On 6/2/21 15:53, Josh Luthman wrote:

"If it was affordable" is a tricky statement.  There's no such thing as a free lunch.  If taxes/government/municipalities/etc are required to make it "affordable" that means all of the people are paying for it with extra steps.

Nobody says we should offer free fibre.

There are markets that find mobile data unaffordable.

To put it very simply, imagine the US does fiber the way it does power.  If every single person throws in $10/mo every month we could easily hook up that guy that's 5 miles from the closest source of power/water in the Nevada desert.  Is that fair to the guy in a 150+ person apartment building?  One gets solitude and fiber internet, the other has to deal with neighbors and gets fiber internet.

Exclude the problems with government regulated power (or anything) for this topic, please.

You now see why I don't live in the U.S. :-).

Seriously, in case it wasn't obvious, I don't live in the U.S., nor am I American. Translation, it probably is not harmful to compare this issue with non-U.S. markets, which was your argument.

In what instance?  Power has cost assistance and water in most environments is pretty accessible.  I'm not sure what you mean here.

Again, non-U.S. context.

There are many markets where folk have a mobile phones and some data, but no access to power or clean water. In others, bringing water or power to areas means bribing officials for years and still getting nothing. But they may be able to pick up some 3G :-).

Mark.