In the town of Harvard, although it seems people are having issues with Charter, we are still enjoying Internet with a nice 30 megabytes per second net neutral uncapped connection, while many other towns suffer from limits of 10 mb/s or lower on Comcast with a monthly 200-300 gigabyte hard cap. That means if you use more than 300 GB, your bill will become extremely high from usage. Even if you don’t care about Internet access, many of the town’s residents will probably use all the data and will cause problems with their Internet bill. If you vote for Comcast, you’ll risk getting lower Internet speeds than we’ve been getting. If you don’t like Charter, Comcast is much, much worse. Streaming movies like Netflix will freeze up or the video quality will suffer. No one needs live TV from cable so forget about more channels; you can get those from Dish or DirecTV, or simply stream from Hulu or something.
According to an editorial published two weeks ago in the Harvard Press, it is possible to talk to the Department of Public Utilities to push other companies to roll out fiber optics in our area.
Some fiber-optic providers include:
- US Internet: Provides 1 GB/s for $115/month or 100 mb/s for $48/month. This one deserves serious consideration despite being a smaller company.
- Google Fiber: The best possible, except it is only rolling out in select areas. 1000 mb/s for $70/month.
- Verizon FiOS: Another good option, provides up to 500 mb/s for $300/month but cheaper plans include 50 mb/s for $80/month (after contract). FiOS already has cables in neighboring towns.
- AT&T U-verse Gigapower: Charges $70/month for three years and then charges $200/month afterwards. This option might be the worst choice, but I wanted to mention it.
This gives us a few options:
- Give in to Comcast and destroy Harvard’s Internet with 300 GB caps and no net neutrality
- Keep Charter for now and look at choosing a new carrier among leading edge fiber-optic providers.
Both companies have approved the change, but as a town, we still have a chance to fight for our right to a free, unthrottled, and unlimited web! We are a town with reliable and fast Internet and we should keep it that way! We should be pushing for faster speeds, not slower ones. Say no to Comcast!
Philip Wesley, Bromfield junior
Old Shirley Road
