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AT&T's Net Neutrality Doublethink

Posted by kdawson on from the like-mccain-said dept.

GMGruman writes "George Orwell would be proud of AT&T, as Bill Snyder explains in this blog post, for its new ads saying it supports Net neutrality when in fact it is working actively to scuttle proposed FCC rules that would clearly ban discriminatory practices against different types of data, such as video streaming or VoIP. It's also trying to get government subsidies to build a substandard broadband network for the under-served areas of the US. If it and its carrier partners win, 'Internet freedom' will mean freedom for carriers to be the 21st century's robber barons."

28 of 215 comments (clear)

  1. I'd like to see... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ...electricity companies trying to charge you different prices for using different applicances. We already have "electricity neutrality", why isn't net neutrality taken for granted?

    1. Re:I'd like to see... by Aladrin · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Because there's no 'unlimited' plan for electricity.

      If ISPs charged people according to usage, there would be no need for a 'net neutrality' bill... ISPs would be loving people who used more, instead of hating them. But then the users would be angry because they've had 'unlimited' so long.

      Don't get me wrong, I'm one of those people. And I'd love to have my cake and eat it, too... But the simple truth is that I use WAY more than most people and they get to pay for some of it and that kind of thing is going to come to an end one way or another.

      --
      "If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
    2. Re:I'd like to see... by irondonkey · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I agree with you that more than likely, we'll eventually end up with a use-based billing scheme. The issue I see is that it seems the ISPs want to keep the "normal" users at the current pricing, and simply charge more for the "heavy" users. If it's usage based, some people will use less, which ought to mean they get charged less since they no longer pay part of the bill for the heavy users, which would mean less money in the pockets of your ISP.

    3. Re:I'd like to see... by GrantRobertson · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Not that I am on the carrier's side... But can you possibly explain the logic in this position other than that you want it?

      I pay extra for a faster connection and a higher total download capacity per month. That seems entirely fair. The problem comes when carriers try to limit what kind of data you download within that limit. They are effectively trying to make it impossible for you to actually get what you specifically paid for. That is what net neutrality is about. Not just letting you download as much porn as you want while still only paying the basic fee.

    4. Re:I'd like to see... by Geoffrey.landis · · Score: 3, Insightful

      When you're paying a monthly fee to use that service, it should not matter how much or how little you use it. ISPs have no right to bitch and moan about high bandwidth users.

      That's not logical. It makes sense that people who use more should pay more. Why shouldn't the people who use more, pay more? If I use more water, I pay a higher water bill; if I use more electricity, I pay a higher electric bill.

      It seems that the problem is that word "unlimited." If the sales pitch says that you're buying "unlimited" internet, then you've got an argument that they're doing false advertising when they then say "...but that doesn't mean unlimited".

      --
      http://www.geoffreylandis.com
    5. Re:I'd like to see... by kenh · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No, we don't have "electricity neutrality" - you've never heard of "off-peak" KW/Hr rates? It only makes sense to offer it to commercial consumers of electricity, but they pay less for electricty used during off-peak hours...

      --
      Ken
    6. Re:I'd like to see... by Chaos+Incarnate · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you use more water, or more electricity, you're consuming finite resources that wouldn't be used otherwise. The same isn't true of bandwidth--the ISP is paying for a certain amount on their outgoing connections, regardless of whether or not uses are actively using it.

      --
      Benford's Corollary to Clarke's Law: "Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced."
    7. Re:I'd like to see... by commodore64_love · · Score: 2, Insightful

      >>>ISPs themself do not pay anything based on amount transferred.

      You're going to sit there and tell me there's no difference in electricity usage for a Server to feed me 1 gigabyte versus 1000 gigabytes each month? C'mon! Of course high-usage costs more money, and I see nothing wrong with passing that on to the high-usage customer.

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    8. Re:I'd like to see... by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "It seems that the problem is that word "unlimited.""

      Precisely. If my ISP told me up front that I am paying for a maximum amount of data transferred per month, I would have no problem with it. When they tell me my plan is "unlimited," I assume they mean, "as much as you want and your equipment can handle."

      --
      Palm trees and 8
    9. Re:I'd like to see... by Svartalf · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Depends on the existing lines.

      In many rural areas they have party-lines (not usable for DSL...) or lie at a distance from the CO that's well beyond anything other than iDSL rates if that. They'd have to spend a bit of extra money that the profit margins aren't "high enough" for them to bother with- there's a reason that the rural areas have Internet access problems in the first place. Nobody wants to serve the areas because they're less profitable.

      If they're wanting to define Broadband as 768/200k, I'm almost okay with that as long as they don't dink with the pipes, keep things the way they currently are, and actually ROLL IT OUT TO PEOPLE at minimum. All this whining about users, etc. is more due to the fact that they way oversold the capacity they have and are unwilling to take a smidge of the profits they raked in doing so to upgrade a bit and offset the problem they made for themselves.

      --
      I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
    10. Re:I'd like to see... by ground.zero.612 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Just... Wow. What's wrong with having the government define broadband as anything over 768Kbps down and 200Kbps up? I'll tell you. The rest of Earth will laugh at us. That's what's wrong with that. I realize the size of the US puts a different burden on network deployment here, but please stop pretending like we don't know that pretty much all of South-East Asia is now on DOCSIS 3.0 and/or fiber-to-the-door.

      I offer to /. again my anecdote about Comcast changing my plan from unlimited to hard capped at 250GB per month. I'm now paying for ~10x less theoretical data now at the SAME EXACT rates when I had for unlimited. The kicker is that no one on residential service from Comcast was ever going to reach the ~2.5TB theoretical max because Comcast's technology shares bandwidth.

      I would have to guess that since Comcast is really the US Government, that this is not what we call a healthy business model. Rather than spend their money marketing and lobbying, they should have spent it on their network. I think it's absolute horseshit, and I feel cheated every time I pay the bill.

      Oh and for all the jackasses out there that wish to make a snide comment pertaining to that list bit, please remember that Comcast is a monopoly in my area and I have no other ISP to offer my patronage to.

      --
      "Be prepared, son. That's my motto. Be prepared." --Joe Hallenbeck
    11. Re:I'd like to see... by aicrules · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Renewable doesn't mean it's infinite. Clearly there is a finite amount of water, electricity and even bandwidth available for use. Even if the entire universe was a big blob of water outside of our solar system, that wouldn't do us any good.

    12. Re:I'd like to see... by Graymalkin · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Electricity and water are limited in practical terms. There's finite generating and transmission capacity. Every switching station turns some of the transmitted electricity into heat. You running your TV turns that electricity into projected light and heat, this is electricity I can't use to run my microwave. Data transmission is quite different, data packets can be duplicated an infinite number of times. Downloading a file from a server doesn't affect the availability file for anyone else. The only resource in contention is data transmission capacity. As long as the transmission capacity exceeds the demand data networks don't really have any limits of what can go over them. Data also doesn't need to be converted directly into work of some sort so it can be split and recombined through multiplexing with no loss of utility. This also means that transmission lines can add more channels to increase their capacity (providing both ends of the connection can be upgraded).

      --
      I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
    13. Re:I'd like to see... by tha_mink · · Score: 2, Insightful

      but they have a finite amount of bandwidth to slice up at any given point in time

      Which can easily be increased with a negligible investment over time by those ISPs, that for some reason, they refuse to admit and/or subsidize.

      --
      You'll have that sometimes...
    14. Re:I'd like to see... by shentino · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Which is rather interesting considering that it is the receivers of traffic and not the senders that benefit the most.

      When you enjoy a webpage or watch a movie, you are receiving traffic.

    15. Re:I'd like to see... by ColdWetDog · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Neither you nor masteryee seem to understand that both electricity and bits cost real money to produce. Even 'renewable' hydroelectricity costs real dollars to make and repair the dams, turbines and transmission lines. Even bits that can be duplicated ad infinitum cost money to do so. Routers, fibers, techs all cost money. You cannot run everything at full capacity all of the time because you have to have room for overhead, redundancy, failure modes and Murphy. You can't 'just upgrade' transmission lines without putting some cash on the line.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  2. lies, damn lies, and advertising by martas · · Score: 4, Insightful

    i wish there was a tractable way of making lying in an ad a criminal offense punishable by death for all those responsible...

    --
    weinersmith
    1. Re:lies, damn lies, and advertising by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Whoosh!

  3. Subsidies ok. by tjstork · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Broadband is one of those cases where experience matters more than ideology. Ideologically, we might say we should have no government interference in the broadband market, or the government should provide broadband to everyone, but what really worked is the government giving the carrier a measure of guaranteed returns on their investment in exchange for satisfying some general social obligations. This worked stunningly well in the old electric industry, where state PUCs did regulate rates, for sure, mandated service levels, for sure, but, at the end, the shareholders of the electric company got a nice dividend check every year. Not a growth stock, but a reliable dividend stock, a good service for consumers, a good company to work for in the community, and it was really about as much of a win-win deal as anyone could get until everyone got greedy - consumers and shareholders alike, and screwed it all up with electrical deregulation.

    To wit : I really don't have a problem with taxpayer subsidies for rural broadband IF the broadband companies subsequently tie themselves to Public Utilities Commissions for the setting of rates in the way electricity worked in the better and pre-deregulation days. Give the rural carriers the monopoly, have the government set the rates. That provides badly needed service, the government gets its social responsibilities fulfilled, and the carrier owners get a nice dividend check.

    This isn't rocket science. But we just have to get rid of this awful grip of capitalism / socialism black and white thinking that has seized our minds and focus instead on historically that which has worked to build our communities.

    --
    This is my sig.
    1. Re:Subsidies ok. by Wildclaw · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why subsidize when you can own instead? It is just a waste of tax payer money. If you want broadband built, you buy the service of putting cables into the ground from companies, and end up owning the cables, which you can then rent out to ISPs who want access to end customers. To separate concerns and reduce centralization, you place the ownership in city/state owned non-profit businesses created for the purpose of maintenance and fee collecting on said broadband.

      What you don't do is give big companies 200 billion dollars in tax relief and tell them to build broadband if they want. Because that way you don't get anything in return. Because once the money has been given out, the companies accepting the subsidies have no reason whatsoever to keep a low price. They can just go ahead and charge as much as the market can bear. And there won't be many competitors because the subsidized will have an unfair competitive advantage.

    2. Re:Subsidies ok. by tjstork · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why subsidize when you can own instead

      Because you want the private sector to come up with the capital for initial construction and by doing so, assume the risk for construction delays and other problems.

      The reason a government has a private sector, isn't ideological, or rather why a private sector works, is sound risk management. If the King wants to build a tower, and screws it up, the King is out the money. If the King goes and says, "I'll tell you what, build whatever you want, but I get a piece of the income", well, the King doesn't have to assume any risk, at all. He makes the barons, if you will, eat the risk and the capital costs, and gets to collect. When you socialize something, you have the government absorb all the risk. Tis much better to let the government work through monopolies, and just collect the money.

      --
      This is my sig.
    3. Re:Subsidies ok. by commodore64_love · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Being a customer of the Uncle Sam Monopoly is even worse than being under the Comcast monopoly. At least I can tell Comcast to go "frak off" and not use their service. Try that with a government-owned ISP and they'll just suck the money from your paycheck instead. Like the U.S.P.S. and Amtrak does.

      And if you think RIAA is bad.....

      Wait until the government becomes your ISP and spies you downloading a movie or song (or worse: porn). They won't just send you a nasty letter; they'll have the cops collect your body and move it into a jail. And no I'm not over-reacting: the government has already thrown teens in jail just because they got caught sharing naked photos. They've also arrested at least one college student who downloaded "Girls Gone Wild" and got kiddie porn instead. "It was a mistake and I deleted it immediately," didn't work as a defense.

      No, no, no. I don't want the government running my ISP.

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
  4. will be? by castironpigeon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If it and its carrier partners win, 'Internet freedom' will mean freedom for carriers to be the 21st century's robber barons

    What do you mean - will be? We already pay a ridiculous monthly fee for piss poor access that you can't even get in most parts of the US. The areas that do get broadband access are all carved up into local monopolies so that users can stay crowded on the same cables as 10 years ago that can no longer carry the load and if you do try to use the broadband you paid for you get disconnected or throttled by the carrier. So how is this any more than business as usual?

    --
    mmmm...forbidden donut
  5. They didn't mind taking the infrastructure by HangingChad · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I remember when the internet first went private. None of the telecos minded inheriting the original infrastructure. But now that it's time to invest in new technologies, they whine like a spoiled little kid. Somebody call the whaaaambulance.

    They're trying for the same deal the big banks get. Taxpayers shoulder the infrastructure investment, but the telecos get to run it and make obscene profits without any real oversight.

    Our 40 year "government regulation is bad" experiment ended with disastrous results. Without a referee looking out for the interests of the public, which has a lot of skin in this game, the telecos are going to ride us all like a carnival pony, just like Wall Street.

    --
    That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
    1. Re:They didn't mind taking the infrastructure by bmajik · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Our 40 year "government regulation is bad" experiment ended with disastrous results

      You mean the failure of our 100+ year experiment whereby the government hands out favors to some entrants, giving them a tremendous marketplace advantage with the full power of a gun behind it? That experiment has a long history of failure world wide. It shouldn't surprise anyone that it is also failing here.

      We have had a mixed economy for a very long time. The #1 trick of the statists and their useful idiots is blaming all of our problems on what we continue to have a shrinking share of - marketplace freedom.

      One would surmise that if unregulated markets were actually a problem, the amplitude of our cyclic economic destruction would be ever decreasing as the benevolent weight of regulatory graft piled ever higher. Yet this has not been the case. And in light of experimental results that contradict the hypothesis thus far tried, a scientist, or a policy maker who's aim was economic success, would be willing to modify their approach.

      But that's not what we have. We have a government that is it's own end. It exists for its own power, and any course of action not commensurate with the increase of power and the subjugation of man isn't realistically considered.

      --
      My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
    2. Re:They didn't mind taking the infrastructure by wurble · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Not all regulation is created equal, and that is why the argument from the "free market" folks is a false dichotomy. For example, letting a company gain a monopoly in a particular region/industry is bad. Enacting regulations which actually FORCE a monopoly is even worse. One is free market, the other is not, both are bad.

      It is not a matter of free market or not a free market. It is a matter of what regulation.

  6. Orwell proud? by a_nonamiss · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why would Orwell be proud? I think he would be horrified. He wasn't adulating the society in 1984, he was writing in fear for what ours might become. The book was supposed to serve as a wakeup call. The fact that we're inching closer to this society might make his prediction correct, but I don't think he'd be happy about that.

    --
    -Arthur
    Cave ne ante ullas catapultas ambules
  7. re: no unlimited plan for electricity by King_TJ · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Nope... you're correct, but metering electric usage is, IMHO, a little more of a necessity than metering Internet usage. Electric power generation involves very real and substantial costs that aren't really a matter of one-time investments and minimal upkeep to "upgrade" so more power is supplied. EG. If I put several large businesses on a power grid and they start drawing a lot of electric power, I very well might be looking at putting another generator online to handle the load. Every hour that generator turns, it's using up coal or oil or natural gas. Or let's say bigger dollars were invested up-front to go with a nuclear plant instead? Ok, great ... but that's kind of like trying to avoid paying for spent inkjet cartridges by purchasing a more expensive color laser printer to do your heavy color printing jobs on. Eventually, the bill comes due by way of a set of 4 expensive toner cartridges, a new fuser and drum. With a nuclear plant, you're looking at a HUGE cost of disposal of radioactive waste at some point .. and don't forget the cost of hiring all the employees who keep it operating safely.

    By contrast, dealing with "heavy bandwidth users" is a different beast. Yeah, eventually, you might need to upgrade some back-end circuits, or even invest in new routing/switching gear. But that new Cisco switch you put in isn't going to require a whole crew of employees operating it 24 hours/7 days to keep it functional. The new optical fiber you put in isn't going to consume more natural resources you're paying for, the more data moves through it.