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Federal Court Kills Net Neutrality, Says FCC Lacks Authority.
An anonymous reader writes "According to a report from Gizmodo, a U.S. Appeals Court has invalidated the FCC's Net Neutrality rules. From the decision: 'Given that the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers, the Communications Act expressly prohibits the Commission from nonetheless regulating them as such. Because the Commission has failed to establish that the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules do not impose per se common carrier obligations, we vacate those portions of the Open Internet Order.' Could this be the final nail in the coffin for Net Neutrality? Or will the FCC fight back? This submitter really, really hopes they fight back..."
It's past time to just classify them as common carriers and stop trying to make an end-run around the rules.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
There's a comment in the article stating that the court found the FCC regulations are not needed because consumers have a choice in broadband providers. That argument always make me shake my head. I have one broadband option - Comcast. Verizon FIOS isn't here. I suspect most people are actually in the same boat as me. There really is no viable broadband option to my local cable provider. Who/where are these people that have these so-called choices?
Generally speaking the idea of anti-Net Neutrality is an anti-business, conservative idea. It "stifles" the "free market" by forcing regulations on businesses. The conservative's "free market" approach would be to let ISPs decide if they want to charge on a per-site basis and let consumers go to other ISPs who will simply do the same thing.
That depends on which Appeals Court it is. There are thirteen of them.
Everything is better with chainsaws.
It sounds like this is a technicality because the FCC's rules are inconsistent with law. They need to fix them.
I am reposting this comment by "CakeStapler" from GizModo because it explains it well:
As we explain in this opinion, the Commission has established that section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 vests it with affirmative authority to enact measures encouraging the deployment of broadband infrastructure. The Commission, we further hold, has reasonably interpreted section 706 to empower it to promulgate rules governing broadband providers’ treatment of Internet traffic, and its justification for the specific rules at issue here—that they will preserve and facilitate the “virtuous circle” of innovation that has driven the explosive growth of the Internet—is reasonable and supported by substantial evidence. That said, even though the Commission has general authority to regulate in this arena, it may not impose requirements that contravene express statutory mandates. Given that the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers, the Communications Act expressly prohibits the Commission from nonetheless regulating them as such. Because the Commission has failed to establish that the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules do not impose per se common carrier obligations, we vacate those portions of the Open Internet Order.
(Emphasis mine)
So, the FCC will remove their exemption from treatment as common carriers, reenact the regulations, and there's nothing to see here. 20 minutes ago
Sure, but the conservative's "free market" approach would also leave it up to companies to decide if they want to pollute, allow car dealers to lock out Tesla (because they don't want competition), absolve Monsanto from liability, further deregulate the financial industry to allow Wall Street to rob us like they were doing before the '08 meltdown, and further extending copyright.
In other words, more crony-capitalism where the rich are free to make backroom deals which benefit them, and which harm the rest of us, and the 'freedom' of the market mostly restricted to big players who paid off the politicians.
The future: broadband packages sold like cable packages.
Basic: $59.99/mo gets you the top 100 websites like whatismyip.com (with commercials inserted before your IP is finally revealed), comcast.com, nbc.com, and 80 other websites you've never heard of nor would ever visit. All with added commercial interstitials.
Friends and Family: $89.99 gets you the basic package plus access to twitter, myspace and livejournal so you can share your experiences on The Comasticnet with all of your friends. Every third post is replaced with an ad, and every morning you automatically tweet how Comcastic your day is.
Movie Watcher: $129.99 gets you the basic package plus access to nbc.com streaming*. You can buy the netflix channel for an additional $10/mo and youtube SD for $5/mo or HD (720p videos only) for $10/mo. As a special deal you can sign up for Movie Watcher and Friends and Family for a low introductory price of $150/mo (*: standard rates only allow 24 hours of video streaming per month. Additional programming charged at pay per view rates of $5/MB)
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.