It appears South Dakota’s Next Big Thing is my Internet bill. Midco is jacking my monthly rate 4.8%, and I don’t even live in Sioux Falls:
| Cory’s Aberdeen Midco Internet Bill | Date | Increase |
| $60.66 | 2016 | |
| $62.79 | 06/01/17 | 3.51% |
| $67.05 | 07/01/18 | 6.78% |
| $70.24 | 06/01/19 | 4.76% |
That’s odd: annual overall inflation hasn’t cracked 3% since 2011. Over the last three years, my Internet costs in Aberdeen have increased 15.8%, while nationally, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the cost of Internet services for urban Tweeters has dropped about 1.4%.
Oh well. Maybe all those new Starlink satellites streaking across the sky will bring us cheaper Internet.
Cut that cord.
Welcome to the wonderful world of subsidizing your own illegal deep state surveillance. This might be the most criminal aspect of what is happening in our country right now. This is an information war. Paying to have the deep state spy on us is like forcing us to dig our own grave. Thing is, to complete the analogy, a shovel can be a pretty effective weapon.
My little town (41,000 people) has 29 internet providers. Prices for internet begin at $29.95 monthly for 15Mbps.
Century Link (formerly AT&T) starts at $45 for 140 Mbps. Century Link fiber starts at $55 for 1,000 Mbps.
Comcast is $45 for 150 Mbps or $75 for 400 Mbps or $90 for 1,000 Mbps. All Comcast has 1 TB Data.
I’ve spent equal time in South Dakota and Vermont over the past 40 years. Very similar in many ways. Same harsh climate. Same agricultural base. Same small population that’s not growing much. However, Vermont has a much higher level of innovation skills. Here’s one they’ve come up with. (Once SD gets it’s internet access “poop in a group” this might work. Biggest problem being the inherent negativity bias against new ideas and outsiders.)
Vermont will gift you $10,000 to move there and work remotely.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/vermont-will-pay-you-10000-to-move-there-and-work-remotely—.html
John, I’ve cut every cord I can afford to cut. We get nothing but Internet from Midco: no cable TV, no landline phone. We get cell phone service from AT&T for $128.77 a month—two phones, unlimited talk and text, 7GB data. We can’t rely on AT&T wireless for uploading and downloading video; I can’t blog from any signaled site in South Dakota with my home Midco service.
29 Internet service providers?! How the heck?! Aberdeen has… two? three?
Cory. I was here before cable and internet and remember the bidding wars that went on between big providers that dumped huge money into elections to win exclusive contracts. This was mid 70’s. Luckily Dems ran the statehouse and all providers are now welcomed. Dems are the real supporters of the free market not greedy Republicans. (Comcast has a program for low income people with means tested rates for cell phones. No income for a while? No charge for your phone.) 🤓
I have only the basic 20 Midco channels, plus the internet. In 2016 my June Midco bill was $74.40. Twenty dollars for the basic 20 channels and $50 for internet plus tax/fees. I have my own modem and router. This year in June the bill is $94.75. They raised the internet to $70 a few months ago and raised the basic TV to $24.00 this month or last month. Midco raises its prices $4/$5 a year. The internet really jumped this year. It would seem with all the competition, rates would be going down and not up. Except…they all get together and decide what to charge. Dish and Direct TV, Century Link all have their zillion channels of junk and then they advertise cheap internet except you have to buy phone service with it. If you have all three of those services with Midco it is over $200.00. It does look like there should be some new regulations on the cable/internet companies and toss out price fixing. Everyone in this country should have internet access at a reasonable cost. It is interesting that when the radio came along it was free to everyone but the internet turned up being very expensive.
Solution: Chattanooga Tennessee’s own. Why give the money to Midco when you can keep it?
“Fed up by a lack of fast, affordable broadband, hundreds of US towns and cities have turned to building their own broadband networks. Studies routinely show these networks not only offer faster, cheaper service, locally-accountable networks are less likely to engage in the kind of privacy and net neutrality violations common among private ISPs like Comcast and AT&T.
Boosting access to quality broadband drives major benefits to these regions. Chattanooga’s locally-owned ISP EPB, for example, directly contributed to that city’s renaissance as a regional business hub, with one 2015 study estimating a net gain of between 2,800 and 5,200 new jobs and $1 billion in regional economic benefit.” https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/evym9n/better-broadband-lowers-unemployment-rates-study-says
Sioux Falls and Chattanooga are about the same population. Get some progressives in office and you can have nice things.
Not familiar with SD regs but in CO if you start your own internet provider, Comcast/Xfinity (the owner of the cable) is required to rent you cable access to every customer you can sign at a non negotiable and fairly determined price. That’s why Littleton, a hub for tech startups, has plenty of diversified choices.