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Democrats Pan Google-Verizon Net Neutrality Proposal
GovTechGuy writes "Four House Democrats wrote to the Federal Communications Commission, urging them to write strict net neutrality rules and reject the framework put forward by Google and Verizon. The lawmakers, including Rep. Anna Eshoo, who represents the district containing Google HQ, said the Google-Verizon proposal increases the pressure on the FCC to come up with actual net neutrality rules, and characterize the deal as harmful to consumers and beneficial for the corporations. In particular, the letter took issue with two pieces of the Verizon-Google proposal: exemptions for managed services and wireless services from strict net-neutrality rules."
Am I too jaded or did anyone else have the reaction to the parents comment that it should read more along the lines of:
"They're finally realizing that they can't let corporations that aren't paying them off for it have their way with the internet?"
That(to me) is the most likely reason for them not submitting their own plan. Whoever is paying the bills at their getaway condo in the bahamas is asking them for a stop gap while they come up with their own plan.
Oh, will you look at that... theres a tin foil hat on my head... maybe I'm just paranoid.
From the way I see it, if these politicians actually had the will to put their foot down on net neutrality then Google wouldn't even have to compromise and cut deals.
But what do I know.
The lack of neutrality for managed services is going to put an increased burden on IT companies. It will increase the costs where cloud services are already being proven to NOT lower costs.
The fact of the matter is that True Net Neutrality is beneficial to every company EXCEPT ISPs. ISPs being a set than includes broadband, T1, DSL and any provider as well as the increasing role mobile providers take. Basically a set of companies that receive quite a bit in government money ALREADY to fund construction of network infrastructure.
No, back in the day we fought so that nobody would control the Internet. Initially, corporations didn't have enough power to screw things up, so the only people we had to keep from abusing their power was the government. Now, they do, so we have to convince somebody more powerful (the government) to step in and keep them in check. It's about balancing one bad guy against another so that the harm cancels out....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
You're saying basically "Because this sounds like an intelligent reaction by politicians, it has to be fake. It simply must be a maneuver, rather than a real response. An actual response would be stupid. Intelligence is always a lie. Progress is always a lie."
No, that's not paranoia, any more than thinking the sun will come up tomorrow is paranoia.
It isn't wrong. They wrote a fucking letter that says we don't like what Verizon and Google have proposed. It doesn't have any proposal of what the FCC policy should be. Just that Google and Verizon's shouldn't be adopted.
The closest they get is saying what concepts should be central in the policy that is adopted.
Since this is slashdot, we can make this a car analogy. Google and Verizon have designed and built a vehicle. They have presented it and it could be sent to the manufacturing line. These democrats have said "don't build it!" and instead are proposing that the factory make cars that have 4 tires, a steering wheel, some seats, and an engine. 4 cylinder? *shrug!* Comfy seats? Eh, if you like.
It would be one thing for a private organization to protest the Google/Verizon proposal. But these people are in the practice of legislation. If they object, why haven't they and their staff managed to come up with a proposal of their own? Its only been, you know, years.
I don't expect morality, equality, consistency, or justice from the law. I expect only legality.
...doesn't exist yet.
When the internet first started...
There was no "cloud".
There was no streaming video.
There was no bittorrent.
There were no VPNs, no work-at-home over the net.
There wasn't even a web - though that came fairly quickly.
The internet was conceived as an open-ended transport mechanism, with no plans or constraints as to the data being transported, though there were some thoughts about QOS, recognizing that some data had to get there quickly, some reliably, some not particularly either.
Commercial deployments of anything, not just the internet, generally aren't open-ended. They tend to plan things, up-front, and put just as much thought into billing as they do into the rest of the job. (Ever see how much cell phone plumbing is dedicated to billing, as opposed to merely shuttling customers' data?)
The best reason for net neutrality is something we haven't done yet, something no company has planned for, and very likely something that would be hindered by default, because it doesn't fit into current plans. (Or can you say, "disruption not desired!"?)
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Here we go again.
Net neutrality is not government control of the Internet. It is government regulation of ISPs, in the form of a mandate that they continue to provide neutral access to the Internet. It is an assurance the free and open Internet remains free and open. That is all. Stop spreading the FUD.
Palm trees and 8