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Free Press Sues FCC Over Discrepancy In Net Neutrality Rules
hypnosec writes "The Free Press has filed a lawsuit against the Federal Communications Commission, challenging the net neutrality rules laid out by the regulator. The lawsuit (PDF), which was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, claims the rules are different for fixed line and mobile wireless broadband. According to the rules, mobile wireless carriers are not allowed to block voice and other applications that compete with their own services, but other than that, they are free do to what they want."
So the only thing they are not allowed is to block competing services? What about detecting them (by packet inspection) and charging premium rates?
Well looking at who had something to gain over the wireless rules, it's no wonder that they got a pretty free reign to do whatever they please over that spectrum. Google's stance in it may have had something to do with their push for Android, but I really don't get why they sided with VZW on it. No neutrality towards all content is not neutrality at all.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely. indymedia
The FCC needs to grow some balls. I can't believe they put these rules through and harped about needing an open internet and then allowed the wireless providers to do whatever the hell they want. What PRECISELY will hurt your "new" wireless networks so much by not being able to block whatever you want? Precisely what? Bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit. I'm pretty sure the companies making 100's of millions of dollars like Verizon and AT&T are quite fine having to deal with the new rules. That any wireless company would claim their networks are new and just barely growing is absurd. That they would use that as an excuse to not have net neutrality is insane. I cannot understand why the FCC people would even give a shit unless they are in someone's pocket. Honestly, what a load of horseshit.
"Those who would sacrifice essential liberties for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - BenF
If net neutrality was strictly applied to wireless carriers, wouldn't they have to stop charging for tethering since they are price discriminating based on where the packet originates from?
Just a guess, but the Free Press lacks standing. Therefore, the lawsuit will be dismissed.
Both the Congress and the DC federal Courts have told the FCC that it does not have the authority from the enacting legislation to enact such rules.
The line based ISPs lost their battle, their bandwidth is cheaper than dirt. Wireless carriers have to build and use expensive towers so their per GB rate is much much higher.
The thing they are trying to avoid is terminating user contracts because they went over their cap limit. I remember when wireless carrier internet was first starting, Verizon termed mine for torrenting down a few linux distros in a day. A year later I got a check for $50 from a class action lawsuit paying for my termed broadband card, stating they terminated my access w/o actually knowing if I was violating their TOS or not, they just assumed I was torrenting w/o actually knowing lol.
Wired spectrum from the local service provider to the customer is limited only by money and the time, effort, and politics of laying new wires. Barring local political obstacles or the rare geographical obstacles, companies are free to invest and lay more fiber to their customers.
Wireless is another matter. Even if additional spectrum were auctioned off and radio towers built every other block, there is a practical limit to wireless bandwidth. There's also the issue that there's not a lot of spectrum to auction off except at the high end, and that spectrum isn't exactly great for things like mobile phones.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Business is built (and grows) from innovation on top of infrastructure.
This is the infrastructure part - by allowing companies to ration the resources and block new business models as they see fit, it allows them to put the brakes on growth.
This then reserves the "growth" for the carrier if, at some future time, they should decide to add new business models.
For a concrete example: by making the barrier to entry for streaming video very high it becomes impossible to start a streaming video company. The carrier wants to reserve that potential business opportunity for itself in the future.
Unfortunately, this sort of rationing stunts the growth of *all* new business which might make use of the resource - including new and innovative ideas which are untested and whose viability is unknown at launch. Big companies are risk-averse, and generally don't innovate. (For instance, this is why at launch it was nigh impossible to make a call with an iPhone in Manhattan - the new business model swamped the limited resources of the carrier.)
Just one piece of the US policy of investing in stagnation.
Everything uses up bandwidth. That has nothing to do with blocking certain protocols/content. As far as I know, they are still allowed to have bandwidth caps. They could use up that bandwidth by doing anything.
That argument would have merit if they weren't selling 5-Laptop hotspots.
help me i've cloned myself and can't remember which one I am
That's not a controversial claim, its a fact which is explicitly noted with a justification presented in the Report and Order.
(Report & Order, para. 8: "Mobile broadband is at an earlier stage in its development than fixed broadband and is evolving rapidly. For that and other reasons discussed below, we conclude that it is appropriate at this time to take measured steps in this area. Accordingly, we require mobile broadband providers to comply with the transparency rule, which includes enforceable disclosure obligations regarding device and application certification and approval processes; we prohibit providers from blocking lawful websites; and we prohibit providers from blocking applications that compete with providers' voice and video telephony services. We will closely monitor the development of the mobile broadband market and will adjust the framework we adopt today as appropriate.")
On the other hand, that's not a fact, its a (demonstrably false) claim. Mobile broadband internet carriers are prohibited from blocking access to any:
1. lawful websites, subject to reasonable network management, and
2. voice or video applications that compete with the provider's voice and video telephony services, subject to reasonable network managements.
(Report & Order, Appendix A, provision added as 47 CFR Sec. 8.5: "[...] A person engaged in the provision of mobile broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block consumers from accessing lawful websites, subject to reasonable network management; nor shall such person block applications that compete with the provider's voice or video telephony services, subject to reasonable network management.")
Presumably they're only selling what they believe their infrastructure can support. If the data bandwidth required were two or three times their capacity model and they didn't have funding or spectrum to increase capacity, not only are they screwed, but so are all their customers.
We can't have it both ways. Either a few pay for tethering and large data usage, or we all pay for tethering and large data usage whether we need/want it or not. What everyone seems to want is all you can eat data with unlimited tethering but at the same price or even less than they currently pay. That will not happen.
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
This is false in three ways:
First, the Open Internet Report and Order distinguishes between fixed and mobile broadband, not wireless and wireline; fixed includes many wireless services.
Second, mobile broadband providers are not "permitted to do what they want", there are several restrictions placed on them (there is a transparency rule, and and non-blocking rules applying to any lawful websites and to any applications which compete with the provider's voice and video telephony services.)
Third, and perhaps most critically to the point you are making, the FCC did not put looser restrictions on mobile broadband providers based on the market being competitive, but did so based on the market being less mature (see, e.g., Report & Order at para. 8: "Mobile broadband is at an earlier stage in its development than fixed broadband and is evolving rapidly. For that and other reasons discussed below, we conclude that it is appropriate at this time to take measured steps in this area.")
Making the service unusable is blocking it, according to the Report & Order, at para. 66:
Powel's Kid was running the FCC under Bush Jr. I assume that was part of the package to get Powel in with Bush, or just Powel pulling some strings for nepotism. That wouldn't be all so bad, it was when the kid rolled back all the anti-monopoly changes in the 1996 telco reform act and allowed wired lines their protected monopoly status again. You wonder why it's a duopoly in the states? The FCC under Bush is a major factor in this. Oh also the lovely Rep Upton (R-MI) who was head of the house subcommittee on telecommunications (My Rep, go figure!) was very pro-big telco and supported these changes back to the old ways. Guess who his largest donors were? But Upton has moved along.. now he's just one of the super 12 fixing the budget. Yeah, that's gonna go over well. So it's not just the FCC, it's the entire system that's rigged. Corporatism run wild.
For instance, there's nothing keeping them from saying "streaming video via our paid app doesn't count towards your tiny data caps". This is in fact reasonable for them since it means that they don't need to increase their upstream connections.
It kind of sucks for the end user though since if everyone in a given area does it the effect is chilling.
Amazing. A limited resource that everyone can tap into. Here comes the tragedy of the commons!
...
If only there was some way to keep the hoards from screwing it up for the rest of us.
Like a per-arranged set of rules that the majority of us found to be fair enough.
REGULATIONS
Wired and wireless ARE fundamentally different. But the fact that wireless has a limited resource isn't a good argument to make EXCEPTIONS to the regulations.
If there can be legal president set defining data as speech then all free speech rules would begin to apply. this would frame the network traffic in a way that US law could start to apply past rulings. It would at least be interesting to explore the legal consequences of defining data as speech.
Anybody remember all the hype about 5 years ago when we heard how much cheaper it is to deploy wireless bandwidth and how much cheaper it was to maintain?
Can someone remind me then how much cheaper mobile networking is compared to cable or DSL?