Published August 13, 2006 in the Hibbing Daily Tribune
By Aaron J. Brown
The Internet isn’t cool anymore. Those forwards you keep e-mailing to your friends, family and co-workers? They’re not that funny. Or inspiring. Or spiritually uplifting. And even if they are, we’ve seen them. Probably eight times. Why? Because the Internet has passed beyond that “cool” opening stage into a stage where most folks have already experienced it. The novelty is long gone. We’ve all seen the clip of the monkey falling off the tree when he smells his own hindquarters. All of us.
Thousands have already tried to win fortune and fame using the Internet. Most failed in the late ‘90s and now most folks know to ask a lot of questions before investing in a company called “E-Synerloutions.com.” In the end, companies with a plan succeeded and those without one failed.
Here’s the point. The Internet is about as exciting as a road. People don’t get very excited about roads, but roads are among the most important things our tax dollars pay for. Roads allow people to live or work anywhere along their path. Roads mean business. Roads mean tourism. Roads mean civilization.
High speed internet – in other words, Internet not dependent on phone lines and fast enough to watch streaming media – is nothing new. Hibbing city residents have had access to high speed Internet for a decade. But high speed internet for everyone, not just those who live along existing infrastructure, is still just out of reach.
Customers access high speed internet in many ways, including through DSL, cable and satellite providers. Each form of access comes with its own challenges. Both DSL and cable require some sort of direct infrastructure and remain unavailable to rural residents. Satellite access is subject to atmospheric conditions, slow upload speeds and is still the most expensive of the three for consumers.
Not everyone needs or wants the Internet in their home or office, but everyone should have the option – just as with power or telephones. Some rural residents have the option, but most don’t.
Companies like Qwest have said that DSL will come to rural regions eventually, but the speed of this happening is entirely related to economic feasibility. Only when enough customers are willing to pay for the service will the service become available – which is a bit of a Catch-22 in many areas.
Since every level of government is concerned with economic development, our towns, townships, counties, and state and federal governments should invest in the “Internetification” of rural Minnesota, the way the federal government invested in rural electrification during the Depression.
We need to stop thinking about the Internet as though it were entertainment, like HBO, and start thinking about it as though it were a road or railway. We should also pay close attention to what’s going on in Washington, where lawmakers are close to splitting the Internet into two networks; one that is slower and available to all, and another that is fast and available only to the large companies able to afford the toll. Just imagine if you had to pay $100 every time you wanted to drive on Highway 53 to Duluth, or else drive the whole way on a dirt road full of bumper to bumper traffic. We wouldn’t allow that to happen to our roads and we shouldn’t allow them to do that to the Internet either.
The novelty of the Internet is indeed long gone, but the utility and potential of Internet communication and commerce remains – and rural areas like ours must fight for equal access as though our future depends on it. Because it does.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune.