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Obama FCC Caves On Net Neutrality
An anonymous reader writes "...the rule, which will be voted on during tomorrow's FCC meeting, falls drastically short of earlier pledges by President Obama and the FCC Chairman to protect the free and open Internet. The rule is so riddled with loopholes that it's become clear that this FCC chairman crafted it with the sole purpose of winning the endorsement of AT&T and cable lobbyists, and not defending the interests of the tens of millions of Internet users."
You voted for GWB? TWICE? The first time I won't fault you, everyone has different opinions. The second time, you knew he was a feces throwing monkey and Cheney was the antichrist and you voted for them anyway?
I hate to break it to the entitlement-crowd, but those corporations built those networks with their own money, and own it outright, and as such, they get to be the supreme authority on what data traverses those networks, who pays how much to connect to any part of that network (as an end-user, a peer, or as a content-provider).
If you want to say "The government paid for ARPAnet", you fail, and get to have a 128kbps US-only backbone.
If you want to say "The government gives the network providers all sorts of tax-breaks and subsidies, so we get to have a say in how it's run", you fail, because your lawmakers didn't tie those sorts of conditions into those subsidies and tax-breaks, and you don't get to play Darth Vader and "alter the deal, pray I don't alter it any further" down the road.
If you don't like your ISP's business practices, find a new one.
If there isn't another, and you think there's like-minded folks out there, find yourself some investors, and build your own ISP. It's actually somewhat trivial to do.
If your local municipality has locked out competition via a "Franchise Agreement", well, now is an excellent time to vote those bastards out of office, or start getting involved in local politics.
The problem isn't that "ISPs are filtering/packet-shaping/blocking traffic", it's that your local governments have been propping up a monopoly. Voting against "net neutrality" is voting for the rights of property holders to do what they want with the property they have paid good money for.