If I understand this correctly, didn't the companies promise to build an infrastructure in the 1990's if they got money and tax breaks and once they got what they wanted, they stopped holding their part of the deal and ended up lying about how much progress they were making?

I did not use to have download caps until a few years ago. Now I pay CAD 47 a month for internet for 10 mbps with a 60gb cap. HD tv is even a worse rip off then internet. Worst thing is since most our tv is american we get all the commercials for cheap packages as well :( Damn Verizon, I pay almost double for TV, internet and phone combined.

It isn't the government's job to give people internet.  Also, people don't need internet.  This is at least true in the US.  Maybe you live or have been somewhere where one of the reasons the government exists is to give internet to people.  In the US, it's the job of people and private companies to work together to get internet.

No, it's not, but the private industry won't be able to roll out a faster broadband infrastructure alone. Not to mention, I doubt that other countries have so many competing ISPs (I can count 4 major competitors for the USA alone!) That's why the FCC is stepping in. Whether or not they will be successful is the question. It would be a very bad thing if the government just decided to step back and leave it alone. It could mean price hikes, or Netflix streaming could crash our insufficient broadband infrastructure. It is strange that we don't have anything better in place, though.

We pay like 30 dollars for 700 kbps internet. Verizon is a shitty service, do not ever get them. They have the worst customer service of all time.

Face it or not, the internet is becoming a needed part of today. There is so much information on the internet and many jobs use the internet more and more. People need the internet more and more to be a competing country. Saying we don't need it makes us less competitive in the world market, and right now the US needs to be competitive as we are falling behind in virtually everywhere.

Also, internet obviously isn't everywhere it needs to be, the government could at least set up some infrastructure as I think up to half americans don't even have it.

Why won't private industry be able to do it on it's own?  Though, if it wasn't possible, than perhaps it shouldn't be done at all?  The US government has a massive debt problem that is a far larger issue.

The FCC shouldn't be involved at all.

I'm certain Netflix isn't going to crash anything.

The US is falling behind because the government is too larger with too many rules and laws.  Additionally, it has too much debt from too much spending.  The solution is to remove many of the laws and cut the spending, not do the exact opposite and make things worse.

Spending on things we need like for say internet and instead cutting off other things mean we don't have to raise the amount of spending to get some infrastructure. It only means we have to spend our money better.

Well, I just wonder how well American ISPs would be able to cooperate. If they could, then a broadband infrastructure could easily be rolled out, but I doubt that it will happen. The US does have a debt problem (I just took Econ., so you don't need to tell me), but it's the FCC's job to ensure that anything involving ISPs goes smoothly. I guess that they couldn't help but to step in. The minimum bar for "broadband access" has been raised, but not nearly enough.

At this point, I think that the matter is mostly with broadband capacity, with speed being a secondary concern. America's internet traffic is increasing, and there simply is not enough to go around. The Netflix thing was a hyperbole, but that certainly adds to the traffic load. During peak hours, Netflix consumes more broadband usage than any other website.

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/10/netflix-instant-accounts-for-20-percent-of-peak-u-s-bandwith-use/