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Net Neutrality Never Really Existed?
dido writes "In his most recent column, Robert X. Cringely observes that network neutrality may have never really existed at all. It appears that some, perhaps all, of the major broadband ISPs have been implementing tiered service levels for a long time. From the article: 'What turns out to be the case is that some ISPs have all along given priorities to different packet types. What AT&T, Comcast and the others were trying to do was to find a way to be paid for priority access — priority access that had long existed but hadn't yet been converted into a revenue stream.'" Cringely comes to this conclusion after being unable to get a fax line working. His assumption that the (Vonage) line's failure to support faxing is due to Comcast packet prioritizing is not really supported or proved. But his main point about the longstanding existence of service tiering will come as no surprise to this community.
The last time I tried to setup something similar, I came to a dead end, find several sources via Google that indicated that the compression used by fax machines was incompatible with the compression used by VOIP. Has the stat of the improved, or is Bob on a goose chase here?
"You can't dissect him, predict him, which of course means he's not a lunatic at all."
Man, that takes me back.
Of course, what you are pointing out is the basic flaw with the whole 'net neutrality' argument. It's not a public network, per se. It's owned and opperated by someone. They have the right and privledge to impose what ever restrictions they want on people.
When I first got into the ISP business about 14 years ago, there were a few basic rules that we insisted people follow as terms of their service
1) Dont do anything illegal. We will rat you out.
2) If you want to run an ISP, thats fine, we have special rates for heavy users
3) If your usage for your web host exceedes a reasonable percentage of our available bandwidth, we reserve the right to raise your rate.
No one seemed to have any issues with these simple rules.
Cringly is even getting bitchslaped for being an ignorant dumbass over this on his own website. Serves him right.
This is a non sequitur. Just because it is an owned network does not mean they have the right to restrict people however they want. I may own a private road, but that does not automatically grant me the right to deny passage to the people that own the mineral rights to that same land. I may own a flower shop, but that does not grant me the right to deny service to blacks, without repercussions.
These privately owned networks were funded largely with our tax dollars, hundreds of billions of them the government provided in subsidies. Many of these privately owned networks run on public right of ways to which the government has granted them an exclusive monopoly. Further, those same private businesses are being granted exemption from obeying the law, namely copyright laws, libel laws, pornography laws, free trade laws, conspiracy laws, etc. Those exemptions from obeying the law are granted under "common carrier" statutes that say impartial carriers goods and information are not held liable for what they carry provided they impartially carry everything. I say it is just fine for these private businesses to decide not to be impartial and to slow down or block traffic from some people to gain a competitive advantage. What I object to is them doing that, and being exempted from punishment for the laws. Common carriers are a public service and that is the only reason they are protected. If you're not serving the common good and are just making money for yourself without benefiting society, why should you be given special privileges?
When I first got into the ISP business about 14 years ago, there were a few basic rules that we insisted people follow as terms of their serviceSo here's the problem... the rules you list have nothing to do with net neutrality. Net neutrality is simply about treating some traffic differently than others not based upon the type, nor the traffic levels, but based upon the person or location from which the traffic is being generated. You can block all users that send more than a gig a day. What you can't do is block just the black users that send more than a gig a day, or just the republican users that use more than a gig a day, or even the users that do business with your competitor and use more than a gig a day... if you still want to be given all the special privileges that are given to common carriers.
I may own a flower shop, but that does not grant me the right to deny service to blacks
I'm confused. Could you rephrase in the form of a car analogy?
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