[sllug-members]: Re: sllug-members Digest, Vol 41, Issue 5

Thu Jan 3 13:33:54 MST 2008

Now that I have a working hard drive again, I should be able to GIMP up a few flyers and such, as a fall-back.

"Plus I'm a pain in the ass when it comes to contacting Politicians. 
There are a few out there who hear from me about Utopia and Comcast's 
marketing fraud frequently.  Hell, now I'm working with a couple of 
Politicians in D.C. to push through a bill which would prohibit State 
Lawmakers from messing with Utopia... Again (note S.B. 66)."

Drop
the list on us, we can start getting petitions and names out to the
public.  Voters calling in to the reps about UTOPIA should catch their
attention.

----- Original Message ----
From: "sllug-members-request at sllug.org" <sllug-members-request at sllug.org>
To: sllug-members at sllug.org
Sent: Thursday, January 3, 2008 8:11:18 AM
Subject: sllug-members Digest, Vol 41, Issue 5

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When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of sllug-members digest..."
Today's Topics:

   1. Re: [sllug-members] UTOPIA Project in the [bad] news
      (Doran L. Barton)
   2. Bad UTOPIA news - let's do something about it (Mike Bourgeous)
   3. Re: Bad UTOPIA news - let's do something about it (u235sentinel)
   4. Re: [sllug-members] UTOPIA Project in the [bad] news
      (u235sentinel)
   5. Re: [sllug-members] UTOPIA Project in the [bad] news (Steve)
   6. Re: Bad UTOPIA news - let's do something about it (Thomas S
 Hatch)

-----Inline Message Follows-----

Not long ago, Nelson H. F. Beebe proclaimed...
> There is a large front-page story in the Salt Lake Tribune on Monday
> 31-Dec-2007 about financial difficulties in the UTOPIA Project, due
> both to delayed federal government funding, and a customer base that
> is 1/3 the size of that predicted.

This is disturbing to me on a number of levels. 

The Tribune ran an editorial today about this as well.

    http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci_7865012

I have supported UTOPIA from the get-go with some reservations. My
political views are fairly conservative so I'm leery of government
 programs
to do anything private companies, citizens, or organizations can do
 because
much more often than not, privately managed ventures are run more
effectvely than any comparable government program. Part of the reason
 for
that is because when you run a company, it's usually your neck that's
 on
the line and not something as vague and nebulous as "future tax
 revenues
of vested municipalities."

That being said, it's clear no private company was going to do what
 UTOPIA
is doing. For example, there's no way XMission could go out and by the
rights of way to deploy fiber optic lines to every home and business in
several cities, not just because of the expense, but also the
 procedural
difficulties of working with various city governments and so forth. The
best way to achieve what UTOPIA wants to achieve is a collaborative
 effort
between cities. 

But, because it is a government project without anything "real" to
 lose,
they don't have the same incentives to rush to "profitability" that a
private company does. City councils of vested municipalities need to
 treat
their pledges like a VC would treat their seed money: Push for results
 and
full disclosure! Otherwise, UTOPIA truly is destined for the route of
 most
every other government program: cost overruns, unmet deadlines, and
dissatisfied users.

Internet service providers that offer services over UTOPIA should have
stronger incentives, from UTOPIA, to increase the take rate. I am
completely ignorant of whether UTOPIA is already doing this or not.

Finally, I am very discouraged by the federal funding wrinkle in the
 story.
When we were operating our office in West Valley, we investigated
 UTOPIA
and were told it would be available soon. I continued to check on its
availability regularly until I was told the build-out in West Valley
 was
slowing or halting because UTOPIA had gotten federal money to build out
rural areas and was going to divert their attention to those projects.

I didn't think much of it at the time, but in retrospect, that was a
 BAD
MOVE! Changing your play mid-game is unfair to the cities that have
 pledged
future tax revenues, no matter how much money the federal government
 was
offering. UTOPIA should have said no to that and continued building out
areas that had been committed to. I believe, had they done that, the
 take
rates would probably be higher today than they currently are.

Comcast and Qwest, of course, continue to fight UTOPIA every way they
 can.
Unfortunately, they have a much larger marketing and public relations
budget to do so than UTOPIA has to fight back with. For that reason, I
believe it is only through grassroot efforts and through the marketing
and public relations budgets of the companies that stand to profit from
 the
UTOPIA infrastruture that the word can be spread. 

-- 
Doran L. Barton <fozz at xmission.com> - Linux, Perl, Web, good fun, and
 more!
 "Have many accidents here."
    -- Seen in a Tokyo traffic handbook

-----Inline Message Follows-----

> Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2008 19:23:31 -0700
> From: fozz at xmission.com
> To: sllug-members at sllug.org
> Subject: Re: [sllug-members]: [sllug-members] UTOPIA Project in the
 [bad] news
>
> Not long ago, Nelson H. F. Beebe proclaimed...
>> There is a large front-page story in the Salt Lake Tribune on Monday
>> 31-Dec-2007 about financial difficulties in the UTOPIA Project, due
>> both to delayed federal government funding, and a customer base that
>> is 1/3 the size of that predicted.
>
> This is disturbing to me on a number of levels.
>[snip]
> Comcast and Qwest, of course, continue to fight UTOPIA every way they
 can.
> Unfortunately, they have a much larger marketing and public relations
> budget to do so than UTOPIA has to fight back with. For that reason,
 I
> believe it is only through grassroot efforts and through the
 marketing
> and public relations budgets of the companies that stand to profit
 from the
> UTOPIA infrastruture that the word can be spread.

I don't post to SLLUG very often, but UTOPIA is a topic that always
 gets my attention, and I'd like to do something to help it out.  Are there
 any audio/video/graphics people on the list (besides myself)?  If
 there are others interested in such a project and some way to get funding
 (Xmission?  Donations?) I'd like to help out with a newspaper ad,
 billboard, bus stop/bus-side poster, radio spot, or TV spot.  If there's
 enough interest from people with money, connections, or skills, we can put
 together a list of who can do what, plan an ad campaign, and divide
 responsibilities accordingly.

Any takers?

Mike Bourgeous

_________________________________________________________________
Get the power of Windows + Web with the new Windows Live.
http://www.windowslive.com?ocid=TXT_TAGHM_Wave2_powerofwindows_122007

      ____________________________________________________________________________________
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