It’s interesting to see the parallels in access to electricity - it’s now rather common in NYC to see people charging things on LinkNYC kiosks.

Those too are a public good but operated by a private company (Intersection), with the attendant conflicts of interest.

Interestingly they were introduced after the city Payphone contract expired - reminding me that phone access has almost totally been privatized at this point.

> phone access has almost totally been privatized at this point.

Phone access has always been private, no?

No. There were public phone booths. [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_booth