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FCC Votes To Consider Next Round of 'Net Neutrality' Rules
As you may have watched live earlier today, the FCC in a protester-heavy hearing has voted to formally consider a net neutrality proposal. The linked L.A. Times story says the 3-2 vote of the commissioners represents a victory for FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler: 'A Democrat who took over in November, Wheeler triggered outrage among public interest groups, online activists and many liberals with a plan that would for the first time allow the possibility of so-called pay-for-priority deals. Wheeler said his plan has been misconstrued and that it would not allow broadband providers to block any legal content or slow down connections in a way that is commercially unreasonable.' As the Washington Post points out, the phrase "commercially unreasonable" is a loaded one. More good coverage at Ars Technica, too.
To me, the real question is: why is this self-described (and, to be sure, described by others as) Democrat acting so much like a fascist?
and be done with it. That's how consumers view ISPs', so that's what we should make them. Stop catering to their silly cries that they want to be something more. They aren't and will never be.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Now the ISP can't throttle content below a speed which is up to what I pay for (since the contracts always specifies this). Thanks a lot FCC zero is in the list of number up to what I pay for.
Imagine, if you will, a crowded freeway with two lanes in each direction.
The people cry out: "Make the road wider, so traffic will flow better!"
The roadbuilder says: "Not unless we can make some lanes into toll lanes!"
The people cry out: "Anything, anything you want, just make it faster!"
The next month there are two toll lanes and a muddy ditch in each direction.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Can we safely assume he has been bought and the others have been made promises regarding other issues they care about? The only thing I can hope for at this point is that these older, technology illiterate politicians will die off as younger people come in and change things for the better because they understand what's going on. I seriously doubt this though.
Um... I think you need to check your facts. You seem to think he's doing this out of ignorance.
Wheeler is hardly "technology illiterate". He was a lobbyist for cable companies! What he was trying to do was 100% intentional and deliberate.
The old saying goes, "Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity." But if you knew the whole story, you would know that stupidity does not adequately explain Wheeler's actions. It is malice, through and through.
I don't need to follow any of the links in that submission to know that "commercially unreasonable" can be construed to be "to maximize profits".
In other words, he's laying the groundwork for them to do as they please, with the standard that seeking to gouge your customers is "commercially reasonable", and asking for extortion fees to make sure what you're already selling works continues to isn't "unreasonable".
Same shit. Different asshole.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
That term means anything goes. There are things which are physically impossible and/or morally reprehensible that are far from commercially unreasonable.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
True. He's pushing it to help out his homies.
Sign and share this petition.
let the White House and politicians of any party know that this is not acceptable. we need ACTUAL Net Neutrality. the ISPs and Cable/Telcos have had their free ride and now they want to take advantage of everyone. this cannot continue!
The real insult to this injury will be when Comcast et al raise their subscriber rates to pay for the new fast lane resources that Amazon and Netflix will already be paying for. Ka-ching!
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
Tom Wheeler is a cable lobbyist, so I get it. He's doing his (evil, sociopathic) job. He's a bad person,, and is acting in bad faith, and he should be fired. The Republicans are idiots, they think that lack of regulation means a closer approximation of the ideal free market (even though almost every single one of the biggest commercial successes of the Internet era said the opposite, and the ISPs depend on regulation in rights-of-way, easements, and spectrum). They're ignorant true believers, and should be fired.
But Obama, Rosenworcel, and Clyburn have some 'splainin' to do. They claim to understand the issue, they claim to support net neutrality. But you can't vote to kick a puppy and then say you oppose puppy-kicking. We can't keep accepting their bullshit theatrics; "It's not so bad, because we're only kicking the puppy a few times." No more death by a thousand cuts. Stop voting to kick the puppy, or we have to stop believing your lies.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
I have watched the whole thing and I anticipated that the proposal would have been passed since commercial interests often outweigh public interest - Money does talk after all, especially in America.
But I thought that the Republicans would voted for killing the Net Neutrality, how wrong I was !
It turns out that all three (3) commissioners who voted for killing Net Neutrality turns out to be DEMOCRATS !!
I owe an apology to all the Republicans and I hereby sincerely apologize for doubting you guys !!
As for the Democrats, FUCK YOU !!
The big vile ISPs are notorious for not listening. Rules will exist meant to ensure that everyone has a fair business model for ISPs and then the big guys will keep looking at the model to squeeze more and more money out of it because fair business isn't enough for those guys... they have to squeeze every last nickel out.
What we need is a global competitor to big ISPs that can deploy anywhere. Google could be that new hope, but so could a DIY off-grid group. Google's baloon experiment could be what we need but it doesn't have to stop there and also it is important to note that Google's closeness to NSA is problematic.
There are other better answers to big ISP. Teleporation could destroy the ISP business model and place the power directly in the hands of each individual. No more government spying. No more ISP bullshit.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Tom Wheeler is the former president of the Cable industry's top lobbyist group. We already knew where he stood on net neutrality before he was appointed or confirmed. That is how he came to be FCC chairman. You don't think they would let someone with the public's interests in mind sit in that chair?
Help stamp out iliturcy.
keeps falling further and further behind the rest of the industrialized world.
Pretty soon we'll be behind countries like Latvia and Romania.
Oh wait. . .!
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Wait ... what?
Is being technology literate a requirement to be a lobbyist for the cable companies? Or is willingness to follow the official line and recite buzzwords more important? It seems like a lawyer with good connections is a more effective lobbyist than someone with a technology background. God knows the people they're lobbying don't know anything about the technology.
Steve Ballmer isn't someone I'd consider to be overly technology literate. I've certainly known software sales people who aren't technology literate. And I've even known a couple of managers in either software or IT who I wouldn't consider technology literate. Those MBAs I've encountered making business decisions in technology companies, sure as hell weren't technology literate.
I'm not disputing that, as a former cable lobbyist, he was always going to be someone who came down on their side and you can pretty much say he's not looking at this from any other position than what's good for cable companies.
But, without knowing his technology background and actual level of knowledge ... I'm still not prepared to rule out stupidity. Not even a little.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
1) no priority tag, data is at priority 0
2) no lower "trunk cost" to preferred customers. trunk costing used only to route traffic to the cheapest/fastest/lease congested route .
3) due to latency and jitter issues, VoIP could be set midrange, at priority 3.
4) one price for all at a specified bandwidth.
that's all the regulation you need, and you need an iron fist to maintain it, considering the number of fat weasels out there.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Ok we did this once 12 years ago and got DRM legal requirements non voted on. We can do this again.
For American Slashdotters:
1.) Tell the FCC what you think in polite terms and why it is a bad idea for business, consumers, and innovation?
2) Go to to your house of representatives website and use the zip code finder in the upper right hand corner. If your personal representative has a (R) in his or her name mention how you worry about the government overstepping its boundaries and ruining the largest emerging economic trend in history. Mention this FoxNews article, where Republicans are urging the FCC to bud out. If you work in the IT industry mention how you will be impacted and how unregulated internet led to the greatest economic expansion in history in the late 1990s.
If your representative has a (D) in his or her name, tell them how it will unfairly impact consumers and force unfair monopolies more power and ruin innovations with services like Netflix. Mention economic impacts as well. Use Netflix as an example of something that used to work until a few months ago and cite sources where L3 admitted it was being bottlenecked on purpose.
Also both parites are under the assumption that the internet worked just fine without net neutrality and we still had the largest explosion of GDP growth in history. So why change (Mega Telecom sales pitch). So inform them that they were regulated beforehand and this time it is different.
Remember it is not about adding new rules that were never needed. It is about preventing new rules that are not in your emails regardless of parties to counter the
FUD of the telecom lobbyists
3. Let the Obama know how you feel? Yes, he does read email and hand written letters every night. Perhaps seeing a large push in volume all angry about this may get his attention?
4. Let your senator know? Copy and paste the email you sent your congressman if he or she is of the same party. If not emphasize free market if he or she is a (r) and consumers and monopolies if he or she is a (D).
Be polite and factual as possible. Yes they are corrupt, but many are inept and get all their FUD from lobbyists. Mention we never had anything like this to counter the fud this is socialism to have the same lane and this is a fast enabler not something that slows regular traffice down yada yada. Mention your IT background too to build credibility.
If enough people whine it may delay or cancel the vote.
http://saveie6.com/
Can we safely assume he has been bought...
No, because you got it backwards: he's a telecom exec and lobbyist who bought his way into a government position to regulate his own industry. And it matters because, no this isn't ignorance and it won't just die off.
...and upgrades they are currently planning that would be put on the chopping block with common carrier status. Be specific. Tell us EXACTLY what new innovations and upgrades you will be forced to cancel because of this.
I can only imagine the math is something like:
"We have Z mbits of bandwidth per customer with current infrastructure. We want to use 80% of that for our value-add services like our own streaming and on-demand services. The remaining 20% is for end-user internet access and we've already oversold that by 50%".
I can only imagine the "innovation" and "upgrades" they will lose out on are their own, internal revenue-generating uses designed to supplant third party services like Netflix/Amazon/iTunes.
I don't think for a minute that they are designing and planning any kind of bandwidth/capacity upgrades designed for general-purpose end-user internet access. Any increases in network capacity or bandwidth (if there are any at all) are strictly reserved for in-house high-margin media consumption services they want to sell, cap-free and un-shaped to their subscribers while they cap and shape Netflix et al into a stuttering, low-res wasteland.
At this point I think we need to just go ahead and eliminate the FCC and Congress needs to legislate these regulations directly. We are beyond the point of just needing to play some BS game of musical chairmen to appoint another industry lobbyist to regulate their own industry. From no longer licensing new radio stations to this idiotic spin the wheels and do whatever you want as long as you hire the right lawyers as lobbyists kind of bullshit regulation the FCC is a farce
Oh, and "literate" isn't even a bloody noun in this context, moron.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Don't they mostly lobby politicians?
So imagine you're the one technology guy in a room full of politicians and lobbyists. Is your attempt to say he's full of shit going to be:
a) Met with sage nods and pointed questions
b) Met with being told to STFU because the big boys are talking
Given how liberally the lobbyists sprinkle around money, I seriously doubt most of them are ever directly confronted with an actual technology expert. And, in all likelihood, if they are they have someone in tow who can field the questions and still keep up the party line.
You seem to assume an honest system of debate. I'm not convinced.
When decisions flow (like shit) from the top down, the people who can actually refute the claims probably aren't ever in the same room as the lobbyists. That could set a dangerous precedent of evidence based decision making.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You have big players on either side of this, but the big communication companies have probably donated much more to politicians. AT&T is the 4th largest donor to federal politicians over the period 1989-2012, for example. Also, the big communications companies got their man on the inside as the head of the FCC. These rules could go through, and it'll start driving prices up, but by then, the voting public won't make the connection between any politician and rising prices or worse service. Most people don't understand what net neutrality is.
Net result: Keeps the big donors happy, very little or no voting consequence, especially with responsibility plausibly divided between both parties.