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Companies Join Together to Maintain Open Internet
idontneedanickname writes "SiliconValley.com is carrying an article from The Mercury News about the lobbying efforts of companies such as Amazon.com, Microsoft and Walt Disney (yes, you read that right) to stop the FCC from "fundamentally altering the Internet. If that happens, they say, the Internet could evolve into a cable-TV-like system, where providers of high-speed Internet access could steer subscribers toward affiliated Internet sites. The network owners could also limit the types of devices that could be connected to their network, potentially stifling innovation." Printer friendly version of the article is online as well."
Microsoft and Disney both see the advantages to un-tethered and relatively "free" (as in open road) access to the Internet for consumers. Cable companies, who are used to being able to "channel" information to passive users, do not, as it raises the bar on what they have to provide.
Luck favors the prepared, darling.
I believe that in due time, the Internet will grow to the level of public infrastructure, in the same way that we regard electricity and highways.
/Just an useless rant.
Only problem is, what kind of road (pun intended) are we going take to get there?
In the early days of paved roads, it was a mess until Uncle Sam wrote a bill saying that all Americans must have a smooth driving experience. When can we expect the same smooth packet delivery experience?
/.'s 10 Millionth
If the FCC actually does put a crimp on the Internet, they can, of course, only regulate it INSIDE the U.S.
Which would mean, of course, that despite all our big talk about freedom we would be up there with China regarding the good old internet.
In Post-Soviet Russia, they still have real internet. =P
Just My Opinion.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I thought M$ version of 'innovators' is nothing more than buying and crushing competitors. Does this overrich mob ACTUALLY think FCC is going to take the advices seriously after all the M$ 'innovations' the antitrust trial has exposed? HAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!! Who can forget Disney is the one who lobby for copyright extortion act? This is nothing more than a PR stunt, and FCC knows it! Thats why you cannot possibly believe anything good will come out of this internation band of consumer right terrorists.
Disney wants to avoid a cable system-like internet? This from the company who is almost completely responsible for your cable bill going up every year (ESPNs fees go up 10-15% every year). I still dont see why. If its open they cant manage to force content upon users. But then again, they'd want to decrease any leverage the cable co's have so they can charge whatever they want.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
The fact that the poster is surprised at the companies supporting this shows that they misunderstand the principles by which these companies operate. They have only one priciple -- to make money. Once you understand that, their behavior is clearly consistant. Their own freedom helps their bottom line, the freedom of others may hurt it.
The problem is that most of the laws are being passed as Super-DMCA at the state level. They have to force the FCC to change the federal law or it will be over before it starts. Ok, Comcast, Verizon, etc.. don't control your internet access over federal laws. However, with Michigan for example, they can say you can't put a Firewall/NAT device on your Internet connection and you can't connect several computers at once. Just as powerful a control.
Microsoft's software freedom of choice initiative meant that we would have less freedom to choose. Now M$ among others have an initiative for an open network. It must mean that we will have a closed network!
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
It does not take Scooby and the gang to figure out why this is occuring. If AOLTW is able to control thw who and where folk go, then MS and Disney are screwed.
...damn, no what was that witty sig again?...
Disney got nailed be the GO.bomb fiasco a few years ago, and they are just now getting back to the point of putting content back online. They HATE the idea of doing all of that work just to have AOLTW direct everyone away from it. MS is in the same boat, and with thier efforts on the hardware front, they would no like AOLTW dictating what hardware folk can buy from them. Oh, and what if AOLTW starts putting browser restrictions on content viewing. You how much Ms likes IE screwed with.
Strange bedfellows...for sure. But if it keeps the internet open and free, well that is a "good thing"...
Right?
How much power?
You can block addresses, you can restrict ports and protocols.
Seems as though you have a lot of power.
79 channels and the most compelling thing on is Futbal Mehicanos (or something like that).
Also, why do we really care?
AOL, MSN, and Compuserve tried to do this, but users wanted to access the "whole net"
Users, not laws, have kept the internet open. I say let them try to offer service no one will one want.
From a public relations stand point, microsoft has been on the right side of every issue like this over the last couple of years. Like when they opposed the telecomunications freedom or some such act last year that would have imposed DRM on anything with a microprocessor. On the other hand, if C# is their idea of an open standard, I think we're all in trouble.
These companies are just taking the high road because they can't take the low road because they don't have the resources monopolies.
Does anyone think for a minute that if MS owned a major cable network that they would care about innovation? The only thing they'd care about is first expanding subscribers and then slowly cranking down the subscriptions to limit them to MS Home Terminal Software users only.
Disney hate the cable companies from a TV perspective because they keep getting sodomozed on access fees to get their channels onto cable systems.
Amazon may actually care about innovation, but only because if everyone gets steered to another shopping site Amazon's "one click" "innovation" won't mean anything.
Move along. There's nothing to see here but a bunch of companies crowing because someone *else* has the ability to steer and lockout, not because they actually give a shit about a free, open and innovative internet.
All they want is to insure that regulation doesn't work against THEM. Just like Disney has their own channel that shows only Disney shows and doesn't run anyone else's commercials, they don't want a regulated internet that forces them to do anything.
It's not about open anything - it's about oligopoly.
Let's look at the issues, shall we?
Content providers want to make sure that the FCC doesn't do something which allows cable or telephone companies to set up rules which prohibit people from connecting to their content, which makes them revenue.
Hardware manufacturers want to make sure that the FCC doesn't do something which allows cable or telephone companies to set up rules which prohibit people from connecting the hardware they sell to a consumer's home network.
This isn't about the internet -- it's about the ISPs. Yes, the ISPs are connected to the internet, but this is just a peripheral thing. The FCC couldn't stop you if you signed up with a foreign company to get access over satellite, [phone calls would go through them, but this way, to avoid that part of the loop].
As for the bit about companies prohibiting WiFi, it was probably against the TOS or AUP for the ISP.... Most residential accounts don't allow sharing of connections to multiple systems. This just means that the consumer should go with an ISP that doesn't place this restriction on their account. [I use Speakeasy, personally... and before that, I was paying more for a business class line, until CAIS went under, and the company that bought them out tried screwing me over by doubling my rates on me].
As with anything else, you are buying a service from someone -- they might have conditions on that service, and if you violate it, they have the right to refuse you service. [ie, the 'no shoes, no shirt, no service' thing at most fast food establishments... although, why they don't require pants or some other similar covering, I have no idea].
Part of the issue may come from downstream liability issues -- if you put up a mail server, and you don't secure it, and become a third party relay for a spammer, they might get backlisted....if you connect up an unsecured WiFi node, and someone spams through your connection, they might get blacklisted, just the same. Personally, I'm okay with the companies putting restrictions on accounts so that they can remain profitable. It keeps them from having to raise prices for everyone else... And if they can't stay competitive, I'm sure there's other folks that aren't bloated and scamming their users, and provide better service, who can do it.
What I have issue with is the way that the ILECs aren't allowing Covad and other CLECs access to their facilities (it took multiple tries to get a damned pair of copper for when I went from SDSL to ADSL, because the CO was 'at capacity'... I'm just not buying it).
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
"Forcing vague regulatory requirements on broadband providers runs contrary to the spirit of the Internet and would only stifle investment, innovation and growth of broadband services,'' said National Cable and Telecommunications Association spokesman Brian Dietz."
IPDroids are desparately groping and here is what would happen if the fcc pushed the issue. The public would drop broadband and go dialup_bbs's_or_wirless/freenet_node_internet_gate way devices. I personally think the taxpayers are getting screwed by the fcc's limiting the range on wirless equipment, they are in effect saying, "we're keeping the telco's into business by limiting what the technology will offer, the ability to make irrelivent traditional wired connectivity shall be forbidden."
They are doing everything they can to make sure when it crashes, it'll be hard.
And the really, really sad thing is that even though IE supposedly forces you to its update site half the time it starts, people still don't download the god damn patches.
Actually, the situation is a lot less confusing than it looks.
It's always nice when someone is "doing the right thing", so being happy that the corporations are doing this is ok.
However, the problem is that they shouldn't have the power to do so in the first place. Companies should be in no position to lobby either for a more open or for a more closed internet.
So we can be happy about what they're doing, but not happy about the general political climate simultaneously. Simple.
My Sig: SEGV
The cable-TV industry has said there's no reason to adopt such rules, because it has no intention of discriminating against Web sites or limiting new technologies.
So, we're supposed to take their word for that, right?
This is just one more example of why companies are completely hypocritical and can never be taken at their word. If MS, Amazon.com, and Walt Disney were in the position of AOL/TimeWarner, they would take *exactly* the opposite position. Worse yet, if they switched positions with AOL/TimeWarner, then they would switch to *exactly* the opposite position.
Lessig has talked about his in "The Future of Ideas".
None of these companies have the public interest in mind. Only *their* interest. They can make useful allies in the same sense that mercenaries make useful allies: temporary, unloyal, and certainly not trustworthy.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
AOL, MSN, and Compuserve are all basically ISPs. They don't offer the last mile connection themselves.
If users don't like them, the users can switch to another provider, usually with a wide variety.
However, a high-speed user has at most two options: Cable-internet and DSL. If one of these providers decides to limit sites and services, it makes it really easy for the other one to limit sites and services as well.
If that happens, users will have to either suffer limited sites and services with high-speed, or slow connections.
Of course, the slow connections are only available until everyone has switched to high speed service. After that, what are the chances that the local ISPs will survive?