House Republicans Roll Out Legislation To Overturn New Net Neutrality Rules 550
An anonymous reader writes: U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and 31 Republican co-sponsors have submitted the Internet Freedom Act (PDF) for consideration in the House. The bill would roll back the recent net neutrality rules made by the FCC. The bill says the rules "shall have no force or effect, and the Commission may not reissue such rule in substantially the same form, or issue a new rule that is substantially the same as such rule, unless the reissued or new rule is specifically authorized by a law enacted after the date of the enactment of this Act." Blackburn claims the FCC's rules will "stifle innovation" and "restrict freedom." The article points out that Blackburn's campaign and leadership PAC has received substantial donations. from Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon.
Lift the gag order first... (Score:2, Interesting)
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Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
There are a lot of issues with it.
I'd like it if the whole thing were nothing but unicorns and rainbows. But the secrecy is not a good sign and we need to think to the future... the FCC might do something good with this today... but the government has a tendency to push the bounds of their authority.
They get some power to take the goods away from drug dealers and before you know it they're confiscating the homes of poor people with basically no justification.
They get the mandate to go after terrorists and a few years later the NSA agents are spying on ex girlfriends using the government terror databases and NSA agents are putting ex wives on no fly lists.
The internet is a big deal. And I just don't want the FCC to ruin it.
I hate the big ISPs too. Everyone does. But the solution to them is competition. Not government regulation. Just remove the stupid laws that make it illegal for rival companies to lay cable in their territory.
Here someone will say those laws don't exist. Both Google and Centurylink were recently complaining about just such laws. So either they do exist or those companies were lying.
Its a real thing. Possibly the new FCC regulations will settle that issue. Which if that was all they were doing would be fine by me. But I worry about the unintended consequences and the long term power creep. The FCC could be a white knight today... but tomorrow? You don't know.
The whole thing could be a devil's bargain. You get something you want today... and later... your soul is forfeit.
You can't say it isn't going to happen... they're keeping the regs secret. That in and of itself is suspicious.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
You are hoplessly naive. In order to compete with incumbent ISPs you have to have massive resources. If you start with small, local deployments, the incumbents will make local price cuts to drive you out of business. Even if you have the resources to make deployments across most population centers in a short time, the result will be lower prices and no profits. If you just built out, your equipment costs will be much greater than incumbents.
The only way to get competition is to force unbundling of local loops. This means more regulation.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
I hate the big ISPs too. Everyone does. But the solution to them is competition. Not government regulation. Just remove the stupid laws that make it illegal for rival companies to lay cable in their territory.
Those laws don't exist in general. The primary thing preventing Time Warner from running cable to my house is the fact that Comcast already has a wire there. Comcast has already spent the millions of dollars required to wire my neighborhood, and the tens of millions required to wire my town. Whatever price Time Warner can offer, Comcast can beat, because they've already sunk costs. Time Warner can, optimistically, hope to get 50% of cable subscribers, meaning at most half the revenue that Comcast projected to pay off their capital. There is no way for a new cable company to compete effectively with one that's already laid out the major capital expenses. The only reason DSL is competitive is it doesn't require laying new copper to every home.
Likewise, there's no way multiple electric or gas companies could compete with an incumbent who had already wired/plumbed a neighborhood. When cities deregulate gas/electric service, they do so by transferring the wires to one company, and forcing that company to sell transit to all comers at regulated rates. If you want to see competition among ISPs, nationalize the coax, copper and fiber, and let the ISPs rent bandwidth to subscribers' homes and manage their access.
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It is not a matter of property rights, atleast not in most states. In most states the state, or local government own the property that this is done on.
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And if the local government was bribed to give exclusive access to the duopoly then I guess you're just gravy with that whole system.
It is precisely this sort of silliness that has allowed the duopolies to operate.
All the cities need to do is provide right of way to ANY ISP. By all means, charge a fee to run cable. Make it the same fee for everyone though and make it proportional to what that ISP is using. If I run a cable down two blocks, I expect to pay fees for two blocks.
If all of this is just too confu
Re: Lift the gag order first... (Score:3)
So 20 different network cables, 10 gas pipes and 15 electricity cables all running to your property would be fine with you in the name of competition? Maintenance would be fun.
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The laws vary from one place to the next because they're done at a local level. Mostly they can be summed up as poll leases or access to communications conduits. Typically any company outside of the duopoly is forbidden to lay cable either on the polls or in the conduits IF they are running last mile cable. If they're not then they tend to be permitted to run the cable. Which is why we have much more competition for backbone cable then we do for last mile cable.
Last I heard, we have over 70 percent unused c
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Then fuck you and you deserve to get shitty internet at an overpriced rate.
Let me further point out that if lots of companies wanted to do that, we'd design the system differently so that it could handle more cable being run through it without disturbing people.
The most sensible solution would be to have a conduit system. You just run the cable through and can access it via manholes. You wouldn't need to dig anything up to change it or add cable. You'd just run the cable into the conduit system through the
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
As all these extra cables are not needed for providing service, their sole purpose is to feed some free market fundamentalist pipe dream. The more sensible solution is to have only one provider for each type of cable technology, and have sensible regulations in place to make sure that there is a competitive market for service providers. Saves a lot of money, as otherwise you will be paying in some way for the twenty identical cables going to your house.
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As all these extra cables are not needed for providing service
If the conduit is already in place, the cost of running extra cable is negligible. The expense is trenching, not fiber. The fiber itself is usually far less than 1% of the cost.
The more sensible solution is to have only one provider for each type of cable technology, and have sensible regulations in place to make sure that there is a competitive market for service providers.
The would be a more sensible solution in an alternative universe where capitalists where not greedy and politicians were not corrupt. If central planning actually worked, communism would not have failed.
you will be paying in some way for the twenty identical cables going to your house.
You don't need twenty providers for effective competition. Usually, three is enough. A single publicly owned conduit, available
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
There is no gag order. The Republicans on the FCC committee have refused to file the correct paperwork to allow this go forward. Pretty sleazy, but the Republicans have become pros at that.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
This a thousand times. Everybody needs to understand that it is not the FCC that is hiding the rules, but REPUBLICANS, because they know if you saw the rules you wouldn't be likely to think they need to be repealed. And of course, like Marsha Blackburn, the Republicans responsible are bought and paid for by Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon.
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Unless your link is bad, what you read there is NOT "these rules". It is a description of what the "rules" are meant to accomplish.
And even if these are the "rules" you think they are, note that they specifically set aside the question of how to actually pay for this regulation for discussion at a later time.
For the record, I'm pretty much indifferent to the whole issue, as long as it doesn't increase my monthly internet bill. Though I do find myself curious how you can have tiered service (pay X for Ym
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
The pay for speed guidelines cover content providors, not end users. Also what is there to pay for?
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Part of the point of the internet is that it's a network of peers; how do you draw a bright line between end users and content providers?
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
These rules prevent that. Without these rule that is possible, with these rules it is not possible. The ISPs are not allowed to slow down content or charge for faster delivery of content (same thing in practice) but they can still charge end users in a tiered manner.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
But users end up paying the subscription fee to those content providers, do they not?
Not for the service they're getting. Let's say I'm a Speakeasy customer, and I also pay for Netflix.
You're a Comcast customer, and you also pay for Netflix.
Speakeasy is network neutral, so Netflix has no disadvantage compare to any other provider. If Speakeasy has congestion, Netflix and Amazon will be just as slow. To relieve this, they increase their bandwidth do their peering points, and all networks are again running fast. I may have to pay more to Speakeasy for this speed increase.
However, in your case, Comcast segregates Netflix's traffic and slows it down to relieve congestion, instead of treating all networks as equal. Comcast says their networks are not the issue, because they show you perfect speed from Amazon. You complain to Netflix, who must pay Comcast to get their speed increased.
Now, this is where the bullshit starts: Netflix passes the cost for the Comcast toll on to both you and ME, even though I'm not a Comcast customer, and this toll did nothing to increase MY speed. In fact, I already had to pay extra to my ISP to get my speed fixed.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, this is where the bullshit starts: Netflix passes the cost for the Comcast toll on to both you and ME, even though I'm not a Comcast customer, and this toll did nothing to increase MY speed. In fact, I already had to pay extra to my ISP to get my speed fixed.
As a Comcast customer, it's also bullshit. I'm *already* paying them for my internet service, so if part of my Netflix bill is going to pay protection money to Comcast (and, that's what this is: a protection racket) I'm paying Comcast twice. I fundamentally have a problem with that.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:4, Informative)
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If the small shops / "mom and pop shops" are overselling the bandwidth that they have by that much, then I would say that the issue is with the small shops themselves. There is no issue for the small shops if they are not massively overselling their connectivity.
I also do not think there are many small shops selling broadband Internet Connectivity in the USA. Where I have have seen small shops is in rural areas where they are selling Microwave based Internet which is usually very expensive for the bandwidth
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
Net Neutrality say if X service (lets say Netflix) is killing your entire network's performance you have to live with it. You can't partition Netflix into it's own walled garden....But the mom and pop shops have to take months to buy more bandwidth.
Keep something in mind here. Netflixs is not sending a SINGLE PACKET to Mom and Pop's ISP that their paying customers didn't ask for.
Those customers are paying Mom and Pop for a service, which in your example, seems to be getting to Netflix.
Now, if Mom and Pop don't like that and can't afford more bandwidth, they have a few choices. They can reduce the speed to all customers, thereby reducing the demand for Netflix. Their customers won't be able to stream an HD movie, for example, because the customer pipe isn't big enough.
They could also allow 30-minute full-speed bursts, followed by 30 minutes of reduced speed. This would allow all non-streaming customers faster downloads in most cases, but would limit streaming video equally, because after 30 minutes your movie quality goes to crap.
They could also prioritize ALL video as lower priority than ALL VPN or HTTP traffic. NETWORK neutrality does not mean PACKET neutrality. It just means I can't give preference to Netflix and screw Hulu over.
As for your Walmart comparison, the reverse is also true. If you allow ISPs to slow traffic from a content provider unless they pay more, only the Walmarts of streaming video will be able to pay more.
The up and coming Mom and Pop streaming video company won't be able to pay off Comcast and AT&T, so Netflix and Hulu will be the only ones that live.
Network Neutrality means NOT picking winners and losers.
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Prioritization only comes into play when there is congestion. Yes, QoS can be designed to let the little game packets ahead of the big video packets, but as a network engineer, I constantly see this:
1. Congestion starts
2. Someone implements QoS, taking a TON of time and using all sorts of advanced features on the gear. Sometimes this causes CPU use to spike, requiring more faster hardware. Sometimes you run into a bug that only relates to QoS, etc. Lots of time, money, and maybe some downtime before the dus
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:4, Interesting)
Peering is a good thing. Peering can *save* money for the content producer.
Sure, and I never said it was a bad thing. I just don't think it should be legal for a duopoly to impose a fee for peering, nor should they be required to peer. The ISP and the content producer can look at their costs and decide if they want to peer or not.
Netflix has not asked for a dime of ISP money to peer, and will even provide caching devices for free. They're not keen on paying for ISP infrastructure, though, and I don't see why they should.
Stop talking about stuff you do not understand.
I'm a network engineer that has been working with ISPs since the early 90's. I do understand this.
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Ummmmmmm.... No. Peering costs. It is NOT true that ISP charges customers only. Well, unless you count Netflix and others as customers, in which case, yes, Netflix is charged.
I know you stated that you are a network admin, but apparently you don't know that the *sender* pays in a peering agreement. It has been this way for a long, long time.
Now it is true that some content providers did cut deals in the early days. For example, it was reported years ago that Yahoo! only payed for half of their transit costs
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Insightful)
I expect that ISPs will add a "fee" for net neutrality compliance. This fee will have zero connection to any taxes or costs incurred by ISPs -- it will be a hidden price increase and extra profits by ISPs.
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It wouldn't be surprising; ISPs add a fee for everything.
My neighborhood only has one supplier, Consolidated Communications. They are godawful. They charge to much and their equipment always goes down. Eventually after a number of complaints from the neighbors, they sent some technicians out who figured out the problems were all on their side, and a bunch of equipment was bad. Lo and behold, everybody's bill now has a $3.50 maintenance fee on it. So basically in order to get the service I originally agreed
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I predict that your monthly internet bill will increase regardless of these regulations. Because inflation. And greed. And because they can.
You're a dumbass if you didn't think of that first, and if you did, you're being a disingenuous asshole. So which is it?
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:4, Funny)
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The FCC is still changing their proposed regulation (reportedly over 300 pages worth). The link you reference is about 5 pages worth. The proposed regs have not been released to the public.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
The regulations are 8 pages worth. The 300 pages, that likes to be famously misquoted is for history, justification, outline of the public response period (legally required)
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.wired.com/2015/03/f... [wired.com]
But last week, three FCC Commissioners voted to saddle the internet with a new set of constraints so complex, vague and problematic that it took over 300 pages of explanation to justify eight pages of rules. While we haven’t seen the full text yet, we do know a lot about what’s inside.
Also it is apparently the GOP FCC members holding this up:
http://motherboard.vice.com/re... [vice.com]
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"
Read much.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
IT is 8 pages of regulations, 300+ of justification:
http://www.wired.com/2015/03/f... [wired.com]
Also it is the GOP holding up its release:
http://motherboard.vice.com/re... [vice.com]
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Interesting)
That fact that they happen to be Republican is irrelevant because both parties are thoroughly corrupted by the corporate interests that actual net neutrality threatens!
Both parties are quite corrupt - we know this. But if on some specific issue like this, one party or the other was not corrupt, that would be interesting. And that often happens, as the businesses in question pick one party or the other as the target of all their bribes for efficiency reasons. But that's not the case here. The safe assumption here is that any net neutrality laws will be a bribery contest between the cable companies and the content providers (mostly Google and Netflix), and anything shat out of that process is highly suspect.
Party doesn't enter into it - this is about the Senator from Google vs the Senator from Comcast!
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Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
The text making up the net neutrality rules comprises 8 pages. The remaining 290+ pages are legally mandated responses to questions and comments the FCC received during the public comment period. There are not 300+ pages of rules.
Why hasn't it been released? Because two FCC commissioners, Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly (the Republican ones) are refusing to submit their comments of record. Nothing is made public until either those commissioners make their official statements of record or the time window for them to do so expires. Taking the usual obstructionist page out of the Republican playbook, Pai and O'Rielly have decided to wait for the clock to run out instead of helping to move things along. They're the ones making us all wait to see the text.
Re:Lift the gag order first... (Score:5, Informative)
Damn they are good, since people tend to write it off, as you did, as republican bashing.
Re:Lest Anyone Forget... (Score:4, Informative)
You mean Bell ... AT&T was one of the baby Bells.
Actually when AT&T, Ma Bell, was broken up there were seven baby bells formed. :NYNEX, Bell Atlantic, Bell South, Ameritech, USWEST, SouthWest Bell and Pacific Telesis.
They were
NYNEX and Bell Atlantic are now part of Verizon, USWEST became QUEST.
SouthWest Bell bought Bell South, Ameritech and Pacific Telesis. They first renamed themselves to SBC and later changed the name again to AT&T.
So the AT&T of today is not the AT&T of yesterday.
So as the parent AC stated, we were renting phones from AT&T for over 80 years.
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So as the parent AC stated, we were renting phones from AT&T for over 80 years.
Actually, GP AC was wrong, and here is why. Pardon the long explanation, but it's not a simple subject. It all has to do with why "Ma Bell" was broken up in the first place.
When AT&T (Ma Bell) was essentially granted "regulated monopoly" status, that monopoly applied to its status as a "common carrier". As such, its job was to deliver signals from one phone to another. (That's what Title II Common Carriers do.) It was NOT supposed to be in the business of making and selling telephones.
Eventually (
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A 5 page summary is not what was voted on. What was voted on was a draft 332 page set of regulations. But nice try.
No, it wasn't. As mentioned elsewhere, the actual regulation is only 8 pages. The rest consists of comments by the Commissioners. So this argument doesn't hold water.
While it might not be the entire thing, it's a pretty good summary. Here's the real story: the FCC is not allowed by the rules to issue the regulation until all the comments are in. Two Republican holdouts are dragging their feet and haven't delivered their comments. THEY are the ones to blame, not "the FCC".
They do what they're paid to do... (Score:5, Interesting)
They know it can't get past the president's veto, and probably not past a fillibuster, but if they keep this up they PAC will keep lining their coffers.
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I don't know, if the outrage over the regulations get's bad enough and they get this attached to some other bill that the president cannot help but sign, they could pass it or override the veto.
However, such would require a bit of backbone which seems missing from congress right now as we really still have a divided senate even if we've done some office shuffling of late. And growing a backbone seems to be an unlikely option for the Senate leadership in all this, unless you had near riots in the streets.
Re:They do what they're paid to do... (Score:5, Insightful)
...which is why I emailed Rep. Latta (co-sponsor) and Rep Joyce (my rep from Ohio) and let them know that I vote, I elected one of them, and I don't support any action to reverse the FCC's recent reclassification.
I know I don't represent big bags of money, but I do directly represent a ballot. I let both of them know that I am a US Army veteran, a long-time IT professional, and a proponent of net neutrality and classifying internet service under Title II.
Re:They do what they're paid to do... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:They do what they're paid to do... (Score:4, Interesting)
Throw "Freedom" On It (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, that has more to do with freedom than this does. What they meant to call it is the "Internet Just Give Us Your Wallets And Shut Up Act".
Re:Throw "Freedom" On It (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that putting "Freedom" or "Patriot" on shit laws helps them just shows me how gullible and irresponsible the electorate is and why they do not deserve to live in a free country.
We have an electorate that is easily swayed and think they are informed while they parrot talking points they see and hear in the media.
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In this case, there are two things that we can call "the American public". If you watch a lot of television then you see hints of what I call the Beav
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The "freedom" is for the ISPs - the only things, I mean, corporations, I mean, *people* (thanks Citizen's United) that Republicans care about.
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This is not the danger, it will be killed quickly. The danger is when she attaches this to the an infrastructure bill, maybe the defense appropriations bill or some other essential but completely unrelated bill.
That's why it's up to us to repeatedly tell our congressmen what's up. I email mine almost weekly (Kenny Marchant) and while he does a great many things I despise I do have yet to see him sign on as a cosponsor to one of these internet restriction acts. If our congressmen begin to believe they will have to pay a political price, they'll won't want to be the first one to come out in favor of an internet restriction act. If everyone is afraid to be first, then no one will be.
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They could write legislation about anything and expect us to like it because it has a word in it like "freedom" or "patriot".
And don't forget the old advertising chestnut of "new and improved". Oh, waitaminute...they already have a word for that in Congress: "reform". Ever wonder why the tax code needs to be "reformed" every few years? - because it's "new and improved"!
For fun, the next time you go into a sit-down chain restaurant, read the menu carefully and look for adjectives such as "garden fresh" or "hand selected". Maybe we could apply some of those same adjectives to legislation, e.g. "The Garden Fresh Internet Freedom
First rule of marketing (Score:2)
Sell your greatest weakness like it's your greatest strength. I'm not in marketing, but I see this all time.
Re:Throw "Freedom" On It (Score:5, Interesting)
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Internet Freedom Act!?!?! (Score:2, Insightful)
LOL! Freedom for the carriers and big business to make more money.
DOA (Score:3)
It won't make it to the floor for a vote, let alone past the president.
Re:DOA (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree it likely wouldn't make it out of Congress let alone past the President, but how do you figure it won't make it to the floor of at least the House?
Re:DOA (Score:5, Interesting)
The House doesn't operate under rules that prevent singular persons from bringing things to the floor like the Senate does. A bill gets written by a member, and gets referred to the proper committee. If the committee votes in favor, it goes before the full House for debate and voting.
There is no filibuster, nor super-majority cloture vote as in the Senate. House rules go back to Thomas Jefferson, and have been changed very little. The Senate was modeled after Parliamentary procedure, thus has some odd things such as cloture votes to end debate, which is the primary mechanic used for obstruction - you need 60 votes to close debate so that you can see if there are 51 votes to pass the bill.
Either way, the second part of your statement is absolutely correct. Even if this thing comes out of the house, and by some oddity of politics or monied influence gets through a cloture vote and passes the Senate, it's highly unlikely that the President would put his name to this piece of trash on parchment. Don't know if he's straight-up veto though - he'd probably want a piece of the monetary influence after he's out of office too. Maybe a pocket veto.
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Taste of their own medicine (Score:3, Insightful)
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Already been done. The conservatives had a shitfit when their ads were blocked. http://www.bloomberg.com/polit... [bloomberg.com]
Naturally that was that and this is this and it's totally different when it's their message being blocked by the carriers.
Re:Taste of their own medicine (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is, we could have the same problem from the FCC controlling & censoring the Internet.
How? They don't control or censor the content of my phone calls, which are regulated as a Title II Telecommunications service.
Congress (Score:4, Funny)
Sheesh (Score:5, Informative)
I'm rather Libertarian about most things in life, but I applauded the FCC's decision to attempt to "stifle innovation." That is, of course, only if you consider "innovation" to be new forms of rent-seeking.
Seriously, AT&T, Comcast and Verizon. Stop trying to wring money out of both content providers and customers. This shit is getting so old.
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The libertarian solution would have Comcast and all other utilities pay every property owner for permission to run lines through their property (which is clearly unworkable -- if a single property owner at the entrance of a street refuses, everybody else on the street would be screwed). That's why even people who normally lean libertarian (such as the GP) realize that government regulation is a better alternative in this cas
Yeah the FCC is stifling freedom! (Score:5, Informative)
They're stripping away Comcast's freedom to shake-down content providers for more money and screw over their customers! What is this, the Soviet Union??
Re:Yeah the FCC is stifling freedom! (Score:4, Insightful)
No, more like 1930s America. It's almost-legalised protection rackets. "Hey netflix, it would be a shame if something happened to your shop windows, wouldn't it. We'll take cash to help make sure that doesn't happen."
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Have you seen the rules? I'm told there is a lot of stuff in there and what you think they say might not be what they actually say.
You've heard that Netflix now doesn't like the rules right? They just used the concept of what the rule's title suggests previously, but now that they are being forced by the FCC, they are backing away. They where just arm twisting the ISP's over money and not looking out for your best interest.
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Oh gee! Your coffeemaker broke again?
"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Interesting)
I can't believe the bullshit I see from some of the "conservatives" I know who treat this like some kind of commie takeover of the Internet.
One guy I used to work with was trying to run an SMB network off his cable modem service from home and did nothing but complain for weeks about the runaround he got trying to get multiple static IPs due to ridiculous cable vendor policies (solved with some MAC spoofing/VLAN hackery in his firewall) and the pathetic bandwidth allocations he was able to get in addition to the general lack of alternatives in his area.
Yet this same numbskull is parroting this ridiculous "Obama takeover of the Internet" bullshit against net neutrality.
I just don't see how "conservatives" are willing to go totally rabid when it comes to government meddling yet so many (but not all) see outrageous monopoly manipulation and rent-seeking as just the good-old free market working like it's supposed to. I can't make this dichotomy make any sense.
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Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Insightful)
It won't. That's the entire point. People like his friend have been brainwashed into thinking anything that isn't 100% pro-corporation is tantamount to communism even when the very same corporations are routinely fucking him over.
Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that's mostly it, it's this refusal to acknowledge that at scale, corporations are as much (if not a greater) risk to freedom as government. Probably even greater risk when collusion with government is part of the equation and you take into consideration the effects of monopoly power, the lack of democratic redress, etc.
Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:4, Interesting)
The conservative bias is "don't regulate what you don't have to," and House Republicans are trying to argue that the regs are unnecessary, first because they ban practices not actually in practice, second that when they do come in practice (Netflix vs Comcast, for instance), they are resolved between the actors in the existing legal framework with no deleterious effects to the consumer.
Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Insightful)
There's prima facie evidence of consumer harm.
Comcast willfully interfered with a business relationship they weren't a party to further their own enrichment, Comcast willfully degraded the service provided to their customers as a means to pressure a competitor of video services, and consumers will likely see price increases as Netflix's costs rise to accommodate payments to Comcast.
If UPS were to erect roadblocks in front of Fedex terminals and refuse to remove them unless Fedex paid them off, we'd rightly call that extortion, regardless of whether they resolved it "within the existing legal framework".
Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Insightful)
The conservative bias is "don't regulate what you don't have to,"
s/what you don't have to/at all/
Republicans know that if government doesn't do regulation, the monopoly or cartel that owns the market sure will (and such regulation is optimized to maximize profits, not the health of the market, much less *customer* health).
And thats where the congresscritters get their campaign funding. Sounds pretty clear to me what their goal is - just like their funders, it's to line their pockets.
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Re:"Conservatives" hating neutrality baffles me (Score:5, Informative)
I can't believe the bullshit I see from some of the "conservatives" I know who treat this like some kind of commie takeover of the Internet.
The foundational problem we're dealing with here is that the majority of the public doesn't understand how the internet works. The Slashdot crowd has long since learned to deal with that at a micro level. However, we hear different things than the rest of society. Net Neutrality to us means "the bandwidth and throughput of internet traffic won't be artificially limited based on its source or destination." To them, it means "The government will tell me what I can and can't post on my Tumblr blog". With no concept of IP routing, peering, or the Comcast vs. Netflix case that brought Net Neutrality into common vernacular.
Whether this is because "understanding how the internet works and what net neutrality does and doesn't impact" is a genuinely complicated topic, or because the Kardashians have killed far too many American neurons, is a separate topic entirely. To be fair though, if the government was indeed regulating what we could and couldn't post, could and couldn't say, or how we were allowed to say it...we'd be up in arms, too.
Re: (Score:3)
The problem with a rule this vague is that neither ISPs nor Internet users can know in advance what kinds of practices will run afoul of the rule. Only companies with significant legal staff and expertise may be able to use the rule effectively. And a vague rule gives the FCC an awful lot of discretion, potentially giving an unfair advantage to parties with insider influence.
Best congresscritters money can buy! (Score:3)
And how many of these cosponsors have taken large donations from ISPs, telecoms, etc. in their last reelection campaigns or recently to their PAC? It's seems that they aren't even trying to hide the corruption anymore.
Money.... (Score:2)
I would like to see how much money was given to, donated to or trips paid for by Comcast, AT&T and Verizon to Blackburn and these 31 Republicans over the past 10 years. I'm sure we'll get our answer as to why they are pushing this afterwards.
More honest names for this bill... (Score:5, Insightful)
Corporate Fascism Reinforcement Act
Fuck the People Act
Go to house.gov (Score:5, Insightful)
Get off your butts. Instead of whining on a forum spend the next 2 minutes of your life emailing your representative for the American slashdotter.
Remember these legislators only hear and get their information from lobbyists and pacs.
Tell them it is not acceptable to have a monopoly cut off your Netflix. If your representative has an R tell him or her that there is no free market and it harms innovation and our economy as a result. If he or she has a D explain monopolistic powers and pacs are writing rules.
Yes they check with their staff all day. If they get a surge of angry citizens they will notice. Remember the law to ban opensource and force drm? I posted that link and the bill died. We can change this if we act together. Religious right did this and won. It's time geeks do the same
Re:Go to house.gov (Score:4, Insightful)
Get off your butts. Instead of whining on a forum spend the next 2 minutes of your life emailing your representative for the American slashdotter.
Unless that email is accompanied by a tens of thousands of dollars donation to their campaign and/or PAC you can rest assured it illbe ignored.
Remember these legislators only hear and get their information from lobbyists and pacs.
Oh they get information from other people. They just only listen to the people giving them money. Good luck trying to outspend AT&T, Verizon and Comcast for your congresscritter's attention.
Re: (Score:2)
I wish I believed it'd make a difference, but I'm in a deep red congressional district represented by a teabagger.
Figures (Score:5, Insightful)
So now a small number of companies has more sway with this "politician" then the record breaking response the FCC received on this issue. Less then 1% of the FCC's response were against Net Neutrality, but because this Congressman's PAC received $81,000 AT&T, Comcast, the NCTA and Verizon, he feels that this is what the American people want?
Right.
Straight up bribery, and nothing will ever be done about it.
House of Cards (Score:3)
Guys, much like 1984, House of Cards is not an instruction manual...
Broadband is a utility, public good and essential (Score:5, Insightful)
Other than for the media companies, I can't see a downside to treating broadband access like a utility, especially since the FCC has waived the right to regulate prices. A broadband service routes packets into and out of your house, just like a water, electric or gas utility. AT&T's packets should not be any different than Verizon's packets, or Comcast's packets...it's the equivalent of the local loop from a CLEC.
It seems to me that shaking up the incumbents in some markets would be a good thing. It would probably operate the same way "competitive" gas service does now -- if someone hates their provider enough or finds a cheaper price for the exact same service, they can sign up to have another company provide it. This would be a good model to keep decent providers running, but put some limits on the Comcasts and Time Warner Cables of the world. Also, forcing some kind of universal service would mean that rural customers would get better network access. Carriers only upgrade networks when forced, and only like to operate in places where it's easy to operate...other than profits, this is probably one thing they're worried about. That, and Comcast is probably worried that Joe's Cable Shack is going to take all the business from people who don't need TV with their Internet service.
I'm also not really buying the "innovation" angle. At the core, networks are plumbing. DSL, DOCSIS, and of course Ethernet are pretty mature standards. Occasionally materials and computing advances allow for faster data rates, but these are open standards that every carrier would have access to.
It's the highest time... (Score:3)
This whole debate... (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They're locking out the PS4 client on their network. Surely this is precisely why net neutrality should be set in law, to stop corporations from blocking what you use to access third party services!
Not that Sony are in the clear either, those shitbags tied Netflix into their PSN accounts, when the PSN wasn't available, tough fucking titties, you were blocked from using Netflix on a Sony console.
That has nothing to do with Net Neutrality. They are not blocking anything on the packet level. In order to use HGO Go you have to first prove to HBO that you own a compatible cable tv package. To do this HBO contacts the cable company. In this case comcast is just refusing to authorize their customers to HBO. It's a dick move, but it's unrelated to Net Neutrality or even the internet.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think net neutrality is the issue with PS4 clients being locked out. The data can get from HBO to the customer's PS4. The PS4 can't authenticate that the customer is a subscriber of Comcast. Unless Comcast and HBO have terms as part of their agreement that say that Comcast needs to provide a mechanism for HBO to authenticate their PS4 customers, then it is a business decision between HBO and Comcast (and maybe possibly Sony a bit) to hammer out. Why should Comcast bend over backwards to the business
Re:Metered access, here we come! (Score:4, Insightful)
Strawman argument, here we come! (Score:5, Informative)
ISPs deal with this in some legitimate ways like throttling (deprioritizing bittorrent packets so that they're first to drop when congestion occurs or policing the endpoints to a maximum throughput rate) and some not-so-legitimate ways (injecting connection reset packets to disrupt sessions).
Sounds like a strawman to me. No one (except perhaps the anti-NN folks, like yourself) has proposed that throttling excessive usage goes against the tenets of NN. What NN does argue, however, is that throttling *based on endpoint* is not kosher - mainly because it provides a strong negative incentive to customer quality.
From the FCC Commission Document ( http://www.fcc.gov/document/fc... [fcc.gov] ):
No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
Don't confuse last-mile congestion issues (that you raise, and are legitimate) with throttling the interconnects. In your example, the BT excessive user should expect to hit monthly caps (which are not covered by NN) or overall throughput caps, especially during peak times. That's all (again referring to Commission Document) considered:
Reasonable Network Management: For the purposes of the rules, other than paid prioritization, an ISP may engage in reasonable network management. This recognizes the need of broadband providers to manage the technical and engineering aspects of their networks.