In the 1990s, new Open Access laws mandated that wireline owners must open their infra to competing internet providers.
Those laws were eventually purchased out of existence (one campaign donation at a time) - but while they held, numerous local ISPs popped up to serve their own communities.
I mention it because apartment dwellers might be happier with their stock arrangement, if it came with a meaningful choice of providers.
landlords must let tenants "opt out of paying for...
Internet service that is offered in connection with the tenancy."
It was approved by the state Assembly in a 75–0 vote in April,
and by the Senate in a 30–7 vote last month.
If a tenant wants another provider, and it involves running more wires, does the landlord pay for the wiring, or have approval power? I can see that causing possible problems.
I grant you, yes it can cause problems. I can see plenty of entitled people say things like "if we pay for the wires, the landlord reaps the benefits when we leave and some other tenant uses those wires we paid for". Sure. Or you think about it as being able to choose for yourselves and yes that comes with costs, whether you own the place or not. We're not talking thousands of dollars here.
Look, I don't live in California but we definitely did choose our own ISPs at all the place(s) we rented (multiple places, multiple different countries) and yes, we did have the ISP come have their actual "physical wire provider" come out and run the line and we paid whatever fee was necessary for that (unless the ISP did) and the landlord was absolutely involved exactly zero percent of that. Because it meant we could get the kind of line we wanted from a third party provider at a cheaper price than the underlying physical line provider would've given us.
It's absurd to me to think that the landlord would've had to provide for any of that, except if it meant a huge amount of money and then one would've wanted to set up some sort of "cost share" arrangement. But we're talking like a hundred bucks here, for a multi-year period of use. We're renting the property, not internet service from them. Same with electrical service. We of course paid for the electrical service ourselves instead of through the landlord. It gave us the choice(s).
In the 1990s, new Open Access laws mandated that wireline owners must open their infra to competing internet providers.
Those laws were eventually purchased out of existence (one campaign donation at a time) - but while they held, numerous local ISPs popped up to serve their own communities.
I mention it because apartment dwellers might be happier with their stock arrangement, if it came with a meaningful choice of providers.
If a tenant wants another provider, and it involves running more wires, does the landlord pay for the wiring, or have approval power? I can see that causing possible problems.
Why would the landlord have to pay?
I grant you, yes it can cause problems. I can see plenty of entitled people say things like "if we pay for the wires, the landlord reaps the benefits when we leave and some other tenant uses those wires we paid for". Sure. Or you think about it as being able to choose for yourselves and yes that comes with costs, whether you own the place or not. We're not talking thousands of dollars here.
Look, I don't live in California but we definitely did choose our own ISPs at all the place(s) we rented (multiple places, multiple different countries) and yes, we did have the ISP come have their actual "physical wire provider" come out and run the line and we paid whatever fee was necessary for that (unless the ISP did) and the landlord was absolutely involved exactly zero percent of that. Because it meant we could get the kind of line we wanted from a third party provider at a cheaper price than the underlying physical line provider would've given us.
It's absurd to me to think that the landlord would've had to provide for any of that, except if it meant a huge amount of money and then one would've wanted to set up some sort of "cost share" arrangement. But we're talking like a hundred bucks here, for a multi-year period of use. We're renting the property, not internet service from them. Same with electrical service. We of course paid for the electrical service ourselves instead of through the landlord. It gave us the choice(s).