[1st-mile-nm] New Mexico Amendment 2: Passes

[John Osmon]

On Thu, Nov 10, 2022 at 10:56:18AM -0700, Richard Lowenberg wrote:
> Overcoming a major impediment.  RL
> 
> 
> New Mexico Amendment 2
> 
> Nov. 2022
> 
> Allows lawmakers to fund infrastructure programs.
[...]


Hooray!

Now we just need to remain vigilant to ensure that tax payer money
builds *open-access* infrastructure.

I have no qualms with entities building private use infrastructure.
Private builds allow for efficient use of resources for providers 
that work top-down to blanket areas they wish to target -- but they
typically only do it in the hopes of (near) monopolistic market shares.

The bottom-up providers that rise to fill niche areas the "big boys"
choose to ignore are an important part of the broadband ecosystem.  If
public money is being used for infrastructure, the "little guys" should
have reasonable barriers of entry to use it.

Local businesses with enough savvy should be able to assemble their own
networks using this infrastructure as well -- without having to pay for
the overhead of a full-service telecom company.

Building networks is *hard* in the rural areas.  If we pull out the
public's money to build infrastructure, we better be ready to defend all
of the "public" that might want to use it.