Poll of the Day > Why were there so many dial-up ISPs, and so few broadband ISPs?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Remember them? Earthlink, AOL, Netzero, etc.? There were a lot.

But when you want home broadband, you have two choices: the local cable company or the local telephone company. If you live in select cities, you might have Google Fiber or something. Is there some kind of physical infrastructure difference that prevents a company like Netzero (example) from providing DSL competition against the likes of Verizon and Centurylink? Or maybe some kind of protected monopoly bullshit?
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Zangulus posted...

Its about infrastructure. The major telecoms were about the only companies with the monies to set them up. DSL couldnt be used on existing hardware for a lot of places.

I used to have a third party ISP, but the physical lines and hardware were still the phone companys.

This.

Broadband is ridiculous expensive to lay-out. Also, you have the political reach of major telecom in the pockets of most of the FCC and congressmen/women to make things easy for you and harder for others.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/qkvn4x/the-21-laws-states-use-to-crush-broadband-competition

And Trump/Ajit Pai is just making things easier for Big Telecom.