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Net Neutrality a Threat to Online OSes?
tomtechie writes "OSWeekly.com talks about net neutrality and how it would impact the world of operating systems, both online and offline. The author states, 'I know of a couple of people who support the legislation despite the fact that it could possibly enable ISPs to restrict access for those who are not willing to pay a premium fee for broader access. They have a strong belief that it is needed in order to make sure that ISPs have the tools and funds to expand their already overtaxed networks. Keeping in line with their belief system, this allows ISPs to make sure that developing connectivity can in fact, keep up with the explosive demand for broadband in more places. In other words, it allows for fatter pipes.'"
In other words, it allows for fatter pipes.
Agreed! It's always good to let private industry widen up those tubes!
I'll be honest, we're throwing science against the wall to see what sticks. -Cave Johnson
I wonder where an online OS fits between the hourses and lottery balls flushing Ted Steven's pipes. (Last night's Daily Show on Net Neutrality)
If you can't grow your broadband, get a loan. If you can't get it, don't expand. If you can't host a service, don't host it. Simple as that.
ISPs don't host mirrors of popular free content out of generosity or because they are such open source fanatics, they do it so you suck that 6+gig image from their local mirror (i.e. only generate traffic inside their net, which they can charge you for but costs them zip) instead of leeching it from overseas (which costs them as well as you).
Don't fall for that, please.
As for "online OS", could anyone tell me the benefit of having even less control over the OS I'm running?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Two Hundred Billion Dollars were set aside for exactly this purpose. To charge people TWICE is just a way of getting more money.
Come on. Where did the money go?!
AccountKiller
Isn't one of the fundamental principals of capitalism that the strongest companies will survive? In other words, for a company to be strong, it needs to invest in itself to give itself a competitive advantage over others? To me, it seems like "fattening the pipes" is just something else that needs to be a corporate investment. The telcos/ISPs/whatever seem to be saying "pay up or we won't invest in making things better".
I just can't wrap my head around why ISP's need a NEW chargable interaction. If the ISP needs more money to improve their pipes, either raise the prices for your customers or gain more customers.
What's so hard about that? If Google's traffic is bogging your network, raise the price on your contract with Google. They will either pay the price, so you can expand, or they will fire up the dark net, opening tons of your pipe back up.
The back bone carriers increase rates for the high tier ISPs, they raise rates for the low teir ISPs, they raise rates for what the consumer's pay. Viola! The pipe bilders get more money, the consumers and businesses still pay for them, and no one gets censored.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
I think you're being a troll, but I'm going to take the bait anyways.
Too many services, both public and private, are moving to the internet. My healthcare provider won't send me an id card, I have to go to their website and print it. My State Civil Service Office requires that I apply for the Technology Analyst list by online application only. New York City has put their entire database of tickets and fines online so that if I plead not guilty to a parking ticket and am found guilty, I have to go online to find it and pay it. The Internet was built with public funding and it should be a public service. If the telcos are going to battle against Municipal Wireless, then they shouldn't be allowed to charge more for fatter tunnels.
Net Neutrality is not a business concept, it's based on a theory in computer science that the most efficient and cheapest networks are those based on the principle that protocol operations (i.e. TCP/IP) should occur at the end-points of the network.
See "End-to-end arguments in system design" by Jerome H. Saltzer, David P. Reed, and David D. Clark:
This principle was used by DARPA when it worked on Internet design and it's the reason TCP/IP communications have experienced massive growth.
It's a principle supported by almost everyone except the backbone owners. Verizon's CEO has said many times that the pipes belong to him and if you're going to make a profit off them then he wants a cut too (referring to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, et al who oppose Net Neut).
An example of a non-net-neut service is a cell-phone. I'm no fan of government regulation, but I don't want my ISP bill to start looking like my cell-phone bill.
I also don't understand why people can't realize that "net neutrality" means preserving the existing internet. It's all about equality of packets. Everything else on the subject is FUD. Light the dark fiber or charge a proper fee base on bytes-per-second (megabytes per month doesn't control tube-clogging, it's more like a truck model). We're really supposed to believe Google doesn't pay for all the video they're transmitting? Hah.
(By the way, OSWeekly could unclog the tubes with a better web design. One sentence per page to maximize ad loads is ridiculous and I sure stopped reading by the third page.)
Unfortunately for Ted Stevens' tubes, it doesn't work that way. Right now the broadband providers have a motivation to create larger amounts of generally available bandwidth. What would happen under a regime that doesn't include net neutrality is that they'd make more money, but there's no reason to believe they'll invest that money in bigger pipes on the consumer end.
Right now, how does a broadband provider get more money from a customer? Offering more bandwidth or providing additional services like VOIP, IPTV, etc. But if net neutrality isn't protected, then that's no longer where they make their money. They will make their money in creating tiered services and charing external providers to get different levels of service through their network. So rather than competing for your dollar, they'll be competing for Google's dollar, or simply pricing superior service in such a way as to eliminate competition for those services mentioned above.
As soon as subscribers become nothing more than a pool of consumers for broadband providers to sell to service providers, bandwidth will stop increasing. What incentive would they have to offer 10Mbps to you if 5 is sufficient to provide the services they want to offer? They'll be investing in equipment to tier their network services, not in putting fiber into your house.
Furthermore, consumers will be paying for this tiering through more expensive services. The bandwidth providers will either charge too high of a fee to use their tiered service and force out competition or they'll simply charge a fee to the competitors just below the level that forces them out and the consumer will pay for it in higher subscription fees and more ads. So what you'll see if your monthly bill will slowly creep up due to lack of local competition, but your bandwidth will not increase significantly and your overall cost for network based services will go up.
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This is the difference between "Free" USA and "Communist" Europe I guess...
In europe, Internet access is already 5x faster for easily half the price. In most of western europe, you can get a 20Mbps pipe in your house to deliver internet, tv (over IP) and phone (VoIP, although they do not call it that there or even make any difference for it).
In Europe, they forced the local operators (usually state owned) to open the local loop, allowing anyone to install their equipement to connect your house to their network. The result? Healthy competition driving the services up and the cost down.
Sure, Europe has a much higher population density than the US, BUT, if that was the only problem, you would have that level of service in any metropolitan area capable to sustain it. This is far from the case here... What happenned is the telcos concentrated on low speed "broadband" and low price. Consummer answered on those terms. You can grab a 1.5Mb/128kb for less than $15 (if you already pay for phone service, get into a 1 year contract and promise your first born) while in Europe, they get 20Mb/1Mb, phone and TV for 30 euros (which is about $40).
"Communist" Europe regulated (forced the operator to open the loop) and got competition. "Capitalist" USA protected the interests of their lobbyists and got a price gouging.
Keeping in line with their belief system, this allows ISPs to make sure that developing connectivity can in fact, keep up with the explosive demand for broadband in more places. In other words, it allows for fatter pipes.
I agree that that is the theoretical ideal that the free market shoots for. However, given that this is not a free market we are talking about (many of the players involved have explicit fiat monopolies, and all have contract-established trusts), the free-market argument doesn't necessarily hold water.
The very real fear is that the legal right to restrict access will be used as a barrier to entry. Most major corporations in the US today focus massive resources on developing and expanding barriers to entry, because they allow you to charge above-market prices. Patents, exclusive contracts, volume contracts, per-employee licensing, per-computer licensing, and dozens of other lawyerly schemes; all these things are thinly veiled barriers to entry based on government and court fiat power. They destroy the competition on which the free market depends for efficiency. All these things are heavily invested in by corporations that claim to be free market capitalists, but are in fact oligopolists and fiat monopolists.
It is killing our global competitiveness. We're getting our asses handed to us in the auto market by China, Korea, and Japan because the cushy barriers to entering our auto markets made Ford, Chrysler, and GM fat, lazy, and stupid (not respectively, all three are all three). Blocking competition is nice in the short run from the corporate executive's stock-option perspective, but it is miserable in the long run. For the consumer it even sucks in the short run.
That is the real problem with net bias - it is another way that corporations are granted a legal right to bar entry.
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True - and it's exactly like every other tax-supported network, such as roads and the mail system. These projects are ultra-critical national infrastructure, and they seem to do just fine with public support.
It's telling that these other systems also have "neutrality," and it works extremely well. The USPS has no interest in delaying your parcel by two weeks. Every driver on the freeway is bound by the same set of rules. And guess what - when we need extra capacity, the taxpayers buy it! What's wrong with that system?
The difference is that unlike these government projects, the internet backbone is almost entirely privatized. It's true that ultraconservatives ordinarily support privatization as "more efficient" than government support. But haven't we recently seen some phenomenally anti-consumer behavior in privatized industries? And this administration is hardly a "typical" conservative gang - the federal bureaucracy has grown explosively under its leadership. Odd, that. I guess it depends whether the heads of the corporate shepherds are your friends.
The problem, as future economic historians will state in tragic retrospect, is that unlike the federal government, private corporations do not have their customers' best interests at heart - often they're in direct conflict. We don't put Microsoft in charge of our missile defense network, because every 20 minutes, they'd be hassling the federal government to pay their monthly licensing fees for the laser-guidance software!
It's more evidence of our shameful government that has completely discarded the notion of serving the people.
- David Stein
Computer over. Virus = very yes.