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Is the Internet a utility?

Is the internet a utility?

  • Yes.

    Votes: 13 56.5%
  • No.

    Votes: 10 43.5%

  • Total voters
    23
It is using other utilities whether you like it or not and could not exist independent of those utilities--like electric. Where is the other end of those lines hooked up to? Satellite or the same means by which telephone or cable is delivered. There isn't a big building that generates something called "internet". The internet is a derivative of other services. It is a service delivered by appliances just like air conditioning and television content.

Water service can't work without electricity. The purification and pumping facilities require electricity, gas, and phone service. I guess water isn't utilities either.

Or what about the power plant. They need water, gas and phone service to operate. I guess electricity isn't a utility either.

You fabricated a completely arbitrary and absurd definition for utilities. Everything relies on everything else. The internet has become a core utility.
 
The internet is a carrier for content, as are phone and TV. The difference is that the internet is at the place technologically where it can carry ALL that content making phone and TV superfluous.
 
I could likely live without out all three, but the phone the most. I have never liked the thought of people having the ability to just get in touch with you at any given moment. Damn Alexander Graham Bell.

I probably like and use the phone the least and yet it's one of the more essential tools when needed. You can't set up utilities, deal with credit cards, talk to out of town relatives, etc without a telephone.

I think TV is old technology and it'll be going the way of the fax machine soon enough.

If they were able to wire the whole country with fiber optics (and they could, if it weren't for political red tape), you could stream better-than-HD quality video online without interruption or delay.

You could literally have access to tens of thousands of shows, on demand at any time you feel like watching, at your fingertips, in better-than-retina display using today's technology.

You wouldn't have to "record" a show and you'd never miss anything, you'd just tell the TV what you want to watch, when you want to watch it, and it would be available to you.

You don't have to sit and watch on your laptop either, most TV's today are internet-ready, and the televisions of tomorrow (see Apple) even more so.

Steve Jobs once said that when he watched TV, he felt like he was looking at 20 year old technology. He was right, as usual.

I agree the TV has become nothing but a large monitor or view screen and the 3 major Networks part of a huge system of channels. I still think that wireless technology will be cheaper, easier and eventually more available at realistic costs. See how easily they beam channels worldwide thru satellites and have been for deacdes. Hardwire connections are truly outdated technology. It's just a matter of time before they increase the speed, data stream and improve signal power and quality with mobile/wireless.
 
No because it is not essential for basic survival or disease prevention like electric, water, gas, sewage are.
gas and electricity are not essential for survival or disease prevention.
Nor is the phone.
 
Public Utility:

Enterprise that provides certain classes of services to the public, including common-carrier transportation (buses, airlines, railroads); telephone and telegraph services; power, heat and light; and community facilities for water and sanitation. In most countries such enterprises are state-owned and state-operated; in the U.S. they are mainly privately owned, but they operate under close regulation. Given the technology of production and distribution, they are considered natural monopolies, since the capital costs for such enterprises are large and the existence of competing or parallel systems would be inordinately expensive and wasteful. Government regulation in the U.S., particularly at the state level, aims to ensure safe operation, reasonable rates, and service on equal terms to all customers. Some states have experimented with deregulation of electricity and natural-gas operations to stimulate price reductions and improved service through competition, but the results have not been universally promising.



So while internet providers have largely supplanted/absorbed telephone (I believe nearly all telephone/cell voice/data is on the internet for interstate calls), they are not regulated (yet) to the same extent.

So yes, internet providers are a public utility.

LOL @ "telephone and telegraph services"

Outdated definition.

I agree, the internet is a basic utility.
 
I probably like and use the phone the least and yet it's one of the more essential tools when needed. You can't set up utilities, deal with credit cards, talk to out of town relatives, etc without a telephone.

Good point, my good sir. I suppose after the fact, I would then do without my phone, haha. Also, I love your display picture.
 
LOL @ "telephone and telegraph services"

Outdated definition.

I agree, the internet is a basic utility.
The least you could have done was comment on the regulation aspect since the FCC is still dealing with that....but instead you went with a low brow snicker on a Webster definition. You focused on the device rather than the class.

What a moronic response.
 
I agree the TV has become nothing but a large monitor or view screen and the 3 major Networks part of a huge system of channels. I still think that wireless technology will be cheaper, easier and eventually more available at realistic costs. See how easily they beam channels worldwide thru satellites and have been for deacdes. Hardwire connections are truly outdated technology. It's just a matter of time before they increase the speed, data stream and improve signal power and quality with mobile/wireless.

Hmm.... that may be true in the long run, but not with existing technology. Fiber optic cables use light waves which, as you know, travel at the speed of light.

Satellites, cell phones, and other mobile devices use radio technology (your cell phone, for example, sends a radio signal to a cell phone tower, which bounces the signal around, it goes via radio waves up to a satellite, and bounces back down to earth).

Radio waves travel slower than light, it's physics.

Optical satellites are possible, but we're talking decades of development to get to that point. As far as I know, even the military doesn't have that yet. Of course, maybe they do.
 
The least you could have done was comment on the regulation aspect since the FCC is still dealing with that....but instead you went with a low brow snicker on a Webster definition. You focused on the device rather than the class.

What a moronic response.

Low brow is my bag, baby.
 
Hmm.... that may be true in the long run, but not with existing technology. Fiber optic cables use light waves which, as you know, travel at the speed of light.

Satellites, cell phones, and other mobile devices use radio technology (your cell phone, for example, sends a radio signal to a cell phone tower, which bounces the signal around, it goes via radio waves up to a satellite, and bounces back down to earth).

Radio waves travel slower than light, it's physics.

Optical satellites are possible, but we're talking decades of development to get to that point. As far as I know, even the military doesn't have that yet. Of course, maybe they do.

Optical broadband isn't that far off. Range seems to be one limiting factor that requires more transmitters though speed sure isn't.
If I were an investor I'd be pumping money into this right now.

SkyFiber, Inc.
 
The Internet is a utility in the vein of cable or phone, not water and electricity
 
I could likely live without out all three, but the phone the most. I have never liked the thought of people having the ability to just get in touch with you at any given moment. Damn Alexander Graham Bell.

I turned the ringers off two of the three and simply do not answer unless I feel like it. :doh
 
The Internet is a utility in the vein of cable or phone, not water and electricity

If my utilities and bank get their way and force me to do all transactions and payments online, it will become a necessity in order to provide for my water and electricity. All they have to do is shut down the US Post Office and that's becoming close to a reality.
 
Optical broadband isn't that far off. Range seems to be one limiting factor that requires more transmitters though speed sure isn't.
If I were an investor I'd be pumping money into this right now.

SkyFiber, Inc.

Hey, look at that. I'm glad someone's looking in to it. Seems kind of pie-in-the-sky to me right now, but that doesn't mean I don't think it will happen at some point.

Fiber optic cables, however, are here today. If we had the will to do it, we could drastically improve our TV, internet, etc virtually overnight. The only holdup is red tape.
 
I turned the ringers off two of the three and simply do not answer unless I feel like it. :doh

I suppose it's a psychological issue with me. I hear a phone ring and I know people are trying to contact me, haha.
 
Do you enjoy freezing to death and starving?
Somehow people survived and avoided disease before we had gas lines and electricity.
I submit that as evidence that survival w/o electricity is indeed a possibility.
 
Hey, look at that. I'm glad someone's looking in to it. Seems kind of pie-in-the-sky to me right now, but that doesn't mean I don't think it will happen at some point.

Fiber optic cables, however, are here today. If we had the will to do it, we could drastically improve our TV, internet, etc virtually overnight. The only holdup is red tape.


That and they don't want technology that they can still profit on go to waste. I about flipped when I saw data that Intel has CPU chips already designed that won't be released for years in different stages in incremental degrees. They'll use and push silicon based chips as long as they can before they release quantum PC's, which will be in the super computing class. And those will probably be miniaturized and mounted in eyeglasses, wristwatches or under your skin with voice or thought interaction.
 
Somehow people survived and avoided disease before we had gas lines and electricity.
I submit that as evidence that survival w/o electricity is indeed a possibility.

I really want to see someone install a wood stove in their apartment. It might have worked back when everyone was a farmer and lived in small homes but the has become impractical in modern society.
 
Fiber optic cables, however, are here today. If we had the will to do it, we could drastically improve our TV, internet, etc virtually overnight. The only holdup is red tape.

The Q&A on the Skynet website says this about current cellular and fiber optic technologies.

As the global demand for bandwidth continues to accelerate, it is becoming exceedingly clear that fiber optics and RF Cellular/Microwave technologies cannot meet all the upcoming need. Fiber Optics is limited by high cost and logistical issues that make it impossible to dig trenches to every building and town that needs high-speed connectivity. RF Cellular and Microwave both are severely limited by the finite availability of spectrum real-estate, there simply will not be enough spectrum to meet the coming need. Cellular networks will have to be supplemented by other technologies, particularly in the area of backhaul, for which OWB is uniquely suited.
Combine these challenges with today’s need to be as lean as possible in capital budgets, and its clear that to meet the needs of global broadband connectivity, the industry needs a viable alternative technology such as OWB to be successful.
 
I really want to see someone install a wood stove in their apartment. It might have worked back when everyone was a farmer and lived in small homes but the has become impractical in modern society.
I think that if one were to try to do w/o gas for heat today, the way to do it would be to build well--meaning lots of insulation, proper venting, and proper window placement. It's amazing the difference between a standard house and a well built house.
In cold climates, you may not keep your house at 78 F in the winter, but it'll stay well above a temperature at which humans can survive.
 
I think that if one were to try to do w/o gas for heat today, the way to do it would be to build well--meaning lots of insulation, proper venting, and proper window placement. It's amazing the difference between a standard house and a well built house.
In cold climates, you may not keep your house at 78 F in the winter, but it'll stay well above a temperature at which humans can survive.

If you don't have gas you need electricity. What happens if you live in an apartment or just in a city.
 
If you don't have gas you need electricity.
That's not necessarily true.
What happens if you live in an apartment or just in a city.
There were no conditions specified. There're any number of situation where a specific person would need something to survive which was not otherwise a human necessity--e.g. someone who needs a respirator.

But more to the point I was just pointing out that survival was not a good criterion to use when deciding what is or is not a "utility".
 
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