting if the OECD report plays any roll in this latest price war, but either way, it’s already gotten ugly between the two companies.

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The internet has become a major cultural centre. People can find literature, musical works and personal videos online. It’s also becoming increasingly important for carrying out personal business such as obtaining passports. For these and a number of other reasons, there was an amendment added to the telecoms package to recognize internet access as a right. Also known as amendment 138, it effectively blocks draconian laws such as cutting off internet access based on three accusations of copyright infringement.

Back in May, the copyright industry as well as French representatives put immense pressure on the European Union to implement a “graduated response” toward a three strikes law. This was a very heated debate which came to an end when the European Union shut the door on the three strikes legislation back in May after, ironically enough, three failed attempts to implement the law.

The seemingly final move was seen as a major victory for user rights. In the end, Europe rejected the idea that users could be disconnected from the internet based on accusations of copyright infringement given that so much is dependent on internet access in the first place.

Unfortunately, the copyright industry doesn’t take “no” for an answer.

No doubt, after a huge amount of lobbying, it seems the industry is making headway into reversing the European Unions final decision and pressuring Europe to neuter amendment 138.

Commissioner Viviane Reding, according to a report in IPTegrity, was in a meeting with rights holders and internet providers on July 6th to discuss measures taken against copyright infringement.

Right before MEP’s headed off for the Summer, DG Information Society issued its position on amendment 138. In it was talks about a “compromise” on amendment 138 which would implement “measures regarding end-users’ access to or use of services and applications through electronic communications networks”

From the report:

The so-called “compromise” is positioned in Article 1 of the Framework directive, addressed to Member States. It should be read in conjunction with Amendment 1.2a of the Universal Services and Users Rights directive, which will permit broadband providers to block impose “conditions limiting access to and/or use of services and applications”. In light of T-Mobile blocking Skype, BT throttling peer-to-peer services, and Karoo, a small UK ISP cutting off users, it should now be abundantly clear what this text means.

IPtegrity also made a sort of “before and after” comparison of the compromise:

Be for (article 8.h):

(h) applying the principle that no restriction may be imposed on the fundamental rights and freedoms of end-users, without a prior ruling by the judicial authorities, notably in accordance with Article 11 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union on freedom of expression and information, save when public security is threatened where the ruling may be subsequent.

After (with paragraph 3a inserted):

3a. Measures taken regarding end-users’ access to or use of services and applications through electronic communications networks shall respect the fundamental rights and freedoms of natural persons, including in relation to privacy, freedom of expression and access to information and the right to a judgment by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law and acting in respect of due process in accordance with Article 6 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

While the text seems to oddly just say that that users have a right to a judicial process, it effectively means that the three strikes law would be alive and well as the legislation would be distorted possibly into a new back door “three strikes” law (either that or other means of disconnecting users from the internet). Compromise? Few people who are familiar with would even buy that term.

There’s no word from the Swedish pirate party yet on this latest development, but there’s little doubt that this latest move would draw quick condemnation from groups such as the Pirate Party.

[Via Open Rights Group]

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While we are not really sure what all of the commissioners intentions are, apparently some of those intentions are to change the regulations on how European citizens access digital content.

“It will therefore be my key priority to work… on a simple, consumer friendly legal framework for accessing digital content in Europe’s single market, while ensuring at the same time fair remuneration of creators,” she told a seminar on Thursday (July 9).

More from Billboard:

“Internet piracy appears to become more and more sexy, in particular for the digital natives,” she said, quoting a survey that showed that 60% of people aged 16-24 downloaded audiovisual contented in the past months without paying.

“Growing Internet piracy is a vote of no-confidence in existing business models and legal solutions. It should a wake-up call for policy makers,” she told the seminar, organized by the Lisbon Council thinktank.

It’s an extremely curious thing to say that “internet piracy” is “growing” considering a recent survey mentioned in The Guardian pointed out the exact opposite:

The survey of 1,000 fans also shows that many14 to 18 year olds are now streaming music regularly online using services such as YouTube and Spotify.

At the same time less than a third of teenagers are now illegally downloading music, the survey suggests. In January this year 26% of 14 to 18 year olds admitted filesharing at least once a month compared with 42% in December 2007.

The research revealed that many teenagers (65%) are streaming music regularly, with more 14 to 18 year olds (31%) listening to streamed music on their computer every day compared with music fans overall (18%).

The picture may be more complex than a simple shift from filesharing to streaming, with people sharing music in new ways such as via bluetooth technology, on blogs, and through copying, also known as ripping content from friends’ MP3 devices.

Still, this wouldn’t be the first time there’s been movement in the European Union to make amends between big record companies and average music fans. A Green Party MEP said that the best way to go about the business of file-sharing is to legalize file-sharing and just issuing a flat rate on ISPs.

Access has been quite a problem for a long time. Many ISPs in Europe have been trying to make groundbreaking deals with record labels so they can sell music as well, but such deals seem to have been few and far between. Meanwhile, the copyright industry has been pressuring ISPs to simply punish music fans for copyright infringement through three-strikes legislation. Realistically speaking, how many major record label backed authorized digital stores have started up compared to the number of BitTorrent sites starting up?

No doubt we’ll hear much more of what is actually being planned as time goes on, but it seems that file-sharing related issues is going to be, once again, on the agenda.

[Hat Tip: Open Rights Group - 1 and 2]

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This debate has been going on for years – clear back to 2005 if one were to recall the “Data Retention is No Solution” campaign which fought legislation that would force ISPs to retain personal information for a period of time. Fast forward to the second half of 2008 and one might remember a plan for Britain to place the information of who people are talking to online at what time, when that conversation was – really, everything except for the content of a conversation – and store it into a central database.

Of course, these facts for an outsider may seem puzzling as to why this is being brought up now. To understand that aspect, one might need to know that the governing party – the Labour Party – supported the moves to put everyones internet activity into a central database for investigators to pour through. Then there’s the other piece of the puzzle – a feared catastrophic political crash for the Labour Party. Those fears were justified a day after the spy report where the governing party suffered the worst defeat in Britain’s political history. What isn’t completely clear is whether or not one of Britain’s spy’s feared that a new party would reverse the surveillance laws that were put in.

Still, Sir David Pepper who use to run the listening centre of GCHQ did go to the BBC to say that if Britain doesn’t record phone conversations and web activity, lives would be at stake. Apparently, it isn’t enough to have the European data retention, and Part 11 of the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act of 2001 combined with the EC Directive. No, it has to be all in one database rather than at the ISPs. Already, ISPs in the UK have to store where users go on the internet and e-mails, among other things, for a period of 12 months. Pepper told the BBC this:

“There are plenty of people who will do all they can to make themselves difficult to find.

“It puts enormous pressure on you. Everybody in the agency is acutely aware that if they don’t do their job properly one of the consequences may be another terrorist outrage.

“The thing you worry about most is the attack that you haven’t seen coming.”

While the political shifts within Britain could make the privacy debate more interesting, the political shifts in the EU might also make things very interesting for privacy rights as well. One of the major things the Pirate Party stands for is privacy. Already, they have won 2 seats according to exit polls in the EU election. It’s not immediately evident what this will mean for the data retention laws, but who knows? Something could happen with France already contemplating legislation that would allow police to put key loggers and Trojan horses on peoples computers via LOPPSI 2. One thing is for sure, it’s possible that the political situation could be a game changer for privacy rights, but of course, it’s too early to tell at this point.

[Hat tip: Open Rights Group]

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Mosnews is reporting that the Russian interior minister is calling for an abolishment of any forms of an anonymous internet. He suggests that businesses should monitor all of the internet registrations to reduce the number of anonymous internet users. From the report:

“Violators of the law should stop abusing the openness of the Commonwealth of Intependent States’ borders,” Rashid Nurgaliev was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying Thursday.

“They should not hide in the territories where the legislation of the states pursuing them is not valid,” he said at the CIS Interior Ministries meeting in Yalta.

“Russia’s Interior Ministry has acquired enough experience fighting cyber-criminality to provide the necessary help to its CIS colleagues,” Nurgaliev said.

Of course, like the situation in pretty much every other nation around the world, tracking internet users and reducing online anonymity could prove difficult with the prevalence of services such as Tor and other anonymizing services available today.

Still, there’s an eerie resemblance to the often used argument in many other countries that says, “If you have nothing to hide, then you should have nothing to worry about.” While ignoring that there are legitimate reasons for people to use an anonymous service such as reporters covering sensitive issues, it also resembles the argument that only criminals would want to use such services. If this still seems to be an issue a world away from countries like the United States and bares little influence, there was a rather recent case known as the Calixte case might ring a bell where police seized someones computer on the basis of computer expertise – the police lost that case. To use an anonymous service does require a certain amount of expertise and just because you use such services doesn’t automatically make you a criminal.

While the student in the US can be thankful that his case won in the courts, it’s unclear whether Russian citizen rights will win out here.

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It is probably another piece of excellent news for the party who stands to win, at minimum, one seat in the European election. A posting on Copyriot shows that Swedish writer Lars Gustafsson, one of Swedens most prolific writers, is saying that his vote is going to the Pirate Party.

“It is odd,” Gustafsson writes (translated to English by Copyriot), “how strongly the situation spring 2009 – on the area of civil rights – reminds about the struggles over freedom of press in France, during the decades preceding the French revolution.”

He continues, “A new world of ideas is emerging and would not have been able to, were it not for an accelerating technology. Raids against secret printing houses, confiscated pamphlets and – even more – confiscated printing equipment. Orders of arrest and adventurous nightly transports between Prussian enclave Neuchâtel – where not only large parts of the Encyclopedia was produced, but also lots of daring pornography, between the atheist pamphlets – and Paris.”

“Between the 1730’s and 1780’s, the number of state censors in France was doubled by four. The raids against illegal printing houses was rising at about the same pace. In retrospect, we know it did not help. Rather, the increase of censorship and printing house raids had a stimulating effect on the new ideas and made them spread even faster.” He added.

For those wondering where Gutenberg was in all of this, Johannes Gutenberg was the first to use movable typeface printing in 1439, about 300 years earlier (which was, at the time, a controversial technology as well because, among other things, copies of the Bible could be made much more easily)

“So [far]” Gustafsson wrote, “this is shown by most historical experience – legislation has never been able to stop technological development.”

“Walter Benjamin wrote an influential essay, whose title usually is translated as “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction“, where he draws a series of interesting conclusions about what the radical changes that must follow on his time’s relatively modest degree of reproducibility. The digital revolution has brought about a reproducibility which Walter Benjamin could hardly ever have dreamt about. One could talk about maximal reproducibility. Google is about to build a library that, if is is allowed to grow, will make most material libraries obsolete or at least outmoded.”

He concludes, “This immaterialisation naturally threatens the material copyright.”

He then questions why it’s such a big deal that the internet threatens the concept of copyright and comments on how we, as a society, should be striking a balance between differing interests and any attempt to not do so is simply nonsense.

He also argues that free speech and any channel that is not controlled by a government of corporate interest is much more important than the interest of legacy industries. He also comments that the primary concern of artists is to be heard or read within their generation and how they do this is of secondary concern.

For those reasons, that is why his vote goes to the Pirate Party.

This also brings up another topic that has been floating around the political debates, does celebrity support actually help a given party? Whether or not it does, it certainly doesn’t appear to hurt the party they are supporting very much.

we do know that support for the Pirate Party has been growing quite a lot. Already, the most recent poll suggests that the Pirate Party has gotten 7.9% support, more than enough to win at least one seat. Yesterday, the party slammed a Swedish minister for applauding the guilty verdict of The Pirate Bay. The party, lately, seems to be on a roll for gathering good PR – something that is critical in an election.

[Hat tip: Cory Doctorow]

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So what is the standard image that comes to mind when it comes to the average major music record label CEO? Grey hair? Overweight? Disgustingly rich? A passion to hate the internet or technology in general? Well, judging by a picture, at least two of those stereotypes were reinforced recently:

According to a quick report by WWDMedia, the CEO of Sony, Michael Lyton, had a few choice words about the internet recently:

The panel was about the future of filmmaking, but that didn’t mean anyone had to like what they saw. “I’m a guy who doesn’t see anything good having come from the Internet,” said Sony Pictures Entertainment chief executive officer Michael Lynton. “Period.”

At a breakfast cohosted by the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University and The New Yorker Thursday, Lynton wasn’t just trying for a laugh: He complained the Internet has “created this notion that anyone can have whatever they want at any given time. It’s as if the stores on Madison Avenue were open 24 hours a day. They feel entitled. They say, ‘Give it to me now,’ and if you don’t give it to them for free, they’ll steal it.”

Apparently, he seems to think the internet is for taking stuff for free or ’stealing’. It’s unclear whether or not he’s had the chance to see someone else’s rendition of what the internet is for, but there was a few other comments that were being made as well:

Lynton tried out another simile. Referring to the Obama administration’s goal to spread broadband access without, he said, regulating piracy, Lynton compared it with building highway systems without speed limits or driver’s licenses. “We do need rules of the road,” he said.

While this is mere speculation, it’s almost as if he was alluding to France’s recently passed three strikes law or a similar and related issue. Still, one wonders that if that was the case, where did such a comment come from? Did the Obama administration reject calls for the US to implement a three strikes law of their own? The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, which is still being currently held as a national secret, had leaked documents last year that did address the concept of disconnecting people from the internet – while not directly addressing three strikes, still alluding to ideas such as the three strikes law.

We already know that the MPAA, to which Sony Pictures is a member of, certainly wanted Canada to adopt something like the Three Strikes law in December of last year. So it’s quite probable that the MPAA wanted the US to adopt the three strikes law at the very least, at some point in time.

Still, it doesn’t help very many arguments when you are seen suggesting that the internet is just some no good piece of technology. Then again, how many are surprised by this revelation at all?

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Late last week, we reported that in a near last minute last ditch effort, the graduated response backdoor for a European-wide three strikes law was re-introduced in the European parliament. Since then, consumer rights organizations like the Open Rights group have been working very hard to round up European support for amendments that would recognize internet access as a right – an amendment that would shoot down any last remaining hope that a Three Strikes law could prevail through the European Parliament.

Now, Squaring the Net reports that the critical amendments to the telecoms package were adopted. Essentially speaking, the three strikes law in the EU parliament is officially dead.

“A formidable campaign from the citizens put the issues of freedoms on the Internet at the centre of the debates of the Telecoms Package. This is a victory by itself. It started with the declaration of commissioner Viviane Reding considering access to Internet as a fundamental right. The massive re-adoption of amendment 138/46 rather than the softer compromise negotiated by rapporteur Trautmann with the Council is an even stronger statement. These two elements alone confirm that the French ‘three strikes’ scheme, HADOPI, is dead already.” explains Jérémie Zimmermann, co-founder of La Quadrature du Net.

While the victory is major one for consumer rights and the internet, the victory isn’t completely absolute. Individual countries in the European union can still adopt a three strikes law. Squaring the Net also noted another issue.

“The strong statement for the access to the Internet as a fundamental right demonstrates that the Parliament can be courageous and reject the pressure to compromise when essential values are at stake. Unfortunately, on issues that appear more technical such as the absence of discrimination of services and contents on the Internet, the Parliament did not take the full measure of what it is at stake yet. Citizens must remain mobilized on these crucial questions.”, concludes Gérald Sédrati-Dinet, analyst for La Quadrature.

So while the three strikes law is dead in the European Parliament, something like traffic shaping or throttling is easily alive and well. There’s plenty to watch out for in the future, but for now, many can enjoy their fresh victory.

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Time Warner and Embarq, the two major US ISPs in the area have already showed signs that they are not happy that a new ISP is coming – particularly because it’s very possible that the new ISP could out-compete them. This was particularly prevalent in the state government where two bills entitles ‘level the playing field’ were tabled.

Now, there is a new development in a municipal vs state issue that has the entire world watching. It seems that a private tech company has sent a letter to the state withdrawing their support for the ‘level the playing field’ legislation.

“On behalf of Alcatel-Lucent,” the letter says, “I am writing to request withdrawal of support for HB 1252, the Level Playing Field/Cities/Service Providers Act. HB 1252, which is currently pending before the Science and Technology Committee, would prevent municipalities from delivering the promise of next generation broadband to the residents of North Carolina through the application of burdensome financial and administrative regulations, and competition policy that deprives North Carolinians of the benefits of next generation broadband infrastructure deployment.”

It’s worth noting that this is no small upstart company. According to their website, Alcatel-Lucent has “operations in more than 130 countries and the most experienced global services organization in the industry, Alcatel-Lucent is a local partner with a global reach. Alcatel-Lucent achieved revenues of Euro 16.98 billion in 2008 and is incorporated in France, with executive offices located in Paris.” Clearly a large force to be reckoned with.

Here’s another sample from their letter:

Alcatel-Lucent supports a level playing field between public and private service providers. HB 1252, however, only serves to endanger the ability of municipalities to offer next generation broadband services where private service providers have not made next generation broadband investments or are not providing next generation broadband service.

HB 1252 would create extraordinary financial accounting and administrative burdens on municipal broadband providers that would render their existence fiscally difficult, if not impossible. The bill also subjects municipalities to the new jurisdiction of the North Carolina Utilities Commission, while not requiring the same of private providers. Also troubling is the injunctive relief provision, which could encourage litigation for purposes of gaining competitive advantage. Furthermore, the legislation appears to prevent municipalities from pursuing alternative funding sources, such as broadband grant programs included in the Federal stimulus bill, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

HB 1252 includes exemptions that appear to allow for municipal broadband in markets unserved by the private sector. Those exemptions, however, fail to distinguish current generation broadband – DSL or cable modem service, for instance – from next generation broadband, such as FTTN [Authors note: Fibre to the Node] and FTTH [Fibre to the Home]. It seems counterintuitive for a market with only current generation
broadband available to be considered as “served,” and foreclosed to municipal entry, when a municipal service provider is prepared to deploy next generation broadband FTTH networks enabling speeds of 50 to 100 Megabits per second downstream. It should be noted, particularly in these difficult economic times, that the overwhelming majority of the cost of building FTTH networks – approximately 70 to 90 percent – goes towards labor and construction employment, not to broadband equipment itself.

Clearly, this company sees the real problems with barricading competition to a given area. There are plenty of companies who provide the technology to lay the groundwork for additional internet connectivity and it would be a boon to such a business if competition like this were to be introduced. One would think that companies who are part of the process of making internet connections possible would be quick to condemn legislation that would bar competition from a given area. It’s a huge business opportunity. At least this company seems to get that.

If more companies jump on board with increasing the number of ISPs in a given area, maybe we’d see less abuses by incumbent telecom companies and more improvements on the networks in the United States. Putting pressure on existing ISPs would be a small price for those ISPs to pay, but it would be interesting to see how those ISPs react when real competition rolls in to town. One could easily suspect that customers would very likely benefit from all of this in terms of quality of service. Of course, as we’ve seen in the past, ISPs that are already in the area aren’t willing to give up their duopoly so easily. It’s going to be quite a showdown.

[Hat tip: Save NC Broadband]

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