Before I write anything more, let me just say how hilarious this all is to a big techie like me. Our leaders are so out of touch, or pretend to be, that they really don't get that all people need are robust internet connections and that nothing else really matters. Talk about out of touch leaders. The city had an abbreviated discussion at this meeting and did not present the public with all of the information from the first meeting. No discussion was brought forth by any member of the council as to ethics, although I have been sending them information on those lines for quite some time now and others have addressed concerns in this area. The truly sad thing to comment on here is the belief that this will create competition. It will NOT in any real sense do so since CenturyLink is not even being held to the same standards as Comcast and they will only build in a very limited area. In fact, they will only put an office in Bellingham if they get to 30% (Virtual Monopoly) market share and are trying to create a geographical virtual monopoly. So all we'll get is yet another monopoly from this. Remember, they refused to answer Dan Hamill's questions on where they will provide services at the 1pm meeting. Their PRISM TV service is very expensive, and although CenturyLink can't discriminate based on race or the economic value of a location (which is good), they can do so based on the infrastructure in that location per this agreement. They will not put it in those terms, but that is what will happen. Our agreements with them are totally toothless and we didn't even try to get much from them in our agreements. Since newer, wealthier communities tend to have better infrastructure this will address none of our social issues since they will get the better services while everyone else receives virtually no upgrades. Again, they avoided talking about what a joke their low-income options are. PRISM TV service goes up in cost after an initial contract period JUST LIKE COMCAST. Traditional TV is going the way of the dinosaur. I've posted another article highlight just a few of the options you can use that require only the internet. Think about it, CenturyLink is bringing you the internet via some means and then charging you for cable as an extra add on, like it's an extra service. Comcast does the same thing. The truth is that the CableTV model in antiquated and what we really need is to get everyone onto a robust internet service that is managed ethically. Also, where was I at this meeting? Well, I sadly I had to miss this one to work.... Wouldn't have mattered much anyway since the council pledged their allegiance to CenturyLink at the 1pm meeting. Michael again reminded us that under their leadership it is impossible to bar a company from CenturyLink from coming into our community. This is regardless of their behavior and their attacks on the 1st Amendment via their Anti-Net Neutrality campaigns. So just another reminder that you have no rights and that the council will not ask a corporation like CenturyLink about their unethical behavior. They will instead spend your tax dollars working with them instead of on more ethical solutions. One final note, if we lose Net-Neutrality, like Comcast, CenturyLink, Verizon, AT&T and a bunch of other unethical companies are fighting for, you might as well put double quotes around whatever services you've been quoted by any of these companies. They will legally be allowed to steal bandwidth from parts of their network to provide to others.