> Sounds like he's wanting to make a financial contribution to other
> people in his area to get broadband. Tempting the cable companies and
> telcos takes a bit more than a threat of "Me and my two neighbors are
> going to make our own broadband."
Very much. We've had it extensively in the UK with the roll out of DSL.
The cable co's came to the UK and rapidly cherry picked the best
locations and then ran out of money. Digging up the roads and pavements
in the hope that people would sign up was always going to be a long
shot.
BT who are the dominant telco, delivered DSL to the highly populated
areas and then similarly ran out of enthusiasm. Then the campaigns
picked up and they switched to a registration scheme where they set a
target threshold for exchanges and asked that people visit the website
to register interest. Once that threshold had been reached, it then
went into the pop for the next stage of the feasibility process.
Initially progress was slow but once it became known what had to happen
things got much better. You can see what's going on here
http://www.adslguide.org.uk/availability/btprereg.asp
I would have thought that there's more chance of getting a telco to
provide broadband by getting a BIG list of people that are willing to
seriously commit.
It's getting more entertaining now with more companies taking part in
the local loop unbundling and offering much faster speeds than BT.
David.
Starting a WISP 
Linear Mode
