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House Republicans Roll Out Legislation To Overturn New Net Neutrality Rules
An anonymous reader writes: U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and 31 Republican co-sponsors have submitted the Internet Freedom Act (PDF) for consideration in the House. The bill would roll back the recent net neutrality rules made by the FCC. The bill says the rules "shall have no force or effect, and the Commission may not reissue such rule in substantially the same form, or issue a new rule that is substantially the same as such rule, unless the reissued or new rule is specifically authorized by a law enacted after the date of the enactment of this Act." Blackburn claims the FCC's rules will "stifle innovation" and "restrict freedom." The article points out that Blackburn's campaign and leadership PAC has received substantial donations. from Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon.
How can everyone argue about all this when the FCC has imposed a gag order that prevents the public from seeing the regulations? The gag order and secrecy surrounding the regulation of the internet is the only concern I have at this point.
They know it can't get past the president's veto, and probably not past a fillibuster, but if they keep this up they PAC will keep lining their coffers.
They could write legislation about anything and expect us to like it because it has a word in it like "freedom" or "patriot". Imagine: The Hero's Freedom Act. Sounds good, right? It could also potentially describe a bill that calls some group heroes while empowering them to take the freedom of others. That would be a hero's freedom act, technically.
Actually, that has more to do with freedom than this does. What they meant to call it is the "Internet Just Give Us Your Wallets And Shut Up Act".
LOL! Freedom for the carriers and big business to make more money.
It won't make it to the floor for a vote, let alone past the president.
SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
I'd like to see multiple ISP block all content and websites associated with those politicians and their political party. Especially during an election to give them a dose of their own medicine. See this is what can potentially happen to you if net neutrality is prevented. Eventually become as censored as China.
They're locking out the PS4 client on their network. Surely this is precisely why net neutrality should be set in law, to stop corporations from blocking what you use to access third party services!
Not that Sony are in the clear either, those shitbags tied Netflix into their PSN accounts, when the PSN wasn't available, tough fucking titties, you were blocked from using Netflix on a Sony console.
Specifically, for the telecom and media network backers of the Congressmen. I guess the ObamaCare repeal isn't scheduled this week.
The best government money can buy.
When someone says, "Any fool can see
I'm rather Libertarian about most things in life, but I applauded the FCC's decision to attempt to "stifle innovation." That is, of course, only if you consider "innovation" to be new forms of rent-seeking.
Seriously, AT&T, Comcast and Verizon. Stop trying to wring money out of both content providers and customers. This shit is getting so old.
They're stripping away Comcast's freedom to shake-down content providers for more money and screw over their customers! What is this, the Soviet Union??
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
I can't believe the bullshit I see from some of the "conservatives" I know who treat this like some kind of commie takeover of the Internet.
One guy I used to work with was trying to run an SMB network off his cable modem service from home and did nothing but complain for weeks about the runaround he got trying to get multiple static IPs due to ridiculous cable vendor policies (solved with some MAC spoofing/VLAN hackery in his firewall) and the pathetic bandwidth allocations he was able to get in addition to the general lack of alternatives in his area.
Yet this same numbskull is parroting this ridiculous "Obama takeover of the Internet" bullshit against net neutrality.
I just don't see how "conservatives" are willing to go totally rabid when it comes to government meddling yet so many (but not all) see outrageous monopoly manipulation and rent-seeking as just the good-old free market working like it's supposed to. I can't make this dichotomy make any sense.
And how many of these cosponsors have taken large donations from ISPs, telecoms, etc. in their last reelection campaigns or recently to their PAC? It's seems that they aren't even trying to hide the corruption anymore.
I would like to see how much money was given to, donated to or trips paid for by Comcast, AT&T and Verizon to Blackburn and these 31 Republicans over the past 10 years. I'm sure we'll get our answer as to why they are pushing this afterwards.
Campaign Donations Appreciation Act
Corporate Fascism Reinforcement Act
Fuck the People Act
Get off your butts. Instead of whining on a forum spend the next 2 minutes of your life emailing your representative for the American slashdotter.
Remember these legislators only hear and get their information from lobbyists and pacs.
Tell them it is not acceptable to have a monopoly cut off your Netflix. If your representative has an R tell him or her that there is no free market and it harms innovation and our economy as a result. If he or she has a D explain monopolistic powers and pacs are writing rules.
Yes they check with their staff all day. If they get a surge of angry citizens they will notice. Remember the law to ban opensource and force drm? I posted that link and the bill died. We can change this if we act together. Religious right did this and won. It's time geeks do the same
http://saveie6.com/
Straight up bribery.
So now a small number of companies has more sway with this "politician" then the record breaking response the FCC received on this issue. Less then 1% of the FCC's response were against Net Neutrality, but because this Congressman's PAC received $81,000 AT&T, Comcast, the NCTA and Verizon, he feels that this is what the American people want?
Right.
Straight up bribery, and nothing will ever be done about it.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
Guys, much like 1984, House of Cards is not an instruction manual...
Always watching out for the little guy... in case he gets too big and needs to be squashed down again.
Other than for the media companies, I can't see a downside to treating broadband access like a utility, especially since the FCC has waived the right to regulate prices. A broadband service routes packets into and out of your house, just like a water, electric or gas utility. AT&T's packets should not be any different than Verizon's packets, or Comcast's packets...it's the equivalent of the local loop from a CLEC.
It seems to me that shaking up the incumbents in some markets would be a good thing. It would probably operate the same way "competitive" gas service does now -- if someone hates their provider enough or finds a cheaper price for the exact same service, they can sign up to have another company provide it. This would be a good model to keep decent providers running, but put some limits on the Comcasts and Time Warner Cables of the world. Also, forcing some kind of universal service would mean that rural customers would get better network access. Carriers only upgrade networks when forced, and only like to operate in places where it's easy to operate...other than profits, this is probably one thing they're worried about. That, and Comcast is probably worried that Joe's Cable Shack is going to take all the business from people who don't need TV with their Internet service.
I'm also not really buying the "innovation" angle. At the core, networks are plumbing. DSL, DOCSIS, and of course Ethernet are pretty mature standards. Occasionally materials and computing advances allow for faster data rates, but these are open standards that every carrier would have access to.
I say it's the highest time for another antitrust breakup.
Please call it what it is: the Comcast Freedom Act.
Sell your greatest weakness like it's your greatest strength. I'm not in marketing, but I see this all time.
I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
When are they going to change their name to the "We hate americans" party?
I am so done with those paid for corrupt scumbags, and it blows my mind how any person that can call themselves a republican can support these idiots and how scummy evil they really are.
I'm waiting for them to start wearing sponsor patches like Nascar race teams.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I can't get past how many of you are stupid. Maybe you all deserve to be slaves. Pay CLOSE attention to what I am about to say.
There were not two plans, there were THREE.
Plan 1. Would allow the ISP's, communication companies, to throttle the internet in favor of whatever service they wanted. A vast majority of people (including myself) did not want this. It would enable companies to expand their monopoly.
Plan 2. Net Neutrality. This is the basic idea that the internet has worked just fine these decades and should be left alone. This is what a majority of the people wanted, but it's NOT what you got.
Plan 3. The FCC hatched their own plan to seize contol over the Internet and they called their plan "Net Neutrality". It is the same name as plan 2, but it has a diferent meaning. This is the plan we actually got. Under plan 3, the FCC would restrict the big carriers from throttling bandwidth, but would be able to impose all sorts of other restrictions and controls. The document was kept secret and it's over 320 pages long. The claims the FCC made would have all fit on a single page.
Under Plan 3 you can expect censorship of what you see, hear and say, in favor of international treeties, but in direct violation of U.S. constutional rights. A tax on internet access is in the works and you can expect to need a National ID just to login to the internet. A license will be required to have a blog or news, and the list goes on.
Plan 3 is an attack on the ability for Americans to communicate freely. Not all at once, but it will encroach more and more over time. and these are not acceptable. In the event of a revolution, Americans would use the Internet as their primary communications and it would be encrypted. The FCC being in such a position is a direct and immediate threat to those abilities to communicate. Many call the FCCs action to be an act of civil war.
Please try to understand this and wrap your brain around it because it's the most important issue on the planet today. It's far more important that all the stupid cat and dog videos, or deflated footballs, missing planes, war in ukraine, etc. etc.
Spread the word by whatever means you can.
Below is a couple of videos that explain this well. :ANONYMOUS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7WHoqsRuxU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRHWUNNP8iI&index=9&list=PLvm7gU7MnrH5bAly4LqxEOnBfjwVL41aw
Fucking Americans. Is there anything left on the planet you won't fuck with to make a dollar? Jesus Christ...
This has zero chance of becoming law.
Ha ha ha.
America, the failed republic where the money men make "laws" to suit themselves.
What a pile of crap.
Because of the few recalcitrant socialists left in the Senate?
These Rules are the same rules that had us all renting phones from AT&T for over 80 years.
HOW charging for the same bandwidth TWICE will spur innovation? The only thing that will spur is lethargy.
The only innovation that Comcast/Verizon/AT$T et. al. have done is in exploring new frontiers of poor customer service, cartel like exclusionary practices against alternate providers, abusive/fraudulent billing practices and extortion to content providers. They are actually arguing to allow themselves to squash the innovation of other content providers, app authors, etc. The true innovators are completely in favor of net neutrality generally.
Has nobody stopped to consider the fact that Net Neutrality (or, more appropriately, Net Neutering) more or less guarantee an eventual transition to metered pricing for customers, that metered pricing will be far more horribly abused by cablecos and telcos than any of this hypothetical preferential treatment could be, and that you'll have absolutely no recourse because the conditions will be fixed in place by regulations?
The "why" should be pretty damned obvious: you have a certain small percentage of users who consume orders of magnitude more bandwidth than others, mostly bittorrent users. ISPs deal with this in some legitimate ways like throttling (deprioritizing bittorrent packets so that they're first to drop when congestion occurs or policing the endpoints to a maximum throughput rate) and some not-so-legitimate ways (injecting connection reset packets to disrupt sessions). If you have to suddenly start treating your teenage neighbor's 8,000 pr0n torrent seeds as "equal traffic" then you either have to expand capacity by orders of magnitude to deal with it, driving up costs for everyone, or you have to introduce metered pricing (or worst case is you can just ignore it and everyone in that neighborhood has crap Internet speed). If you are worried about pricing abuse with so-called "fast lanes," that ain't nothing compared to the abuse you'll get with metered pricing.
Yes, cablecos and telcos are run by shitheads who do want to play stupid fast-lane games with their connections, but a certain amount of outrage can eventually correct that or make it livable. Getting rid of that without consequence would be desirable, but with an almost certain consequence of metered access it seems to me like people are doing an extremely poor job of picking their poisons. And for those who don't think metered access will happen haven't payed much attention to the FCC's history...
This is a practical worry about the ISPs, but it's not the worst one. The FCC is also the group of milquetoast, any-way-the-wind-blows political hacks responsible for freaking out every time there's a nipple slip on public television or somebody says a dirty word where The Children's fragile eyes and ears may be burned with hellfire. Because Satan is in boobies and f-bombs or something like that. And the only people they're semi-accountable to is Congress, who has a 9% approval rating. These are the people you want in charge of our Internet. Seriously? Yes, again, the people running telcos and cablecos are shitheads, but whenever there is hierarchy you will wind up with a shithead in charge. The only way you control these shitheads at all is by having as many as possible choose from. In this case, sorry, I think the supporters of Net Neutering have chosen their shitheads extremely poorly.
Help save the critically endangered Blue Iguana
Give me 60 minutes with each of these corrupt dirt bags. I'll make them admit public how much of a whore they are. Man we need to kill both parties and start fresh. I keep hoping more people will register independent and vote out career politicians, but it won't happen. Both the house and senate should have a term limit of 1. Do your job, serve the people and get out.
crap
So Some cell providers in the US provide "x" amount of GB's of data on a rate plan and when that data is used up, they turn off access to the Internet (blocking) and other providers will allow you to use "x" amount of data and then throttle back your remaining data (throttling) to dial up modem speeds (EVDO or less). Since these rules prohibit blocking and throttling, what will Net Neutrality do to cell phone plans?
Select from tblFriends where interesting >= 4;
I haven't seen anyone mention yet that this "bill" is pure horse shit. Legislation can't just declare that power which the FCC already has (given to them by the 1934 act and by follow-on legislation) doesn't count, and they can't do such-and-such. To accomplish what they claim to want to accomplish, they have to frame new legislation that changes the FCC's authorization. Of course they know this. They have lawyers; hell, they ARE lawyers.
This piece of shit is just kabuki theater. Nothing to see here.
seems like a lose lose situation to me. Either we have an over bearing government running the show, or companies that want to gouge people and not give the service they should be providing. Either way I think that the Internet is going to suffer greatly after it is all said and done.
No, the voters who voted them into office.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
Parent does not agree with the general consensus of douchebag smug NPR chanting Slashdot liberals. We angry people LOATHE those who HATE the people, and the government protecting OUR rights is typically always the solution. It doesn't matter what you think or say. You're wrong because Comcast and the Republicans are EVIL. It doesn't matter how much the discussion of power has been railroaded. You are a MORON. And you need to get off this site because we Diggers own it now.
Well, now we know which representative delivers the fastest response time for having money waved under her nose, and the strongest stomach for the shit the regional monopolies are shoveling. Seriously, is there any law that has been passed that has the words "patriot" or "freedom" in it that shouldn't be repealed? Besides FOIA, that is.
Internet Freedom Act
Freedom is Slavery indeed
I'd be impressed if Marsha's inner-bread support base can even spell A T and T, and use the it a sentence. Lets face it, they voted for her. But when one considers how he sounds, maybe lesser pay, no medical insurance, and second class citizenship for women is what Marsha sees as "good?" Which begs the question, "are women even U.S. citizens?"
It's rather ironic they named their bill the "Internet Freedom Act". I suspect the "Freedom" part doesn't apply to us but instead applies to the telecoms.
Freedom from accountability, freedom from competitiveness, etc...
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
Just glad I don't live in a country where legislation is bought like this. America desperately needs some kind of movement towards becoming a democracy.
ISPs deal with this in some legitimate ways like throttling (deprioritizing bittorrent packets so that they're first to drop when congestion occurs or policing the endpoints to a maximum throughput rate) and some not-so-legitimate ways (injecting connection reset packets to disrupt sessions).
Sounds like a strawman to me. No one (except perhaps the anti-NN folks, like yourself) has proposed that throttling excessive usage goes against the tenets of NN. What NN does argue, however, is that throttling *based on endpoint* is not kosher - mainly because it provides a strong negative incentive to customer quality.
From the FCC Commission Document ( http://www.fcc.gov/document/fc... ):
No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
Don't confuse last-mile congestion issues (that you raise, and are legitimate) with throttling the interconnects. In your example, the BT excessive user should expect to hit monthly caps (which are not covered by NN) or overall throughput caps, especially during peak times. That's all (again referring to Commission Document) considered:
Reasonable Network Management: For the purposes of the rules, other than paid prioritization, an ISP may engage in reasonable network management. This recognizes the need of broadband providers to manage the technical and engineering aspects of their networks.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Let me first outline what I believe: I believe in the CONCEPT of Net Neutrality.
However, what the FCC and this administration has passed, while it is calling it Net Neutrality, is NOT Net Neutrality in any way shape or form. It is Political Correctness run wild and will result in a thousand unintended problems that will require further tweaking by the FCC.
And if you trust the FCC not to fuck this up, you're just haven't been paying attention.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
It's going to get vetoed anyway, so why go through the exercise?
"Net neturality" is a lousy idea that's going to hurt Internet users for years to come, but it's going to take a Republican Congress and a Republican president to fix.
No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
The existing rules on phone usage limits, home connection usage limits, are fine and will stay... what they cannot do in the new rules is discriminate the type of traffic based on where it is coming from or going to.
Section 255 of Title II applies to Internet providers now, as does section 225 of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA):
http://www.fcc.gov/guides/tele...
http://www.fcc.gov/encyclopedi...
These rules have such unbelievable broad statements as:
"Accessibility and usability must be assessed for individual products and services. Accessibility features that can be incorporated into the design of products or services with very little or no difficulty or expense must be put in each and every product or service."
"...require network architecture to be designed in a way that does not hinder access by people with disabilities. Network architecture covers the public switched telephone network, and includes hardware or software databases associated with routing telecommunications services."
"Telecommunications service providers and equipment manufacturers must provide the FCC with the name and contact information of the person (or persons) in their companies who are authorized to resolve accessibility complaints."
"Each common carrier providing telephone voice transmission services shall, not later than 3 years after July 26, 1990, provide in compliance with the regulations prescribed under this section, throughout the area in which it offers service, telecommunications relay services"
"The term "telecommunications relay services" means telephone transmission services that provide the ability for an individual who has a hearing impairment or speech impairment to engage in communication by wire or radio with a hearing individual in a manner that is functionally equivalent to the ability of an individual who does not have a hearing impairment or speech impairment to communicate using voice communication services by wire or radio. Such term includes services that enable two-way communication between an individual who uses a TDD or other nonvoice terminal device and an individual who does not use such a device."
Many news stories have been published about how ADA was exploited by scammers to extort money out of bricks-and-mortar businesses. Now these scams are coming to the ISP biz.
http://www.adaabuse.com/
I needed someone to tell FUCK YOU today. So House Republicans, thanks for the opportunity.
FUCK YOU.
man, they have it completely backwards. not uncommon for republicans, of course: they take the opposing 'slogan' and try to show it applies to them. setting up bidding wars over the last-mile bandwidth, and disadvantaging smaller players and new entrants: that WILL "stifle innovation" and "restrict freedom."
it's about as logical as "you're trampling on religious self-determination when you stop me forcing my religion on my employees".
The FCC and the executive branch have ZERO power to fix our internet EXCEPT under the administrative powers of the FCC which is fully within it's rights to classify ISPs under title 2.
This is the only thing they can really do; that previous move they made was stupid and bound to lose in the courts like it did.
What is really needed is a sane law to be passed which does actual Net Neutrality. But as anybody who has been paying attention (Faux News doesn't count) knows that our government is foobar. That isn't going to happen and if history is any guide, despotism is all we can realistically expect in the future and if people are lucky, a short lived one before another democracy forms. As is the life cycle of democracies... (see Ben Franklin's full speech which closed out the constitutional convention, it's always relevant.)
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I'm on several discussion boards and the republicans have universally just got bat shit crazy over this issue.
I'm having a hard time understanding their motivation or rational or source of talking points that's driving them.
Comcast gave huge amounts of money to both parties but it looks like it only stuck with republicans.
But are their some philosophical reasons why they support comcast and verizon being able to manipulate the internet and extort web sites to provide service the comcast customers already paid for?
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
All economists know about these things called natural monopolies. It is widely recognized that regulation is necessary in natural monopolies because of the power differential which makes monopolies what they are. Many other countries deliver cheaper better internet for less over very spare countries. Whenever you have barries to entry you have to do a cost-benefit analysis. At a certain point the cost of regulations is less for everyone. It is not a black and white issue. If you think it is, then you are living in a comfortable "truth", and not trying to understand the world.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Bless you my son. That was one of the saddest explanations for defeatism and failing to help those that are trying to help you, that I've ever heard.