[8739] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Rurual Internet Access (was Re: One-way Internet?...)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (INFOnet Administrator)
Thu Dec 2 14:34:28 1993
Date: Thu, 2 Dec 1993 13:29:57 -0600 (CST)
From: INFOnet Administrator <KEVIN@ins.infonet.net>
To: com-priv@psi.com
Cc: KEVIN@ins.infonet.net
>As a physician (radiologist) I can personally attest to the
>attractiveness of net access in a rural area. Im moving to a rural area
>soon, and already feel pangs of loss of the University class access I
>have now. God forbid I should be the internet expert in our noew town!
I'm new to the list, and jumping into the conversation
rather blindly I suppose, but with the talk of telcos
and rural access, I thought I might share what we are
seeing in Iowa.
Iowa has a large number of rural independent telcos, which
banded together after the Bell Buster and formed an equal
access carrier for the state to bring 1+ dialing and a choice
of carrier into rural areas. Now the same is happening for
Internet access; netIOWA is using it's fiber network to carry
data, and offer links to the Internet to Iowa businesses,
schools, hospitals, libraries and such through the rural
telcos and otherwise. We're also offering 800 dialup Internet
access so people without the resources to go the dedicated
route can gain access.
An interesting factor influencing this is Iowa's state
government has also built a state-wide fiber network to
carry video/voice/data for schools, hospitals, and government
agencies. This is tax money in direct competition with the
private sector and rural telcos, and the sentiments of a
publicly owned versus a privately owned network are pretty
hot. Since the telcos are allowed by the FCC to get into
the cable business, things are really getting confusing as
to where the industry lines are drawn.
