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FCC Commissioner Blasts Verizon On Net Neutrality
destinyland writes "FCC chairman Julius Genachowski says that net neutrality rules 'will happen,' promising the FCC 'will make sure that we get the rules right... to make sure that what we do maximizes innovation and investment across the ecosystem.' But the same week, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps announced that the public should not stand for deals 'that exchange Internet freedom for bloated profits,' mocking the tiered-data plans of the 'Verizon-Google gaggle' and accusing them of wanting 'gated communities for the affluent.' Speaking at a New Mexico hearing, the commissioner warned the audience against proposals that would 'vastly diminish' the Internet's importance, blasting 'special interests and gatekeepers and toll-booth collectors who will short-circuit what this great new technology can do for our country.' (The text of his speech is available as a PDF file at FCC.gov.) He concludes by acknowledging that 'you can't blame companies for seeking to protect their own interests. But you can blame policy-makers if we let them get away with it!'"
That any and all data on the network, regardless of source, destination, or content, should travel unhindered.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
when you get a packet, move it on when you can.
Over which connection? The 1000000 gigabit/nanosecond pipe for the paying content providers (Disney, etc) or the 14.4kbps modem for everyone else?
Over a 100GB/sec pipe, you can't ask for 300GB/sec so no hindrance in effect
You can ask - you just won't get it. It's called denial of service. You don't (normally) ask for speed, you ask for a volume of data. But if it comes over too slow a connection (intentional or not) you clog up the network like a highway at rush hour. Clever networks WILL intentionally route traffic they don't want over too congested a connection knowing that they can then shake down content owners and end users to fork over more dough for less freedom. It's not remotely difficult to intentionally under-invest in a network to keep it slower, especially when there is little/no competition.
Keep going? On what?
Plenty. If you are going to define how network providers are going to route traffic, you're going to have to get quite detailed about what that means. Doing this in a manner with no loopholes is REALLY hard. You're also going to have to define how it will be monitored, what will be monitored, what the consequences are for violating the rules, who is going to monitor it, and for how long and with what funds will the oversight be conducted with. Easy? I wish it were but it won't be. Net neutrality is important but keeping it is going to be quite a challenge.
http://www.democracynow.org/ - no advertising, no special interest
Your question makes no sense. The answer is obvious: You would handle all packets identically regardless of content.
If the "pipes" start to get full, install new faster pipes to relieve congestion. If that's not practical impose ~250GB limits + 5 cents/extra GB so people will limit themselves (in the same way they limit how much electricity or water they use).
I want you to do something for me... Let's do a demonstration, then think this through.
Disconnect any devices from your modem (both wired and wireless).
Now, look at that "Activity" light; Notice that it keeps blinking even though you are not using the Internet?
That's because of Internet Background Radiation. There are packets of unrequested data arriving at your modem many times a second. The sources are numerous, distributed, and many are malicious.
In a $x per Gig model a distributed denial of service attack directed at your IP will drive your bill to absurd rates; If you're lucky you have a hard cap on your monthly consumption, if you're unlucky you pay for the overages (as you suggested above).
The current answer to IBR is a NAT/Firewall that drops all unrequested packets, but NAT makes using your connection to run a server difficult. Now, you can come up with clever ways to "open ports" on your NAT router, but they all rely on having admin access to the router.
Even with a NAT router connected to your modem, you would still be paying for all those IBR packets with a $x per Gig model -- they would be delivered to your modem before being dropped.
So, the ISPs can put a NAT router / firewall on the other side of your modem, in their facilities where you have no admin access to the router (indeed, some already do this). Then, they can charge you only for the packets that make it through -- the ones you specifically requested. The problem is that now, you've limited the way you can use the Internet. You can't very well host a (game) server if you can't accept incoming (read: unsolicited) connections.
Protocols like STUN help bypass the "behind NAT" problem, but require a 3rd party to help coordinate the connection... (3rd party AKA MITM).
The phrase "only pay for the bits you use" depends on your definition of "use"; Treating all packets as equal doesn't really describe how most people expect they are "using" the Internet...
This is a very complicated thing indeed.
That hasn't been true for fourteen years. The Telecommunications Bill of 1996 made exclusive licenses illegal.
What we have now is basically collusion between the major ISPs. The phone companies have all agreed that only one phone company will ever serve any particular area, and the cable companies have all agreed that only one cable company will ever serve any particular area, meaning that, for the majority of the area of the US, broadband customers have at most two choices.
For example, I have a choice of AT&T DSL or Time Warner cable, period. My parents live a five minute drive away and they have a choice of Verizon or Comcast, period. Verizon doesn't serve my area, despite the fact that they have hundreds of FIOS installations less than a mile from my house, and Time Warner doesn't serve my parents, despite the fact that they have a regional office less than a mile from their house.
This has nothing to do with government conspiring with business, and everything to do with too few players falling into a Nash Equilibrium: a state where nobody competes with anyone else, and instead work to squeeze as much money out of customers as possible.