Windows 7: Finland first country to make broadband a 'legal right'

My beloved and greatly missed native Finland made me proud today, making broadband internet connection part of what we call Citizen's Rights, meaning from today every Finn is guaranteed to have a broadband connection.

More: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10461048.stm

Nicely done Finland.

Well done Finland!
May many others follow.

Continuing the discussion (Today thread) here.
Last week I read about a couple back home in Finland, living in northern region of Lapland. To get phone and internet, ISP should build over 80 kilometers (some 50 miles) new line. Of course ISP has until now refused, but in the near future this couple gets the line, thanks for the new legislation. Cost is calculated to be about €80,000 (about $100,000), €1K per kilometer.

Are you saying these people should blame themselves to be so stupid to live there, in the house where the husband was born? You find it negative that because phone and internet are now considered a fundamental right, they now get the line?

No, but there are several factors you are not considering. One is that I cannot imagine that couple is the only one living anywhere near that location. Another is, where exactly do you think that $100k is going to come from?

Whenever the government gives themselves the right to regulate prices, the pattern typically goes like this:

Price controls >> harder for industry to make a profit >> lay-offs, decrease in wages/benefits, bankruptcy OR taxpayer-funded bailout. This is EXACTLY what happened in the U.S. recently. Forcing ISPs to build $100k lines for areas from which they can never hope to make up the money, is just going to accelerate this process.

In the U.S., Internet prices hardly change at all based on location. Service comes to a given town when an ISP thinks there is enough demand in a given area to offset the cost of building the infrastructure.

My country has already lost her real estate market due to the government using the kind of logic Finland is employing in this legislation.

I am also concerned that far too many commodities are being labeled as "rights." We lost our housing market over here because our government decided that every human has a fundamental right to own a house, even if they can't pay for it. We're about to lose our healthcare system because the gov't has decided that people have a right to demand elective medical procedures without payment. It's a slippery slope.

(If any moderators or admins think I get too political at any time, please tell me and I'll tone it down.)

That couple I mentioned lives over 80 kilometers, 50 miles, from "next door neighbors", literally in the middle of nowhere. According to the new legislation, the ISP is building the line and organizing the service at no higher cost than other customers of that ISP are paying.

The building of the line is paid by the government, which took the responsibility with this legislation. ISP has no extra cost, so they no longer have a valid reason to deny the service. Finland is a country with small population (5.3 million) but a big area, there still exist about 4,000 households considered to be too far to build a phone / broadband line (over 10 kilometers, 6.2 miles from existing line).

Tough talk around here, tough time we all have, tough time we will have next, tough time is the price to pay to be all stuffed! I'm still amaze being from this world and pretty happy of new technology that are coming. I don't wanna die without a substitute of it.
Somebody has got a better job for me, please... They do call me a Citizen!

Good on ya Finland, you're still in the top 3 places in the world I'd like to visit.

Great another giveaway to the masses. They can always pay for it with HIGHER TAXES.

My point exactly.