Comment by bmelton | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bmelton | Hacker News Reader

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I'm honestly a little surprised that your comment isn't already gray, but you've (more eloquently) expressed the view I've attempted to express at numerous points in the past.

I very sincerely believe that the most rabid proponents for net neutrality are overlooking the root cause of the issue, which is that the government has created this system in which competition isn't really a viable option for the immediate future.

As a libertarian, I agree with you 100%.

As a pragmatist, I (begrudgingly) acknowledge that because the system is rigged, net neutrality is likely our only option to prevent the existing telecoms from completely screwing over their customers (whichever end of the pipe they happen to be on).

This was not a view I came to on my own, and it was an argument within the HN community that enlightened me, but while I freely agree with your assertion that a truly free market would certainly force the telecoms into being more honest and forthright, I also, and regrettably agree with your assertion that such a free market does not exist in this realm, as it has never been free of the shackles that made it.

Suppose you have a market, to enter which you need to invest capital C. It you get a monopoly, you get profits having net present value M, while if there is competition the total profits from the market have net present value R, where R<M. If R<C then a monopoly is inevitable, and it is likely even when R is somewhat larger, because a new entrant can expect to get only a fraction of the market.

It is true, of course, that government regulations can reduce R and therefore make a monopoly more likely (or indeed by making some dumb exclusive deal). But there is absolutely no reason that government must be the cause. In fact, since R<M there is always some C for which a monopoly is inevitable, and we see this in the ISP market: in areas of low density population, C is higher, and there is more likely to be a telco monopoly. Hence, neutrality laws are likely to be needed anyway.

>As a pragmatist, I (begrudgingly) acknowledge that because the system is rigged, net neutrality is likely our only option to prevent the existing telecoms from completely screwing over their customers

I completely agree on this point. We need net neutrality for now. But what I'm worried about is people losing steam after this. We've seen more energy put into rallying people around net neutrality than anything else like it. Now, if and when we get it, people will think the fight's won.

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