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Net Neutrality Bill Aimed At ISP Data Caps Introduced In US Senate
New submitter Likes Microsoft writes "Yesterday, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) introduced a Net Neutrality bill aimed at ISPs using data caps soley for profiteering purposes, rather than the 'traffic management' purpose they often claim. The text of the bill is available at Wyden's Senate page. It would require ISPs to be certified by the FCC before implementing data caps. It says, in part, 'The [FCC] shall evaluate a data cap proposed by an Internet service provider to determine whether the data cap functions to reasonably limit network congestion in a manner that does not unnecessarily discourage use of the Internet.' In a statement, Wyden said, 'Americans are increasingly tethered to the Internet and connecting more devices to it, but they don’t really have the tools to effectively manage data consumption across their networks. Data caps create challenges for consumers and run the risk of undermining innovation in the digital economy if they are imposed bluntly and not designed to truly manage network congestion.'"
Dear Senator Wyden,
Thank you for actually being a good Senator, that introduces good bills that create or change laws that help out the average US Citizen. I'm glad I voted for you the last time you were on the ballot, and if I still lived in Oregon I'd vote for you again.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Well, no, the FCC does not have the authority to do this. This story is about a bill that would grant the FCC such authority.
It won't pass though, because there is a lot more money against than there is in favor.
The law is created in the bill. The FCC is the enforcer or "over watch" of the law.
Much like when you contact the FCC for a spectrum use violation.
We start approaching our monthly ISP imposed data cap of 150 GB just from watching Netflix. One room mate nearly busted us through when she started watching the new Dr. Who series, beginning from the first David Tennant episode on up.
If I remember right, Netflix currently accounts for about one third of all total Internet data usage.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
How about congress actually pass a LAW on this, after all, they are supposed to be the legislators, eh?
I know most people don't bother reading the stories here, but did you bother to even read the summary (which actually does a decent job of summarizing the story)?
This is a bill. Bills become laws if they are approved by Congress.
This isn't the FCC doing something, its a member of Congress proposing a law directing the FCC to do it. If they pass the law, then the FCC will, ipso facto, have authority to do it (assuming, of course, that Congress has Constitutional authority to pass the law.)
That's exactly what Senator Wyden is proposing: Congress passing a LAW that would ISPs from imposing data caps without prior approval of the specific cap meeting specific requirements from the FCC.
Couldn't this serve to discourage ISPs from improving their infrastructure? If they let their infrastructure age, they'd be spending nothing on improvement, and would eventually be allowed to put data caps in place as bandwidth usage increases.
Disclaimer: Didn't RTFA.
Apparently wizard is not a legitimate career path, so I chose programmer instead.
An alternative to this would be to finally break the monopoly faced by many Americans on their broadband cable services.
I live in an area served by both FIOS and Cablevision, and neither have caps, and have played them against each other to get discounts on my service bills.
Let's cut to the chase. In the modern political arena our money faces no obstacles whatsoever. It is up to you whether that money supports you in your next run for office or pours into your precious state decimating not only your own campaign but every other congress critter down-ticket along party lines. Not that we enjoy threatening our investment opportunities, far from it. Its just business.
Hugs and Kisses,
ISPs
Did /. just get spammed by an ad from someone who's anti-ad? Oh, the irony...
While this law sounds reasonable on the surface and seems well enough intentioned, looking at the past history of government regulations, I can't help but assume that even if this were to pass, the law will be twisted and manipulated to the point that it actually hurts the end users or stifles competition. Perhaps the requirements for compliance with the law will be so onerous that small ISPs cannot compete, leaving only the big players and a high barrier to entry, or it will prevent new innovative business models and force us to stick with the status quo even if a better alternative is found.
For example, the regulations for bidding for government contracts were intended to level the playing field, reduce corruption, and lower costs. But as the regulations became more and more complicated (trying to plug the loopholes), only the biggest contractors with government bidding officers and on-staff lawyers can actually get through all the red tape. The result is that small players cannot compete and costs go up. The regulations ended up doing exactly the opposite of what was intended.
You forgot the third option: slapped down because the law giving them authorization was unconstitutional.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
It's already over in Australia. We've discovered here that the Mayan apocalypse was actually only referring to anyone who's still trying to do their Christmas shopping. Seriously, have you been anywhere near a shopping centre (mall) in the last few days?
I wonder if this would apply to the wireless (cell phone) carriers as well. I mean, recently I watched one hour of a movie on my smartphone (and yes, I watched it using my data plan because the nearest free wi-fi wasn't capable of handling the kind of bandwidth required for streaming video -- that's something that's got to change, too), and that one time of viewing ate up close to 1 GB of my 4 GB plan. Sure, in this case it was entertainment, and I could have used more discretion, but what if it was an instructional video I had to see in the field for my job, and there was no [fast, reliable] wi-fi around? What's the point of moving forward in technology with the ability to stream video to mobile devices if the data plans are all severely limited in that respect? What, so people are always expected to wait until they're in a spot with [again, fast and reliable] wi-fi, which is usually indoors, to be able to see any kind of video on their mobile devices? What a crock! The wireless carriers need to get it together and get back to unlimited data plans with a ton more bandwidth. We pay a hell of a lot of money for these plans (and are often locked into them for two years); the least they can do is upgrade their networks to fit the times -- not only with fancy bell-and-whistle features like 4G LTE (and I do appreciate the faster speeds, mind you!), but also more BANDWIDTH so they don't have to impose these ridiculously low data caps for tons of $$$. We Americans pay some of the highest rates for cellular service in the civilized world.
The government exists to regulate monopolies that must exist, like power, gas, water, waste disposal, police, fire, and transportation, and break those that must not, like telephone, computer hardware, and computer software.
Those monopolies I listed must exist because of the barrier to entry and the potential consequences of a monopoly. Electricity and gas being necessary to survive winter, or even summer for some folks, a company cannot be allowed to hold someone's life for ransom. Water is a necessity of life, which is why it's provided by the city government (who holds a monopoly on it). On the other hand, there are things a monopoly can do better than competition, like take a loss on serving certain customers because the loss is made up by less costly customers, or make a large capital investment because they can take a credit risk and be assured that customers have no other choice (in a more competitive market, risk is heightened).
Of course, what I've just said is a good argument for government-owned fiber to the home (except for the "necessary for life" thing, which is only a matter of time).
How about: ISPs are freely allowed to impose data caps, but everything sent over the connection has to be in those caps.
If your going to legislate anything how about opening up the last mile cable monopolies to competition as was done with the telephone network for DSL?
You will never solve anything if your answer to side effects of lack of effective competition is legislation. Most of our pricing and service issues can can be traced back to effects of prior decade of nonstop consolidation in the ISP market to the point where in too many areas there is no other ISP to choose from.
I have a feeling if you pass such legislation the ISP will just drop your speed for the rest of the month to work around the inconvience... see your not capped..wink wink..... good luck with that netflix video.
With few exceptions caps in USA have some analogy to electricity usage and rush hour in that peak usage is all that matters. While you could argue pricing structures more closely matching the cost of production are better..another argument could be made that caps are easier for the user to understand, minimizes cost of any metering infustructure and puts least mental constraints on natural tendancies of users.
There is also the idea that any legislation benefits large ISPs who have staff, power and money to get their way disadvantaging the smaller ones we ought to be doing everything possible to promote to increase competition and systematically reign in fat, lazy, selfish tendancies that accompany being a monopoly.
This has been needed since netflix type video services started getting popular. You cant use internet video streaming without hitting a bandwidth cap pretty fast unless your ok with gameboy resolution in your stream. Movies simply dont look that good unless you view them at full resolution, and netflix at HD resolution is up to 2GB/hour. Leaving your internet tv streaming during the day will eat up most any bandwidth cap.
http://interserver.net/
A mobile network operator with coverage in multiple states engages in "commerce [...] among the several States", which the Constitution grants the Congress power to regulate.