{"id":2014,"date":"2011-01-27T05:00:53","date_gmt":"2011-01-27T10:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/?p=2014"},"modified":"2011-01-23T13:42:38","modified_gmt":"2011-01-23T18:42:38","slug":"comcast-merger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/comcast-merger\/","title":{"rendered":"Comcast Merger"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/comart.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-2044\" style=\"margin: 5px;\" title=\"comart\" src=\"http:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/comart-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"comart\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/comart-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/comart.jpg 750w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>The FCC and Department of\u00a0 Justice recently approved the Comcast NBC\/Universal merger.\u00a0 There are conditions. You can read some of\u00a0 those conditions<a title=\"Comcast Merger\" href=\"http:\/\/arstechnica.com\/tech-policy\/news\/2011\/01\/low-cost-broadband-key-to-comcastnbcu-merger-deal.ars\" target=\"_blank\"> here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Of note is this passage from the linked report:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The deal requires Comcast to provide &#8220;approximately&#8221; 2.5 million low  income households with high speed Internet for less than $10 a month. To  this population the ISP must also sell PCs, netbooks, or similar  computer equipment at prices below $150, and offer a host of &#8220;digital  literacy educational opportunities.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;In addition, Comcast must grow its broadband networks to about  400,000 new homes, get fast Internet service to six additional rural  areas, and offer free video and ISP offerings to 600 new &#8220;anchor  institutions&#8221; in low income regions (&#8220;anchor&#8221; here means schools,  libraries, and such).&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Well, this got me to thinking.\u00a0 If the government REALLY wanted to serve low income households, they would also build into this condition that all the computers come <strong>without<\/strong> an operating system.\u00a0 Why pay a premium for Windows?\u00a0 The absence of Windows would further lower the cost of the computer to the ISP.\u00a0\u00a0 Next, they could supply <a title=\"PCLinuxOS\" href=\"http:\/\/www.pclinuxos.com\" target=\"_blank\">Linux<\/a> for those computers.\u00a0 <a title=\"Download Linux\" href=\"http:\/\/www.pclinuxos.com\/?page_id=180\" target=\"_blank\">Linux is free! <\/a> Now, use those &#8220;digital  literacy educational opportunities&#8221; to teach the communities how to install and use Linux on their new system.\u00a0 Believe me, it&#8217;s easy.\u00a0 <a title=\"Anyone can install Linux\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gnomejournal.org\/article\/88\/the-un-scary-screwdriver\" target=\"_blank\">So easy, anyone can install Linux!<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In addition, users would have a system more secure and stable than Windows.\u00a0 They would also have no need for anti-virus software. Linux is immune to Windows viruses, Trojans, and spyware.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a win-win.\u00a0 Lower equipment costs to ISPs and a free operating system (and software) for the user.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The FCC and Department of\u00a0 Justice recently approved the Comcast NBC\/Universal merger.\u00a0 There are conditions. You can read some of\u00a0 those conditions here. Of note is this passage from the linked report: &#8220;The deal requires Comcast to provide &#8220;approximately&#8221; 2.5 million low income households with high speed Internet for less than $10 a month. To [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[35,62,9,10,102],"class_list":["post-2014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-computer","tag-internet","tag-linux","tag-pclinuxos","tag-windows"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2014"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2056,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014\/revisions\/2056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.georgetoon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}