FTC Says 'Slow Down' on Net Neutrality

Bushido Hacks writes "The Washington Post reports that the Federal Trade Commission has fumbled the Network Neutrality Act, again, as of this past week. However, the FTC defended its actions saying that their decision was not a give-in to the big telecom and cable companies. Instead, the FTC report urges caution on Network Neutrality Regulation. While this news is disappointing, the FTC's decision appears to be thought out and a message to remind people to not let the subject of Net Neutrality be abandoned by the general public so corporations could undermine the interest of consumers. We discussed the row this created, but with constant stalling tactics being employed here how long will it be before net neutrality opponents craft their own legislation?"

Comments

Let them get rid of their own network neutrality.

[Spazntwich]

Americans are still consumers, and while we may be a largely unthinking purchasing mass, people can quite easily distinguish "shitty" from "awesome" which is exactly the distinction one can make between a mass media run network with terrible latency and low bandwidth and one run by, say, Google.

If the networks go to hell in a flaming hand basket, what would it take for Google to start lighting up fiber they already own? Get a few major metropolitan areas wired up, get word out, and consumers will begin switching in droves. It wouldn't take much pressure beyond that to wake up the telecoms and get them right back into the game.

I'm no free market blind follower, but this seems like a situation when a viable and large enough competitor is sitting in the wings, ready to smack the wannabe monopolists upside the head if they attempt their backwater cousin fucking ideas of raping the connections we pay for.

Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[seebs]

Look, I know that everyone here gets regular blowjobs from network neutrality, but I'm just wondering. Having looked at the Patriot Act, and the YES-YOU-CAN-SPAM act, and our "healthcare system" (I use the term loosely), and our current, uhm, whatever it is, but it's certainly not a war, over in Iraq...

Are you guys SURE you want the US federal government legislating this?

I have said it before, and I suppose it's time to say it again: Most of the time, when I see someone try to articulate what "network neutrality" means, that they want legislated, they end up with a set of words which, if they were a law, would prevent me from blocking spammers and DDOSers. There are good reasons for which networks are sometimes rather decidedly non-neutral about which traffic they carry, and there are real reasons for which people would like to have the option of paying for guaranteed bandwidth.

Most of the horror stories come down to "what if I only got the sorta dodgy networking I'm currently paying for, but other people were able to buy a better network." Not all; there's real potential for abuse. I just don't think I trust the US federal government to come up with something better, no matter how smart or good the people advocating it are... And honestly, a lot of the advocacy I see is knee-jerk reactions that haven't even bothered to gloss over the question of whether teergrubing should be illegal, or any of the dozens of other technical questions this raises.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

It is quite simple really, all the legislation needs to say is that

no provider or network owner can distinguish between the traffic on their network based on a payment in access of a normal fees others are charged or charge individual parties additionally or above what it charges to connect the networks together.

In addition, no Internet Service provider or network connection in the service of the internet can charge more, restrict, throttle or otherwise interfere with the delivery of services and information to the requesting consumer. No network owner or ISP can cause by their own action, any service or information to be delivered to the consumer at data speed rates slower then the implied speed of their connect. Anyone advertising the implied speed of an Internet connection must make an honest effort at providing the services as they advertised it. Taking an action, installing a device or changing settings incidentally or on purpose is evidence of not acting in an honest manor.

This does not include the hosting company or private side of the network where a server isn't connected to the promise of speed and may be limited by their own service providers limits.

Each violation when done in mass or multiple instances shall be treated separately from each other and count as a separate and single violation. Each violation found to be willful will carry a $5000 fine and the parties involved are allowed to file suit for the same.

Something like that should mean that if they attempt to degrade your connection because of a payment a the website or service didn't make and that you are requesting, they are subject to a fine for each instance. So in cases of www.google.com being throttled, if 10,000 people are effected, they can sue for $5000 for each time they are effected, google can sue for 10,000*$5000 for having all those customers effected and the company involved would have to pay 10,000*$5000 to the government.

Lets say it slowed 5 visits down, that's 50,000,000 per incident or 250,000,000 to consumers, 250,000,000 to the government, and $250,000,000 to google. So unless they can make more then $750,000,000 from the deal in 5 turns, it is going to be a loss every time it is tried. But it allows for problems with the network that get fixed without demanding payment from third party people. The wording could probably be trimmed down a bit too. But it doesn't have to be complicated.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[Anonymous Coward]

You, sir, put the word "naive" to shame. It's not that simple. And even if it were, the law we'll end up with won't be. What good is simplicity in principle if we have no hope of seeing it put into practice? It will be a 1000-page, technology-stupid, nonsensical, hole-ridden disaster and if you don't know that then you should!

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[Revotron]

o_O How did your fine structure jump from $5000 to $50,000,000? I support enforcing Net Neutrality... but come on, that's just rude.

Also, what's to stop all the false claims that people will make just to make a quick buck?

I know it's too much to ask of you all that you just drop your ISPs if they rate-limit a service or become anti-neutrality (imagine a few million nerds screaming "My precious!"), but there are only two things in the US that can stop net neutrality - the free market and the government, and alot of you seem to despise the latter.

If the government can't or won't enforce network neutrality, then it is up to us, as the consumer, to stand up and show anti-neutral ISPs that we have a voice and a choice.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[Stradivarius]

I believe part of the problem is that nobody can even seem to agree on what the heck "net neutrality" is supposed to mean.

You've got some (like the article) that make the term basically about QoS - whether you can treat streaming video differently than email. I don't really see what there is to get upset about if service providers prioritize real-time applications over non-realtime applications.

On the other hand, you've got others who make the term about business relationships. I.e. is a service provider obligated to provide service to Company A on the same terms as Company B? There it's a lot more murky. If it's just a matter of volume discounts, then I have a hard time seeing what's different about internet providers providing discounts versus, say, FedEx or UPS providing volume discounts for package deliveries. The one potential area of concern, IMO, is the antitrust angle - is a service provider allowed to discriminate against a customer in order to benefit its other businesses in separate markets?

The devil is in the details with these proposals, and the "network neutrality" slogan doesn't really clue you in about what specifically is meant to be neutral. So I agree that caution is very much warranted here.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[Anonymous Coward]

Last week I went into my Congressman's local office. I laid out my side regarding many issues. When it came to Net Neutrality I did not say I was for or against it. I stated what I did not want to happen. My reason for this is that I have read about way too many people stating they are for or against Net Neutrality but when they give their reasons they are sometimes the opposite of what they said. If a legislative bill is what it takes to keep people from taking freedoms away, then a legislative bill is what is needed. Although I think we could do with a lot fewer laws and a lot more enforcement of the ones we have. No need to re-invent the wheel just because a computer is involved.

The issue with Net Neutrality is that no one has made an actual statement of what is what. The statements that have been made are so thoroughly diluted that they do not hit the key issues.

So please, someone tell me which side of this fight I am on. My stance is this:

I do not want a tiered Internet. AOL was like this many years ago, I did not like it and did not use service from AOL, as I wanted to reach everything not just what AOL said I could.*

I pay for access to the Internet. Google pays for its access to the Internet. If I want to visit Google, I do not want anything artificial to stop me or to slow me down. I do not want a higher level ISP, or even my ISP to request that Google pay them for the privilege of getting my request.

I also have a website that is hosted elsewhere. If for some unknown reason I get a huge influx of people visiting my site, I do not want to be contacted by some third party telling me that I need to pay them money in order to keep those visitors coming. Now my site host calling me up saying I need to up my plan to avoid going over my allowable bandwidth is fine, as I signed up for a certain amount of bandwidth, but I knew that when I signed my contract.

*In regards to AOL. If they have something on their network that I wanted to visit then I would either have to go without, or sign up with them. If my local cable company wanted to offer IPTV to its Internet subscribers, then fine, no issues there. If I am not signed up with them, then I should not get their content over the Internet. I mention this, as this is the gist of what my Senator replied with in regards to my inquiry about Net Neutrality earlier this year. He avoided saying exactly what Net Neutrality was, he only mentioned a situation where an ISP wanted to offer content directly over the Internet. I have no problem with ISPs offering content directly over the Internet, but they better not purposefully slow down a secondary party if I chose to view that party's content instead of theirs.

For the record the Senator I received the response from was Durbin of Illinois.

Please someone tell me where I am mis-interpreting things. And if I am mixing both sides up. I will attempt to read through the Wikipedia article later, so please no links to that, unless you have a particular section of interest. Thank you.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[cdrguru]

Why would anyone purchase "broadband" Internet service with a guaranteed speed of 5Kbps? Because that is about all that can be actually promised and delivered 24x7x365 ,day in and day out.

Why? Because DSL and cable do not deliver "guaranteed" bandwidth. They deliver access to a shared resource. I believe Verizon FIOS delivers access to shared bandwidth as well. None of these can make any absolute guarantees as to what is actually available at any point in time other than taking the total available and dividing it by the number of customers. If everyone is trying to use the maximum possible bandwidth at any one time, this is all everyone is going to get.

Trust me, this is a lot less than the 12MB that some cable systems are advertising that your speed can be "up to". Way less. So much less that dial-up seems to be pretty attractive because you are very likely to get your full 28.8Kbps. Anything over that is in reality a digital connection that is once again shared bandwidth.

If what you want is bandwidth guarantees, you are looking at a complete teardown of the infrastructure that has been built. None of what is considered "residential" connections today provide any guarantees whatsoever.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[vertinox]

Are you guys SURE you want the US federal government legislating this?

Not really, but unfortunately they have been legislating and funding the internet from the get go.

Most of the telcoms have basically been willing to take millions of dollars worth of tax breaks and tax payer money from back in the 90's when they were basically subsidizing fiber roll out.

So in reality, telcoms were and currently are basically government regulated monopolies.

If you don't like net neutrality, they the only real solution would be to tear down the barriers of entry, break up the telcoms (again) and make a rule they are never to merge never ever again under no circumstances under pain of death.

Then we can talk about no government regulation of the internet's backbone.

Until then... They are simply government mandated monopolies.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

It would be $50000 each time it happened, So if it happened to 10,000 people, that would be $50,000,000 in fines. And then your could even take it on a per instance so it if happened 5 times on those 10,000 people, it would be 50,000,000*5 or 250,000,000.

I don't find this rationel offensive either. I think the purpose of a fine is to discourage an activity. If they can pay the fine and still profit, they won't be too discouraged.

Also, what's to stop all the false claims that people will make just to make a quick buck?

You would have to have someone make a complaint around the same time some service made a complaint. Of course, it wouldn't be a valid complaint if the ISP or netwrk provider says Router X blewup last night, but in order for them to make money, they would have to be asking Google or yahoo for extra money in some way. So it isn't that there will be false claims, it is that there would be claims that are unsubstantiated. I mean, the idea of net neutrality is to stop the degradation of services based on a third party payment. It that third party hasn't been asked to pay, then were is the problem? And of course you could tell if everything comming through the hub is slowed or if it is just that one company who didn't buy PlanX from some Telco.

It would take some investigation. I don't think the FCC needs a law to investigate complaints would they?

I know it's too much to ask of you all that you just drop your ISPs if they rate-limit a service or become anti-neutrality (imagine a few million nerds screaming "My precious!"), but there are only two things in the US that can stop net neutrality - the free market and the government, and alot of you seem to despise the latter.

I have one option for high speed Internet in my area. Well, i have another option, satellite, but the lags and my bandwidth usage places me beyond the fair use clause and I end up getting dial up speeds all the time. Plus there is the $500 install and all. It just isn't an option for a lot of people in America. I'm 200 to 300 yards from a time warner line that connects 2 small towns to a larger one, My neighbors have roadrunner and can get cable TV. They told me it wasn't economically feasible to service my house 2-300 yards away.

But the problem is worse then any ISP. An ISP leases their lines from someone else and there are interconnect hubs and networks that allow the data to go across multiple networks if necessary in order to get to the destination. Most of these networks have been instituted under the protections of a government monopoly called a utility. Now, the decentralized system was originally mandated because they didn't want pacific edison or something charging the east coast for service. and there is a known that the information would go both directions creating a mutual need. Now, when you buy your Internet service, yo do so dealing with one person who has secured the right to resell your connection to you. When Qwest or some other network owner wants to charge you personally more for visiting websites or whatever that cross over to their network before getting into your network, changing ISP will have no effect. You cannot easily change networks and routing on the internet because of the way the Internet is.

If the government can't or won't enforce network neutrality, then it is up to us, as the consumer, to stand up and show anti-neutral ISPs that we have a voice and a choice.

That sounds good and all, But i don't think you understand the gravity of the situation, people you never see currently can limit the data along the parts of their network that your web surfing passes over depending on weather google or yahoo or whoever has paid a special rate to them. You can take your money anywhere you want but it won't influence them because you are not paying them directly in the first place. This isn't a matter of writing a nasty letter to your ISP, your ISP may not be th

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[timmarhy]

"when I see someone try to articulate what "network neutrality" means, that they want legislated, they end up with a set of words which, if they were a law, would prevent me from blocking spammers and DDOSers"

rubbish, you block spammers at the mailserver not at the routers. in fact net neutrality doesn't even apply to YOU, unless you is an isp. DDoS is easy to cover in an unambiguous clause.

"there are real reasons for which people would like to have the option of paying for guaranteed bandwidth."

i'm sure they do have real reasons - such as profit. that doesn't mean it should be allowed at the expense of everyone else. the core problem with paying for speed is it amount to double charging for the same service. i pay to access the internet, the website pays for it's access, the teleco's pay to interconnect to each other - why should they then all get to charge websites AGAIN?

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[complete loony]

Ideally, an ISP should not be able to abuse it's last mile monopoly to exclude competition, or to extort other businesses.

If an ISP wants to provide a service to their customers, they should allow any competitor to provide that service. The customer network access and server hosting parts of their business should be completely separate from any additional services they may offer.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[seebs]

And why do they need to say that?

What's the problem this legislation is going to fix?

What happens when I want to run a spam filter, which blocks mail from large spam sources, but one of those sources has a single opt-in list that includes "requested information"? Right now, I can point out to my customers that, well, we have a spam filter. Under your wording, I'm in trouble for "interfering with the delivery of services and information". Sounds like a bad law to me.

Try again, and this time explain why we need this?

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[vuffi_raa]

this is the problem as well with in my neighborhood at&t. all lines are controlled by at&t and I was talking with someone on the inside the other day about this whole issue because I am looking to switch ISP's off of at&t to a local ISP- what he said is "do it, things won't change here until people start dropping accounts and people have been complaining and doing it at a rate of 5 to 10k a day".
He also gave me a bit of insight to where these rules are coming down from and as it happens at&t is evil, yes but corporate rules like file filtering and throttling and government spying were all initiated by yahoo who has a controlling interest in sbc/yahoo/at&t internet.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[fireboy1919]

But it allows for problems with the network that get fixed without demanding payment from third party people.

I don't know how I stand on this, as it does pose that interesting problem. Maybe just restrict proveably malicious behaviour.

Your solution doesn't work, though, because it fails on these two points:
1) You have to trace the money
It would be easy, for instance, to have a separate agency that does the actually traffic shaping. These "internet optimizers" could supposedly be independent agencies that just watch traffic and try to maximize the bandwidth of everybody by restricting flow certain services/websites intelligently - maybe, for example, under the guise of stopping spam. Of course, there are plenty of ways that such an agency could be slipped money under the table to support one specific service over others. That kind of thing happens all the time now on a different kind of traffic system - the US highway system. Traffic flow analysis is an art - and displaying the data in a way that supports the claim that your "client" needs priority is all too easy.

2) Define what "internet" means
Cable modem companies currently send a large stream of data through their pipes exclusively used for broadcasting television signals, and nobody else gets that. What would happen to that? It gets an exemption? Then what's to stop people from formatting other parts of their service similarly? This is really fuzzy.
In addition, what are the implications of such a definition? Will it, for instance, stop people from using TCP/IP for their infrastructure (in ATMs, cell phone networks, etc.) for fear of being considered part of the internet and therefore subject to net neutrality regulation? I don't want to see us go back to dozens of proprietary packet technologies over an issue like regulation.

I really want to see this work. But I don't know how it can, and I've not heard any ideas clever enough to make it happen.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

And why do they need to say that?

lol.. If you don't know why we need this then I have some people who wanna talk to you about some prime beach front property in Arizona. Common, are you serious? Have you followed the situation at all?

What's the problem this legislation is going to fix?M/i>

Here is a short rundown. At&t, verizon and several other ISPs are wanting to see you internet at advertised speed of 3 megs per secone or faster. They then want to slow certsian websits down based on how popular they might be and how much money they are making so if WWW.Google.com doesn't pay a fee in addition to this Internet access to your ISP directly, their paged may be slowed down to the equivilent of a 56k connection. Now this is doing two things, First it isn't delivering the content at the speed they told your you have. Second it is breaking the entire model of the internet where you get access and your can do whatever with any other computer in the world that has access. The idea being pushed by the telcos is instead of just getting internet access at both sites, you could end up have to buy your internet connection and then pay someone who controls the other connection yourself to send and receive traffic there without reguard to the other computers internet service.

Now think about this. Suppose you own to computer both with internet access, One at your home and one at your college dorm. Now imagine both having a T1 connection which is already slower then most broadband Internet but usually is a solid 1.5 megs. Suppose you want to copy homework assignments from the college computer to your home computer and they are on different ISPs or even the same but the routing takes it across some network not under the control of your ISP. So in order to transfer the files faster then dial up speed, you have to call the other network operators or the other ISP and pay them a sum of money on top of your normal internet service fees to get the line speeds they told you that you would have when getting the internet service. And then you go home, do your work in your spare time, take your vacation, visit the family and all that then want to transfer the homework back, Now you have to do the same and call someone to get faster then dial up speed to send it back, but this time it costs more because the homework is finished and each file it larger.

Currently they just want to do this with the larger websites and companies making money. But nothing is stopping them from realizing they could make more money by discriminating in all trafic that isn't theirs. That scenario is exactly how the telcos are wanting to do it. Google or Yahoo or whoever because of their success is going to have to pay them extra in order for you the customer, to receive the information or services at the line speeds you were told you have when you signed up for the service.

What happens when I want to run a spam filter, which blocks mail from large spam sources, but one of those sources has a single opt-in list that includes "requested information"? Right now, I can point out to my customers that, well, we have a spam filter. Under your wording, I'm in trouble for "interfering with the delivery of services and information". Sounds like a bad law to me.

Your only in trouble if you run the filter and then ask a spammer for payment to get through it. thats the entire Idea. Of course the spamfilter has to be an opt in or have a way to opt out. I wouldn't stand for any of my mail being filtered by anyone besides me. But the intent and way I wrote that was to be based on a payment or lack of. It also attempted to isolate operators of the service who are controlling the speed their server send their controlled information out. So as long as you aren't locking mail out based on the sender making a payment you aren't covered. So if you think is doesn't do that, then change it to something that does. The

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

1) You have to trace the money
It would be easy, for instance, to have a separate agency that does the actually traffic shaping. These "internet optimizers" could supposedly be independent agencies that just watch traffic and try to maximize the bandwidth of everybody by restricting flow certain services/websites intelligently - maybe, for example, under the guise of stopping spam. Of course, there are plenty of ways that such an agency could be slipped money under the table to support one specific service over others. That kind of thing happens all the time now on a different kind of traffic system - the US highway system. Traffic flow analysis is an art - and displaying the data in a way that supports the claim that your "client" needs priority is all too easy.

It is simple. Google, yahoo, or even you send a complaint to the FCC saying someone requested money to rout my traffic. I send in a complain saying every time I goto your site, it is slow as hell but isn't on the work computer. There is the money trail and the connection. Now it doesn't matter who is shaping the traffic, if SBC hires a ghost company to do it you will still have to scenarios in place, someone will be asked for extra payment and someone will be slowed. If the shaping company uses SBC told me to do it as their defense, then you go after SBC. Otherwise your go after whoever shaped the traffic.

Trafic shaping isn't the problem. It is doing that and then demanding a payment in excess of the normal internet charges in order to get the services your already paid for that is the problem. There is nothing wrong with At&t saying we will increase the speeds for google video or youtube for a fee, as long as every customer gets what they paid for in every other way. When a service provider advertises speed upto 6 megs per second, they shouldn't be doing anything to slow it on purpose by their own action to anything slower then that.

And if what I wrote doesn't do that, change it to were it does. We will craft our own net neutrality legislation and send it in.

2) Define what "internet" means
Cable modem companies currently send a large stream of data through their pipes exclusively used for broadcasting television signals, and nobody else gets that. What would happen to that? It gets an exemption? Then what's to stop people from formatting other parts of their service similarly? This is really fuzzy.
In addition, what are the implications of such a definition? Will it, for instance, stop people from using TCP/IP for their infrastructure (in ATMs, cell phone networks, etc.) for fear of being considered part of the internet and therefore subject to net neutrality regulation? I don't want to see us go back to dozens of proprietary packet technologies over an issue like regulation.

You don't have to define internet services. The ISPs already do that when they deliver the service. You don't get the internet when you get cable TV so you would have to look at the internet portion of the pipe(tube). But the problem isn't really shaping trafic to keep the internet service running smoothly, it is denying network access and depriving the consumer of what they payed for based on a payment from a third party in addition to their Internet access fees. If they are degrading your service because Google didn't pay an extra fee, you aren't getting what they promised you. If they say speed upto 6 megs per second, they shouldn't be doing anything on purpose to lower this based on a payment or not of a party on another network.

Currently, there are large interconnect hub that connect the main networks to each other and then there are more connecting smaller ones. Your ISP pays for access to these hubs when they connect you and the current idea is, what your ISP pays covers all the services he gives you. The non neutral approach it attempting to charge some people based on their success more money on top of what the ISP charges to have their traff

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[seebs]

Yes, I've followed the situation.

You haven't made a case for this legislation at all. I am well aware of the alleged problem, and frankly, I don't think it's one that needs legislation. I think this is well within the scope of market forces to fix.

Every time someone proposes a "fix", it's worse than the actual problem. The mere fact that we don't like something a company might do does not mean we need legislation.

I am so glad you guys weren't around when New Coke came out. I could see the regular discussions on Slashdot of the need for legislation against changes to the recipe of well-liked products.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[quanticle]

then it is up to us, as the consumer, to stand up and show anti-neutral ISPs that we have a voice and a choice.

And how exactly am I supposed to do that? Where I live, I have exactly 2 choices for high-speed internet: Verizon (ADSL) and Comcast (Cable). Neither supports network neutrality. Short of moving, is there anything I can do?

Switching to a neutral provider may be an option on the coasts, but here in middle America (Minnesota), its a bit more difficult than it appears.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

You haven't made a case for this legislation at all. I am well aware of the alleged problem, and frankly, I don't think it's one that needs legislation. I think this is well within the scope of market forces to fix.

Then I don't think you understand how the internet works. That or you do understand and think it would be nice to have random companies artificially degraded based on their willingness to pay an extra fee. Currently, You get access, I get access, our computers can talk to each other as much as that access allows. There isn't a market force that could keep this because the backbones owned by these telcos wanting to change this was given to them by the means of a government granted monopoly called a utility.

You or I cannot lay a backbone for the same costs these telcos have and even if we could, we could replace their backbone because they still have the government granted monopoly.

So i don't think your clearly understanding at least one part of the problem.

Every time someone proposes a "fix", it's worse than the actual problem. The mere fact that we don't like something a company might do does not mean we need legislation.

The problems come from special exceptions added to the legislation and the attempts to water it down. All we need is a bill that says if you already contracted with someone or another network you cannot degrade their service based on a fee paid by an individual on either end of the network. That is what I attempted to do with what I wrote. If it doesn't do that, change it to do it. Without ensuring a neutral net, and if some of the telcos get their way, you will not be getting the service you paid for and whoever is on the other end might not either. That is fraud and need to be stopped. The fines I purposed were just to make sure it wouldn't be profitable to ignore the idea. if the pitfals seem worse then the adventure, they won't try it in the first place.

I am so glad you guys weren't around when New Coke came out. I could see the regular discussions on Slashdot of the need for legislation against changes to the recipe of well-liked products.

Now I'm positive you don't understand something involved here. This has nothing to do with change. change is good. This has everything to do with you getting what you paid for and Me getting what I paid for. When we are paying to 3 meg connections and the network owner limits your connection to 56k because I didn't pay a fee in addition to my connection fee, you are getting robbed. Do you understand that concept? This isn't anything about change, it is about deception and the monopolies in charge of the networks double dipping. They already get a payment for the traffic that goes across their networks. Now they want more based on how successful they think you are.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[seebs]

No, no, I understand how the internet works.

I see no evidence at all that anyone is actually successfully breaking it, or that if they did, that there would be any problem other than people switching providers.

Your proposed language is dangerously vague, overbroad, and implies a sort of hypothetical world in which all traffic is desired. You have not suggested a way to allow people to block or filter unwanted connections when they have good reasons to do so. You have not convinced me that I don't want people to have the option of paying extra to get better service.

Keep in mind the flip side; it's not just about possibly degrading service, but also about buying upgrades. The service we currently get is pretty degraded sometimes under load. If someone wants to pay extra to get bandwidth guarantees, that's fine by me.

Re:Pretty one-sided coverage, here.

[sumdumass]

I see no evidence at all that anyone is actually successfully breaking it, or that if they did, that there would be any problem other than people switching providers.

When your on covads network, I'm on verizons, At&t slows your traffic down because I didn't pay the fee to them when my traffic passes through their network to get to yours, how is either one of use changing providers going to make a difference? Or better yet, who changes providers when it is covad that slows the traffic down? it is me or you? My network didn't slow it down so I say it should be you. Whats that, every ISP in your area runs through the covad backbone? what did your switch accomplish?

Your proposed language is dangerously vague, overbroad, and implies a sort of hypothetical world in which all traffic is desired. You have not suggested a way to allow people to block or filter unwanted connections when they have good reasons to do so. You have not convinced me that I don't want people to have the option of paying extra to get better service.

It is vague on purpose. This stops loopholes. But the point of the language is that a payment is expected to end the slowdowns. If you are offering a 2 meg network because of filtering and shaping but allow it to burst as fast as 10 meg, it isn't effected. The only time it is effected is when the slowdown is because someone refused to make a payment.

but I asked once, so I will ask again, change it to were your more comfortable with it. But I still have doubts that you understand the situation.

Keep in mind the flip side; it's not just about possibly degrading service, but also about buying upgrades. The service we currently get is pretty degraded sometimes under load. If someone wants to pay extra to get bandwidth guarantees, that's fine by me.

Thats fine by me too. And I think the practice legislation I described made that clear. It is supposed to say that you cannot purposly make anyone's connection slower then the implied speeds because of someone not paying. It means that if you have a 3 meg connection, they cannot slow your traffic to 56k because Google never paid your network or any network in between extra on top of their connection fees. If google want to work a deal out where they come in at 10 megs on your 3 meg connection, fine. If you want to buy a 10 meg connection, fine. But be aware, it doesn't effect the operators of the servers or what ever that limit their own connection speeds. Only backbone operators, network operators and ISPs who are limiting the speed based on an extra fee on top or the connection fees already being paid. This is the problem, they are willing to not give you what they claimed they would based on some sites willingness to pay an extra fee.

The FTC needs to shut up!

[computerman413]

The FTC needs to let net neutrality through. If they don't, telecom companies will ruin the Internet.

Re:The FTC needs to shut up!

[CajunArson]

If they don't, telecom companies will ruin the Internet.
You mean the same companies that you depend on to actually do anything on the Internet and have relied on since day 1 to do so? Why haven't they already ruined it? Why don't you just stop paying them to ruin the Internet?
    How some things get modded up on Slashdot is beyond me. How about: If we pass the wrong type of network neutrality law, there will be 0 profit in expanding broadband access, and while that will make everyone on Slashdot extremely happy that those 'evil' companies cannot make money, it will also guarantee no new broadband, because unlike Slashdot, in the real world if you make something unprofitable, companies will take the hint and not do it anymore.

Re:The FTC needs to shut up!

[TakeyMcTaker]

On day 1 of my first use of the Internet, it was on a college campus. It was a good thing I was starting college in '94, because we couldn't afford true Internet access from home back then. Having used ethernet from day 1, I don't think modems count, so now I'm a snob. The college campus had Internet peering agreements with several other colleges and institutions, including the local telco. Thus the local telco monopoly benefits from that college's own bandwidth, network deployment, and redundant peers. The "same companies you depend on" also relentlessly lobby our government, at all levels, to maintain their local monopoly against competition. It was tax dollars and monopoly status grants, NOT private investment, that built their networks, yet they continue to charge whatever they want for crappy service. If there's no other option where you live, where else are you going to go? Day 1 of the Internet had nothing to do with telco's, and everything to do with the government opening up its military/academic ARPA Network to be exploited by private industry. It just happened that the only private industry in a position to take advantage of this network was the local monopoly telcos. It was very convenient that they already had the lobbyists, and campaign funding power, to maintain those monopolies afterwards.

Yes, I view money-grubbing, anti-consumer, anti-competition, monopolist-fascist-oligarchs as 'evil'. Unlike our current Supreme Court, I don't think freedom of speech is only for those who can afford to be heard.

Re:The FTC needs to shut up!

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

You mean the same companies that you depend on to actually do anything on the Internet and have relied on since day 1 to do so?
Why haven't they already ruined it? Because "network neutrality" was the legal mandate until just a few years ago. "Network Neutrality" has been required of the phone system since at least the AT&T break-up. Until 2005, most home broadband services were regulated by the FCC in the same way as voice calls, thus ensuring that internet packets were treated just as neutrally as voice packets.

So, to answer your question directly - the reason they have not already ruined it is because they've only had about 2 years to reverse some 25 years of precedence. It's only after the FCC reclassified home broadband so as to make network non-neutrality legal that all the big telecomms started to make noise about taking advantage of it.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Capt_Insano_X]

Americans are still consumers, and while we may be a largely unthinking purchasing mass, people can quite easily distinguish "shitty" from "awesome" which is exactly the distinction one can make between a mass media run network with terrible latency and low bandwidth and one run by, say, Google.

Yea, because Google, who is in bed with the CIA, would be a MUCH better choice. Google will probably be the Internet 2(read Net Neutralized)bringer of doom. What else would they need all that fiber and all those data centers?

The internet should not be run by a handful of corporations, or one corporation. The Internet should stay the decentralized network that it is.

Simply giving control to a single company, Google(as you seem to be OK with), is not the answer. if anything it is worse than five companies.

Just my two cents.

The Captain

If history has shown us anything...

[Anonymous Coward]

If history, especially recent history, has shown us anything, it's that if you write conservatives a big enough check, they will draft any law you tell them to.

All AT&T and Verizon need to do is give Dick Cheney several million dollars, he will run through some "comprehensive" net neutrality "reform", and lo and behold, ATT and Verizon can do anything they damn well please.

And if anyone wants to know why they gave a few million to Cheney... well that's just executive priviliege, or national security, or whatever bullshit excuse he pulls out of his backside. Have Rush and O'Reilly defend him, and all the conservatives will understand just how evil and anti-American having a free liberal-loving internet is.

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[sumdumass]

There is nothing wrong with At&t or verizon doing anything they want. As long as they don't deliver less then what the consumer is paying for. Then it becomes fraud, bait and switch or whatever else you can think of.

There are a few other restrictions, but letting them charge more for faster service isn't necessarily bad. It is just charging more for the same service and not delivering their promised speeds based on a third party payment that it the real problem.

And it isn't just the conservatives you have to watch out for either.

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[canUbeleiveIT]

Have Rush and O'Reilly defend him, and all the conservatives will understand just how evil and anti-American having a free liberal-loving internet is.

Bill O'Reilly's "Radio Factor" program just became available in my area and, out of curiosity, I wanted to hear what all of the fuss was about. From the writings/rantings here on slashdot, I expected to someone who--like GOP talking point readers Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity--seems to be merely a mouthpiece for Conservatives and Republicans, but I just can't reconcile that with what I've been hearing.

While O'Reilly does seem to me to be quite arrogant and a demagogue on certain morality issues, he's hardly a shill for GWB, the Neocons, corporate interests or the Republican Party. Within the last month, he has:
--called for greater regulation of the Airline Industry and Big Oil
--defended Bill & Hillary Clinton on numerous occasions, including claiming that Bill governed more conservatively tha GWB
--lambasted the Bush administration's handling of the war in Iraq, immigration, the selection of Michael Chertoff as head of Homeland security
--called for more environmental regulations
--criticized the Republicans for helping destroy the middle class

Admittedly, I haven't seen his TV show, but, from what I've heard, I would have a hard time lumping him in with Limbaugh, Hannity, Laura Ingraham, G Gordon Liddy and Neil Boortz. I guess the point is that just because you disagree with someone, it doesn't make them an ideologue.

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[Anonymous Coward]

Give me a break. This is just a version of the age old dispute between buyers and sellers; landlords and renters; producers and consumers. Both sides are trying to maximize the revenue or minimize their expenses. Neither side openly confesses to greed so they couch their arguments in moral terms.

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[sgt_doom]

Whoooo, dood, has Fox Security really gotten to you. An official /. spokesperson, PR type for Bill - the shill - O'Reilly. I'd better be careful what I say, after all, even though he's never served in the military, Bill claims to be a combat vet!!! Ooooooh...aaaah...

If you'd heard that phony clown over the long run, you'd know he's just know jumping off the ship - like the rat he is - or jumping aboard the proper vessel -- either way, it's waaaay tooo little, and waaay tooo late. KEither Olbermann rules, and O'Really's ratings are plummeting faster than Dick Cheney's unit after being confronted by Ann Coulter......Can't talk any further, Billy boy's just killed my mike....

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[Anonymous Coward]

The issue is not (only) about charging more for faster access. If we let
the telecom oligarchs cast it only in those terms the battle is nearly lost.

Other issues are: 1) bandwidth providers restricting/degrading traffic for
services that compete with ones they're offering, 2) monopoly or near-monopoly control of last-mile access, 3) ripping out voice wire, which must be shared, however minimally, and replacing with fiber, which need not be shared, 4) vertical integration all the way from the wires on the poles to (partial) ownership of video content producers, and several others

Controlling legal authorities have said things to the effect that there is no problem yet: I call attention to the fact that cell phone companies now prevent consumers from using 3rd party phones; IIRC the Carterphone decision established that freedom years ago. If I want an iPhone, I can't use it unless I sign up with ATT.

Re:If history has shown us anything...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. I don't like O'Reilly at all... but anyone who says Olbermann rules needs to be prevented from reproducing. I guess it's a good thing this is /. and you'll never see a real woman naked... but really man. Less cocaine!

Parent is flamebait!

[Anonymous Coward]

Watch him call anyone who responds to him "gay" or something. Oh wait, I just called him out.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[ushering05401]

Your idea of the market players regulating each other seems sound enough.

My interest lies elsewhere, though. We have an election coming and numerous candidates have already declared intent, raised millions of dollars, and started building their platforms.

Will one of them have the foresight to make this more than a John-McCain-style-uninformed-soundbyte type issue?

If so, I am ready to start thinking about actually voting in this election. No one candidate can reverse the course of the war in Iraq, no one candidate can fix healthcare/welfare/the educational system. One candidate can, however, help America understand how high the stakes are for this particular issue.

Believe me... I would much rather see some sort of movement by all candidates to drop the party lines and attempt to fix the war and all the other issues I detailed above. Failing that, I guess I will consider voting for any candidate that shows an understanding of this issue because the impact on our future can be so incredibly far reaching.

The candidates now have some added time to weigh in on this issue. I'll be watching.

Regards.

The problem...

[canUbeleiveIT]

The problem is that "net neutrality" sounds so techie and confusing, and the majority of Americans have no idea what the issue is, nor do they care. This is especially dangerous for consumers because in cases where the public is disineterested, lawyers for corporations, unions or special interest groups usually get to write the legislation nearly verbatim.

Re:The problem...

[interiot]

I don't think there's a realistic chance of "average Americans" becoming more informed about these details. I have a number of friends who are software developers, who have almost what DRM is. DRM has been reported on by mainstream press (~300ghits at cnn.com, ~500ghits at foxnews.com, etc), and DRM is something that people sometimes encounter in their daily lives, yet it's still not widely understood.

Trying to explain the details of why TCP's end-to-end principle is good, why it's helped jump-start things like YouTube, Google, etc, that the most innovative ideas haven't necessarily come from large corporations, that last-mile telecom companies have a natural monopoly and they've historically had important but subtle gaps in regulation by the U.S. government, and balancing all that against libertarian principles... it's impossible to expect most people to grok all of that.

Re:The problem...

[sgt_doom]

The problem is that "net neutrality" sounds so techie and confusing, and the majority of Americans have no idea what the issue is, nor do they care.

Wait, damn you! Maligning the American masses again, are we? Yup, it's always those dummies fault!

Now, just because 53% of Americans polled believe the Cosmos was created only 6,000 years ago, and 49% accept the official 9/11/01 story, and 51% believe the "lone gunman" theory behind the JFK assassination, and 52% believe Bush is the messiah....

Ooohh...wait...you're right! THEY ARE ALL a bunch of certified nitwits....

Re:The problem...

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

The problem is that "net neutrality" sounds so techie and confusing, Whoever came up with the phrase should have sacrificed the alliteration for simplicity and just called it, "Network Equality" instead.

Well

[Lifyre]

I for one welcome this move. Many many problems have been caused by quick to act not very well thought out actions on the part of our government. The FTC said slow down lets make sure we don't fuck this up, that doesn't happen very often these days and should be welcomed with open arms. As a member of the US military I can say I am being directly effected by one of these rushes to judgment, maybe if the morons in the Hill had thought about shit first and made the intelligent rational choice instead of the "patriotic" one we wouldn't be in this mess. Just for the record I'm net neutral by leaning but I understand why they corporations want what they do. Here's the catch though they're very often regional monopolies. I've lived and live in a place where there are one or if you're lucky two broadband providers. If backbone and distribution access was free and open then we wouldn't be having this issue. Time Warner and Verizon etc.. would have already tried this and failed when many of their subscribers moved onto providers that didn't restrict their access.

I agree... sort of.

[WK2]

I completely agree with urging caution when it comes to regulation. However, the fact that they urge caution with network neutrality, but pretty much nothing else, suggests that they are singling out network neutrality.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[RelaxedTension]

I don't think you understood his point. Google wouldn't take over the internet, they would provide a net-neutral alternative. And, given their history, it would be low cost as well.

So, it plays out like this: Major players start degrading service of non-paying services, Google enters the market and starts providing service that people expect, gaining them an immediate large share of the market. After the major players get told that it's too bad, and that Google isn't violating any anti trust laws, they have no choice but to move to a network neutral policy just to compete.

That's the hope at least, if the government isn't willing to look out for it's own citizens.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Anonymous Coward]

I was not interested in voting this coming election generally disgusted with the current state of politics in general, Then I stumbled upon a certain congressman who is running for president. You my friend need to check out Ron Paul.

Visit youtube and search for Ron Paul.
Google Ron Paul.

The more you find out about Ron Paul the more you will regain hope in restoring the Republic and participating in our democracy.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[TopSpin]

people can quite easily distinguish "shitty" from "awesome" Consumers couldn't give a rat's ass about this topic. This weekend millions stood outside mall stores and cheered each other as they consumed AT&T exclusive iPhones. The FTC is foot dragging because on one hand you have Apple and AT&T fostering a real (F)TRADE(C) phenomena, and on the other you have a few activists. Guess who's lobbyists buy FTC bureaucrats the most meals.

ready to smack the wannabe monopolists upside the head if they attempt their backwater cousin fucking ideas of raping the connections we pay for Aim those smacks with care. What fraction of this audience just pwned Net Neutrality with their disposable income?

and low bandwidth and one run by, say, Google. Google is a board and a balance sheet, regulated by that same FTC. Google is not your $2.3528E11 buddy.

Why is more government the solution?

[Anonymous Coward]

And just who will "net neutrality" laws benefit besides lawyers and those that can afford them?

Because the thousands and thousands of pages of rules that will have to be written to define "net neutrality" will NOT aid the consumer. Oh, they'll claim to do just that. But it'll be just like the old AT&T monopoly.

Anyone think today's telcom industry is worse for the consumer than the government-regulated days? Why is there such a push to regulate the fastest-growing part of the US economy?

Re:Why is more government the solution?

[Count Fecal]

What we need is more competition.
Why aren't there more WiMax players in the US? I live in a major metropolitan area yet there's no WiMax provider.

Re:Why is more government the solution?

[cdrguru]

How many people do you live near?

How fast can WiMAX run? Let's say that it (or a replacement in the near future) can consume an entire OC3 (48Mb/sec) and provide service for 1,000 homes in a narrow geographic area. That works out to about 48Kb/sec per home at one connection per home.

You want to call that "broadband"?

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[TubeSteak]

Your idea of the market players regulating each other seems sound enough. I can only attribute your agreement with the GP to ignorance.

Most people do NOT have a choice when it comes to broadband. In many areas with relatively dense populations, the local cable/telco provider is given a monopoly, either by the town or the developer.

Ontop of that, the Internet as we know it, is an oligopoly run by a handful of national providers who get their bandwidth from a cartel of 9 Tier 1 ISPs and half-a-dozen or so important Tier 2 ISPs.

Because of this, no matter what you & the GP seem to think will happen, Google can't fly in and save the day by lighting up dark fiber. The "free" market is not so free.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[heinousjay]

The market is perfectly free. It's just expensive to provide the service. I personally think the government should take it over. I'd have a never-ending stream of laughs at how badly they would bobble the whole thing.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Kuukai]

That seems like wishful thinking to me. People aren't stupid, but these companies play dirty. You won't want to switch your ISP because you get it at a discount from the same people you get your cable from, who in turn use said cable to tell you that your other options suck (and, coincidentally, that net neutrality is evil). These ISPs already only give, like, what, 60% of their advertised speed? If a "good" company wanted to step up, the situation for that kind of competition is pretty much as good as it ever would be with a non-neutral net. No one's doing so in my area, so I'd hardly count on it. I'd feel safer with the legislation...

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[ushering05401]

I didn't suggest Google could fly in, only that the major players will continue to battle each other whatever happens. The OP put forward one way in which he thought another player could change the scenario. Really, there are many. Major companies who are in the middle of the pack with regard to market share are not going to stop fighting the dominance of the other players. I just don't want to see this situation go down. There are better ways... like voter education.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[calstraycat]

If the networks go to hell in a flaming hand basket, what would it take for Google to start lighting up fiber they already own? Get a few major metropolitan areas wired up, get word out, and consumers will begin switching in droves. It wouldn't take much pressure beyond that to wake up the telecoms and get them right back into the game.

What would it take? Well, a hell of a lot more money and influence than Google or any other company has.

Light up some fibers? You think that is all that it takes? It appears you have a poor understanding of the telecommunications infrastructure. Since the telcos and cable companies are no longer required to share their lines, Google (or whoever) would have to dig up every street and yard in the United States to offer a competing service. Google doesn't have that kind of money, the cities wouldn't let them do it and granny wouldn't let them dig up her rose garden. Furthermore, there is currently no wireless technology that can provide competitive bandwidth on a large scale.

While it's true that Google has bought up some dark fiber, that only allows them to bypass the core network to a certain extent. The key is the last mile and it's locked-up in the hands of the telcos and the cable companies.

It is very naive to believe there is a viable competitor waiting in the wings. There isn't one. There isn't going to be one tomorrow, next year or anytime in the foreseeable future. No company has the money and influence to duplicate the infrastructure and there are no viable wireless technologies available to bypass the last mile. It's going to be a duopoly for the foreseeable future and free market economics don't apply.

sure he could

[Anonymous Coward]

or she. Someone new gets elected, first duty, tell all the generals and admirals to bring the guys home *now*. End of story. One person can reverse what one person started. Orders fall downhill. And yes, it is that easy. The military gets paid to follow orders and to stay on top of sudden changes and their supply trains and infrastructure. They cover the details, but the overall orders come from DC.

We learned jack and squat from nam it appears. All that crap for more than ten years, and they just left anyway, and surprise, the Vietnamese sorted their own stuff out, good, bad and ugly, because it was their business not ours in the first place. Same with the iraqis, time for them to fish instead of cutting bait. Sure it might get even uglier than now, but it's too late for hindsight. If the UN wants to step in and chop it into three nations, so much the better, Iraq as one nation is only possible with a heinous draconian dictatorship, so that seems to be an unwise move to try and maintain that artificial construct like they are now..

Those hundreds of billions would have been much better spent dividing it up into alternative energy research and humanitarian medical aid and research, fix the environment and the energy question, and fix the broken and out of control healthcare situation. Instead, bombs, bullets and bombast with all sorts of talk of "honor" or "cut n run", simply *pathetic* junior high level (at best, it's pitiful really) braggadocio speak. They have done nothing but make it worse there, the Iraqi infrastructure is smashed, WAY more people now are being tortured or killed than under saddam, as bad as he was, and now the US has fallen severely in global polls about trust issues, because the bulk of the planet thinks we are..well, bully assholes. Can you imagine the goodwill we would have gotten with a few hundred billion in energy and healthcare research, even to the point of freely sharing it with the world? And all that loot spent and respent inside the US economy instead of being mostly wasted in the "broken windows" economy that that war represents? War is spend once heavy, with the purpose of destroying the accrued wealth or "broken windows". It's a short term extreme centralized profit model for a few blood profits corporations, benefits hardly anything else. And now we have over a billion people really annoyed with the US, for *no reason*.

And as long as I am ranting, I'll say it out loud, it is well past time for the US to STOP being Israel's and Saudi Arabia's bitch, and we also need to stop exporting dollars to other extremist nations, and both those places are jerkoff extremist and quite stupid nations. End it yesterday. No more exported petrodollars, no more exported US troops, no more exported advanced weaponry to any nation over there. There's no need and it keeps just making things worse.

Keep listening

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought the same way as you several years ago when OReilly first entered my area, but he eventually changed my mind. The problem is that, right now, you are listening to what he says, and not paying attention to the way he frames his show.

Once you become familiar with his show, a few things start to become apparent. First, Bill is not only intellectually dishonest, but is violently opposed to the concept of intellectually honest. Second, Bill is a religious fanatic- he is the kind of conservative who dreams of a Theocratic corporate police state.

The problem, as I see it, with OReilly's brand of hate-speech is that casual listeners might buy into his claims of being "a centrist". For example, Bill was one of the chief propagandists assisting the Swift Boat Vets, but he was really really slick about it: he would have them on, show after show, for weeks, and the whole time claim he didn't agree with them. He never really did much to articulate this disagreement, however, because most of the time he would simply read off their points or let them take over the show for a few hours... then every so often he would offer the disclaimer that he, being a centrist, didn't really agree with what they were saying... but he thought what they say needed to be given an outlet.

So you don't have to agree with me right now, but just bear it in mind while listening to him. You will start seeing his true agenda leak in through his own words. Because OReilly's true dishonesty isn't so much in what he says, but in what he doesn't say. He may claim he doesn't like Bush, but he will never actually say anything tangibly bad about him. Whether he claims to like Bush or not, he is still carrying water for him, and that's how you see where his real beliefs lie.

Article Mis-spelling

[Anonymous Coward]

net neutrality opponents

I'm sorry, it looks like you misspelled 'evil, greedy telecoms' there.

Very disappointed in the FTC

[u-235-sentinel]

I would have expected they would have gotten a clue that people are being abused these last few years by companies such as Comcast. We can't trust them to do the right thing. So why do politicians think the market will make sure it's ok? After all, we have very few options unless you live in SunnyVale California.

Most states don't have 20 or 30 options for highspeed Internet. If a company goes nuts you have to put up or go dial up (like that's an option these days).

I urge people to contact the FTC and let them know what's on you mind. This needs to be dealt with before Telco's make their own laws.

Re:Very disappointed in the FTC

[Anonymous Coward]

or just cancel the service. internet is not like power/gas etc is not needed for survival (though handy) however, most americas dont want to give up there convience to prove a point. if these mononplys suddenly lose there customers because its not a need service they will change there ways and very quickly :)

get involved with your community, encourage petitions and give them plenty warning, but if you need to shove, shove....if they go bankrupt laugh at them and let the new player get your buisness. free market doesnt mean free compitetion, it means you can choose what you do with your services.

Re:Very disappointed in the FTC

[coaxial]

It's Sunnyvale. One word. No studly caps.

Re:Very disappointed in the FTC

[u-235-sentinel]

or just cancel the service. internet is not like power/gas etc is not needed for survival (though handy) however, most americas dont want to give up there convience to prove a point. if these mononplys suddenly lose there customers because its not a need service they will change there ways and very quickly :)


Point taken however try to get a job in some companies without internet access. It's very difficult if you can't support the company after hours. Unless you like driving.

get involved with your community, encourage petitions and give them plenty warning, but if you need to shove, shove....if they go bankrupt laugh at them and let the new player get your buisness. free market doesnt mean free compitetion, it means you can choose what you do with your services.

Done that. I've had many conversations with the City Council including a presentation on what's going on and how the Government granted monopoly isn't working. That's why I'm shoving with my blog and speaking to everyone about the issue. It's gone up to the Boston Globe and the New York Times. I've even had a couple other prominent magazines contact me. The internet is important to our future as a country. Otherwise the arguments about taxing it wouldn't come up every year :D

Are you aware we've dropped to 7th in tech and science these last few years? I'll have to check where I posted that on my blog. I believe the lack of broadband penetration is a contributing factor.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Ash Vince]

Can we please start shooting moderators?

Or maybe build something into the new discussion system so that we can see who moderates each message. Anyone who thinks the parent is flamebait is quite obviously both stupid and insane.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Zonk (troll)]

And, given their history, it would be low cost as well. Not to mention that your every online move will be tracked and logged forever.

Don't get me wrong, Google does some cool stuff (gmail, google maps (I really like the hybrid setting), picasa, etc), but at the massive ammount of information they log on everyone is very scary.

Citizens not consumers

[NobleSavage]

the FTC's decision appears to be thought out and a message to remind people to not let the subject of Net Neutrality be abandoned by the general public so corporations could undermine the interest of consumers. Can we please stop referring to ourselves as just consumers. Citizens have rights and responsibilities. Consumers are like cattle to be taken care of by their corporate overlords.

Re:Citizens not consumers

[Anonymous Coward]

Can we please stop referring to ourselves as just consumers. Citizens have rights and responsibilities. Consumers are like cattle to be taken care of by their corporate overlords. Welcome to America.

There ahs to be a compromise...

[Chabil Ha']

so why not do this:

Allow a tiered Internet to be created, but the Telecomms, by regulation, must keep a certain level of quality of service to the most basic of tiers, and if the market will bear increasing costs of the higher tiers, allow that to take place. Those that want that higher tier of service will subsidize those of you who prefer the usual way of getting your bits across.

Re:There ahs to be a compromise...

[Anonymous Coward]

All that will happen is that the legislation lags behind the technology. Five years down the line when we should all have 10mb/s in our homes (I hope!) the legislation will still say that our minimum is only a fraction of that.

The telecoms will only bother upgrading the "extra pay" service and essentially force us all to cough up the money for the higher tier whilst claiming that they are perfectly entitled to do so.

How can legislation create competition?

[Anonymous Coward]

Putting a bunch of regulations in place where only those that can afford expensive lawyers can understand and comply with will certainly decrease competition.

The added expense of dealing with "net neutrality" legislation will raise the barriers for entry into the internet market.

How is that going to help?

Re:How can legislation create competition?

[Anonymous Coward]

will certainly decrease competition. Well, regulation worked for a while when the FCC required that the phone companies share their lines with competitors at cost, and increased up until the FCC de-regulated that regulation by declaring that phone companies that upgraded their lines wouldn't have to share. SBC immediately sent their techs around to kiss every one of their exchanges in Houston and declare them "upgraded" and then proceeded to sell even shittier service than we were getting from Covad.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[n3tcat]

If American's cannot distinguish between "awesome" and "shitty" governments, how can they possibly distinguish the difference between high and low latency connections?

80% of the Americans on the internet would probably still be happy on dialup. The only reason they all have broadband is because advertising told them to like it.

Mistake in the works

[jkiol]

The "let the mraket decide" in this case is fundamentally flawed if not just stupid. I live in the suburbs of a major city, and we've only had "high-speed" for 5-6 years. And even so, there is only one provider, so if I don't like comcast my only other choice is dial-up (which would suck since I don't have a phone). All the fiber/cable is on public property, I don't see anything wrong with saying, if you use public property you have to follow net neutrality.

FCC caves in once again to corporations

[intnsred]

...the FTC defended its actions saying that their decision was not a give-in to the big telecom and cable companies....the FTC's decision appears to be thought out... Given that the overwhelming majority of the public is for net neutrality, of course the decision has to have the appearance of being well thought out. Like duh!

But make no mistake about it, this is the FCC -- once again -- caving into the large corporations that fund politicians and who more-or-less run the US gov't.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[TubeSteak]

The OP put forward one way in which he thought another player could change the scenario. Really, there are many.

Really?
There are many?
Name some.
 
...
 
The only viable way to seriously change the market is wireless... because it will break the physical monopoly on the last-mile. However, this assumes that the existing telecom/cable giants aren't the ones rolling this tech out, which isn't a safe assumption to make.

We can discuss spectrum allocations - part of the spectrum is unlicensed, the rest is mostly assigned to Sprint/Nextel, who also happen to be a Tier 1 carrier. Which brings me to my final point, even WiMAX won't resolve the ultimate fact that once you've dealt with the last mile, you run into another not-so-free market: the Tier 1 carriers (many of which are big telecoms).

My hope is that some long reange wireless technology will help reshape the internet's ownership. Unfortunately, I remain pessimistic because someone still has to build out that wireless infrastructure and my guess is that it'll be the companies with the budget to do it.

Ron Paul

[falconwolf]

The more you find out about Ron Paul the more you will regain hope in restoring the Republic and participating in our democracy.

I voted for Ron Paul in 1988 for president and if I get the chance to vote for him in 2008 I will. Though I'm currently registered "No Party" Preference" I'll even change it to "Republican" just before the primary so I can vote for him. Of course I'll change it back afterwards.

Falcon

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[TubeSteak]

Furthermore, there is currently no wireless technology that can provide competitive bandwidth on a large scale.

4G (WiMAX and others) is coming.
Just not in the next 5-10 years.

Even if Google implemented it tomorrow at the endpoints of their fiber network (to bypass the last-mile), they'll still have to essentially become a Tier 1 ISP with peering agreements to the other big players... and to do so, Google will have to play by their rules.

I'd love to hear how someone can come in and change the nature of the industry, but like you, I don't really see how that can happen.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[evlmonkey]

It is very naive to believe there is a viable competitor waiting in the wings. There isn't one. There isn't going to be one tomorrow, next year or anytime in the foreseeable future. No company has the money and influence to duplicate the infrastructure and there are no viable wireless technologies available to bypass the last mile. It's going to be a duopoly for the foreseeable future and free market economics don't apply. Wrong. There ARE wireless technologies available that bypass the last mile. In fact, that bypass the last five, ten, sometimes twenty miles. (This is just one example). http://www.trangobroadband.com/products/point_to_m ultipoint_products.shtml

I have a job site currently that is fed T1 speeds over a wireless signal because the wired infrastructure doesn't exist there. The fact of the matter is that no local companies have the resources to put up transmission towers or get licensing for use of water towers to provide the signal because the costs are to high and the demand is too low. The wireless hardware available today can provide amazing back haul speeds and can produce signals up to 30 miles LOS. If Google has enough dark fiber all you need to do is give them transmission towers, wireless hardware, and a public tired of poor Internet access and I'm sure that's enough incentive to light some up and make some money off the Tel Cos mistakes.

cable and isp

[falconwolf]

You won't want to switch your ISP because you get it at a discount from the same people you get your cable from

No I don't, I get my net access from a different company than I get my cable from. And when WiMax is widely available and relatively cheap I may switch my isp. Also I don't get my phone service from either one either.

Falcon

No there doesn't.

[The Master Control P]

One side wants to rape the principle that made the Internet great, the other wants to save it. Compromising with evil doesn't stop it, it emboldens it and only delays the inevitable confrontation.

I agree

[91degrees]

Net neutrality legislation is a blunt instrument because nobody has any idea exactly what the Telcos want to do. We don't want a law that's too broad just to stop them from doing something that they have no desire to do because there's always the risk of also preventing perfectly legitimate behaviour.

Re:I agree

[Tuoqui]

Net Neutrality legislation would be a pro-active attempt at preventing the Telcos and Cable Companies from abusing their monopoly (or in some instances duopoly) positions.

We are already seeing the very beginnings in the behavior of the internet companies of the potential or in some cases actualization of things which will be VERY hard to correct if not legislated and soon.

Packet Shaping is being used in a negative way to impact customer performance on the network already in most cases. These internet companies are throttling or other measures to ensure that bittorrent and other high bandwidth internet uses are being hurt in terms of performance for the users all because they (the companies) did not purchase enough bandwidth to cover their users adequately. Now making sure VOIP packets go through first and things like that is okay because that generally improves the quality of the network.

The whole net neutrality debate seems to be focused on the fact theres a few 800 lb gorilla's ready to duke it out. Because companies are throttling bittorrent today means they may throttle other high bandwidth uses in the future. Now I don't know about you but I enjoy watching video clips people post on youtube as much as the next person (like the soda bottle explosions and stuff).

There is also the argument that bittorrent is also used as a LEGITIMATE distribution method for some smaller companies. Linux is one of the bigger players distributing their stuff by bittorrent. Some small amateur movie makers post their videos online as well using youtube or sometimes bittorrent.

In short, its about greedy telcos wanting to be able to say that you can have a connection with X kb/s and then pulling a bait n switch so they can save money by not having to purchase any more bandwidth. It is not only false advertising (they should be forced to specify that you cant use X if they specifically throttle X) but also unethical (people paid to get X bandwidth, if you didn't anticipate some people to be high users then its your fault not theirs) as well as reminiscent of the tactics used by used car salesmen of yesteryear.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[calstraycat]

Well, you are a lot more optimistic than I when it comes to various up-and-coming, point-to-multipoint wireless technologies. Most of the frequencies currently available for these systems are too high and therefore require line-of-sight paths with little to no obstruction. Maybe if the big telcos fail to acquire all that UHF spectrum the government plans to auction off (say, Google ends up the highest bidder) and the wireless equipment vendors can redesign their equipment to use those frequencies, I would be a bit less pessimistic.

Even if that pans out, it's really not equivalent to what the telcos and cable companies can offer in terms of bandwidth. Plus, home owners have to put up with antennas and powered NIDs.

I would love to be proved wrong and be shown that my pessimism is unwarranted. But having spent 20 years in the telecom industry I've seen dozens of over-hyped, supposedly disruptive technologies fail, I'm a bit jaded.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[calstraycat]

I agree. Widespread deployment of WiMAX or similar technologies is way out in the future. And, I believe these wireless technologies will only succeed if the lower frequency spectrum going up of auction soon ends up in the hands of someone other than than the be telcos. I don't have a lot of confidence that will occur.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[PopeRatzo]

people can quite easily distinguish "shitty" from "awesome"

But they have a harder time saying or doing something about it.

this seems like a situation when a viable and large enough competitor is sitting in the wings

We've seen how well this works in other areas, say operating systems, energy, and the media

I'm no free market blind follower

ahem...

Who enforces RICO?

[TakeyMcTaker]

'The four simple words "pay up or else" are sufficient to constitute the crime of extortion.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extortion

I would say this is exactly what the consumer telco monopolies are saying when they threaten to throttle bandwidth on any Internet host or service, if some form of additional payment is not provided.

Re:Who enforces RICO?

[RobertLTux]

the other thing that i wish would get fixed is how they define "unlimited" what that should mean is if i get a 1.5 mbps downline i should be able to download (assumes i peg my connect) in one week 907200 megabits or 90720 mega bytes (90gigs). anything that is not a goodly fraction of this number is not unlimited.

If an ISP is going to cut off or otherwise impair a connection after a certain amount of transfer over a period of time then this info should be published in simple terms as part of the first page of the AUP (i would suggest a format of percent of line cap averaged over period example 60%/week)

I also would like the pipe folks to stay away from business between me and a third party.

Canopy

[Colin Smith]

No company has the money and influence to duplicate the infrastructure and there are no viable wireless technologies available to bypass the last mile.

Motorola Canopy. Designed for exactly that purpose. I'm sure there are competing products.

It's going to be a duopoly for the foreseeable future and free market economics don't apply. Rubbish. However the barrier to entry is high and the cable companies and telcos have spent a huge amount of money putting a network in place. Any new entrant to the market is going to have to see long term profitability. If revenue levels are too low they won't bother.
 

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[(negative video)]

Since the telcos and cable companies are no longer required to share their lines, Google (or whoever) would have to dig up every street and yard in the United States to offer a competing service.

How 1890s of you. They'll simply deploy a wireless comm module, run power and fiber to it, and be in service. The module will consist of a big-ass industrial computer, an Akami-style accelerator, perhaps a local Google Apps cache, two or more redundant refrigeration modules, and a fold-up phased array antenna (with clip on facades to meet local zoning ordinances). Every bit of this technology is already available off the shelf--it would not take much to integrate it into a slick, efficient package.

Furthermore, there is currently no wireless technology that can provide competitive bandwidth on a large scale.

<boggle> This discussion is not about current hardware competing in the current market. It is about what will happen if a cartel starts providing awful service at a ridiculous price, in the face of substantial market pull.

It's going to be a duopoly for the foreseeable future and free market economics don't apply.

Duopoly? Here in a small city in Oklahoma I have my choice of cable, ILEC, CLEC, satellite, and WiFi.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[evlmonkey]

Even if that pans out, it's really not equivalent to what the telcos and cable companies can offer in terms of bandwidth. Plus, home owners have to put up with antennas and powered NIDs. I agree, in terms of speeds and reliability hard lines will always prove better than wireless. But, if I have to sacrifice my 3Mb/256Kb filtered connection for a 768Kb/128Kb unfiltered connection I will. Once users (even the dumb ones) realize the content they want to access they can't, or that they have to pay extra, they will start looking for alternatives. A great example of this is Satellite vs. Cable. Cable is much more reliable than Satellite but costs more than Satellite on a per channel basis. If the Tel Cos start losing customers in droves they will rethink their policies and pricing and become more competitive.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[RoboStone]

Any ISP logs every piece of information, remember the AOL search logs?

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[snarfer]

Yes, the market will regular everything.

And any websites that say different shouldn't be on the web.

We need net neutrality mandated by law. Period. Telecoms are ALREADY censoring union websites, for example. What is to stop them from censoring websites with political opinions that disagree with the corporate position?

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[rtechie]

The market is perfectly free. How does "government enforced monopoly" translate to "free market"? The telcoms and cable companies ARE monopolies (by ANY definition of that term) and these monopolies are granted to them by the federal and state government in exchange for providing public interest services, like reduced fees for low income people, public access television, rural telephone service, etc. Much of the infrastructure they use (telephone poles, cable lines, etc.) were/are constructed and maintained by the government.

It's just expensive to provide the service.

Without government subsidy they'd collapse within days. Why should taxpayers support private enterprise that stay afloat without massive government aid? Is it better to have private for-profit corporations heavily subsidized by the government (airlines for example) or is it better to simply have the government take over the corporations?

I personally think the government should take it over. I'd have a never-ending stream of laughs at how badly they would bobble the whole thing. What, like the Post Office, interstate highway system, Social Security, and national parks? And the system we have NOW is run by the government, it's just contracted out to telcoms and cable companies. It's like claiming the US military is a "free market" because their weapons are provided by private contractors.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[lordSaurontheGreat]

Google can, however, offer cheap, fast WISP, or Wireless Internet. WISP has been analyzed to hold an additional TRILLION dollars in GNP for the US if it was implemented. WISP is cheap (no wires, no licensing fees, no legislation about right of way), fast, reliable (grid it together and what do you get?), and fast. 802.11 may sound slow, but compared to the pathetic speeds of even metro broadband through cable (which I have) the speed of 802.11 is unbelievable. The average user of broadband gets 600K down and 30K up. 802.11a would be about 1M. That's 500K up and 500K down worst case scenario for traffic. New transmitting/receiving technology (MIMO, phased arrays, etc) are rapidly extending the range. Now we have 802.11g. That's 11M. 5.5M up, 5.5M down. The Internet wouldn't be a tree, it'd be more like a spider's web. Obviously landlines would be needed to distribute load and get servers to transmit further out geographically (otherwise the local transmitters would get overloaded and the web would slow down in the vicinity for everyone and that server would have bad latency times everywhere). It's very secure (read the security papers on the 802.11 standard, what with all the frequency hopping and stuff...).
The age of wired Internet may fall, but there are more than enough alternatives. Bouncing signals off the moon doesn't work though. Some defense contractors tried it once. The latencies of the time it takes the signals to travel from earth to moon were too high. Just wanted to squash that before it got suggested.

How long? Could be soon!

[Anonymous Coward]

"We discussed the row this created, but with constant stalling tactics being employed here how long will it be before net neutrality opponents craft their own legislation?"

Well, opponents would be buoyed by the success of the anti-fairness doctrine folk... When a few people on the left mentioned the idea of returning to the Fairness Doctrine to combat the significant imbalance of broadcast media, the right took quick and stealthy action.

They not only made the issue their number one talking point, they mobilized conservative voters to call their representatives in congress to complain about "impending fairness doctrine legislation" that was anything but impending. Republican congressman Mike Pence managed to somehow submit a bill (even though his party is in the minority) late on a Friday afternoon prohibiting the Fairness Doctrine, and he got an overwhelmingly supportive vote, even from most Democrats. The entire process took only several weeks and was completely under the radar. Those who weren't in the loop had no idea this process was occurring.

The fairness doctrine was killed before anyone even had a chance to talk about it, learn about it, discuss it, etc. Although I would expect more opposition over a net-neutrality ban, but considering the amazing results of this one example, there is really nothing stopping net neutrality opponents from using the same stealth tactics with the same level of success.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[Chandon Seldon]

If you think wireless networks will solve the last mile problem, I've got a really nice bridge to sell you.

The problem isn't that wireless network technology doesn't exist (although it's not perfect), or even that it isn't fast enough (it's pretty fast), but that in the current legal situation with licensed spectrum - there simply isn't enough legal wireless bandwidth to go around. Trying to use a single 802.11g network with ten or twenty other people sucks. WiMax isn't much faster, but it sure let's a bunch more people use it at the same time.

If we really want decent internet connections, we need to have neutral connections - and we need to not allow companies with legally granted infrastructure monopolies use that as leverage to expand into extra-fee content delivery. Allowing stuff like Verizon FIOS TV is a horrible mistake.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[speaker of the truth]

They can run their network on private property anyway they like. The second this network is placed on public property it should become subject to certain rules, net neutrality being one of them.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[(negative video)]

... there simply isn't enough legal wireless bandwidth to go around.

Exactly, which is why I specified a phased-array system, like the ones Vivato makes. Phased-array systems use multiple antennas and mathematical tricks to transmit/receive narrow beams of radio waves. (Each antenna gets a programmable signal delay. Pick the delays right and you can make a flat antenna act like the dish antenna of your choice.) The neat thing is that radio waves don't interact with each other, so you can run many beams on a single antenna array. The number of beams is limited by how many antennas and math chips you can afford, which greatly multiplies the data throughput. The systems would also use small dish antennas for the fixed building customers, meaning the customers don't see each other or other base stations, and nearly eliminating interference with omnidirectional wireless systems on the same frequency.

If we really want decent internet connections, we need to have neutral connections ...

It would work, and goddamn fucking well. We'd have a new era of blazing fast networks, rapidly improving because of intense capitalistic competition. It would be just like the Alexander Graham Bell era of cowboy telecommunications: whoever can deliver charging whatever the market will bear. Why, within a few years, it will have worked so well that people will forget there was ever a problem, and take the new status quo for granted.

And then the professional administrators will take over the regulatory agency. Just like the post-Bell Great Wars era of telecommunications. They'll have inherited the three-ring binders that tell how to do things, figured out years before by people who actually knew what the hell they were doing, so the system will keep working, a little creakily but not bad enough that the people who could fix it care enough to.

And then the professional administration layer will be captured by the industry that is being regulated. Just like the AT&T era of telecommunications. Gradual consolidation and mission drift will mean the industry becomes dominated by a giant near-monopoly, at both the government and market levels. It will end up running for the benefit of the people running it.

And then a social crusader or a revolution will smash the near-monopoly into bits and pieces. A new era of cowboy whatever will start, bringing cheaper and better whatever to the grateful capitalistic masses.

And so on and so forth.

You see, human enterprise has cycles just like wild things do. Riotous growth, consolidation, stasis, fire and chaos, ash. The wheel turns. People like you come up with these oh-so-clever little plans for perfecting an enterprise, but what you usually end up doing is yanking the wheel around to the stasis phase.

If you should succeed, start planning the anti-trust lawsuit before the network neutrality laws go into effect.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[deanlandolt]

Any ISP logs every piece of information, remember the AOL search logs? The AOL search debacle wasn't "AOL as ISP" but "AOL as platform" -- that is, if an ISP really is just a bit pipe. This will, however, never broadly be the case if the telecoms have their way.

Ron Paul is a racist lunatic

[Anonymous Coward]

I too encourage you to research him. Just watch out for the uncritical fanboys.

Ron Paul is an idiot

[Anonymous Coward]

His economic ideas are close to a century out of date, and so are his incredibly regressive social policies. Luckily there's next to no chance of him winning; the only thing he has on his side is an incredibly noisy crew of Internet fanboys who like him think all the answers they need are to be found in ideas from the last century. If you Google him you'll likely find mostly adulatory Ron-Paul-will-save-us-all sites for that reason, but there are exceptions:

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArti cle.asp?articleID=30953
http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/aol-metropo litan/96/05/23/paul.html

Just Build a New Internet -- Without the Telcos

[bratwiz]

Its not impossible. That's how it got started in the first place. There are other ways to do it, they just require cooperation. And there, I'm afraid, is much of the rub.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[heinousjay]

Post Office

I've worked there. It's run like a dungeon. But that's neither here nor there, because the Post Office is only quasi-governmental. They have to keep themselves afloat, and as such, they're much more efficient.

interstate highway system

Arguably the biggest cause of the pollution that is causing our home planet to slowly become less and less livable. Not an intended consequence, to be sure, but if you want to make a huge mistake, you need a huge plan.

Social Security
It's hanging on by a thread, barely pays out enough to live, and eats a huge administration cost that comes on the backs of the working man (Yes, the wage cap on the Social Security withholdings means the wealthiest people don't have to support the system).

national parks
They were there, already. Their success is dependant on not doing anything with them. Even the government can handle that, mostly.

Re:Let them get rid of their own network neutralit

[rtechie]

Arguably the biggest cause of the pollution that is causing our home planet to slowly become less and less livable. And you're arguing that private enterprise is doing more in America to fight pollution that the government? I think you're right here in the sense that most of the new technologies that are eventually going to replace fossil fuel are being developed and deployed by the private sector. For example, I definitely think that the EPA should be more stringent with it's enforcement and that Congress should pass tough new emissions regulation. But it's

It's hanging on by a thread, barely pays out enough to live, ... Yes, the wage cap on the Social Security withholdings means the wealthiest people don't have to support the system). I agree. We don't spend enough on social welfare programs and we should expand them. I agree we should make bigger payouts to disabled and needy Americans. And furthermore I agree that we should remove the wage cap to move the burden of Social Security more heavily on the backs of the wealthy. Sounds like we agree here.

They were there, already. Their success is dependant on not doing anything with them. Even the government can handle that, mostly. Don't tell me that thousands of park workers and volunteers throughout the nation are just standing around doing nothing. Really, this statement is so astonishingly ignorant that it angers me. Maybe visit one sometime. Trails, roads, campgrounds, etc. aren't free. Here's a bit from the fucking Wikipedia article:

The 'dean of western writers,' American Pulitzer prize-winning author Wallace Stegner has written that national parks are 'America's best idea,' - a departure from the royal preserves that Old World sovereigns enjoyed for themselves - inherently democratic, open to all, "they reflect us at our best, not our worst."