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Comcast Customers Urged To Opt-Out of Settlement

funchords writes "As a settlement to the class-action lawsuits over Comcast's blocking of users' Internet traffic, Comcast stands to pay 'up to' $16.00 to every subscriber who makes a claim at their settlement website and declares, under penalty of perjury, that their online activity was for a lawful purpose consistent with applicable copyright and other laws. Robb Topolski, the veteran networking engineer who kicked off the case when he discovered the blocking back in 2007, says that the proposed settlement doesn't make sense, especially after the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled this month that the US Federal Communications Commission didn't have the authority to enforce its Net neutrality principles on Comcast. 'You paid about $50 a month for the service, and the amount that Comcast stands to return is up to about 50c per month for each month that it blocked traffic,' he wrote. 'If that tiny amount of money is compensation, then there is no penalty to Comcast for interfering with its customers, for failing to disclose it, for repeatedly lying about it, and for taking so long to stop it.' The Associated Press and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, in late 2007, each independently confirmed Topolski's reports that Comcast was blocking BitTorrent and some other traffic without telling its customers. Comcast first denied interfering with traffic, then finally said it throttled some applications only during times of peak congestion. However, studies from the Max Planck Institute for Software Systems in Germany eventually proved that Comcast slowed BitTorrent traffic around the clock."

7 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Never understood class action lawsuits by TheRaven64 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Looks like English to me, although I'm not sure who this Never chap is, nor why we should care that he, she, or it understood class action lawsuits.

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  2. Re:I will punish comcast.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    What if you came home one day and someone had taken a shit in the middle of your living room floor, and there was a note next to it: "Fuck you, courtesy of The Comcast Corporation"

    Would you stop buying their product then?

  3. Re:Here's my question by BigSlowTarget · · Score: 4, Funny

    I am patenting this business practice right away. Anyone who uses it without my permission will get sued.

  4. Re:I will punish comcast.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    WTF? So basically, you are implying that I move out from where I live? High speed internet is absolute necessity for me for the work I do.

    You're a porn critic?

  5. Re:I will punish comcast.... by StuartHankins · · Score: 2, Funny

    Same here. But I use a wireless card instead of paying money to those bastards. Yes, even Sprint is better than Comcast.

    Now I have to go brush my teeth for mentioning either of those names.

  6. Re:Being Urged To Opt-Out? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Is their a link?

    No, it's the third person plural possessive pronoun. Thanks for asking!

  7. Re:Here's my question by silverglade00 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Dude, go easy on him. He just got stabbed and he's high.