Net Neutrality and Carrier Incentives To Invest

An anonymous reader writes "In policy debates before Congress and the FCC, the big ISPs and wireless carriers (Verizon, AT&T, Comcast, Cox, Sprint) argued that net neutrality rules would give them less incentive to upgrade their networks. The reality is just the opposite, says Infoworld's Bill Snyder, citing a game-theoretic work done by two researchers at the U. of Florida's business school. If carriers can charge premium prices for expedited service, they have an incentive not to invest. Hmm, this reminds me of the agriculture business, where prices are sometimes propped up by paying farmers not to grow crops."

Comments

Open source internet?

[Anonymous Coward]

With wireless technology developing as it is, is there any chance that some day we can create our own ad hoc internet without relying on expensive cables and thus expensive carriers?

I suppose we would still need some kickass routers, but it's not like open source projects are completely devoid of money. Wikipedia has tons of hardware, no?

Re:Open source internet?

[Ash-Fox]

With wireless technology developing as it is, is there any chance that some day we can create our own ad hoc internet without relying on expensive cables and thus expensive carriers?

Not without a decent spectrum allocated for it. The 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz band at our current power restrictions don't allow for very good distances, unless you have a very clunky antenna that you wouldn't find on a mobile device.

Developing an ad-hoc mesh network has many issues to take into consideration, including dealing with the fact that there will be people who are using an unfair amount of resources and no single transmitter can be trusted to keep any information secure or even 'truthful' about who it is.

Re:Open source internet?

[jellomizer]

The internet is Open. The specs to communicate over TCP/IP are quite clear. The problem is who owns the infrastructure. Cables, Satellites, and the ability to bring them to peoples location costs money. Then they have the cost of maintaining their routing to other providers.
An Add Hock network can only go so far, once you scale larger then you get into more issues.
100 people all maintaining their own routers is fine.
1000 people you may need to find a good techie and pony up to give him a good router.
10000 More techies that you need to maintain the router. And you are start having complains on who's cable go where. Or crazy nuts afraid that their house is getting too much wi-fi radation.

The bigger it gets the most it costs and the more issues that happen. You will start to need Full time people working on this stuff, and they can't starve for the glory of keeping your internet up, they will need to be paid for their work...
Then when you are done you either have a set of big ISP that you probably need to pay $20-60 a month too or a government controlled internet, where you will get think of the children people yelling at the government to block whatever seems bad information to them at the time.

Re:Open source internet?

[Ash-Fox]

Certainly correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd think trust is something you'd deal with at the presentation layer. We've dealt with spoofing at lower levels in our existing setup after all.

The problem with talking about the OSI model is that our current networking technology doesn't even respect that model. I will note that I didn't say it wasn't impossible to deal with untrusted nodes, but it's something that we should take into consideration when developing a new networking environment such as this.

Back to your original comment, I think dealing with it in the presentation layer is a bit too high in my opinion, as it would require reworking essentially every application to offer some form of encryption. There wouldn't be a clear way to ensure that every application developer even ensures there is encryption. I would suggest producing something similar to IPsec which sits in the 'network' layer of the OSI model, where by user applications would need little knowledge of what network they're operating over to function and ensure some form of security by default.

The issue however is having some sort of global authority system that hands out registered assignments to devices to ensure no spoofing. An authority system like this would likely cause a new slew of problems however, mainly the faults of having to deal with a centralized system.

Dealing with this sort of system with issues such as a netsplit (where the authority is on the otherside of the split and new devices are added to the side you're on, unable to get assignments ends up being rather a complicated matter.

Re:Open source internet?

[Richard_at_work]

Fuck that, how about routing millions of nodes in general? Ad hoc would result in either massive routing tables or long routes...

Re:Open source internet?

[Ash-Fox]

802.22

802.22 requires dedicated 'towers' to be setup, which can really only be done by big money, this does not work with the idea of "creating our own ad hoc internet without relying on expensive cables".

and limit the hogs.

What if the hogs are providing a very useful service? How do you distinguish between a torrent and a game server?

And someday the interference problem will be licked and we will have multiple users on the same frequency;

To be honest, a mesh network could be done far better using frequency-hopping spread spectrum radios, you could build the addressing scheme into the frequency hopping, this would allow software defined radios to listen in on specific broadcast messages, as well as provide a new form of security measures for dealing with secure communications between any single node or to a select many without much of an issue with interception.

802.22 doesn't really seem that developed for a technology for constantly changing mesh network, especially since it seems to expect some kind of dedicated infrastructure setup.

it's a software problem we haven't solved yet, not a physical one.

If it's 802.22, it's both for this specific circumstance of "creating our own ad hoc internet without relying on expensive cables".

Re:Open source internet?

[Ash-Fox]

How would you solve the transatlantic problem?

I've networked (and I don't mean computer network) across the transatlantic before with only a few watts over short wave. I've done it with both a huge ugly antenna and using a well hidden ground antenna.

Networking over vast distances is possible (hell, Guglielmo Marconi did it in 1900s), but in my uses, bandwidth was extremely limited, I'm sure someone smarter than me can come up with something far better.

I feel that due to how fragile shortwave is, that we need to have very responsible people using those frequencies and not just average Joe consumer device.

An idea to investigate, the submarine monitoring networks are capable of hearing ships leaving port across the globe, potentially that technology could be further developed for relaying messages over the sea - I wouldn't know how viable that is.

Sadly, I don't have a concrete answer on this, I didn't do much research on long distance communications.

Re:Open source internet?

[Ash-Fox]

Well if everybody just signed up for FON we'd be pretty close. We'd still be using the carriers but we'd have WiFi access anywhere a FON subscriber is nearby.

My Internet is usually saturated, I doubt being a FON user would be that helpful. The idea of "Imagine enjoying videos, movies and games at WiFi speeds while you're away from home - for free! " on my already over saturated connection seems a bit unlikely.

Re:Open source internet?

[hairyfeet]

Plus he is missing the point that it is no different than our political system, with two groups at the top that are Coke and Pepsi and take any competition VERY nastily. In my own area neither the cable nor DSL has moved a single inch in a decade and when a friend tried to route around them by getting his boss to shell out for a T-1 and renting connections off the line the duopoly made a few calls and has his connection price raised 400%!

They told him "Just try and sue us" and his lawyer told him flat footed "Oh yeah you'll win no doubt, but it'll cost you about a mil five in fees and a decade out of your life" so they just closed up shop and moved away. those folks are STILL stuck with nothing but cellular or dialup BTW, and guess who is the only ones that offer that in that area? Why one of the duopoly of course!

The only way things are ever gonna change is if the lines are opened up to competition. We even have precedent as we gave them 200 billion to run us nationwide broadband more than a decade ago and all they gave us was a low res Goatse while their CxOs used the cash for big boobed hookers and blow. If they want a monopoly? We'll give them 15 years for any area they run FTTH, we'll give them 25 if that area had never been served. oh and it doesn't count unless EVERY house can receive it, otherwise they'll run it to a single house and count the whole area, like they do on that lame .gov broadband list that shows my mom has SIX different ones to choose from when all she has is a single badly run WISP that is frankly not much better than cellular.

Personally I think with so many out of work it is time to bring back the WPA and have those that are hurting for work run us nationwide fiber that We, The People will own. any carrier can then compete and give us plenty to choose from. Otherwise all we are gonna get thanks to our corporate overlords is the short bus to the information superhighway while even Romania kicks our ass on speed!

Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[cayenne8]

Hmm, this reminds me of the agriculture business, where prices are sometimes propped up by paying farmers not to grow crops."

I wish as much as anything, we could get the Feds to stop all farm subsidies, especially corn.

WTF should we be doing this? It isn't like we have food shortages in the US. Let's grow all we can...sell it to other countries, but there is no need for taxpayers to pay someone to NOT grown something.

Especially since so many of the farms are large corporations now....

But, sadly, it'll never happen...there's always an election around the corner, and they won't want to piss off states like Iowa, etc.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[hedwards]

The problem is that those countries need to be growing their own food. It would probably work if countries where starvation was common they'd be producing other things, but those countries are usually lacking in all around production capability.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[Oswald McWeany]

The crazy thing about the subsidies is that they encourage the growing of things like maize over vegtables and healthy alternatives.

Maize- yes that wonderful grain that contains almost no healthy nutrition compare to other grains that is often served instead of vegetables.

From which at subsidized prices we get artificially low sweetners such as corn syrup, and because it is used as animal feed (cattle, pigs)- meat prices drop.

Not that there is anything wrong with protein- but it is the high fat that goes along with it that would be missing from more veggies instead of a 99cent ham burger- or a steak.

The subsidies, especially the ones tilted towards encouraging farmers to grow maize of all things does nothign but encourage the obesity epidemic.

Cut the maize- grow healthier grains, healthier fruits and veggies- why are my tax dollars going towards making my neighbours into fat pigs?

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[stephencrane]

The main problem is that the US -does- sell much of our food overseas, but that price point is based on the subsidized price. The price gap isn't recaptured in the form of tariffs. Many countries don't invest in agricultural and associated legal infrastructure at home because there's no way for anyone to grow crops cheaper than the US can sell them.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[Aqualung812]

Cut the maize- grow healthier grains, healthier fruits and veggies- why are my tax dollars going towards making my neighbours into fat pigs?

It gets better. Wait until the USA has national healthcare. They they'll use tax money to make people fat (maize), then use tax money to deal with the health issues from being fat! PROFIT!

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[bws111]

Look up 'dust bowl'

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[Oswald McWeany]

Ahh-well the government will love then that not only do corn fed cattle have higher fat contents then grass fed cattle- they also require higher levels of antibiotics.

These antibiotics in farming is what leads to super bugs and antibiotic resistance in bacteria... which leads to... ... higher health costs and prescription costs.

Government should double subsidies on maize immediately to help make the loop complete.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[geekoid]

Wrong.
Many starving areas don't invest because they have no stability to invest. Food is't a problem, delivery to the people who need to east it is.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[geekoid]

Dust bowl? the market will fix that~

The guy is one of many who doesn't understand why something is done, and why it was started, but spouts off it should stop because he doesn't understand what it is he is talking about.

AND he gets to vote.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[gumbi west]

The government doesn't pay to not produce any more but does buy land and turn it into prairies or parks. Basically land is so productive now that we don't need it all.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[Oswald McWeany]

First off, I don't have a problem with "corn" I have a problem with Maize. "Sweet Corn" if you must.

The word "corn" usually refers to the most commonly grown grain in a region- it is a generic word- so means different things in different countries- and amongst older generations of Americans means different things depending what region you are from. Younger generations are more removed from agriculture so it means maize to them more.

Absolutely Maize is a problem- your 99cent hamburger would not cost 99 cents if it were not for subsized Maize. Over half the cost of maize production is subsidized- it would cost over double if it were not government subsidized. Cheap beef and pork comes from corn-fed animals.

Your 99cent hamburger (now $2+ hamburger) would also contain less fat if it were from a grass-fed cow... and have a superior taste.

Maize makes sweeteners cheaper and much more attractive to use in bulk quantities by food producers.

Look at bread ingredients- in the US which unproportionately subsidizes maize- you will see a lot more maize based sweetners than that of bread from overseas.

This is not as apparant in more quality breads... but your average pre-wrapped mass produced bread will have corn syrup in it. Do you think pre-subsidies bread would get corn syrup added?

You can bet that 99cent hamburger bun contains corn syrup too!

A simple study of economics would show that people prefer to pay less for things rather than more.

If truffles (not the chocolate) cost 99cents- people would eat them too.

Maize is a calorie rich- nutrient poor food. By making it cheaper and thereby adding to the appeal to the masses- you are prodding people to consume crap.

Yes, people have the choice what they eat (that's why I don't eat much sweet corn or hamburgers and have a decent body)- however for the goverment to promote the biggest item that has contributed to America's obesity is absurd.

Maize- and corn syrup useage has gone through the roof because it is so cheap.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[wierd_w]

The problem with this, is urban sprawl.

Seriously.

Farmers own fat chunks of property that urban and suburban development companies constantly salivate for. Thr land is perfect for homes, in that it is already mostly flat, well drained, cleared of subsoil rocks, and conveniently located near a roadway. It's rural, and makes an attractive prospect for rich people wanting a "country house".

Farmer goes out of business, what happens to the farmland? Do you think a starving farmer that barely held onto his shirt is going to be the one buying it?

Once the developers put houses on it, it stops being farm land. Getting it back into production would mean evicting dozens of families, bulldozing and disposition of all the houses and foundations, removing all the underground plumbing, and possibly chemical cleanup. (Rich people and their use of ChemLawn...)

The result? The agricultural capacity of the US drops precipitously.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[BranMan]

I'll take a shot at it. In essence, subsidies are an insurance policy so that we always have plenty of food. Without subsidies, farming would be subject to the ups and downs of the free market. Consider this - with subsidies, farms can, regardless of how much of what they produce, KNOW what they are going to have for income, more or less. The subsidies make sure the prices they get are STABLE. With that we can make sure we're always producing the right amount - i.e. too much for us here at home, so we sell the excess overseas - regardless of climate or droughts, since we'll always make sure we have excess capacity.

That works out really well. Without that, the market rules. If one year there is a drought, for instance, prices will jump as there will be shortages. The next year, all kinds of new people will try to get 'in' on the high prices and end up with a bumper crop, which will depress prices instead. Maybe to the point of bankrupting farmers, closing farms, etc. The next year after that, not enough of a crop is produced, and we have more shortages. Up and down, up and down. Not something we want happening to our food supply.

I'm probably not explaining it well enough, but that's the general idea - simple economics, lots of players looking for an edge - if we leave prices unsupported, we'll have chaos. And hunger. And if we end up hungry here, what about all the places depending on our exports?

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[cayenne8]

Without those subsidies, the only ones who could actually afford to farm would be the giant corporate farms. I don't really want them to be the only ones that I can get food from.

But, that's exactly pretty much what we currently what we have NOW in this nation.

Pretty much all of our food comes from like 5-6 major corporate entities. I wish I could remember the fairly recent documentary, but I was shocked when they showed that pretty much all of our meat (beef, pork) comes from like 3-4 major companies.

There aren't that many indie farmers out there left, really... most small farmers are just corporate producers, subject to their rules.

Re:Farmer subsidies need to STOP

[hedwards]

Precisely, if those nations are unable or unwilling to invest in the infrastructure to feed themselves then it's rather unlikely that they'll invest in the infrastructure to produce goods to trade for food. It's not a lack of people or ability so much as the corruption and war that prevents it from happening. Few populated parts of the world are genuinely incapable of producing their own food for long periods of time.

Premium service..

[Anonymous Coward]

...is what you used to call 'regular service' yesterday.
Case in point: Data caps. there were no data caps before, services wee running just fine...and somehow, a couple of years later, you need to pay more for the same data transfer.
It's artificial shortage is what it is.

Re:Premium service..

[Catbeller]

The big problems with network capacity happened in San Francisco and New York City, both places loaded with tech journalists who had the ability to broadcast their complaints. Other cities are mostly fine.

SF dwellers complain, but don't seem to realize that it takes two years to get a new cell installed in their city due to NIMBY laws. AT&T simply could not roll out new capacity after the iPhone took off in 2007 for over two years because they were not permitted to do so. The problem started to diminish when the extra cells started going up... in 2009. Sometimes, when you have a problem, look in the mirror and the answer is staring back at you.

NYC? Dunno.

Glad to hear it, but a big "duh!!!"

[MobyDisk]

I am glad that someone did some academic research to prove this, but it seems unnecessary. Isn't the entire point of eliminating network neutrality just so that carriers can charge more for their existing bandwidth? They slow down a site, then charge you to restore the speed back to what it originally was. Or they charge you a fee to make your packets a higher priority than your neighbor's. Either way, no infrastructure changes were required. The highway analogy the article uses is spot-on.

Can someone explain to me why Republicans keep spewing this illogic about Net Neutrality? Why all the hate and rhetoric? It's really a very simple, and should be a non-partisan issue.

Re:Glad to hear it, but a big "duh!!!"

[0racle]

They slow down a site, then charge you to restore the speed back to what it originally was.

Actually, it's worse than that. In addition to the above, they could introduce internet tiering packages where they went to the content providers and charge them for getting preferential treatment or at least slightly less throttling. They charge you for access, charge you again for faster access and charge the content providers for letting them get your traffic in the first place.

Can someone explain to me why Republicans keep spewing this illogic about Net Neutrality?

You seriously have to ask this? It's about money. Also, I don't believe anti-net neutrality is a partisan issue, R and D are both for it.

Re:Glad to hear it, but a big "duh!!!"

[Bloopie]

Also, I don't believe anti-net neutrality is a partisan issue, R and D are both for it.

If both parties are against net neutrality, how do you explain the Senate vote last week where the Democrats voted against repealing it and the Republicans voted for repealing it? And Obama threatened to veto a repeal? Link

Re:Glad to hear it, but a big "duh!!!"

[SuricouRaven]

Ideology. The republicans, or at least the base that they need to keep happy, oppose all government regulation by default as a matter of princible. They strongly believe in the power of the free market to self-optimise for the good of the people, if the government would just stop trying to fix it. Any times the market fails they'll just blame it on the government anyway.

Re:Glad to hear it, but a big "duh!!!"

[MobyDisk]

Following the money doesn't seem to work here. The telecom industries are giving equally to both parties.

http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=B08
AT&T and Verizon are the biggest lobbyists in the telephone industry by 10:1 and 5:1 respectively. Most of the money went to Obama, naturally, but he supports Network Neutrality. The next 4 on the list are Republicans. Looking at the "Party Split" graph, 2010 the Democrats got 4.3 million and the Republicans got 4.2 million. The "Telephone Utilities to House" graph does show the Republicans receiving somewhat more money, but it is fairly even in the house.

I don't see any definitive conclusion from this.

Incentive, incentive, this is capitalism?

[Anonymous Coward]

Industry is a bunch of spoiled children these days. They cry and scream and throw a tantrum, threatening to take their ball and go home unless they get bribed with candy to behave. Remember a time when all it took to get a business to make a wise move was prove it would make them more money? Neither do I.

Re:Incentive, incentive, this is capitalism?

[shentino]

Being rich enough to buy laws that keep everyone else poor is a profitable move indeed.

Why cannibalize your revenue ?

[Crashmarik]

If you upgrade your base quality of service, you are going to eat into your revenue from selling quality for particular services A la carte. If a carrier is charging you and or netflix to provide a quality connection why would they invest in making the network "better".

You mean the ISPs lied to congress?

[JustAnotherIdiot]

I, for one, am totally shocked.
Shocked I tell you.

Manufacturing scarcity

[Catbeller]

They aren't providing a service; they are manufacturing a scarcity of service. Any producer or provider will ultimately do this if they are not regulated in some fashion. They will build out a minimum of infrastructure for a maximum of profit. And they will never stop raising fees. Our great-grandparents understood this, so electrical utilities and such are government-regulated monopolies. Some things can't be covered by free market economics. Wiring all homes is one of those things.

Re:Manufacturing scarcity

[cobrausn]

Any producer or provider will not 'ultimately do this' as long as the market barrier-to-entry is not too high. This can occur for a few reasons, one of which is actually the existence of regulations that favor the existing businesses (e.g., Regulatory Capture). Another reason is that the infrastructure required to support the service is incredibly expensive, which serves as a 'natural' limitation to the number of players. It seems in this case we have a bit of both. The only viable solution I see (solution being something that benefits both the market and the consumer) is to not allow the person who owns the lines to also provide service, only rent out the lines in a neutral fashion.

Re:Manufacturing scarcity

[slimjim8094]

I'm almost a socialist, but you're right on. The classic example is the electrical market - when the utility owned the plants, transmission, and distribution, they made their money by convincing the regulators they had to raise rates. Plant inefficiency actually helped them do this.

And in that form, they were a natural monopoly. But simply splitting up the three parts made everything vastly better, as long as the split was handled properly. But now that production is competitive and the transmission companies are common carriers, a company can pay for power to be created and transmitted to them - and there's competition for that business, so reliability has gone up and prices have fallen.

For anyone who hasn't read up on it, basically there's a graph of quantity vs marginal $/MW, sorted by $/MW so it's monotonically increasing (though not linearly). Things like solar and wind are at the very bottom (since they cost nothing to run), hydro, then nukes, coal, gas, oil, peakers (jet turbines), etc. Every day, they predict how much they'll need for the next day (plus a margin) and tell all the plants below it to be ready. The key is that everybody gets the market rate. The last plant to turn on makes no profit, and the solar plants make (near) 100% profit at any load. So there's an enormous incentive to move down that graph.

It works. It really does, for the past 10-15 years. Prices fall, reliability rises, plants get cleaner. It's because they're not making money by convincing regulators, they're making money by moving down that graph.

I should note that the company with the wires is still regulated, but even they've been split into physical maintenance and procurement divisions - you can swap out the procurement side and the small line fee is still present, but you're not buying your electricity from the local utility any more. You're buying it from someone else. The reason it's cheaper is because the local utility has to be the "provider of last resort"; they pick you up if you don't pay your bill to the other one, so they need to buy a little bit extra. And yes it's all the same power, but the dollars match everything up and if you go through it, it does actually make sense to think about paying for those exact megawatts to get to you (since they're all the same) and it simplifies things.

Let's try logic

[brxndxn]

Here's simple logic on 'carriers' or ISPs:

ISPs either have a monopoly or pseudo monopoly (in practicality) or they have competition. Therefore, there are two types of situations:

1. Monopolistic - Upgrading networks not necessary
2. Market-based - Carriers must upgrade networks to compete or lose customers

In either situation, there are two types of sub-situations:

1. Net-neutral - Carriers must upgrade networks to satisfy bandwidth demand, content decided by individuals
2. Prioritized - Upgrading networks not necessary, low-priority traffic dropped, content decided by corporations

What we have now in most of America is Monopolistic, Net-neutral. Carriers are arguing for Monopolistic, Prioritized. Consumers demand Market-based, Net-neutral. What should we get? Market-based, Either. What will we get most likely? Monopolistic, Prioritized.

The fact we even need a study to prove that the carriers are lying is ridiculous. The best incentive to force ISPs to upgrade their networks is MORE and DIVERSE competition. It is not free-market competition when the only 'normal bandwidth' Internet access at home for a consumer is a choice between either the local cable company or local telco. It is not free-market competition when the only cellular bandwidth is a choice of 1 of 3 major carriers that control hardware and software of the devices and lobby in unison to our government. Carriers are essentially arguing to continue a monopoly and ignore advances in technology that allow unlimited upgrades in bandwidth.

Instead of arguing net neutrality at all, if our lawmakers started making it easier for some competition in the marketplace, ISPs that do not deliver all traffic quickly would die off.

Re:Let's try logic

[SuricouRaven]

It's called a natural monopoly: The costs to enter the market are so huge (Equipment, laying fiber, buying spectrum, etc) that once one company is established, it's simply pointless for anyone to try to compete - and anyone who has the required billions of dollars isn't stupid enough to try it.

Re:Let's try logic

[fermion]

There is one other thing, a thing that most in the US have lot sight of. All mobile operators use the public space to generate a profit and as such should be required to use that space for the public good. If they cannot make a profit using the public space for public good, that public space should be given to someone who can. Nowhere is it written that profit is a fundemental right, although some conservative wackos want profit to be a fundemental right, I am talking about bush and reagan and the bailouts. Profit is merely something we have the right to persue.

We lost this when TV and radio took over our government and decided they were entitled to the bandwidth loaned to them by the people. The people have every right to take that bandwidth back. Even the cable operators, whose cable runs though and limits the use of public space, has a duty to the public though they too believe they can take from the people without giving anything back.

The argument for net neutrality is simply that the airwaves are public property and the public should make the decision on what it is used for, not the firms who are borrowing them. Like I said, if the mobile companies can't make a profit, then take the bandwidth away and attempted to be let to a new firm that can make a profit. This is what is done in real life. When a firm rents a space and does not make enough money to pay for that space, the space is taken back and rented to someone else. In the US we do say that they space is theirs forever just because they squatted on it and no one else wants it. We let the market work, except when a firm is so big they can corrupt the market by creating regulation to favor them. Which is the purpose of many regulations. To keep competition out.

And as far as sig goes with Ron Paul, remember that instead of letting the market work and allowing his constituents to suffer for bad housing and car choices, or to allow the public to decide what food was best for them, he used tax payer money to build a million dollar bus stop and gave untold hundred of thousands of dollars to his fishing buddies so they could be hired as consultants to push shrimp. This is what is wrong with the market. Even those that claim be hands off will not be able to avoid the temptation of free money and helping their friends steal from the poot.

heres how this works.

[nimbius]

you start a business, and we impose regulations to prevent you from abusing your tacit monopoly be it global or regional. Comply with them or spend more lobbying dollars.

do not threaten the customers hoping they will back you. verizon and AT&T subscribers enjoy some of the shittiest wireless service in the first world, comcast customer experience is comparative to that of an internet subscriber in rural india. cox service, if it ever gets installed, is just as bad. Sprint does nothing more than bait-and-switch its customers hoping they remember the CEO chortling about some amorphous unlimited everything plan on paid advertising.

What about latency?

[jopsen]

Today most homes is either hooked directly up on fiber or hook up on cobber with translation to fiber not very far away... I'm guessing here, but I think ad hoc wireless networks, would be crazy unreliable, slow, insecure and have an extreme latency...

Re:What about latency?

[Pope]

Today most homes is either hooked directly up on fiber or hook up on cobber with translation to fiber not very far away... I'm guessing here, but I think ad hoc wireless networks, would be crazy unreliable, slow, insecure and have an extreme latency...

Cobbler...so you're proposing the return of Sneakernet?

Not hard to incentivze them

[silas_moeckel]

Require some truth in advertizing from them. Enact legislation where if they do not meet there advertized speeds one average during peek times they are fined and eventually loose there monopolies. There networks are cash cows network upgrades are a simple matter of trending and re engineering for wired networks. They want to suck all the money they can out and avoid capx purchases to make there bonus bigger. Honestly most monopoly services should be bid out where the carrier offering the most for the least gets the contract. I would love to see AT&T loose out on DSL and have to give up that franchise, they have no cost of bandwidth (paying your sister company does not count) but aggressively limiter there subscribers.

The difference with agriculture

[rsilvergun]

is that there's a good reason to prevent over farming. Over farming tobacco turned Virginia into a desert in the 1800s. Plus in agriculture you sometimes have to get people to grow food that's not profitable but that people need to eat, e.g. it might be a bad year for potatoes, but we still need potatoes.

The trouble with net neutrality, indeed with any concepts on the Web, is that we're brushing up against a post-scarcity economy here. There really isn't any analogy that works because we've never done that before.

Re:Question: When Did Net Neutrality Pass Congress

[spidercoz]

1934

Re:Why wait?

[SuricouRaven]

Because the FCC can send men with guns around to arrest you and take your stuff.

Re:Actually it doesn't matter either way

[bws111]

Except it doesn't work that way in reality. The simple fact is that the ISPs don't WANT to compete with each other, because it is too costly to do so. On slashdot you hear a lot of whining about monopolies keeping competitors out, etc. Ever hear an ISP complain about that? In my area Verizon was making a lot of noise with FiOS. They sent out all kinds of advertising, got people to urge their local governments to allow them to offer service, etc. Then, when they actually got permission to deploy, they sent out letters saying 'on second thought, we can't make enough money competing against the local cable companies, so we are not going to deploy'.

No company (that wants to stay in business anyway) is going to invest the huge capital required to build a competing network if the only way they can get customers is compete on price. That is how the government-created monopolies got created in the first place: the choice is either monopoly service, or no service at all.

So that leaves the 'make them share the wires' option. Have you ever met anyone whose phone bill went down when they allowed you to pick your own provider (other than for a brief period of time when all kinds of fly-by-night outfits showed up offering low rates, before they went out of business)?