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Will the FCC Regulate the Net?
Lam1969 writes "Computerworld's Robert Mitchell wonders if the FCC could one day have regulatory power over the Internet. The causes? As telephone calls are increasingly delivered as an IP service, and traditional telephony fades away, traditional telephone companies are demanding a level regulatory regimen for all service providers. From the article: "Assuming that the FCC buys arguments such as this, we could see a new regulatory focus on the Internet and a decline in the hands-off attitude shown in the past. From the regulators' viewpoint, the Internet increasingly may be viewed as just another utility that requires oversight.""
Geeks around the nation will revolt if this happens. It's not a good idea. Also consider that America isn't the whole world. They can't regulate the whole Internet now, can they?
The FCC has no juristiction outside the US. Plus the article in question pertains to VOIP and telephony not the entire internet.
Mitchell makes the classic error in assuming "the internet" only exists in the US.
I'd like to see him explain how he thinks the US is going to suddenly make rules for the rest of the world, with the many telecommunications providers run as government-owned monopolies, or even provide "Universal Service" for, say, Germany.
The internet will route around the damage, like it always does, and if the US enacts too many rules for its portion, American companies will lose business over it. That's all there is to it. In fact, since everyone is already plenty upset over ICANN retaining monopolistic levels of control, any further attempts to exercise control over countries will possibly lead to them setting up an entire infrastructure alternative in defiance.
Get off my launchpad!
I feel the FCC is one of the most unconstitutional organizations in the Federal government today.
The FCC is basically the big media conglomerates arm in government, creating an extremely high cost of entry in media markets, preventing smaller companies or individuals from trying to compete. The days when we needed the FCC are over -- we have so many different ways to communicate that we don't need any regulation over those systems. Any regulation that takes 5 years to create will be superceded by competitive companies finding loopholes (or bribing their way past restrictions).
Even the old belief that airwaves are limited and should be regulated is bunk. Interference from large broadcasters is a myth. Ever wonder how your house can have 3 cell phones, 3 cordless phones and 15 wireless accessories work together? It isn't the FCC that's helping this situation, it is manufacturers working with one another so they can all compete.
The telephone company is dead -- as WiFi or faster wireless bandwidth is made available, even cell phones will be antiquated. I can imagine a near-future of open bandwidth, frequency-hopping competitive technologies that walk all over each other yet don't conflict. The more power you want to broadcast, the more energy you'll need to do so. If some large radio tower company wanted to block EVERY FREQUENCY for hundreds of miles, do you know how much it would cost them? Look at just the FM radio spectrum -- they couldn't afford it. A 50,000 watt radio station broadcasting at one tiny sliver of a frequency has a HUGE electric bill. The only way you could stay in business is with advertisers, and who wants to be affiliated with a company that burns everyone's communications?
Without the FCC, we'd see thousands or tens of thousands of community broadcasters. Picture Mr. Universe versus 10,000 mosquitos. Who would win?
If the FCC regulates the Internet, we'll find ways to get around it. The user can obfuscate transmitted information faster than our government can decode it. If they find quick ways to decode it, we'll find other ways to hide information within information. The FCC can attempt to regulate the Internet, but it will be a failure. Information has found freedom, and there is no stopping it. 6 year olds are using google, 72 year olds are using Skype. Can a government "of the People, by the People and for the People" go against the People any long?
I'm ready to make an effigy of the FCC and burn it. Are you?
I had occasion to consult the FCC a few years ago and was told that a major function of the FCC was to ensure that the governmnet didn't take all the aavailable frequencies. There are other regulatory needs for control of frequencies and power of course but I would hope that we can stop them from expanding their control over what should be non-issues for them. Trouble is that the foxes want to control the hen house and this administration favors that view.
Nate
With all this talk from various Baby Bells about how they will provide different levels of service for traffic originating from someone other than their customers, we might actually *want* a little regulation in the future.
Before the FCC was co-opted by the Religious Right AKA the American Taliban, they actually did things like shut down pirate radio stations and make sure that the phone company actually provided the service they were legally obligated to provide.
Obviously, I don't want the FCC keeping my internet porn from me, but if some routers in the middle are slowing my downloads because I'm not their direct customer, government regulation might be a solution.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
without the FCC you would never know when you turn on the TV if the rich prick down the street is broadcasting goatse over all the channels at 5000 watts
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
The government never tried to reulgate Internet content when everyone was using dial-up. It seems like they would have had a better argument since dial-up uses regular phone lines to to transmit data.
This is just the old, entrenched telcos trying to shut down VOIP as competition to their antiquited landline systems. They already tried to do this by having the FCC force VOIP companies implement 911 service. And when cellular providers still don't have 911 service wiorking properly, and the cell companies have been around far longer than the VOIP companies.
The telcos are regualted because they were given a limited monopoly in landline service in the early 20th century. VOIP providers have no monopoly, as anyone can send data packets over an existing 'net connection.
The problem is that the exorbitant taxes applied to landlines, and the innefficiencies in the existing infrastructure make landlines unattractive for more and more people. I gave up my landline, and just have cell phones for my family.
If the FCC starts regulating VOIP as a communcations system, will they try to regulate TeamSpeak? What Battlefield 2 or XBox Live, both of which have Voice capability? What about IM systems with voice?
Poll: Who here wants the internet to be regulated?
*crickets*
*hooting owl*
*tree frogs chirping*
*leaves rustling in the wind*
*lone howling wolf in the far-off distance*
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Even the old belief that airwaves are limited and should be regulated is bunk. Interference from large broadcasters is a myth. Ever wonder how your house can have 3 cell phones, 3 cordless phones and 15 wireless accessories work together?
Wow, man - are you even listening to yourself? The airwaves are limited, by the laws of physics. If we both broadcast on the same frequency, some device somewhere is going to be seeing each of our signals at an equal, and equally useless strength. Why can I be typing this message through Wi-Fi in my house, watching AIM on my mobile phone next to me, and knowing that my wireless house phone will still work, even when I'm microwaving my soup for lunch? Exactly because there are regs and legal recourse when people screw with what makes all of that work. Do you REALLY want the guy next door deciding that it's OK by him if he puts up a megawatt transmitter that happens to step exactly on all of those devices' carriers?
The telephone company is dead -- as WiFi or faster wireless bandwidth is made available
Well, I suppose that depends on what the meaning if "is" is (heh!). Since I talked to my mom on her copper land line this morning, I'm thinking it's not actually dead. And since I talked to my mother-in-law, in rural Virginia, just the other day... you know, in an area that's too mountainous for any line-of-site carrier, and where cable-based broadband is years away, and DSL won't go the distance... the "telephone company" isn't dead there, either. It's the only thing that DOES work, or will work for a long time.
If some large radio tower company wanted to block EVERY FREQUENCY for hundreds of miles, do you know how much it would cost them?
So what? There are people with lots of money that would love vanity moments like that. You know, people like George Soros who are willing to spend tens of millions of dollars to impact elections... he'd LOVE to blanket all of downtown NY, even for a few minutes, with a signal no one could escape. Or, what about someone who doesn't care about paying the electric bill? You know, one-last-gasp type idealogical or vandal broadcasting?
Can a government "of the People, by the People and for the People" go against the People any long?
You wouldn't be referring to the government that actually created the 'net in the first place, would you? You know, as a defense research project? You make "the internet" sound like it actually exists as single thing. It's not. It's a bunch of individual, corporate, insitutional, government, and foreign networks all communicating with each other - a network of networks. If municipal governments are supposed to start trusting VoIP for 911 calls, etc, then they are going to expect a certain amount of predictability and interopability in the way that some of the those networks talk to each other. If that can't be established, then they'll just continue to expect "the telephone company" to take care of it for them, and enforce that through the large regulatory burdens that those companies carry.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The real issue here is not some need for the FCC to regulate the internet, but for the FCC to ensure that the use of VoIP has 911 emergency access. As VoIP becomes more frequently used, it's only natural and smart for the FCC to impose 911 emergency access to VoIP users in order to ensure a very basic level of user safety:
"TCS said that it will partner with infrastructure operators that can deliver VoIP E911 calls to Public Safety Answering Points serving approximately 190 million people in the US.
Its service is designed for mobility and enables the routing and delivery of the E911 VoIP caller's registered location information to the PSAP nearest to the emergency caller's current location.
John Crabill, 911 coordinator for Montgomery county, stated, "Having a full-scale solution in place for the routing and delivery of the caller's current registered location in the event they place an E911 VoIP call provides our citizens with the added security in knowing that we can find them in the event of an emergency." In June 2005, the FCC published its E911 Order requiring all interconnected VoIP service providers to automatically provide E911 services to all customers as a standard, mandatory feature without customers having to specifically request this service, and without the ability to opt out."
source
Health Insurance Quotes
Ok, so the FCC was given the right to regulate the air waves under the premise that due to the relative lack of choice (back when there were 4 TV channels), and due to the fact that the EM spectrum is a public resource that is leased by private companies.
But now that there are a lot more than 4 channels, how does this continue to fly? Is it simply because the EM spectrum is leased that the FCC somehow has the power to stop people from saying shit on ABC?
What happens if these broadcasting companies start moving over to WiMAX/UWB-style technologies, where a huge part of the spectrum is used and certain frequencies are no longer require to be reserved (or leased) from the government? Will this then finally kill the last argument the government has to continue to limit free speech on TV and radio?
And how can there be proposals to regulate the internet and cable when none of the "justifications" for censorship exist in these mediums?
Seems to me that is a damn good case to be made that the FCC's power to censor, at least in the case of cable/internet/non-leased-EM-Spectrum mediums, is a direct and unjustifiable violation of the 1st Amendment.
Regulation has nothing to do with distinguishing VOIP packets or controling volume, it's about capitalizing on a growing industry, and for the telcos asking for the regulations it's about leveling the playing field.
Have you ever looked at your (US) phone bill? I rely on my cell phone but keep a basic dialtone at home in case of power outage, tsunami, terroist act (I live in NYC) or some other catastrophe. Ove 50% of the $20/month I pay comes from surcharges, including:
FCC Line Charge 6.40
911 Surcharge 1.00
Federal USF Surcharge 0.66
Federal Tax 0.50
Surcharge(s) 0.91
NY State/Local Sales Tax 1.40
In theory VOIP can offer the same service at the same cost for half the price because of the regulatory surcharges and taxes. The phonecos are put at a competetive disadvantage simply because their bill includes fees the VOIPs don't. If you had a choice of dialtones and one was 50% cheaper than the other what would you choose? More importanly what would the average technologically ignorant consumer chose?
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