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President Obama Backs Regulation of Broadband As a Utility
vivIsel writes In a move that is sure to generate controversy, the President has announced his support for regulation of broadband connections, including cellular broadband, under Title 2 of the Telecommunications Act. Reclassification of broadband in this way would treat it as a utility, like landline telephones, subject providers to new regulations governing access, and would allow the FCC to easily impose net neutrality requirements.
Seems Ted Cruz is not wasting any time in opposing Obama on Net Neutrality by calling it "ObamaCare for the Internet", a laughably stupid hyperbolic statement only a complete moron would make -- unfortunately, he's got a support base of tens of millions even bigger morons who will think this idiotic statement is actually accurate.
That is false. NetFlix has offered many times to provide fee CDN service to the ISP. While that may alleviate the internal traffic issue for customers, it doesn't solve the extra $$$ the ISP's want so they don't take it.
Headline should read "Common Carrier" because that's the option Obama picked....the strongest protection for users.
This is what we have wanted all along...the best protection for Net Neutrality
Damn /. or any troll/techies who try to downplay this move by Obama...he gave us *exactly* what we asked for
No Republican would do this.
Thank you Dave Raggett
Where does it say free?
Back in the 1990s when ISPs were being sued by the MPAA and RIAA for carrying bootlegged stuff, the ISPs claimed common carrier status as the reason they should not be sued - arguing that they just carry the bits and have nothing to do with what the bits actually are.
Fast forward to the 2000s when Verizon et al start rolling out their own video networks. Well, suddenly they claim "media company" status and not common carrier status, so they can regulate actual content.
I'm not sure what backdoor deal allowed them to abandon common carrier and still not get sued for carrying pirated material, but I am sure there was something baked into an agriculture or other unrelated bill that did it.
Comcast admitted to congress (The House hearings about the Comcast Time Warner Merger) that what they pay for data has gone down over 99% in the last 10 years.
The spelling and grammar police can kiss my ass
1: this is theoretically a tech site, he shouldnt need to provide examples. we should all be fairly well acquainted with the internet of other countries by now, and how muchj better it is than the the US industry.
2: the US isnt special. the same economic rules apply here as elsewhere.
3: the list is only short if youre ignorant.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Bullshit! Obama meet with the Republicans several times to work on the AHA. Obama even used a CONSERVATIVE plan as the model for AHA - you know a free market style solution - only to have it opposed by Republicans! So stop this bullshit narrative that Obama didn't try to work with the Republicans. He did but they weren't willing to work with him. The Republican so oppose Obama they threatened to not raise the debt ceiling to get some budget concessions. Something that was never done under Bush!
So again, fuck off.
NetFlix has offered many times to provide fee CDN service to the ISP.
Free to NetFlix, not free for the ISP. They tried to offer this "deal" to a local ISP and weren't even willing to pay the usual co-location fees to offset the ISPs security/energy/space/bandwidth costs. Is there anybody not named Hastings that's arrogant enough to think he should get free co-location services?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
You mean, after AT&T was regulated by being broken up and by being forced to allow third-party devices (e.g. modems), major innovation was able to start.
Umm, no. On a couple counts:
Regulation is very important in many industries, including telecommunications. But it is almost never synonymous with innovation.
"95% of all Slashdot
Single man? No, the only person chosen by a majority of the people to represent them as President from 2013-2017. He is not just any old person. The President has a well defined relationship with Congress, unlike a "single man". The Congress in prior years passed all of the laws enabling the President to classify ISPs as common carriers. Congress routinely passes general laws that gives the President a lot of flexibility to execute those laws. For a Republican-type person, you seem foggy about the nature of a republican government.
I'm sure if you asked people, "Should your cable and Internet provider be allowed to slow down Internet video services like Netflix and Youtube so that they can sell more of their own video services?" and they understood the President's decision, they would agree with the new policy. That is what we are talking about here, Obama standing up to monopoly power on behalf of people as he is supposed to (under anti-trust laws), not a President behaving like a monarch. You have been very ill served by whatever media you used to arrive at your conclusion.
Your sentiment has a history. It was called the Civil War by some, and the War Between the States by others. It really did happen. A lot of people died. It decided some issues, and changed the relationship between all the states and the federal government.
Join the IParty!
Why don't other countries have a net neutrality problem? Because they have competition among their ISPs. If an ISP tries to deliberately slow down a popular website to extort the site for extra payments, it doesn't put pressure on the website to pay. Instead it puts pressure on the ISP's customers to switch to another ISP. In most of the rest of the world, any ISP trying to pull this stunt puts itself out of business.
It only works in the U.S. because these ISPs have government-granted monopolies over the local customer base. The customer can't flee to a different ISP because there is none - the local government has made it illegal for there to be a competitor. Essentially, net neutrality is more government regulation to solve a problem caused by government regulation.
According to Ars Techinca (and many others) UK regulators officially mock US over ISP "competition":
Here's how US regulators do a broadband plan: talk about competition even while admitting there isn't enough, then tinker around the edges with running fiber to "anchor institutions" and start collecting real data on US broadband use.
Here's how they do it in the UK: order incumbent telco BT to share its fiber lines with any ISP who is willing to pay. In places where BT hasn't yet run fiber, order the company to share its ducts and poles with anyone who wants to run said fiber. In the 14 percent of the UK without meaningful broadband competition, slap price controls on Internet access to keep people from getting gouged. [...]
"Aside from small urban countries with highly concentrated populations, like Singapore, the main countries which are currently leading in the rollout and take-up of super-fast broadband are those which have had significant government intervention to support deployment, such as Japan and South Korea."
I've Googled around and I can't find any evidence that backs up your implication that consumers benefit from less government regulation of ISPs. Everything I've seen says the benefits in non-US countries stem from greater government intervention.
The nuanced Republican stance you refer to seems to be a code-phrase for BS. IMO the core of the problem is there is a lot of BS flying around because our corporate controlled "fair and balanced" media (including the NYT) refuse to call out politicians on outright lies. This gives a decided advantage to those who lie more. With no checks and balances from the media, public debate is mired in giant echo chambers filled with BS.
We don't see the world as it is, we see it as we are.
-- Anais Nin
Actually, it's quite simple. You create a non-profit corporation to implement and manage the "last mile." That organization would be funded by bond issues (just like every other public works project) and supported by user fees. Those user fees would be paid by ISPs who compete on price and features.
And the existing last-mile networks: what do you do with them? Maybe you expect your non-profit to buy them from Comcast, AT&T, and Quest. How exactly do you plan to figure pricing when you nationalize those networks? Or to compensate the companies when you dig up their wires and throw them away. I guarantee you will do it wrong. Taxpayers will overpay by 5-fold and the companies will be lucky to realize half of their fair value.
You proposal would be fine if internet were a blank slate, but any change you impose now will amount to nationalization of private enterprise, and there is no way people will stand for that.
Firstly, "nationalization" is a paranoid fantasy of yours. All of this stuff is done at the municipal and state levels, mostly the municipal level. Secondly, the existing last-mile networks can compete with the non-profits. Unless, of course, local governments decide otherwise. Decentralized decision making, management and implementation will provide a plethora of models to compare. The best ones will, in the end, win out -- unless co-opted by those who are raping us. Have a great day!
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr