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De Blasio Vows To Slay Time Warner With "Universal, Affordable High Speed Internet"
By
Christopher Robbins
Published May 19, 2014
Modified May 19, 2014
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By
Christopher Robbins
Published May 19, 2014
Modified May 19, 2014
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It's Internet Week in New York City (just a week to think about the internet, everyone, then we can go back outside), and Mayor de Blasio announced that he's forming a "broadband task force" to "shake up the status quo when it comes to broadband." "The goal is quite simple," he said. "We must have universal, affordable, high-speed internet access throughout this city....It's essential for everything we need to do to be a fair and just city, because we can't continue to have a digital divide that holds back so many of our citizens."
Not only has de Blasio vowed to turn our payphones into Wi-Fi hotspots and continue Bloomberg's initiative to make Harlem the site of the largest continuous, free public Wi-Fi network in the country, he wants to challenge the telecom oligopoly.
"We're going to introduce more competition into the process, which is desperately needed," the mayor said. "We're going to reexamine our franchise agreements—including with Verizon Fios and Time Warner Cable—to hold them accountable for providing the kind of service they're obligated to."
In February, Time Warner Cable announced that they'd raise fees by an average of 6.4% and there was nothing you could damn well do about it. But that was all the way back in February—later, Time Warner Cable's CEO stressed to Variety that we should expect more rate hikes in 2014, because why not?
Which leaves us in the pitiful position of begging one giant corporation to save us from another. Municipal Internet, please hurry.
Tagged
bill de blasio
broadband access
internet
Internet Week
time warner cable
verizon
Christopher Robbins
Christopher Robbins is a New York City reporter covering transportation, affordable housing, local politics, and criminal justice. His work has also appeared in New York Magazine, The Village Voice and The New York Times. Chris is a graduate of Patrick Henry High School in Roanoke, Virginia, and enjoys biking to Fort Tilden in the summertime.
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