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Bill Would Ban Paid Prioritization By ISPs
jfruh writes In the opening days of the new U.S. Congress, a bill has been introduced in both the House and Senate enforcing Net neutrality, making it illegal for ISPs to accept payment to prioritize some traffic packets over others. But the sponsors are all Democrats, and with Republicans now in charge of both house of Congress, the chances of it passing seem slim.
But the sponsors are all Democrats, and with Republicans now in charge of both house of Congress, the chances of it passing seem slim.
WooHoo!
On another note, whenever those assholes work together, Watch out! Like when the PATRIOT act was passed. Or when the criminal Wall Street crooks were given a free ride and bonuses to boot at taxpayer expense.
And where were the Teabaggers then? Nowhere.
But there was plenty of those people condemning the Occupy Wall Street kids! Who were protesting against taxpayer money waste!
Fox News watching morons.
Funny. Their actions would suggest they believe in pork barrels.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"That's because Republicans believe in the free market not communism."
Funny, the current bunch Ds are typically to the right of Reagan.
And no, the Rs aren't in favor of any kind of free market either. And "free markets" don't exist, ever - they are an imaginary construct much like "friction free inclined planes" in physics.
--
BMO
Credit where credits due, the actual bill itself (linked in the article) is only 4 pages in total and although IANAL it does seem to be straightforward and to the point. It also generously defines "edge provider" as
(A) any content, application, or service over the Internet; or
(B) a device used for accessing any content, application, or service over the Internet.
Maybe someone with a bit more knowledge can poke a hole in it, but in this age of 1000+ page bills that no-one seems to have the will to read it's a nice change.
I've not been a fan of previous "Net Neutrality" efforts, because they didn't seem likely to fix the problem. This, however, is great. It totally undercuts the ISP extortion racket, without trying to fix a technical problem.
The big ISPs can always find a loophole in any law that tries to prevent throttling by some technical rules - that's what engineers do: we game a system to maximize some value. Bad approach. By instead saying "do whatever, but you can't charge money for priority access simply removes the incentive to do it in the first place. Good approach.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Exactly, the free market. If you don't like what your broadband provider is doing, just switch to one of the many other offerings in your area!
If the Democrats wanted this to pass, they would have brought the bill to floor when they had a chance of it actually passing. Far too many in the Democratic party are in the pockets of those that won't let this pass, but by bringing it up now, it can look like the Republicans are the bad guys.
Which, they are. Both parties are opposed to net neutrality. But this bill is just there for grandstanding. The Democrats could have made net neutrality happen MANY times in the last few years, so this is just to try to smear team red, even though team blue agrees with them totally on this issue.
This still doesn't address the real problem, when an ISP degrades traffic which competes with their other revenue streams. I.E. a cable company degrading netflix traffic or a telephone company degrading skype.
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The Republicans believe in "free" market that helps the most powerful Corporations.
Oddly enough, Net Neutrality is about protecting and strengthening the free market such that it remains free and competitive.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
No, Net neutrality is a routing policy about how to prioritize packets that people can choose to implement.
Using the government to mandate it upon everyone, under threat of legal action, whether it's a good solution or not, is an entirely different issue.
Wonder what the public key field is for?
and with Republicans now in charge of both house of Congress, the chances of it passing seem slim.
To preface, this is not a partisan-based slam. This is a slam on our entire system. The fact that we accept something won't pass despite it being universally wanted by "the people" (not pronounced "corporations") shows our biggest hurdle that we as a country need to overcome. Not race/gender equality or financial disparity, but the ability of this country to be propelled forward by a system that is representative to the needs of the many, not the powerful.
This bill does nothing to address that problem.
a routing policy that protects and strengthens a competitive free market among internet based services and companies.
im well aware of what NN is.
and one aspect of its implications is that big fish cant pay for preferential treatment or an unfair advantage, allowing upstart "internet startups" a fair shot as taking on goliath. the task of a startup taking on an existing leviathan is hard enough on a level playing field, just by virtue of being a tiny nobody going against a big somebody, but its everyones interests to preevnt Goliath from stopping David from even born. And that is one aspect and implication of a sound NN policy.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
The problem of insuring that rent seekers don't destroy the value of an open Internet is a collective action problem because it's in each ISP's interest to tax the hell out of usage as heavily and as _opaquely_ as possible(i.e. suppress pricing feedback so consumers, even if they had a choice, wouldn't know when to exercise it), even if when all ISPs do this the overall wealth creation is less.
The solution to collective action problems is government. Government is therefore the ideal institution to impose net neutrality.
Net neutrality channels profiteering into a more transparent and efficient mode of economic activity. It's an extraordinarily simple rule, and so the regulatory cost is de minims.
If you want to refute the argument, you need to either 1) show that an open Internet is less efficient at generating wealth than one that is heavily tolled, or 2) show that the problem is not a collective action problem in actuality.
Obviously there are all kinds of theoretical approaches: dramatically open up radio spectrum so it becomes cheaper for new ISPs to enter the market, mandate transparency in tolling practices, etc, so that consumers can easily and rapidly switch ISPs. But that's a pipe dream.
In practice net neutrality is the simplest and cheapest way to address the problem. Maybe in 100 years things will be different and we can drop the rule.
Not sure where you were going with that, but the bridge to nowhere was sponsored by Republicans.
Then maybe you can list some Republicans who object to the currently widespread practice of cities forcing businesses and developers to provide more parking than the market wants and is willing to pay for of its own accord? Are there any true laissez-faire Republicans in Congress?
No, Republicans quickly turn into socialists whenever it benefits Big Oil.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
good call. that was a huge mistake on my part. Thanks for pointing that out.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
the current bunch Ds are typically to the right of Reagan
Do any of you even remember Reagan?
What do you mean? We are awash in staunchly pro-life, tax cutting, government bashing, communist hating Democrats that want to aggressively expand military spending, appoint moderates like Rehnquist and Scalia, outlaw hiring of illegal immigrants and casually joke about nuking the Soviets on live radio.
You can't swing a cat without hitting one of these right wing Democrats.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
It would be great if we could have an actual debate, on actual solutions, to actual problems.
Thing is though, on this and many other issues, the politicians/parties don't believe there's a problem, won't propose solutions, and try to shut down, derail, or otherwise prevent actual debate by distorting the issues.
I would love it if the debate were between Republicans proposing measures to actually increase real competition, versus Democrats proposing measures to prevent the various companies from screwing over their customers. A situation like that, where most of the politicians were actually advocating for what the average citizen wants/needs, would be pretty close to ideal, and the outcome would at least be a reasonably close solution.
At least the Democrats in this case are trying to suggest solutions. We need Republicans that recognize there's a problem and propose solutions, too.
Not sure where you were going with that, but the bridge to nowhere was sponsored by Republicans.
In this case, it doesn't matter if they're Republicans or Democrats. AT&T is a major purchaser of votes in Congress. This has no chance of passing. The people sponsoring it know that and are still doing it so they can campaign on it.
In other words, it's a dog-and-pony show.
It is beneath the dignity of the slashdot front page.
No, really.
This.
And, if we put profits first, but make that "We The People"'s profit, net neutrality is not a partisan subject.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
Our state allows wealthy drivers to pay extra for the convenience and speed of the Express Lane.
When your state installed this "Express Lane" did it actually add a new lane, or did they wall off existing lanes, forcing everyone who doesn't pay up into fewer lanes than they had before, making the traffic for everyone else worse?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
And "free markets" don't exist, ever - they are an imaginary construct much like "friction free inclined planes" in physics.
Exactly. Adam Smith, the guy who invented the term in the 1700's, argued that it was the job of Government to do its best to regulate markets to keep them as "free" as possible. Previously, government action mostly consisted of helping the rich and connected build and protect their market monopolies. Sound familiar?
So if Netflix doesn't like a particular broadband provider they can switch to one of the many others currently connecting the same customer...
Or they could urge their customers to switch to one of the many better providers in their area...
Such revisionist history.
All history is revisionist. Anyone claiming otherwise is trying to sell you something.
But the sponsors are all Democrats, and with Republicans now in charge of both house of Congress, the chances of it passing seem slim.
Which is why they're introducing it now instead of in any of the last 11 sessions when it might have actually passed. It's a way for them to appear like heroes to their constituents, without actually accomplishing anything (or pissing off their corporate donors).
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
outlaw hiring of illegal immigrants
That's already illegal. It's just not enforced very well, and even when it is, they only prosecute the shell company used for labor by the big developers, who act all shocked that their subcontractors would have hired all those illegals. Even Tompkins Builders did it on a federal building in Richmond. Oh, look I found a reference.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Previously, government action mostly consisted of helping the rich and connected build and protect their market monopolies. Sound familiar?
Yep, sounds like Republicans to me. And Democrats. "Government" in the US means "government by the rich for the rich".
One of the problems is that there are two right-wing parties and no left wing at all. When Republicans froth at the mouth about socialism or communism they haven't a clue about what really is; they just think it's the same thing as government control, forgetting that their governments have been just as controlling as the other incompetents'.
Where the GOP went wrong was in getting into bed with the pro-lifer, fundamentalist, flat-earth, =3, bible-thumping loonies, who are further to the right than Hitler. They need to ditch those associations — a better choice would even have been the libertarians, who despite their own looney ideas on state control are far closer to the original Republican ideal or liberty than Oral Roberts or the Waco flakoes.
Obviously you weren't there.
He was president for 8 years. How could the government not grow if the country did? But in any case, Congress funds the size of government, and the deficit, not the President. And they beat him politically, a lot.
I was making minimum wage, $3.35 an hour, in 1983. Reagan's tax cut took my $125 weekly check to $135. That was a big deal for me. You guys can revise all you want about his 9 tax increases or whatever, I was there.
Cuba was in the process of taking over Grenada, and there were a lot of Americans there. But yeah, Reagan knew the difference between Grenada and Iraq.
Reagan knew enough to generally leave monetary policy alone. He didn't fuck it up like this current guy and one before him.
And also, his peed diaper was probably smarter than you.