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FCC Approves Net Neutrality Rules
muggs sends word that the U.S. Federal Communications Commission has voted 3-2 to approve an expansion of their ability to regulate ISPs by treating them as a public utility.
Under the rules, it will be illegal for companies such as Verizon or Cox Communications to slow down streaming videos, games and other online content traveling over their networks. They also will be prohibited from establishing "fast lanes" that speed up access to Web sites that pay an extra fee. And in an unprecedented move, the FCC could apply the rules to wireless carriers such as T-Mobile and Sprint -- a nod to the rapid rise of smartphones and the mobile Internet. ... The FCC opted to regulate the industry with the most aggressive rules possible: Title II of the Communications Act, which was written to regulate phone companies. The rules waive a number of provisions in the act, including parts of the law that empower the FCC to set retail prices — something Internet providers feared above all. However, the rules gives the FCC a variety of new powers, including the ability to: enforce consumer privacy rules; extract money from Internet providers to help subsidize services for rural Americans, educators and the poor; and make sure services such as Google Fiber can build new broadband pipes more easily.
4-5 years in the courts...
... on my next bill from Comcast
...Just like the utilities.
Is there is no local loop unbundling. This was the real solution. With competition to supply the service who cares if comcast or time warner are pieces of crap. You can drop them like hot potatoes. Instead we have more control and less freedom.
So when do they release these 322 pages of new rules? With all this transparency, what could POSSIBLY go wrong?! /s
I mean, after the broadcast flag incident, how is it everyone so comfortable with letting the FCC become the packet police? The regular court system has proved to be inadequate... when?
Wonder what the public key field is for?
It doesn't go far enough. What we really need is to separate content creators from the network providers. Have a separate utility company that only provides your internet connection and nothing else. That way, every company that wants to sell you product is on 100% equal footing. Make the market truly free for everyone to participate on a level playing field. After all, isn't that what's most fair to everyone? Distributing your cable TV service over your now independent internet link will open it up so you can get your TV service from anyone you want. Think of what the competition will do to the industry and how much better it will be for the consumer.
Oh wait. I forgot that the cable companies will bribe everyone in congress they can in order to keep their municipal monopolies firmly entrenched. So much for real free markets and competition. Rats.
I usually have to pay extra for that but now they can't charge more!
I think you mean 8 pages of regulations, 300 pages of summary. I mean unless you are claiming that citing justifications is the same thing as a regulation... Also what do the people lose, besides the ability for the ISPs to unilaterally act as paid gate keepers to us...
When you cant win, ad hominem.
Fox News refusing to show you the open and up front discussions on this does not mean they didn't happen. You should try a different source for your information.
What will happen when the FCC decides to use the new powers to "clean up" (i.e. censor) the Internet the same way it's done to TV and Radio?
Yeah, it might be like when they regulated the phone service and suddenly there were no phone sex lines -- oh, wait.
this ladies and gentlemen is the RWNJ Brain At Work.
They (the FCC) literally have a series of meeting, press releases, and publicly proposed rules, public commentary, all saying "Here it is! This is what we want to do, what do you think?", and still the RWNJ's decry "we have no idea what's going on, why won't they tell us what's going on, they're hiding it from us".
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
so then you're opposed to the internet as it stands right now?
you oppose the preservation of the status quo in lieu of ISP's being able to block services they don't want you do have?
Say being blocked from Amazon Prime and forced into Verizon Prime?
Or Comcast redirecting Netflix users to Hulu?
Or otherwise turning internet delivery into a fancier cable channel, with certain websites available in certain tiers of service?
You're a shill.
Or a liar.
Or just ignorant.
But likely all 3.
Net neutrality is the basis of the internet as we know it: ISPs provide access to the entire internet, not just the parts they want us to see.
If you like the internet as it stands, then you like NN. \
It's that f!@#()% simple.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
As I understand it, the FCC and the description of common carriers under "Title II" of the Communications Act of 1934 was created by Congress. The FCC is ruling that Internet Service Providers are "common carriers" under the language of Title II, and not "information service providers" under the language of Title I. This ruling includes adjustments/interpretations of the Title II language as the FCC envisions it would be applied to Internet Service Providers.
The FCC didn't give themselves this authority, the FCC was created by Congress to have this authority.
Is there a definition of what is THE internet?
Its the internetwork connect. Its a framework of voluntarily linking connections for mutual
surely comcast can create a parallel construction and sell however they wish like a private toll road. It could have discrete points where it could tap into the "real" internet. Thus amazon or netflix or whomever could connect into this autobahn on the goes-into side and pop out into "the" internet at some Comcast hub in the customers town.
If this happens, I'll eat my hat. No one is going to buy anything but the real internet, and you won't see company set up shop without users, which are all on the real internet. Also, the instant they start offering an internet gateway they become an ISP and regulatable, so there is no loophole. If they don't, they will need content on their private network, which no one is going to provide, because most of the content exists outside their networks. No one wants their shitty content, and thats their problem. If people did, they wouldn't have to throttle netflix for competing with their services.
Picture it like FED Ex, transporting a package 90% of the way, then mailing it. the postoffice might not charge differently for different customers and Fed Ex might not either (or they could) but only customers with valuable deliveries would be willing to pay the cost of the combined service, which would be dominated by the Fed Ex high speed service.
almost completely diffrent because niether fedex nor the post office own any of the infrasturcture, just the delievery mechanism. Any delivery service can use the same roads.
How companies like Time Warner will defeat Net Neutrality: Self-divestiture.
The "Time Warner Cable/Internet" you know of today becomes a myriad of companies specifically designed to continue on with business as usual while still adhering to the letter of the law:
- Time Warner Broadband - a company which does nothing more than operate Hybrid-Fiber-Coax outside plant (the actual wires on the actual poles).
- Time Warner Cable - a company which leases spectrum from TWB (above), and provides cable-video service on that outside plant
- Time Warner Transit - a company which does nothing more than provide wholesale (non-retail, non-mass-market) internet connectivity to ISPs and other service providers. As a wholesaler, TWT is not encumbered by net neutrality regulations.
- Time Warner Internet - a company which leases spectrum from TWB (above) to provide IP connectivity to end-users. It obtains *all* of its internet connectivity from TWT (above), and charges metered billing to all its end-users (you pay a flat rate PLUS you pay "by the bit", the same way you pay for water or electric today).
Netflix, et al, will have to tithe properly to TWT if they want access to TWI's customers, since TWT is the only path to GET to TWI's customers. The FCC can't really punish TWI for this move, without opening up an even messier Pandora's box of trying to tell ISPs "which upstreams they HAVE to obtain connectivity from".
Yes, it'll all be a LITTLE more complicated than that, but they've got teams of lawyers to work out the details.
Oh looks its mi back to provide more lies, while backing his arguments with links to sites that actually disprove everything he says.
Mi, the gentleman who declares "I'm not a bigot, I love (insert random slur here)."
Seriously though. Yet again, from your links:
The Fairness Doctrine had two basic elements: It required broadcasters to devote some of their airtime to discussing controversial matters of public interest, and to air contrasting views regarding those matters. Stations were given wide latitude as to how to provide contrasting views: It could be done through news segments, public affairs shows, or editorials. The doctrine did not require equal time for opposing views but required that contrasting viewpoints be presented.
Let us remember that the FCC exists because "the spectrum" is seen and treated under law as a public resource owned by the nation's citizens. So the FCC was
created to administer it (in lieu of created the Federal Minitry of Truth you mention and worry about) in a collaboration between government (and the public's) interests in having the spectrum used in the publics benefit, and private interests in making money while doing so. A middle ground, a middle way, between government provided (and potentially abused) content, and private use (and potential abuse) of the spectrum. A compromise.
That's background. Onto the Fairness Doctrine:
No part of the Fairness Doctrine had anything to do with determining "what content is fair".. So right off the bat you're spouting BS. Rather, it simply requires that broadcasters talk about "things in the public interest", which essentially means news. Like right now, there is a major trade deal going down, the TPP, that not one news channel is talking about. OR during and after citizens united, they rarely talk about the money in politics. Such ignoring of important issues would be a valid basis for a complaint to the FCC. And complimentary to the first part of the rule, when discussing or presenting these "things in the public interest", the presentation couldn't be one sided. IE, no Fox News. This so far is logical, straightforward, and completely reasonable.
But lets dig further. More from your link:
In 1974, the Federal Communications Commission stated that the Congress had delegated it the power to mandate a system of "access, either free or paid, for person or groups wishing to express a viewpoint on a controversial public issue..." but that it had not yet exercised that power because licensed broadcasters had "voluntarily" complied with the "spirit" of the doctrine.
So it was never actually enforced. Broadcasters, chiefly the big 3 until the advent of cable, implemented a similar policy internally and voluntarily.
I could point out your stupidity and ignorance on these topics all day long, but I'm running out of time and need to cut the history and facts lesson short. But the history even gets more interesting: when the FCC revoked the doctrine, there was significant opposition to it. They feared one sided mouth pieces for companies, politicians, or other special interests. A de-evolution of political discourse fed by the chief mechanic people rely on to be informed. Any of that sound familiar, like a news channel or two you know about? Hmmm?
In short: go away you ill informed troll.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
This has been a great demonstration as to how easily the ignorant Republican masses are controlled by right-wing media designed to keep them frothing at the mouth so they never stop, think, and realize that the conservative movement is a scam. They'll come out against individual rights, and in favor of corporate masters whenever Fox, wingnut blogs, and hate radio tell them to.
Yeah, I'm getting annoyed at this whole "years in court" thing too. Title II is NOT new. It was established in 1933-4? and lasted until the late 90s I believe. Title II is very well tested. Further, we've had several DC circuit court cases in 2014 where the judges said that the FCC had the authority if they reclassified. They have. Done Deal.
They left out one important detail though... we didn't get unbundling back. It used to be that the phone carriers had to lease their lines to whomever asked for a decent price. That let mom and pop ISPs into the field to compete on service, and it was awesome for creating competition.