In 1927 Congress created the Federal Radio Commission, endowed with the power to assign wavelengths. It began aggressively doing so, booting hundreds of small stations off the air, to produce “clear channels” for the big firms—wide-open zones where they could broadcast with no interference. Amateur time was over, as the FRC explicitly warned in a memo: “There is not room in the broadcast band for every school of thought, religious, political, social, and economic, each to have its separate broadcasting station, its mouthpiece in the ether.”

Thanks to Jeff Hoel for providing the transcript for the Episode 63 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast with Jim Baller on second part of the History of Municipal Networks. Listen to this episode here.

00:06:

Jim Baller:  It is the code of omerta within the cable industry that you don't compete with an existing system.

00:14:

Lisa Gonzalez:  Hi there.  This is Lisa Gonzalez, from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.  Welcome again to the Community Broadband Bits Podcast.  Large corporate providers enjoy lack of competition within the status quo.  Unfortunately, those same providers often refuse to build in communities without the potential for large enough profits, or where they would encounter competition.  What is a local community to do when existing providers see no reason to serve their community?  Several weeks ago, we brought you Jim Baller, President and Senior Principal of the Baller Herbst Law Group.  Baller Herbst has worked with local communities for years, as they have found ways to provide connectivity to residents, businesses, and government.  During episode 57, Jim and Chris discussed some of Jim's experiences with early legal battles, as publicly-owned networks began to pop up across the country.  This time, Jim and Chris continue to explore the history of publicly-owned networks.  As momentum builds, and more communities consider the pros and cons, past experiences can mold future decisions.  Here are Jim and Chris with more on the early days of the municipal network movement.

01:20:

Chris MItchell:  Welcome back to another episode of the Community Broadband Bits Podcast.  This is Chris Mitchell.  And once again I'm speaking with Jim Baller.  Jim, welcome back to the show.

01:30:

Jim Baller:  Thank you, Chris.  I'm happy to be here.

01:32:

ILSR is excited to announce a new short video examining an impressive municipal broadband network, Glasgow Kentucky. Glasgow was the first municipal broadband network and indeed, seems to have been the first citywide broadband system in the United States.

We partnered with the Media Working Group to produce this short documentary and we have the material to do much more, thanks to the hard work of Fred Johnson at MWG and the cooperation of many in Glasgow, particularly Billy Ray.

People who only recently became aware of the idea of community owned networks may not be familiar with Billy Ray, but it was he and Jim Baller throughout the 90's and early 2000's that paved the way for all the investment and excitement we see today. 

I'm excited to be helping to tell part of this story and look forward to being able to tell more of it.

It is the Internet’s essential nature that fuels a very heated policy debate that the network cannot be left in private hands and should instead be regulated as a public utility, following the example of the interstate highway system, the electric grid and drinking water. The intuitive appeal of this argument is understandable, but the potholes visible through your windshield, the shiver you feel in a cold house after a snowstorm knocks out the power, and the water main breaks along your commute should restrain one from embracing the illusory virtues of public utility regulation.

During the summer, I spent two days in Glasgow, Kentucky, to learn about the first municipal broadband network in the country. I believe it also became the first community in the US to have broadband access available universally within the town.

Working with the Media Working Group, we recorded several interviews with people there, including a lot of time with Electric Power Board Superintendent Billy Ray. Billy Ray has been a key proponent of local self-reliance and a pioneeer of community owned networks.

Below, we pulled out a few snippets of our interview talking about the origins of the Glasgow network. All of our stories about Glasgow are available here.

As a patriotic American, I find the current political atmosphere where telecom lobbyists set the agenda to be a nightmare. All over the world, high-end fiber is being deployed while powerful monopolies in the United States work to prevent it from coming here. Some of those monopolies are even drafting "model legislation" to protect themselves from both community broadband and commercial competition.