Utilities and service

You may have heard about the latest bruhaha with Comcast and L3 communications. There are a lot of other issues related to Comcast's behavior lately, and they are not doing anyone any favors. Comcast is easily identifiable as a Utility. The problems it seems intent on creating have always been issues with utilities.

The solution is simple. Utilities have 2 parts. There is a simple delivery mechanism that is location based, and there is what those delivery mechanisms deliver. In the case of Comcast, they deliver telecommunications services. The easy way to think of it is connectivity and content. I had the privilege of living in Texas recently, and they have a classic example of this solution implemented with their electricity providers. There is one connectivity provider in Texas. It is actually owned and operated by the state. It is prohibited from providing actual content, in this case electricity. It works well. The service is way faster than in other states, and the rates are generally lower. I actually had a slightly higher rate, because I went with an all renewable electricity provider. That was my choice because I was supporting something I believe in.

The same thing needs to be applied to phone service and internet service and cable service, and maybe even natural gas and water and other utilities. The provider of the connectivity needs to be separate from the provider of the content. That way, there is no conflict of interest, and market competition keeps the price of content down and the quality of content up. Only the connectivity provider needs be regulated. For companies like Comcast, the choices would be simple. Provide the connectivity, and be regulated, or provide the content and compete. You can't do both. If necessary, split the company into two, one for the connectivity and the other for the content.

That is the best solution. It could be done at the state level. Then, our rights as consumers would never be infringed by a monopoly connectivity provider that forces us to use their low quality and high cost content.