House Democrats Shelve Net Neutrality Proposal 221
crimeandpunishment writes "A compromise on net neutrality appears to be as likely as Google and China becoming BFFs. House Democrats have pulled the plug on efforts to work out a compromise among phone, cable, and Internet companies. House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, who shelved the proposal late on Wednesday in the face of Republican opposition, said, 'If Congress can't act, the FCC must,' and called this development 'a loss for consumers.' Internet companies and public interest groups say the new regulations are needed to keep phone and cable companies from playing favorites with traffic, while those companies insist they need flexibility so high-bandwidth applications don't slow down their systems." The net neutrality debate seems to have fallen victim to the extreme polarization evident in the larger political culture.
My first "bump" where this law could help (Score:5, Informative)
As some of you know Xbox Live is getting a cool update called ESPN3. The concept of the app & system is pretty amazing, technology has come a long way to make it so. What you probably didn't know is that to get the deal, Microsoft had to get the ISP's to agree to license the content for Internet Users in order to broadcast ESPN3 over the internet. Not all ISP's bought the license, so not everyone will have ESPN3 - even if you're a Xbox live subscriber.
This is an area where net neutrality should shine. It should protect Microsoft and allow them to license content to distribute and it should protect consumers to not be held hostage to a carrier paying for content as a middleman. I hope this EPSN3 thing can light the fire under the community so they understand how net neutrality can impact them. I know this isn't the "typical case of concern" in regards to p2p or throttling or priority of services, but this just goes to show that Internet Traffic is already beeing bought and sold not just as a commodity itself but something that people have now had to license in order to push specific traffic over that commodity on as a carrier - not just a distributor.
With that said, the app is freaking amazing and i don't even like much sports. The fact you can watch scores, hedge on who will win and i'm sititng in my living room watching HD games on demand or live is pretty awesome. I admire comcast for building out the network to support stuff and maybe, that is what the license agreed to but damn, these backroom deals are dissapointing for the consumer and only pollute the fairness & equality of having broadband now into having to chose a carrior that has the right license deals, not just the best performance.
Re:Bandwidth hogs should pay more.... (Score:4, Informative)
"Phone and cable companies insist they need flexibility so high-bandwidth applications don't slow down their systems." Fine. Let them charge the content producers by bandwidth. The wider bandwidth your content needs, the more you will pay. Low bandwidth content (most web pages actually) would get a free ride, things like Hulu and Youtube would probaby have to open their wallets to help support the inferstructure. Just so long as nobody gets priority over anybody else. First come first serve, but if you take more than average you pay for it.
As an ATT&T wireless user who has exceeded her monthly 5Gb limit once or twice, I can tell you for a fact, we "hogs" do pay more for additional usage. Too bad we don't get "rollover" bits.
Re:My first "bump" where this law could help (Score:3, Informative)
Because as of right now it's only in testing ... so if you're experiencing this right now while "sititng" in your living room, I would like to know how this is possible.
Because MS is already sending invitations to selected people [softsailor.com] to beta-test the new Xbox Live and Kinect setups?
Re:My first "bump" where this law could help (Score:5, Informative)
There's a separate fee for ESPN3 (previously known as ESPN360). Almost every provider provides ESPN on basic access, so that's not the issue. The issue is that ESPN is charging a PER SUBSCRIBER FEE for a WEBSITE to ISPs. This means that if your provider has ESPN3, you are paying for it, whether you want it or not. ESPN wants to turn the Internet into cable TV. That is the issue.
Re:My first "bump" where this law could help (Score:5, Informative)
I'll also note that this per subscriber fee is significantly higher for small ISPs. By about a thousand percent... as a result, small ISPs do not carry the service. If you *want* ESPN3, you have to switch to a big carrier, because you cannot buy an individual subscription to the site.
Re:My first "bump" where this law could help (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Bandwidth hogs should pay more.... (Score:5, Informative)
Actually I don't see any problem with charging consumers more per se. If I use twice the bandwidth that my neighbor does, then there's some logic that I pay twice as much. What's objectionable isn't that they charge more for using more bandwidth, but that they charge more for applications that they assume will use more bandwidth. Example:
I have an Internet connection. I use it for e-mail and web browsing (low bandwidth activities) on a moderate scale, but a few times a month I torrent something (Blizzard uses torrents for it's game updates, Linux distros, etc). While I occasionally use this "high bandwidth application" my overall usage is rather low (say 5-7 GB a month).
My neighbor has the same Internet connection I do. He uses only "low bandwidth applications", but he uses them *constantly*. Say he's a teenager and it's summer vacation. He's *always* doing something on the 'Net. He downloads multiple small files (often at the same time), but does so over low bandwidth (theoretically) protocols like http and ftp. In the end he uses way more bandwidth in a given month than me. 25-30 GB.
Under the types of rules that Internet companies want to see, I would be potentially charged more than my neighbor. Because I use a "high bandwidth service" (despite that I don't use it much and it doesn't actually add up to that much bandwidth), and he doesn't (despite that he actually uses far more bandwidth because of his sheer volume of activity).
A big part of the problem here is that Americans have gotten used to "unlimited Internet". No ISP wants to be the first to say "you pay by the GB", because they know that they'll get their lunches eaten by all the "unlimited" services. So rather than limit the actual bandwidth people are allowed to use (or charging a metered rate), they attempt to offer "unlimited" service while at the same time demonizing certain protocols and applications and trying to charge more for those. This allows them to claim that you can use the network as much as you want, while at the same time curtailing the use of protocols that are most likely to stress the network.
Net Neutrality isn't about you getting free Internetz. It's about companies being forced to sell unrestricted access to the network (on the protocol and application level). They can sell packages based on bandwidth or based on total usage (or both), but not based on protocols or who you're trying to connect to. They can charge you more for more Mbs. They can charge you more because you use more total GB a month. They can't charge you more because you want to use Bittorrent or access a competitor's website.
Re:You? Why TF should they care about YOU? (Score:5, Informative)
and the list goes on... As for the last 30 years, actually I beat you, let's do 60 years, under Democrats the income of the middle class has steadily increased by 3%/year and that of the upper class by 2%/year, under Republicans the increase has been around 1% for both.
if you want to believe propaganda go right ahead, You would look a lot smarter if you did some research first though. I'm an independent and I can think with my own brain. There are lots of stupid Democrats but they don't resemble the Republicans by far.
Re:I'll Say It Again ... (Score:2, Informative)
Any person that believes banking is a "free market" has no understanding of the concept of fractional reserve banking.
Fractional reserve banking increases the money supply through lending, literally creating money from thin air. In order to maintain the money supply and keep inflation from spiraling out of control, the Central Bank must both manipulate the currency through the prime rate, and regulate the banks through reserve requirements. So, core to the concept of banking under fractional reserve is the necessity of the government to regulate banks in order to keep the money supply safe.
This doesn't even include the volumes of laws on what types of products banks can sell, or who they can sell them to. It doesn't include the thousands of pages of regulations on their employees and their facilities. It doesn't count all the tax regulations they must abide by.
It doesn't take more than a few minutes of research to find out that the "free market" line is not an argument, but some sort of uneducated attack that tries to dismiss the problem as easily as possible - just blame some mythical "free market" that doesn't exist, and move on rather than consider the reality of things.
Re:I'll Say It Again ... (Score:4, Informative)
I would argue that even from the most hard-right libertarian point of view, the only job of the government is to ensure that markets stay free. This includes preventing the purchase of monopolies, so that small businesses have a chance to provide equal or better service than the big players. Net neutrality should be in the interests of anyone who believes in the free market.
The idea that the right has gotten into its head that government regulation should stay out of the market is wrong, not because regulation is some kind of socialist mindset, but because in the hard-right view of things, the only role of the government is to play "cop", to catch cheaters and make sure the market always runs smoothly and is an even playing field for all.