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House Panel Backs 'Internet Freedom' Legislation
GovTechGuy writes "The House Energy and Commerce Committee passed legislation on Wednesday once again affirming the current management structure of the Web. In doing so, the lawmakers made one thing clear: the only government that should have its hands on the underpinnings of the Internet is the U.S. ' It affirms the importance of an Internet free from censorship and government control and codifies the existing management structure of the Internet. ... Notably, however, lawmakers dropped from the legislation the phrase “free from government control,” which had threatened to derail the April 11 markup by the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology. ... [Democrats argued] it could undermine the U.S. government’s ability to enforce existing — or future — laws online.'"
nothing about freedom from corporate control or censorship. Interesting.
Can come up with its own protocols, build a network and tell the U.S. government where to go, and what to do upon arrival. .uh. . .
Such an effort is hindered by. .
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
The power to control the internet rests with whomever has either control over the hardware, or control over those who have control over the hardware. They can blow all the hot air they want about an internet 'free from censorship and government control' - but in the end, a lot of that internet runs on hardware that isn't located in the US. If China, or Iran, or Saudi Arabia, or Pakistan, or Turkey, or any other country with a government that decides the internet needs to be censored of 'harmful' political or social content, then there is nothing the US government can do about it.
And they say Americans dont get irony.
Boy you got that right....
From the story
the only government that should have its hands on the underpinnings of the Internet is the U.S.
I could name a dozen countries I would trust to manage the web more than the U.S.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
That sounds like the democrats too. They put on a big show together of fighting over things, but on most issues they are really very similar. Just find me any recent act passed by congress in which they gave up any significant amount of power.
Even when the parties aren't screwing the people over, there are lobbyists to make sure they do. Look at healthcare reform, for example: It started out as a well-intentioned plan to set up a minimal level of universal health care. By the time the lobbyists from the insurance industry were done, all it did was compel everyone to have an insurance policy and hand out mountains of money in subsidies. Not even subsidies to directly pay for medical care, but subsidies to private insurance companies.
I agree that the Republicans are, on balance, worse than the democrats... but that just means the democrats are less bad.
Er... who says that exactly? I could see the French saying that I suppose, but I thought it was just they looked down their noses past their pencil mustaches at everyone for not being French.
And they say Americans dont get irony.
Indeed, in this case they don't... they get coppery (as in: the cop of the Internet; nobody else has the right to police it)
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
One good thing about the US is it's big enough to stand firm against opposing interests. Good as long as the interests they are protecting are in the Internet's best interests.
I'm waiting for the rest of the world to wise up and cut off the US from the Internet. Our "we control da wurld" attitude needs a serious slap down.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
Which means if China decides it wants to create it's own Internet, there's nothing we can do about it.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
And they say Americans dont get irony.
Boy you got that right....
From the story
the only government that should have its hands on the underpinnings of the Internet is the U.S.
I could name a dozen countries I would trust to manage the web more than the U.S.
The U.N.?
Sometimes I do wonder if the US having all the control is such a good idea - Megaupload was shut down last January, without judicial due process. However I am pretty damn sure that I don't want countries like China to control my Internet...
The reason that the Republicans rule the House is simple. When Pelosi and her cronies ruled they stunk it up so much anything at all seemed better. The way the Democrats ran amuck with control of both Houses of Congress and the Presidency ignored one simple political reality, that elections come every 2 years. For 2 years they acted like it was all about them ignoring and ridiculing an electorate that still leans slightly to the right overall. I can't believe the ignorant fuckers didn't see the backlash coming. If the Republicans could ever pull their heads out of their asses for a minute or two the Senate would fall too. I don't see them doing it though. Maybe they'll get some glass belly buttons though, at least then they can see where they're going.
Kind of like the term "People's Republic" isn't it.
Oh man. No mod points but you deserve +5 Funny if anyone ever did. I laughed so hard I almost ruptured something.
The US goverment is the least corrupt...
Citation please!
Spoiler: 13 other governments are less corrupt than the US
Man, I have no idea what you just said. Do you?
That's what the "free from government control" bit was about. Republicans wanted to sneak that nice sounding line in there so that they could kill off net neutrality. Democrats saw through their scheme and stopped it.
free from control by anyone with an IQ less than 140 and that hasn't had a minimum of 20 years of computer / networking related experience
This is why we need more H1B's!
In the end, both Republicans and Democrats can't help being themselves - politicians. What we need are statesmen and they're always in short supply.
I am not sure what you mean by "Reverse Robin Hood". I do know that attempts by Democrats to pass "Robin Hood Taxes" are ludicrous. The idea that you can imitate Robin Hood by taking money from anyone and giving it to the government is to not understand what Robin Hood did. Robin Hood robbed from the government (usually the tax collectors) and gave the money to the people. Many people want to take money from people and give it to the government and then compare that to Robin Hood because the people they are taking money from are richer than average. That is how Robin Hood became an outlaw. He was one of the rich that weren't part of the government, so the government took what he had and called him an outlaw when he objected.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
I'm still stuck with AT&T DSL at 1.5mbit because South Carolina passed a law giving them a legal monopoly on fiber services in the State.
Fuck AT&T. Fuck the US Government. Anyone who thinks the government does anything with the best interest of "we the people" in mind is a fucking blithering idiot.
I could name a dozen countries I would trust to manage the web more than the U.S.
Please name some.
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
In the end, both Republicans and Democrats can't help being themselves - politicians. What we need are statesmen and they're always in short supply.
The definition of "statesman" is "a dead politician". While I don't think those are in short supply, I am rarely disappointed when their numbers increase.
I'm a big fan of the U.N., but something like this absolutely is not a good idea.
Take a look at the recent ITU meetings/conferences and how they are run. Yeah, that's exactly what a U.N. controlled Internet would look like. Not a pretty sight.
For now, the U.S. is the best combination of large-enough-to-matter, and free-enough-to-be-mostly-nonevil there is. There's certainly no other country with the combination of economic/technical power that also has quite as much of a open society mindset. I'd love it if the Swedes or Norwegians or Dutch could handle it (maybe even the Finns), but they simply aren't Big League enough. And the E.U. as a whole is completely broken right now, so that's right out.
Fact is, the USA is the least-worst option. Which isn't a ringing endorsement, but sometimes, Perfect is the enemy of Good Enough.
Looks like 18 to me!
The best thing about UDP jokes is I don't care if you get them or not
Yeah - I saw that too. There is something fishy about this list. As if there is data missing.
Trying to regulate any major international infrastructure with a single country in charge of almost everything is always going to be troublesome, but if I had to pick an alternative to the US, I can think of a few credible choices.
Switzerland, maybe? Their position on neutrality in international matters is promising.
Germany? They are successful economically, but also for obvious reasons very conscious of individual freedom and the dangers of centralising too much power.
The trouble I have with the US is that it tends to appoint itself the world's policeman, but primarily when doing so serves US interests. Similarly, what most of the world calls things like "human rights" that apply to all, the US tends to value as "Constitutional rights" that protect primarily US citizens. While these things are perfectly understandable and of little concern if you're actually from the US, most people on the Internet aren't, and that's always going to make for awkward relationships.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Hmmm, lets see...
Based on that into, you have New Zealand, Finland and Denmark tied for equal first. Seeing as NZ jumped into the US pockets with the whole megaupload/kim dotcom thing a while back, you can rule out all three. I mean, clearly you can't trust the folks at the top. Next up, Sweden in 4th place. You can't trust those crazy folks, I mean...they are like Swedish. Enough said. I can't even find who they are tied with, so that rules them out as well. Switzerland is next up. You simply must rule them out, I mean like they have holes in their cheese, what's to say they don't have the same sort of glaring holes in all the regulations. Then you have Norway and Australia next up.
Seeing as we have crossed so many off already - that leaves the internet in the firm control of either a bunch of folks who can't pronounce W's and everything is a V as they sing along to absurd amounts of death metal - or in the steady hands of a bunch of beer swilling outdoorsey folk who are freakishly good at swimming and medal tallys at the Olympics and Commonwealth games based on the size of their population.
Goodbye internets... we liked you while you were around...
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
Actually the UN would be perfect. When was the last time they actually accomplished anything? Pretty much every motion they ever make is vetoed. It's perfect, put the Internet under the control of an entity so dysfunctional that they simply can't get their act together to mess it up.
I would trust the UN over the USA to run the internet any day.
They have opened the door. From TFA: Notably, however, lawmakers dropped from the legislation the phrase “free from government control”
Which is to say: They have deliberately opened the door for further regulation by the FCC and whatever other federal agencies care to stick their noses in.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
The way the Democrats ran amuck
The USA in your head must be very interesting. Unfortunately, it bears little resemblance to the one in the real world. Try to focus, okay?
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
They couldn't agree on a global form of censorship, but if you count all the countries who'd like some form of censorship I don't think there'd be any problem to find a majority to open the door. Then you start building international treaties like the Berne convention saying we'll help you with your censorship if you'll help us with ours. Cue the obvious poster children that nobody* can object to in order to get the ball running then start poisoning the well. Or to put it another way, no matter what other constellation they make up I sincerely doubt more would be permitted on the Internet than today. All the other options range from somewhat less to a lot less.
* that'd like a political career.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
The Internet is not the world wide web. The Internet is not the world wide web. Its much bigger than that.
"I could name a dozen countries I would trust to manage the web more than the U.S."
How many of them invented the internet?
'Freedom' and 'Legislation' are two mutually exclusive terms as far as I am concerned. It seems to me that if the US govt were really concerned with internet freedom they would NOT be passing laws, as the nature of a law is to forcibly limit freedoms that would otherwise exist naturally.
Considering how horribly the US has been running it so far, It wouldn't likely be worse. At least at the UN the USA isn't the only country with a veto, Right now the USA can screw it up without any oversight (and have on many occasions). At the UN the USA would still need to want to screw it up, but they could no longer do it on their own, they'd ALSO need to convince the other veto power nations.
There's really zero downside to this compared to the current situation.
Of course a better solution would be a new internet that NO country can mess up... but that's really just a pipe dream at this point.
k... well I guess I should not have expected anyone to actually read the page on how the index was created. But I thought at least the title might have been a clue. Let's take it one word at a time, shall we?