Cable Companies Urge Judges To Kill 'Net Neutrality' Rules

An anonymous reader quotes Reuters: Trade associations representing wireless, cable and broadband operators on Friday urged the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to reverse...the Federal Communications Commission's so-called net neutrality rules, put in place last year to make internet service providers treat all internet traffic equally...

The cable groups said the court should correct "serious errors" in a decision "that radically reshapes federal law governing a massive sector of the economy, which flourished due to hundreds of billions of dollars of investment made in reliance on the policy the order throws overboard".. In its filing on Friday, the CTIA said it was illegal to subject broadband internet access to "public-utility style, common carrier regulation" and illegal to impose "common-carrier status on mobile broadband."
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said he wasn't surprised to see "the big dogs" challenging net neutrality.

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Comments

AC Urges Natalie Portman to Dump Hot Grits In Pant

[Anonymous Coward]

frost post my ladies

They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

If I was a judge and someone was trying to change a law that prevents extortion and other organized crime style corruption, I'd fine them and kick them out of the courtroom. But maybe this judge takes bribes.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

On the other hand, one would like elected officials to pass a law changing the status of such a massive thing, and not just do something Congress did not envision with that law. This is a massive sector for unelected officials to rewrite.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

This is a massive sector for unelected officials to rewrite.

It needs to be rewritten. It's past time to turn the internet (into a dumb pipe) and even cellular service into a public utility, just like the land line. If Congress won't do it, the courts must. And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot. We endure lousy service only because of public apathy.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Obfuscant]

If Congress won't do it, the courts must.

The courts are not supposed to be in the business of writing law. That means if Congress won't do it, the courts have even less business doing it.

And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot.

You wish for a patchwork of internet regulation on a state-by-state basis? What a minefield that would be.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

That means if Congress won't do it, the courts have even less business doing it.

I don't care how it is done. It just must be. Time to push the blockage out of the way. The companies have even less business writing the rules than the courts. It is time for us to write the rules, and if we have to, use the courts to do it. The ends justify the means.

You wish for a patchwork of internet regulation on a state-by-state basis? What a minefield that would be.

Then make it federal. That's the way it should be anyway to avoid that very thing. Hell, the president should sign an executive order to make it happen. If not, let's demand it from the Supreme court. The imperative is there. It's up to us to enforce it. Or you can spend the rest of your lives discussing it and get nothing done while prices reach for the sky. It's not complicated. Either you want proper internet service, or you don't. The technology is there waiting to be used. The singular impediment is human politics.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

There was never any need for the legislature or the judiciary to touch the subject of "net neutrality". "Net neutrality" is the functional baseline MINIMUM for proper operation of the Internet. It's a packet-switching network designed by the military to guarantee the proper routing of packets from source to destination irrespective of content. Anyone trying to subvert the core functionality of the Internet should be booted off the network, period. We don't need them or their customers on the 'Net if the ISPs are going to act like idiots. And it shouldn't have taken the FCC to step in to make that happen. ICANN/NIC should have dropped the hammer, hard.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[mishehu]

If Congress won't do it, the courts must.

The courts are not supposed to be in the business of writing law. That means if Congress won't do it, the courts have even less business doing it.

Playing semantics is pointless. By interpreting the law, the courts essentially write it. It's simply a different process, and they don't write new, original laws, only taking in ones that already exist.

And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot.

You wish for a patchwork of internet regulation on a state-by-state basis? What a minefield that would be.

Where does he say that it should be a on state-by-state basis?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[AK Marc]

The law was passed in 1996. The FCC thinks the law gives them some powers, those who would lose their ability to hold customers hostage disagree. The law is sufficiently vague that it appears the FCC has the powers. The law was sufficiently vague so that the regulations would have force of law, and the FCC would have the flexibility to react to the industry, without having to go back to Congress every year with pules of laws needed to keep up. That was by design. If you are against "activist judges" re-writing law, then the FCC has the power, as that was the intent in 1996.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[AK Marc]

The FCC is supposed to be writing the rules. That's what the law says. Cable Companies are trying to strike down the FCC, because the law gives the FCC the power to write regulations.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[AK Marc]

There is no process for putting an initiative on the ballot at a federal level, but many for doing that at a state level. So the comment about putting initiatives on the ballot must be about doing it at a state-level.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

We need to demand that any judge who gives the cable companies more than the time of day should be impeached. Like the Rocky Horror Picture Show, democracy requires audience participation to be effective.

Re: They should be fined for acting like babies

[stevedog]

Actually, this is exactly what the law was intended for. ISPs have been common carriers (in function) ever since the internet became a staple, rather than a novelty, in the average American life. They managed to keep this change at bay for a while, despite their deployments being almost entirely subsidized by federal, state, and local funding and frequently claiming protection under Title II (guess which title "common carrier" falls under?) in order to make their installations easier. Furthermore, at this point, there is nothing carried by telephone lines that anyone would consider more important than what is carried across internet fiber, and thus no law that applies to ensuring the integrity of the handling of telephone line transmission that shouldn't apply to ISP data transmission.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[mishehu]

Or perhaps it's just a figure of speech meaning "make enough noise to get the federal legislature to do something about it" ? I don't know, and I don't feel like assuming what the original poster meant by it.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[John Jorsett]

This is a massive sector for unelected officials to rewrite.

It needs to be rewritten. It's past time to turn the internet (into a dumb pipe) and even cellular service into a public utility, just like the land line. If Congress won't do it, the courts must. And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot. We endure lousy service only because of public apathy.

I flew in the era when airlines were regulated. Fares, routes, it was all controlled by the federal government, and guess what? It cost a fortune to fly anywhere. Sure, it was great that my employer-paid seat was on a half-populated plane where I could stretch out on the seats, but if I were going somewhere on my own dime, I'd either be driving or Greyhounding it, because I couldn't afford the 'luxury' of flying. Those were also the days pre-Carterfone decision where it was illegal to attach your own devices to 'your' phone line, and long distance calls were expensive as hell. That's the kind of crap regulation was giving us: expensive, limited, and inflexible. And that's the kind of world you'll get if you attain your fantasy of internet and cell services treated as public utilities.

Re: They should be fined for acting like babies

[hackwrench]

And I would say that the only way to achieve a just ends is through just means.

Re: They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

the "noise" that usually matters at US Congressional level is "let me write this check to your reelection campaign...", and, "we have a great job for you when you retore..."

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Obfuscant]

I don't care how it is done.

Do you care what the Constitution says, or is it just toilet paper to you?

The ends justify the means.

Right.

Then make it federal.

There is no federal initiative process, and no support in the Constitution to create one. That means any "initiatives" have to be at the state level.

Hell, the president should sign an executive order to make it happen.

We've had too much "rule by fiat" already.

Or you can spend the rest of your lives discussing it and get nothing done while prices reach for the sky.

Prices have nothing to do with net neutrality, and where does it say anywhere that the Supreme Court has the authority to set internet rates?

Either you want proper internet service, or you don't.

I have proper internet service.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[LifesABeach]

Cable types hate Net Neutrality? My nipples are so sensitive, excuse my rubbing of them. Now, Net Neutrality means that Cable companies can't rip the community off? Oh, my nipples, they seem to need more rubbing. Maybe the Cable companies should sell off their Internet interest? Oh god; my nipples are just longing for more rubbing. Apologies to South Park

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you care what the Constitution says, or is it just toilet paper to you?

The Constitution is just bad toilet paper if it is a hindrance to its purpose, which is in service to the citizenry.

A lot of people don't get this, they think that they need to treat the Constitution as sacred, which is exactly the OPPOSITE of what needs to be done.

The ends justify the means.

Right.

Especially applicable in this case, where the means are not necessarily repugnant, but more novel.

But not unprecedentedly, mind you, several state constitutions do recognize the principle.

There is no federal initiative process, and no support in the Constitution to create one. That means any "initiatives" have to be at the state level.

There's no law against initiatives, or other prohibition, and Article V is conceptually applicable.

Still, I will concur that is a fault to the US Constitution, the citizenry are not given explicit tools to enact their wishes.

We've had too much "rule by fiat" already.

And we've had too much obstruction by process as well.

Prices have nothing to do with net neutrality, and where does it say anywhere that the Supreme Court has the authority to set internet rates?

Ah, but the prices are related, besides, the Supreme Court can just farm the task out. That is their typical option.

I have proper internet service.

So do I, but it was despite everything Comcast and AT&T could do.

Re: They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

Phone restrictions were imposed by Att, not the government. The government regulations were why you COULD buy your own phone instead of rent it.

Airfare us cheaper because planes are have better power to weight per passenger now, thanks to tech improvements.

If you don't have a barely accountable government to regulate things, then you get a completely unaccountable corporation regulating themselves.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

It cost a fortune to fly anywhere.

At least you knew when you purchased the ticket what the price was. Now there are so many hidden fees that most people have no idea how much a trip is actually going to cost. And some of the pricing is still designed to rip people off, a trip from California to Osaka Japan costs LESS then a trip to Houston Texas. And I remember reading on Slashdot about some trick where you could buy a ticket to a destination with a layover where you actually wanted to go and then not bother to re-board the plane and it would cost you half as much. So don't tell me that deregulation is always a good thing. Corporations have proven time and time again that they NEED regulation in order to keep their profit margins out of the triple digit range.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Obfuscant]

Or perhaps it's just a figure of speech meaning "make enough noise to get the federal legislature to do something about it" ?

No. There is no federal initiative process, and NO BALLOT TO PUT IT ON. Here in the USA we do not have a true national election. The highest level election (and thus "ballot") is the state level. All the gum flapping you read in your papers about the "winner" of the "popular vote" for President (the only national elected office now that Pres and VP are combined) is just gum flapping. There are state elections which result state winners, and a process to select the final winner from that. "Adding up all the votes for X and Y" isn't how the winner is selected and is a quite meaningless number.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Obfuscant]

We need to demand that any judge who gives the cable companies more than the time of day should be impeached.

"I'm sorry, cable company, but we cannot consider your legal rights in any matter at all, because fustakrakich has ruled that if we do more than 'give you the time of day' we shall be impeached. You have no legal rights and no defense against any lawsuits anyone files against you for any reason."

There is no end to your hatred of the cable companies and no end to the means you will go to to destroy them, is there?

Like the Rocky Horror Picture Show, democracy requires audience participation to be effective.

You know those people who make up cable companies are part of the democracy that gets to participate, don't you?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

Congress gave the FCC the authority to oversee the internet in the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The FCC could have classified the internet as a common Carrier under Title II at that time if it wanted to, but it chose try to work with ISPs instead... and they took the FCC to court over their rules and won because the FCC didn't have the authority under Title I, but did under Title II if it had only classified internet service as common carrier. So, of course the FCC used their authority to classify it as what it is, and then imposed new regulations.

Congress has already voted to give the FCC authority -- and confirmed the selection of members to the FCC board. It's their job to exactly this sort of thing, and Congress explicitly gave them the responsibility of dealing with it.

The internet absolutely falls within Congress' own definition of common carrier as written in the Telcom. Act of 1934. It was a MISTAKE to not label it as such in 1996, but at that time, many were still using AOL/Compuserve/Prodigy walled garden internet services that were a hybrid of common carrier and separate internet portals with exclusive content. The FCC let them get away with fewer regulations as it was an emerging technology that wasn't even competing with telephone or on-demand video services yet.

"COMMON CARRIER.--The term ''common carrier'' or ''carrier'' means any person
engaged as a common carrier for hire, in interstate or foreign communication by wire or radio..."

There's really nothing for Congress to debate. They'd have to carve out a special exemption for the internet or revoke or curtail the FCC's authority to regulate it.

Don't believe all the BS about common carrier meaning the internet is to be regulated like a utility -- the FCC went out of its way to explain it wouldn't be, and it's not a utility. Utilities have a lot more regulations than simple common carriers. Also, the FCC carved out a portion for mobile and wireless internet users to regulate them differently as well.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Obfuscant]

The Constitution is just bad toilet paper if it is a hindrance to its purpose, which is in service to the citizenry.

The purpose of the Constitution is not to give everyone their little heart's desire. It's to put a limit on the federal government. It is not the purpose of the federal government to give everyone their little heart's desire, either. "My internet service isn't good enough" isn't a problem that the US government and the Constitution were created to solve.

Especially applicable in this case, where the means are not necessarily repugnant,

Yes, the means are repugnant. When a court steps in to start legislating it is repugnant. When it steps in to set internet service rates is would be especially so.

There's no law against initiatives, or other prohibition, and Article V is conceptually applicable.

Article V speaks to amendments to the constitution, not the creation of a federal election system with ballot initiatives. Many people believe the state level initiative process is significantly broken and wasteful, and trying to scale it up to a new federal system would be a disaster. Were there to be authority to do such a thing in the first place.

Ah, but the prices are related,

No, they aren't. What you pay for service has nothing to do with net neutrality. Nothing at all.

besides, the Supreme Court can just farm the task out.

No, they cannot. They cannot do it themselves, they cannot hire someone to do it for them. They have no authority to mandate prices for internet service.

So do I, but it was despite everything Comcast and AT&T could do.

So you are using one of the many other ISPs, then. Otherwise, "everything" means "not provide any service" and you'd have no internet service. Funny how the presence of other ISPs means there isn't really any need for SCOTUS to regulate ISP prices. And no reason to create an authority for it.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

There is no end to your hatred of the cable companies and no end to the means you will go to to destroy them, is there?

Wrong again. I want to make them have to compete, and to be declared a public utility. Nothing about destruction there. Their lawsuits are clearly frivolous, but their money and the purchase of legislation always buys them time.

You know those people who make up cable companies are part of the democracy that gets to participate, don't you?

They are purchasing and receiving special privileges, not participating in the democratic process. They are super-predators and thugs. I only want a balance of power.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Ramze]

Executive orders are when presidents (heads of the executive branch) give orders to federal agents under their command. The internet is regulated by the FCC -- an independent executive organization outside of the president's chain of command. A president giving an order to any person or agency not under their command would be null and void. Obama could issue an executive order for all ice cream shops to give out free ice cream on Thursdays, and it would be null and void. It's nonsensical to give an order to anyone who doesn't take orders from you.

As for federal courts, judges only take cases from those with standing and with which the court has jurisdiction... so... since the FCC is the only federal agency with the authority to regulate the internet, what grievance do you have with the FCC (or your ISP if it's a federal issue) that personally affects you that you want to sue and/or prosecute them for doing? Considering how federal court rulings generally only apply to the district level, even if you were successful in petitioning a federal district court judge to take your case, and you somehow won based on federal law, any decision, verdict, and/or ruling would only apply to that District... the other 8 Districts wouldn't have to do jack about it --unless others won cases there as well... and then maybe it'd head to the supreme court.

The thing is, you're stuck with the FCC. Congress gave them the authority to do as they like with the internet. We're lucky it's now common carrier under Title II. Maybe one day they'll decide it's a utility and regulate it further. Maybe.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

And just as well. We don't want people from California and Texas deciding what happens to Vermont and Wyoming.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Hylandr]

Having lived through and remember the era of phone company monopoly that was destroyed by the courts in the early 80's I vastly prefer not to suffer under that same heal for any length of time. The Judges decision is timely, or would you prefer history repeat itself first?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[no1nose]

The current FCC has no actual power (balls).

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Dog-Cow]

You are a fucked-up retard. Stop with the "designed by the military" shit. Arpanet was designed by universities and private companies. The funding and direction came from DARPA, but that's it. It was a way to share computing resources between institutions. They never envisioned home Internet connections, never mind cellular phones and IoT.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[bluefoxlucid]

Congress created laws for this already, and the President issued an executive order creating the FCC to enact those laws. By not acting, Congress is stating their position on the matter: the FCC was created to decide how this works, and Congress sees no need to intervene.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

Having lived through and remember the era of phone company monopoly

Me too... That's why I don't want the judges to give in to these companies' frivolities. What makes internet "duopolies" any better? Common carrier, public utility, and competition are all steps in the right direction. What have I posted to contradict that?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

the FCC was created to decide how this works, and Congress sees no need to intervene.

Unless the FCC fails to enforce the rules.

And we still need the judges to fine the companies for wasting the court's time instead allowing these cases to drag out.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[stealth_finger]

There is no end to your hatred of the cable companies and no end to the means you will go to to destroy them, is there?

I'm not American so don't have to deal with them but from the impression I get isn't that what they do to you?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[stealth_finger]

Prices have nothing to do with net neutrality,

Prices have everything to do with it. Cable Co. want rid of it so they can apply premiums, multiple rates and generally charge you more for everything. Everyone else wants it so they can pay for the internet and get the internet.

I have proper internet service.

You won't if net neutrality is gone, unless you want to get your wallet out again that is.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[bluefoxlucid]

There is no "unless". If Congress looks at the FCC, determines what they're doing is in line with the best judgment of the FCC given their specialized expertise and their mission, and takes no action, then Congress has determined that the FCC is doing what the FCC is supposed to do. They don't need to pass a new law stating that the FCC's current actions are all fine by Congress and require no remediation at this time.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[oh_my_080980980]

Just fuck off troll. The FCC has the authority. We the people are sick of the lack of competition and ISP taking Billions of tax payer dollars and not delivering what they were contracted to do.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

how's that power, water, and mail working out for you?
Always works ?
Flexible enough to add/remove devices at will ?
Relatively inexpensive?
Usually safe?

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[silentcoder]

>When a court steps in to start legislating it is repugnant

That is literally what the ENTIRETY of all common law consists off - and most hardcore libertarian types consider common law the ONLY justifiable type.

Of course they are insane, and we do need governmental law as well - but to suggest that judges legislating is some massively anti-liberty idea or repugnant to the separation of powers is grossly ignorant. Legislating is, in fact, a time-honored and fundamental part of being a judge - seperation of powers ONLY comes into play when the issue being judged is ALREADY a matter of law the legislative branch.

Why could net neutrality NOT be implemented based on existing common-law principles ? They would in fact greatly support it, and judges extending it that way would be perfectly acceptable, not violate separation in the least and be far less prone to problems of regulatory capture, bribery^H^H^H^H^H^H^lobbying and abuse.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you believe the FCC has the authority? Who do you think created this 'lack of competition'? It takes power, guns, and laws to crush voluntarism. But keep blaming the ISPs for this mess of Corporatocracy.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Grishnakh]

I think maybe we should do the opposite: we should give them exactly what they're asking for. We should exempt them from Common Carrier status, and let them regulate traffic on their network however they see fit.

However, by not being common carriers and having that status and protection, they become fully liable for all traffic on their network. So if any crimes at all are committed using their network, they are fully liable, including criminally. If someone gets hacked and it went over a company's wires, that company's executives get convicted of accessory to hacking and sent to prison. If terrorists use the internet for recruiting members and propagandizing, and that traffic goes over a company's wires, that company's executives go to prison for aiding and abetting terrorists.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

Sorry, the idea is ludicrous on many fronts, and I can hardly take it seriously. All you will see on the internet would be cat pictures. We are supposed to keep it open. Censorship is evil.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

As massive an issue it is, most voters don't get past the personal noise of I can't eat, I can't pay for my health care, I'm afraid I'm going to be murdered, I'm afraid the government is going to yank away my marriage.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[lsatenstein]

If Congress won't do it, the courts must.

The courts are not supposed to be in the business of writing law. That means if Congress won't do it, the courts have even less business doing it.

And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot.

You wish for a patchwork of internet regulation on a state-by-state basis? What a minefield that would be.

If Congress won't do it, the courts must.

The courts are not supposed to be in the business of writing law. That means if Congress won't do it, the courts have even less business doing it.

And if they don't, we need to put the initiative on the ballot.

You wish for a patchwork of internet regulation on a state-by-state basis? What a minefield that would be.

I dont mind if the government does allow the law to be struck down but only if and only if the government puts in an alternative IP Highway. The government provides interstate transportation, it should provide communication transportation.

My province, (Quebec) nationalized the distribution and generation of electricity. It was done so that remote areas could get electricity at the same cost as city dwellers. Today, we have one of the cheapest electricity rates in North America. I wish they would do the same for data, cellphones -- communications.

  The internet is too indispensible to be left in the hands of ISPs / Cable companies. A national grid is required. The cable companies could still make money. They would be able to provide faster communications as the way for them to earn a profit, provided they use their own grid.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the first two applies to more people

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Grishnakh]

Why is it "ludicrous"? Do you have any real reasoning as to why it wouldn't work? The whole point of Common Carrier status is that it's a bargain: the telecom company gets immunity for information passing over its network in exchange for not interfering with that information. It was devised back in the telephone days, so that the telephone company didn't have legal liability for their communications system being used to abet crimes, in exchange for them not interfering with communications, and treating all calls the same. The same principle applies here.

So if these telecom companies don't want it, maybe they shouldn't have it forced on them. So then they lose the immunity aspect, and become completely liable for anything criminal their networks are used for. That should very quickly solve the problem: with all the telecoms executives in prison (which should be very easy to do given the volume of traffic and the number of crimes committed, including hacking, phishing, copyright infringement, etc.), the companies won't be able to operate any more, and the companies will be sold off for peanuts to new companies which will either suffer the same fate or accept Common Carrier status and net neutrality. Why shouldn't they have the choice? The problem I see is that they're not being given that choice in those terms.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[fustakrakich]

Do you have any real reasoning as to why it wouldn't work?

*sigh* Guess I gotta say everything twice... "Censorship is evil."

The government and companies all want to control content, out of perceived necessity for their survival.

Let's try to keep things simple, ok? No more charades. No need to argue. Common carrier, take it or leave it. The phone company does just fine. We have to demand the same for internet.

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[Anonymous Coward]

The Constitution is just bad toilet paper if it is a hindrance to its purpose, which is in service to the citizenry.

The purpose of the Constitution is not to give everyone their little heart's desire. It's to put a limit on the federal government. It is not the purpose of the federal government to give everyone their little heart's desire, either.

Ok, how does that address what I stated? Really, did you even recognize what I said? Or how your response is not directed to what I stated?

Or do you think that the Constitution is not reputable? That the people can't reject it when it is no longer in service to them?

You're basically trying to offer an argument that applies to some specific manifestation, but I want to establish a principle that underlies it. Because you see, you can't make a complaint about the Constitution concerning itself on some petty matter unless you acknowledge what I presented.

Once you've done that, then we can move on to a more particular examination.

In hopes that you've done so, we'll see about it.

"My internet service isn't good enough" isn't a problem that the US government and the Constitution were created to solve.

That would be hard, as the Internet was only created recently, and those two things are over 2 centuries old. Really, depending on the birth date used, you could say the US was two centuries old before there was an Internet. So you say this, and it's true, but so what? You're basically stating an irrelevant and meaningless factoid, for reasons that I can't fathom. Can you even articulate one to me?

Now if you wanted to discuss the merits of the Internet, and what role the government has in regard to it, there is plenty to discuss. We could discuss issues of provision and censorship, global access, criminal investigations, and security issues, even personal liability.

Were you simply trying to distract from those kinds of issues, by offering this interjection? If so, then shame on you.

Besides, it's easy to recognize that the Internet is a venue for the conduct of Interstate (and International) commerce, so actually, I would say that is a consideration that was part of the Constitution, that it's conducted in a manner that would be hard for the writers to fathom is not important.

Not that I would agree that you can say the Constitution or the US government ever solves anything, but that's a question of evolutionary process. I would merely say that they have means to address problems, solving them is beyond the human ken.

Especially applicable in this case, where the means are not necessarily repugnant,

Yes, the means are repugnant.

Really, all possible means are necessarily repugnant? You are committing to that very high standard?

Have anyone even committed to a given means? I'll grant that nuclear bombs set off at Comcast headquarters would likely be repugnant under all reasonably foreseeable circumstances, but surely you must recognize that we have other options?

Why do you see fit to tell us we can do nothing? Why do you demand we be restrained? Have you decency sir?

When a court steps in to start legislating it is repugnant.

Silentcoder has already refuted you on much of this, as the common law system does indeed provide this role for the judiciary in the United States, but I will note two specific flaws with your assertion here.

One, you are assuming that a court has to do this at all when any number of avenues could be explored, and two, there is a difference between a court validating existing legislation passed by Congress that authorized a designated agency to take certain actions, and what you purport to be concerned about.

When it steps in to set internet service rates is would be especially so.

Yet you offer no reasoning. Jus

Re:They should be fined for acting like babies

[beastofburdon]

I'd love to sit back and watch those bastards rot in prison too.

comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Joe_Dragon]

comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and not just HSI + HBO GO.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

Look no further than Canada to see what a lack of net neutrality looks like
1) Expensive (minimum $85 to get ANY internet service)
2) Unbundled packages save you nothing
3) To get things like HBO, you have to spend over $100 in package bundles
4) Each carrier has their own garbage-tier VOD service that only has the last 1 or 2 episodes, and sometimes not even that if it's a childrens show. This is because they came with their own Netflix-clones for watching entire seasons of the exact same VOD material.
5) And if you switch carriers, you have to pay for data on top of the subscription cost to use those netflix-clones.

Basically the Canadian carriers are trying to "kill netflix" by using the bandwidth caps against it's users and then go "but you can use Shomi if you use Rogers/Shaw, or Crave if you use Bell/Telus for only another $10 per month" when you can pay an extra $15 and just get the unmetered package.

The requirement, should be: The Cable, Telephone, and Fiber networks shall only be a "dumb pipe", any content can go over it. The congestion controls should be set at the switching points, not the ISP. If a neighborhood is "saturated" then that neighborhood is checked for who is using a disproportionate amount of bandwidth, sent a "speeding ticket" that tells them they will be downgraded to 8Mbits until they explain how they are using that bandwidth.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

You had me until the end where people are fined for using too much bandwidth. I use about a terabyte a month all of it on legal content. I'm either streaming video or downloading something from steam. None of my use is hurting anyone on my node. During peak hours I stream video like most people. Why should I be penalized for that?

Flat reasonable fee for a promised speed. Bandwidth isn't water, its not going to run out and they can simply add capacity. The fact that every major ISP takes in huge profits from internet access should tell you all you need to know about pricing, speed and congestion. If they were breaking even or losing money that might be one thing but considering I pay $80 a month plus separate fees for streaming services I should be able to use all the bandwidth that speed allows. Period.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Obfuscant]

Look no further than Canada to see what a lack of net neutrality looks like 1) Expensive (minimum $85 to get ANY internet service)

Has nothing to do with net neutrality.

2) Unbundled packages save you nothing

Also not net neutrality.

3) To get things like HBO, you have to spend over $100 in package bundles

You are batting 0.000 for net neutrality issues so far.

4) Each carrier has their own garbage-tier VOD service

Comcast OnDemand isn't an internet service, it's a cable TV service. Not net neutrality.

5) And if you switch carriers, you have to pay for data on top of the subscription cost to use those netflix-clones.

Uhh, what? You have to pay for data to get data? I'm at a loss what you're talking about here.

The requirement, should be: The Cable, Telephone, and Fiber networks shall only be a "dumb pipe", any content can go over it.

How is paying Rogers for Shomi different than paying Netflix for Netflix, and what does it have to do with "any content can go over it?"

The congestion controls should be set at the switching points, not the ISP.

Uhhh, so an ISP cannot ever allow any congestion within their own switching network? What if the "switching points" with the congestion are inside the ISP network?

If a neighborhood is "saturated" then that neighborhood is checked for who is using a disproportionate amount of bandwidth, sent a "speeding ticket" that tells them they will be downgraded to 8Mbits until they explain how they are using that bandwidth.

So I get downgraded to 8Mbps and have to explain how I am using my bandwidth because my neighbor is hogging all the bandwidth and got caught? Wow.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[AK Marc]

Bandwidth isn't water, its not going to run out and they can simply add capacity.

Water falls from the sky and is free, yet they meter for that. But you think bandwidth with actual capacity costs is free?

If they need to spend $10k to upgrade a link, should they have the cost spread among the 1GB per month users, or the 1TB per month users? The 1TB users, like you, want it split evenly by connection, when the benefit is almost exclusively for you. That's why the metering and caps exist.

Selfish assholes like you want free bandwidth, at the expense of others.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[runningduck]

The problem is two-fold: 1) carriers have been selling oversubscribed bandwidth and then complaining when people hit the actual limits, and 2) the public wants everybody else to pay to their incessant over-consumption of bandwidth. If carriers want to sell an unlimited bandwidth package then they should charge enough to cover the costs. And if people want the unlimited bandwidth package they should pay for it.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[cbeaudry]

Water is free.

Treated water is not.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

As a Canadian I pay only $52 per month for Internet, am a cord cutter, and Netflix with no VPN is getting progressively better but still missing shows from Netflix U.S.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

The requirement, should be: The Cable, Telephone, and Fiber networks shall only be a "dumb pipe", any content can go over it.

I agree 100%

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

I call BS. 1 TB a month is:

1TB / 30 days *1000 = 33 Gigabytes per day every day for a month. No way that's Netflix streaming and Steam downloads. No way that's even you streaming legal content yourself to Twitch.tv or another service.

Most USA connections can't even hit 20 mbps on downloads which maxes out at 20/8*60*60*24 = 216 Gigabytes per day.

For uploads, most can't do better than 1.5 mbps. Netflix streaming only requires about that as well. You'd have to stream Netflix 24/7 for a month non-stop to use up HALF a Terabyte on downloads. When do you have time to sleep?!?!? Don't tell me the rest is steam games -- you'd have to download entirely new games every single hour of every month to pull that off, and you'd have no time to game. Many games are 5 to 20 gigs max, and they only patch for updates.

TB a month for games 'n netflix my arse.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Ramze]

VOD is actually a sticking point with ISPs and the FCC.

Modern cable systems are digital, and they push content... so a video on demand service from a cable service is extremely similar to any other video on demand service -- like Hulu, Netflix, or Amazon. The FCC has warned ISPs not to degrade the quality of other VOD services to favor their own, but they can provide their own for free or for a fee to compete with others.

The sticking point is net metering -- should cable companies be allowed to exclude their own VOD services from data metering while counting the streaming from others VODs as data that goes towards metering? Some say it should be excluded because it is on the cable company's network and they don't have to pay a fee to pull it over an internet connection. Others say data is data, and excluding it from metering is unfair and might harm other VOD services from competing with non-metered data. Cable companies might even heavily raise fees and impose data caps to strangle VOD competition.

The latest Time Warner Cable + Charter merger requires them not to meter internet connections for another 5 years... so, for TWC/Charter, that can is kicked down the road a bit.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

The requirement, should be: The Cable, Telephone, and Fiber networks shall only be a "dumb pipe", any content can go over it. The congestion controls should be set at the switching points, not the ISP. If a neighborhood is "saturated" then that neighborhood is checked for who is using a disproportionate amount of bandwidth, sent a "speeding ticket" that tells them they will be downgraded to 8Mbits until they explain how they are using that bandwidth.

How in the HELL did you ever come to this Gestapo-style conclusion?!?

Seriously, you were spewing plenty of common sense right up until you wanted to send in the fucking thought police all because I was thinking about letting three people in my house stream HD Netflix content all at the same time.

From HD streams to online gaming, there are 101 legitimate reasons to consume a "disproportionate" amount of bandwidth, and restrictions or caps on that have about as much validity as arguments against net neutrality.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in a country without Net Neutrality.
1) $30/month for a 10/10 connection.
2) There are both bundled and unbundled packages available. Typically for bundled is that you get a lot of crap you don't want.
3) HBO costs $10/month separately, haven't checked bundled alternatives because I don't like bundled deals.
4) It baffles me that anyone would pick a service provider based on VOD services. It is not part of their business model. They should compete with their internet service, not with bundling crap.
5) I don't really pay for data, I pay for availability. Personally I make do with a 30/30 connection. I use that bandwidth as I see fit. Things like data caps is unheard of.

It doesn't take more than a single example to show that every single point you made has absolutely nothing to do with net neutrality.

To me it seems like the main problem in the US is that the major companies have bought enough legislation to not have to worry about competition.
You get crap service because you don't have competition in your market.
Net neutrality will not solve that problem. Breaking up your larger companies into smaller might.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, water falls from the sky and if you want to drill a well, install a pump, and connect it to your house, you are free to do that. If you want it cleaned/filtered, the water company is happy to provide that and will charge you based on the size pipe running from your meter.

The only thing I'm seeing is an expectation that:
1. if there is a cap, it should be clearly advertised
2. if no cap is advertised and I want to run my connection at 100% 24x7x365 there's no reason I shouldn't be able to

Like it or not, if money is spent to upgrade a link, EVERY ONE benefits from lower latency and higher throughput regardless of using 1GB/month or 1TB/month. The only difference is how much of a benefit is seen by each user. So yes, EVERYONE should split the cost evenly based on their plan, and i would expect on going expenses and upgrades to be built in to the price so that it is transparent.

But what do i know? I haven't worked for an ISP in 10 yrs and only supported VMs on shared hardware for the last 4 or 5 yrs.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Pascoea]

I use about a terabyte a month all of it on legal content. I'm either streaming video or downloading something from steam.

How may people do you have in your house? I have 4 that pretty much do nothing but sit on the internet when they aren't at work/school. I use about 350GB consistently month to month

Are you deleting your steam games and re-downloading every time you want to play them? I just can't fathom how a residential customer downloads 1TB/month consistently with just Netflix and Steam.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Grishnakh]

Sure, water falls from the sky and if you want to drill a well, install a pump, and connect it to your house, you are free to do that. If you want it cleaned/filtered, the water company is happy to provide that and will charge you based on the size pipe running from your meter.

Not true. Most places will not allow you to just drill a well; any municipality will not. If everyone in a city drilled a well, it'd be a disaster; aquifers would be depleted or worse. Only rural dwellers are allowed to do this because the population density is low.

What *is* usually free and allowed (except in some weird western states like Colorado) is collecting rainwater. If you want to route your house's gutters into some tanks and collect rainwater and then drink it, go ahead. However I wouldn't want to drink that stuff. You could filter it yourself, and install a pump to pressurize it so your taps in your house all work, but that's going to cost money for equipment and electricity.

With a water utility, you're paying for multiple things: the purification and treatment of the water itself, and also the pressurization (which requires a non-trivial amount of power; the pumps they use are huge). You're likely also paying either a combined or separate sewer fee to take away your wastewater, so that you don't have to find space for a septic field and then pay for its maintenance.

Re:comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Obfuscant]

so a video on demand service from a cable service is extremely similar to any other video on demand service -- like Hulu, Netflix, or Amazon.

Except Comcast's isn't. It is delivered like a regular cable channel, encrypted, and the STB is instructed to tune to that channel. It's isn't a dedicated data stream. In fact, before they started encrypting those feeds, it was quite fun to use a digital tuner to scan for any OnDemand and watch along with your neighbors. It was great. They would skip the ads for you, and rewind to rewatch the interesting bits.

Different delivery system, different part of the available bandwidth.

Some say it should be excluded because it is on the cable company's network and they don't have to pay a fee to pull it over an internet connection.

1. For Comcast, it isn't data. OnDemand is a TV channel. No, they shouldn't "meter" it because they don't meter any other data for any other TV channel.

2. For on-net originated data on the internet service, they save money because it doesn't have to cross a border from some other network provider. They pass that savings on to the customer by not metering it. Would you rather they keep the money as profit?

That's a big downside to "net neutrality". Everyone has to pay for everything the same way because it is "unfair" otherwise. Even if the provider is able to save money on some services, they can't pass that on to the sub because of "net neutrality". Binge On is a perfect example of that.

Isn't it shooting yourself in the foot to demand that you be charged the costs of the most expensive way of handling data all the time just so nobody is treated "unfairly"?

Cable companies might even heavily raise fees and impose data caps to strangle VOD competition.

That they shouldn't do. But there are a huge number of "mights" that we can come up with to improve our hate of cable companies. They might deliberately route gaming packets via satellite unless you give them your first-borne child. They might randomly drop bits in your packets unless you sacrifice a goat at every full moon.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix HD: 5Mbps.
Let's say 4 hours per day with six devices (large family all streaming different things).

5 Mbps * 6 watchers = 30 Mbps
30/8*60*60*4 = 54 Gigabytes per day.
* 30 = 1.5 Terabytes.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[david_thornley]

Untreated water is not necessarily free in quantity in a certain areas. Many places have adequate water for the taking, and many don't. California was having a serious drought for a while, and if there had been an unlimited source of free water there would have been no problem.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[dywolf]

they meter for the water that's been pulled from the river/reservoir, filtered, disinfected, and delivered to your house.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv and

[AK Marc]

Well yeah, like an ISP has to pay to get the content to your house. Water and content are "free", but the service of getting them to your house isn't, and both are often limited or metered.

News at 11:

[Type44Q]

News at 11: Liars lie.

Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

First, get rid of municipal dictates that put a chosen ISP crony in control of the infrastructure; open up the Internet infrastructure to a market of voluntary trade between individuals.

Then, get rid of Net Neutrality; not all data is the same—not all data has the same requirements in space or time; VoIP, Netflix, etc., do not have the same requirements as grandmother's email.

A byte is not just a byte, and the market needs to be allowed to account for the differences.

Re:Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

A video byte is a video byte -- except when it isn't and it gets a free pass.

This is an attempt to stop them from acting like a gateway charging access. It isn't the difference between gramma'e email and Netflix. It is Netflix and some cable company's new video service.

Do you like the cable company selling you a service at a speed, then demanding, secretly, a cut of what you pay Netflix, or the cable company will crappify your Netflix video -- making a lie out of what they promised you for the cable service?

Re:Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

You'd think that would work. And in some cases it would. But, since all of them will end up being companies and not "for people", you won't be able to get a "good" one. You think of free market as "just pick the best one". But there won't be. We would have Scott Adam's "confusopoly". This one let's you have vimeo and netflix not count, this other one exempts the app store, this one has no limit but is thottled. There wouldn't be a clear choice for most people. We would still need to treat a packet as a packet. We can't have the ISP exempting their home grown garbage service while gouging people for vimeo, netflix, and youtube. Zero rating might not be terrible - but it is awful when it is the ISP making their own service more attractive by zero rating it (to hurt competition). Net neutrality is a requirement. We need it.

Re:Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

In your scenario, there is a clear opening for a competitor: Providing Internet access without the confusion.

If you want innovation that ultimately benefits every free rider, then you must not constrain self-interest.

Re:Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

The cable company is a violently imposed monopoly.

If they lie about their advertised services, then they are committing fraud.

Re:Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't provide Internet access if the local thugopoly will bully you out of the market before you even go into business. They won't let you lay any lines, they won't let you run community-wide wifi (it's banned unless you're an established carrier) . . . the best you might be able to do is lease time on someone else's carrier medium (cell tower, fibre lines) at a cost so prohibitive that you'd have to charge your customers just as much - if not more - than the established ISPs to get anything out to customers.

Re: Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[elton247]

Thank you for mentioning that. As an ISP owner who competes with cable, dsl, satellite and cell, my biggest obstacle is government regulations. The incumbents get exclusive rights to the resources, so it is almost impossible to compete against them.

Re: Kill Violently Imposed Monopolies

[Anonymous Coward]

Further to the other comment to this:

Let's imagine you get you cables down. You even get physical access to your first region.

The thugopoly drop their prices below your break even point. Why? Because there's competition now!

As you expand, they drop their price in every region you go. Every dollar you spend they lose in their own price drop. Then you go out of business. They buy your hardware and customers at firesale rock bottom price, then raise access prices (if any mercy they do this slowly) back to pre competition prices.

Congratulations, your company's seed funding just paid for a hardware upgrade in each region you tried to invade.

Illegal?

[Anonymous Coward]

the CTIA said it was illegal to subject broadband internet access to "public-utility style, common carrier regulation" and illegal to impose "common-carrier status on mobile broadband."

citation needed.

Common Carrier

[jasnw]

It would serve them right if the court just turned around and declared that cable and internet service providers are all in the category of "common carriers" and should be regulated and controlled as such. Bazinga.

Re:Common Carrier

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe that's exactly what DID happen last year, and which caused them to actually have to enforce net neutrality, and is the cause of this story in the first place.

Re:Common Carrier

[Obfuscant]

It would serve them right if the court just turned around and declared that cable and internet service providers are all in the category of "common carriers" and should be regulated and controlled as such. Bazinga.

Cable television certainly isn't a common carrier. Not even close. It is a video distribution system. One way.

Re:Common Carrier

[Anonymous Coward]

"Cable television certainly isn't a common carrier. Not even close. It is a video distribution system. One way."

You have no idea what Common Carriers are; one way has nothing to do with it. With certain exceptions, (Garbage being the most obvious and corrupt one...), all Utilities are considered Common Carriers:
"n. an individual, a company, or a public utility (like municipal buses) which is in the regular business of transporting people and/or freight. This is distinguished from a private carrier which only transports occasionally or as a one-time-only event."
From the Legal Dictionary, law.com

For an another example of Common Carrier, see the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935, which defined Electrical Distribution as a Common Carrier function.

Re: Common Carrier

[nehumanuscrede]

Their video distribution service may be one way, but the ISP side of their house certainly isn't.

It's also not a separate company from the one who provides you your internet.

Thus, unless they spin the business off into it's own subsidiary, they would find themselves attached at the hip to the regulated side of the business.

Something they wouldn't care much for.

However, breaking off has its own issues as well. Like not getting a free ride across those Comcast owned data pipes.

Re:Common Carrier

[Anonymous Coward]

It would serve them right if lobbying was recognized as a synonym for bribery.

Re:Common Carrier

[Ramze]

Common carrier has nothing to do with whether something is unidirectional, bidirectional, or omnidirectional.

Any service that allows anyone to pay a fee to have their goods &/or services picked up from one location and delivered to another is a common carrier. Airlines, telephone companies, electric companies, freight and railway companies, and internet service providers are all common carriers... because they "carry" a thing from A to B for a fee -- generally from any random member of the public.

The key term is "common" -- as opposed to a contracted or private carrier.

You are correct that Cable TV is not a common carrier... mostly. The FCC does require cable TV providers to carry broadcast TV stations within their respective areas (with some restrictions) The key being they don't just broadcast whatever any random person wants for fee. They could, but it'd be a nightmare for scheduling, payment, censorship, etc. They contract with individual stations, networks, and networks of networks to broadcast rather than allow just anyone to pay to push content to peoples' homes.

Re:Common Carrier

[Anonymous Coward]

They should be common carriers. That is what Net Neutrality is supposed to mean. This also shields them from Kiddie pr0n lawsuits.
If they want to be able to packet filter, they should then be liable for ANY problems that come across their net. pr0n, virus, fraud and any other conspiracies.
If you know what is in the package, you are part of the conspiracy.
They cannot be allowed to have it both ways. (pr0n pun intended)

Re:Common Carrier

[Obfuscant]

You are correct that Cable TV is not a common carrier... mostly. The FCC does require cable TV providers to carry broadcast TV stations within their respective areas (with some restrictions)

When I say "common carrier" in this context, I mean "should be treated under the law as a common carrier". And that "some restrictions" is a pretty big one. They aren't required to carry broadcast stations unless the station demands it. Most stations have found out it is financially better for them to demand payment for carriage instead of using must-carry. I'm sure there are some small independents that still demand must-carry, but the major broadcasters don't.

The key being they don't just broadcast whatever any random person wants for fee. They could, but it'd be a nightmare for scheduling, payment, censorship, etc.

Many cable systems have what's called PEG -- public, education and government -- channels that are available to the public (and education and government) users. It's no problem in scheduling, usually it is free, but yes, the content can be a problem. Unless the cable company structures the public access correctly.

And Comcast in my area has at least two "leased access" channels for other paying customers to use. Until the LDS arranged their own full-time channel, they used to transmit the yearly conference from St. Lake City on such a leased channel.

Throttling!

[Anonymous Coward]

Throttling baby!

I don't mind it, I'll throttle my bills too.

From month to month I'll change my service tier, fry "your" modem, and pay the bill in anywhere from 0.05 to 0.25 increments, by cheque, by mail.

I'll complain that the internet is slow on X networks, and I'll hapilly post my speed test results. Good luck maintaining your "fastest in X" category.

For heavy downloading, that is where the Microsoft store, and apple store come in. I'll hapilly use your bandwidth, sure, I'll purchase a 20.00 mouse, and then return it the next day.

The cable box will be treated with impunity. It will sit in a sealed box with no ventilation. I'll actively pump heat into it to make SURE it dies early, all on your dime of course. Power conditioner? For the cable box, I'll introduce noise, good luck having your "Technicians" diagnose random reboots.

That in addition to running whatever ad blocker, popup blocker, virus blocker that I can find. Don't worry, the tech can diagnose my Windows 98 machine that I will keep handy, and loaded with spyware.

I'll change my DNS server to google, but don't worry, the Windows 98 box will run some bogus queries to keep you happy.

Force me to become a WiFi access point? I hope you like DeAuth attacks. Heck, I'll configure a few RasPi's to be portable DeAuth spammers. At 5.00 a piece, I can littler the neighbourhood with them.

Re:Throttling!

[Quzak]

I love you AC. You are a hero!

Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[PvtVoid]

Never mind that nothing fits the definition of "common carrier" better than a service which sends packets over the inter-tubes. If the Cable Co's want to argue in court that they aren't common carriers, that is terribly dangerous for them: it sets a precedent that means that they are not afforded the protections given common carriers under the law, most important immunity from prosecution for transmission of illegal content.

Careful what you wish for, Comcast.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[fustakrakich]

One of the reasons they don't want to be a public utility is that they want those censorship powers. If they had their way, all you would get is Facebook and Amazon.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[Zocalo]

Yeah, that argument keeps coming up; "Net Neutratility or Common Carrier Status - just pick one already!" Seriously though, if the cable operators were to lose their common carrier status what do you think they'd do? Come down like an anvil on content and install non-optional and over-reaching filters, transparent proxy use and draconian levels of logging across the board, perhaps? Realistically, pretty much anything that will let them produce log files that pass the buck squarely onto the end user when anyone who cares to ask comes knocking seems rather inevitiable I think but, if we're lucky, I suppose they *might* insist on a warrant before they hand over the data. Probably not though; unneccessary processess and paperwork takes up employee time, and that costs money!

Be careful what *we* wish for as well...

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[Bartles]

Are you saying they didn't receive protection for transmission of illegal content until they were classified as CC this year? Something doesn't sound right with your argument.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[roman_mir]

There shouldn't be any such thing as 'illegal content'. As per usual the real problem is lack of competition and monopoly power protection by governments and also criminalization of various behaviours, none of which should be done by any government.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[geekmux]

One of the reasons they don't want to be a public utility is that they want those censorship powers. If they had their way, all you would get is Facebook and Amazon.

Uh, they are a US capitalist company. Therefore, all they "want" is to secure revenue. If they had their way, you would get billed separately for your Facebook and Amazon "channels".

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[bluefoxlucid]

Until recently, we might not have had an official explanation for why ISPs don't have strict control over content flowing across their pipes, and so handwaved liability based on common sense. Now, with rules and definitions in place, we have decided that an entity which asserts that it has control over what type of content it delivers must also have *responsibility* for that content.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[bluefoxlucid]

So child pornography and its production shouldn't be criminalized behaviors? Look, I'm explicitly not a family-values politician, and even I think that's loony.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[fustakrakich]

Same difference

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[roman_mir]

Child porn *production* should be illegal (though again, I am against all things public, including the police). Child porn data access on the Internet must not be criminalized at all, it immediately gets coopted to control the media, not the message.

Re:Really? Arguing against Common Carrier?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, they are saying without Common Carrier protections, the ISP can be held liable for *any* illegal content crossing through their network, whether it's Ghostbusters3, WorldOfWarcraft "free" servers, child porn, or extortion like emails. All it takes for that to kick is to show that you are able to selectively filter/block data.

Insulting the judge's intelligence

[quax]

"billions of dollars of investment"

If they spent this much money without taking into account that this legislation could come down the pike they'd be amateurs.

Of course this is just a smokescreen, they did the math up front. This is still profitable, just not as much as it could be.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[Calydor]

Those are the billions of TAX PAYER dollars they were given to build out the infrastructure, but they leave out that little detail.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[quax]

Good point.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[Anonymous Coward]

massive sector of the economy, which flourished due to hundreds of billions of dollars of investment made in reliance on the policy the order throws overboard"

Traffic shaping is apparently a massive sector of the economy, which required hundreds of billions of dollars of investment to get right. Traffic shaping is clearly as or more difficult task than a manned mission to Mars.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[ausekilis]

Further, where have those billions of tax payer dollars gone?

We have no appreciable competition with other developed countries for overall speed/price parity.
We don't even have local competition within a municipality, often it's the choice between cable and DSL... Two technologies that, while similar, are not real competition with one another. If anything, DSL's slower overall speed is incentive for cable to slow the F down and match price.
Over the past 15 years that I recall, speeds have gone from 50Mbps to 100 Mbps, for roughly three or four times the price.

How exactly have those billions of dollars been spent on upgrading networks and building the US's comm. infrastructure? By letting the big boys buy each other out?

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[Anonymous Coward]

No TAX PAYER dollars built the infrastructure. You are drinking too much liberal Kool-Aid.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[Karl Cocknozzle]

Right--the cable ISP business is profitable already, to the tune of an ~90% profit margin. What they're really bitching about here is being blocked from attempting to double-dip and charge two parties for the same bandwidth instead of the current total of one.

Re:Insulting the judge's intelligence

[Calydor]

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pu...

Well no kidding

[HalAtWork]

Why work to earn loyal customers when you can just tip the scales against your competition?

In addition

[fred911]

They also asked the Judge for an emergency injunction to require their customers to submit to further sodomy,

Remember MA BELL?

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep pushing it greedy ass cable companies, please.

People used to have to rent f!@#% rotary dial telephones from the phone company. No other option. Stupid.

Third World Infrastructure

[Anonymous Coward]

The US is a third world country in terms of basic infrastructure.

People can barely get clean drinking water, and Floriduh just added MORE chemicals that can be allowed in drinking water.

And now you want First-World services, like Internet?

Crumbling bridges, unsafe highways, barely drinkable water, but heck, wes wants us them there interwebs.

Never mind healthcare, banking reforms etc.

We need the POTUS, the SCROTUS, and the HOROTUS to fix our interwebz!

Re:Third World Infrastructure

[Bartles]

We spent a trillion dollars on infrastructure in 2009. Shut your stupid face.

Give the carriers a choice

[rossz]

Tell them, you have two choices:

1. You accept common carrier status, net neutrality, and you are not held liable for content you carry.
2. You are not a common carrier, you can do what you want with traffic, but you take full responsibility for all illegal net traffic.

Choose wisely.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Obfuscant]

Here's the excluded middle you've ignored: they are allowed to shape traffic as necessary to manage bandwidth and the people who send the illegal content are the ones responsible for it. There can be congestion that slows border traffic which is content agnostic, and having to inspect each packet to make a legality determination will only make it slower.

I hope you realize that they don't have to inspect the content to be able to prioritize services which need higher QoS and lower latency. A Skype call that talks about subversive overthrow of the US Government will look no different than a Skype call talking about Aunt Martha's cookie recipe, yet the latter is clearly a violation of several federal laws of patent and DMCA.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a fucking idiot. I don't say that lightly, but it's necessary.

Re: Give the carriers a choice

[Anonymous Coward]

It's hard to tell if you are serious and dumb or just trolling. At best ISPs can guess what kind of traffic you're sending based on destination. Ports used to be useful but aside from games anf bittorrent it's 80 and 443 now. Less and less goes over 80, and trying to divine QoS for TLS-protected traffic is a fools errand. The ISPs could offer support for native IP QoS bits and give customers a lower guaranteed quota for low latency traffic, but neither customers or ISPs are really smart enough to work together. So just forwarding packets is the ISPs job. Sure, throttling actual DoS/abuse packets is fine because those degrade service. Frankly, if a customer is sending ACKs on a stream it's pretty clear the ISP should stay the fuck out of their business. If a customer initiated a UDP conversation, stay the fuck out of their business. Anything beyond that should require service agreements for DoS mitigation.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Anonymous Coward]

So... they get to have their cake, eat it too and charge for it?
We assume they're supposed to be incumbent and any competitors to their regional monopolies should have to 'compete on a level playing field', by which they mean a completely orthogonal playing field while subject to peripheral business impediments that while anti-competitive, are also made with impunity because lobbying is a legitimate political tactic?

Yeah i can't believe i bothered to respond to you either.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Obfuscant]

For the ACs who are jumping up and down saying you can't tell what kind of traffic is what ... there are still well known ports for many services. A whole list of them. And even DD-WRT has the ability to set QoS for port ranges etc.

If you want to hide what kind of traffic you're sending so no QoS can be applied in transit, fine. Accept the congestion that undifferentiated traffic can be subject to.

As for the yammering about how these awful monopolies ... stop. There is no monopoly for ISP service. None.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Ramze]

QoS is tedious and nearly impossible to set up and maintain properly and fairly. The easiest and most cost-beneficial way to use it is to favor content and services the ISP/Cable provider offers -- to the detriment of other providers. Also, QoS is basically useless for prioritizing anything over an encrypted VPN... and it's highly dependent on applications being fair and sticking to RFCs. All one has to do is write a program to send their data with a different packet header that lies and says the data is a critical VOIP packet to get routed into the fast lane -- unless the fast lane only allows packets with certain origin or destination IP addresses.

QoS was for private networks with limited resources that could control what was on their networks (and their employees, PCs, and apps to some extent). In the wild, it's just a way for corporations to favor their own services.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[fedos]

Wow, and I thought your first post would be the dumbest thing I read today.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[oh_my_080980980]

I guess you are not aware of Franchise agreements and why Comcast argued it should be able to purchase Time Warner Cable because they don't compete in the same markets.

Trolling for the cable companies gets you no where.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Obfuscant]

I guess you are not aware of Franchise agreements

Yes, I am very familiar with franchise agreements, because I have been on the local cable regulatory commission in two of the localities I've lived in. I've read those franchises, and the franchises of many other municipalities. I've asked multiple time for anyone to point me to an exclusive franchise and nobody has yet been able to show me one. There is a reason for that.

I guess you are not aware that by federal law franchise agreements are NOT ALLOWED to be exclusive. Some of them were, but the law has prohibited them for so long that they've all expired and been renegotiated as non-exclusive.

and why Comcast argued it should be able to purchase Time Warner Cable because they don't compete in the same markets.

Comcast and Time Warner have agreed not to compete, but that's not how you create a monopoly on ISPs. The fact is, neither Comcast nor Time Warner are ISP monopolies in ANY sense of the word -- dejure, defacto, or anything else. They may be defacto cable television monopolies in some regions.

Trolling for the cable companies gets you no where.

You have so many other reasons to object to what cable companies do, you don't need to lie about their legal status to make an argument. It isn't trolling to point out the facts, it's just trying to stop misinformation from being tossed about.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[Obfuscant]

I'm truly sorry that you've never heard of QoS related to TCP and the internet, and that you feel compelled to argue based solely on ad hominem.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[zifn4b]

A Skype call that talks about subversive overthrow of the US Government will look no different than a Skype call talking about Aunt Martha's cookie recipe, yet the latter is clearly a violation of several federal laws of patent and DMCA.

I hear Aunt Martha is on the FBI's top wanted list. She's pretty dangerous. We need to keep a close eye on her.

Re:Give the carriers a choice

[rossz]

As for the yammering about how these awful monopolies ... stop. There is no monopoly for ISP service. None.

What are you smoking? In most areas there is exactly one choice for internet service. Usually the local cable company. A business with a history of some of the shittiest customer service in existence. In other places the only choice is DSL from the local phone company. The world champions in shitty customer service.

If they win...

[Anonymous Coward]

... the internet will be divided into channels. And I'll bet that their Basic Package won't include all of the sites you have access to now.

Verizon: AOL? Yahoo?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Verizon is not a cable company, but shouldn't Verizon be spending its money on sending its shareholders dividends, or putting up more FIOS, or LTE, instead of buying websites?

Logic doesn't work.

[Anonymous Coward]

We are talking about law here. Law is made by the rich.

They have no problem insisting that they should get all the benefits of common carrier status, and none of the responsibilities. And they will pay for legislation that enforces this.

If you want to fight them, donate to an appropriate lobby. It is basically your only recourse.

None of the Big Dogs Complained in 2005

[Anonymous Coward]

> and not just do something Congress did not envision with that law

Funny how the big corps had absolute no complaint back in 2002 when the FCC switched away from net neutrality. It went all the way to the SCOTUS who said it was the FCC's right to make that decision.

All that has happened here is that the FCC changed its mind and returned to the original classification. Which, frankly, was the obviously correct application regardless of net neutrality. So obvious that even Scalia realized the new classification was bullshit, calling it "an implausible reading of the statute."

Re:None of the Big Dogs Complained in 2005

[isdnip]

No, the FCC was right before 2002 and wrong now.
Before 2002, the carriers had to make TELECOM available, but the Internet was unregulated. Telecom is raw bit transmission, and The Internet runs on top of it, as its payload. In 2002 the FCC said that fiber was exempt, and in 2005 DSL was (cable always was), so there was nothing left for competitive ISPs. So the telcos called themselves ISPs.
The FCC should have regulated telecom again, so ISPs could compete over telco wires. But they didn't. The new rules seriously fsck up small ISPs who don't have Comcast's and ATT's lawyers to defend themselves, and make actual innovation in Internet harder. They're designed for Netflix, period.
And the law is against the FCC, but since the telcos and cable don't want the telecom regulated again (as the law calls for), they didn't fight it correctly.

Re:None of the Big Dogs Complained in 2005

[Anonymous Coward]

"the telecom" ?
lol!

This is about the classification of internet providers as either "telecommunications services" or "information services." If the former, then they are common carriers which includes the requirement for network neutrality. If they are the later then they are not common carriers. The Brand-X case was specifically about cable - so much for your claim that cable was always "exempt."

Re:AC Urges Natalie Portman to Dump Hot Grits In P

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad it wasn't frosty piss, you almost nailed it.

USA internet access is too expensive to be honest.

[choupette]

My brother-in-law lives in the usa (Seattle) he pays $80 (iirc) monthly for his internet, he said it was the cheapest. I live in france, for €32, I have a 22Mb/1.4MB VDSL connection along with a €0 euro mobile plan including 2h voice, and unlimited sms per month, and another 17€ with 50GB 4G plan with unlimited voice and sms (along with free roaming up to 3GB per year in a lot of countries including uk, germany, italy and spain). So I don't know what turned bad in usa, but it can't be that pricey.

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[Bartles]

What percentage of your income do you pay in taxes?

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[Anonymous Coward]

What does that have to do with the price he pays for Internet and Mobile?

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv an

[hackwrench]

You have a poor definition of unlimited and I don't understand why you think it makes sense to define wired capacity in terms of "bandwidth" I pay for 25 Mbps, downstream. That's bits not bandwidth. I haven't seen any other limiations on our downstream capacity in our contract, so I should be able to run that at capacity if requests made over upstream permit it

OR

[Anonymous Coward]

Those company executives could just leap off a tall building onto some rusty beds of nails.
It's simpler and cleaner!

Too bad that...

[Anonymous Coward]

they will most likely get some dumb ass judge who knows nothing about the internet or why net neutrality is important, get persuaded by the big telecom saying it's "harmful" for the consumers when it really isn't, it only is to their bottom line because they won't be able to double/triple dip.

Theiving bastards

[Anonymous Coward]

In a similar case:

Convicted criminals urged the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to reverse the thou shalt not steal law, and release them all from jail.

The criminal groups said the court should correct "serious errors" in a decision "that radically reduces their ability to earn a living breaking into houses."

Same idea.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv a

[Anonymous Coward]

Sort of.
That plan has a download limit.

That is 25 megabits times however many seconds exist between billing periods.

Places that give youb25 megabits, but then say "500gb cap" are simply providing you a slower link, but that slower link ALSO can burst upto 25megabits.

You Americans are so fixated on unlimited broadband you completely ignore reality surrounding caps.

On this topic, I hate caps. They are the worst. I'm in Australia and have lived with various caps that would make an Americans eyes bleed. But you know what? I complain about the size of the cap, not the mere existence.

If my ISP wants to sell me a contended link that 99â... of the time gives me my full link speed with a usable cap? I will be god damn happy that I don't have to pay the 200 to 300 times more expensive price for a dedicated uncontested link.

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[Sparowl]

If you are trying to point out that his taxes subsidize the cable companies there, let me be the bearer of bad news - so do ours (in America). We just don't get to see the benefit.

Privatize profits, socialize losses and all that.

Re: USA internet access is too expensive to be hon

[Bartles]

Yes. Fascism is a terrible thing.

Unsustainability

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this make their business unsustainable or are they fighting in the court for no reason?

Some people just take your 10 cents if you give them.

Re:AC Urges Natalie Portman to Dump Hot Grits In P

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the shoutout for R. Kelly.

Analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

... common-carrier status on mobile broadband ...

It uses the same technology and provides essentially the same service; point-to-point delivery of data packets. How is it not a common-carrier? This is like saying it's illegal to charge women the full bus fare.

When a judge rules for you

[Anonymous Coward]

It's OK.

When a judge rules against you,

It's a BIG Conspiracy...

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[geekmux]

My brother-in-law lives in the usa (Seattle) he pays $80 (iirc) monthly for his internet, he said it was the cheapest. I live in france, for €32, I have a 22Mb/1.4MB VDSL connection along with a €0 euro mobile plan including 2h voice, and unlimited sms per month, and another 17€ with 50GB 4G plan with unlimited voice and sms (along with free roaming up to 3GB per year in a lot of countries including uk, germany, italy and spain). So I don't know what turned bad in usa, but it can't be that pricey.

Pricing for these kinds of services has been comparatively expensive for a very long time now. This is hardly new, and doesn't really depend on the carrier de jour.

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[bluefoxlucid]

I pay $80 for 172Mb down and 10Mb up. My mobile phone includes unlimited voice, text messaging, media SMS, and low-speed Internet, along with a few GB of high-speed Internet, but that costs $60 (I could get cheaper).

Your GDP-per-capita is as shitty as the UK's. Get ~12% more productive over there to catch up to the U.S. For the price I pay for Internet, I could buy 77Mb down and 4.5Mb up in France.

Even lagging as Europe is now, it won't be long before they catch up. What's holding Europe back relative to the U.S. is our wage slave labor culture here in the states: we have an insanely high labor force participation rate, and people are dumb enough to complain it's too *low*. More people working per capita means more buying-power per capita. 56.1% participation rate in France and 62.6% in America, which puts France's productivity per worker about on par with the U.S.

Part of my long-term goals for America (if I could ever get elected into the House, ffs...) is a reduction of working hours to 32/week, although that might be a longer-term goal. Bluntly, it would put us at the same working hours as we'd have with 50% labor force participation rate today; however, we have a lot of temporary and part-time work, meaning 17-18% of our workforce (in good times; we've been 19-20% since 2008) works fewer than 35 hours per week. We'd really come out at around 53%, putting our GDP-per-capita about 6.7% higher than France and the UK.

This is all mainly interesting to me because I've been developing a Universal Social Security plan which cuts back on the tax burden to the United States tax payer while remediating our completely-broken welfare system. It doesn't directly-export to France, Germany, UK, AU, etc.; I could tailor a similar plan to any of those places and work out viability--it may be non-viable in any economy not sufficiently wealthy, although the way I've defined viability is kind of inaccurate (I don't want to pass more money through the system than our current social services; however, most of the money passed through the system goes immediately back to the people paying into it, so "slightly more expensive" means "a trillion dollars cheaper"). My initial goal was just to end homelessness and hunger in this country because, fuck, why do we have this?

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv a

[hackwrench]

That's just it, I've never seen a cap on my wired connection. I try to find my contract. but Comcast isn't good at providing it. The agreements are done over the phone. Speed tests usually show the full speed though.

Not a Dingo

[fedos]

Tom Wheeler has really proven himself as a regulator.

Ah Yes

[jon3k]

"that radically reshapes federal law governing a massive sector of the economy, which flourished due to hundreds of billions of dollars of investment made in reliance on the policy the order throws overboard"

Love the subtle implied extortion. Either drop the lawsuit or we'll pull funding. It's a bluff. If they don't continue to build out we'll see fiber deployments continue to eat away at their subscriber base until widespread 5G deployments (years if not decades away) arrive.

Re:Ah Yes

[david_thornley]

It was after the FCC decision that the phone company came through and tried selling us 40-1Kmb/s connections. (They had very little sales resistance here.)

Re:USA internet access is too expensive to be hone

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in the USA (St. Louis) and I pay $60/month for internet. It's not the cheapest, but it's the most reliable and fastest. It's 100Mbps down, 7Mbps up, from Charter. I don't buy their cable TV or VoIP services because I don't need them, and Charter doesn't give me any trouble over it. My bill is consistent (unlike when I was with AT&T) with no fluctuating fees or surcharges.

My cellular plan is separate and is with T-Mobile. It's a family plan, so it's $30/month per service (we have 3 phones, so $90), which covers unlimited voice, SMS, and data. The data runs at 4G LTE speed up to a 10GB-per-service cap each month, then is reduced to 3G speed for the rest of the billing period.

My point is that it's not all that bad in the US. There are certainly places where it's worse, and you'll probably hear a lot about those places. It's only natural for squeaky wheels to squeak.

In other news

[silentcoder]

Serial killers urge judges to stop convicting homicide cases.

bye bye net neutrality

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing the US can withstand the onslaught of corporate interests. Eventually, there will be no net neutrality.

Good grief

[Anonymous Coward]

They are just relentless, and oh, the chutzpah! What makes it their 'right' to commandeer and privatize a public resource? The modern day tactic of choice for all greedy companies and individuals seems to be deflection - they don't deny anything they've done, just misdirect people to irrelevancies. They are scum, just disgusting. I wasn't sure about Wheeler at first, but now I pray he stays right where he is.

Common utility

[Anonymous Coward]

It is time to treat the ISPs as utilities.
It is used for digital control systems communications for other public utilities ( water, power, traffic cameras....).
It is used for government and military communications.
It is used for money transfers ( civilian and non-government ).
It is used for security information communications ( traffic cams, surveillance cams, burglar alarms...).
It is used for news, advertising, political and religious campaigns, and public service information.
It is used for voice and video communications ( Skype, phone... ).
It IS the new telephone support system.
All of this, and more make it a utility, and not just an information service.

Dinosaurs

[zifn4b]

The problem is AT&T and Comcast are whiny babies. They are dinosaur companies that are still trying to run their mega corporations as if we were still back in the days of Ma Bell and the Cable barons. Welcome to Capitalism friends! The same system that let you thrive when you actually were innovative and competitive is now urging you to evolve to continue to be competitive in the face of new and better services like Google Fiber, Verizon FIOS, Netflix, Hulu, Playstation Vue and you guys can't step up to the plate. So what do you do? You try to pull a mafia style strong arm and force everyone to play by your rules instead of the free market.

Sorry, thanks but no thanks. Get in the game or move over so better players can take over. You had your day.

But it ISN'T equally funded.

[Anonymous Coward]

"...put in place last year to make internet service providers treat all internet traffic equally..."

But the internet ISN'T equally funded. Especially low-income individuals who get an almost free ride.

They have as much right to watch porn as their neighbor who pays for internet! At taxpayers' expense, of course.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv an

[AK Marc]

I pay for metered water. When I open the faucet all the way, I don't get infinite water. The water company lies.

That's bits not bandwidth

You'll have to define "bandwidth" for us. Your use seems to not agree with any dictionary I could find.

I haven't seen any other limiations on our downstream capacity in our contract,

Then you haven't found the "best effort" clause. It's in every residential contract, and many business ones, even "dedicated Internet" contracts.

You'll get your 25 Mbps between you and the DSLAM (or other network point), and no guarantees after. That's 25 Mbps of bandwidth (or bits, or however you want to define it). Content is different.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv an

[hackwrench]

the range of frequencies within a given band, in particular that used for transmitting a signal.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv an

[AK Marc]

Ah, "Signal bandwidth" is the current term for that. "Bandwidth" means "useful data rate or theoretical line rate". You need a qualifier now to get the original definition. Like "broadband", whose current definition bears zero resemblance to the original definition.

Re: comcast wants you to buy HBO with cable tv an

[hackwrench]

No, you need to stop trying to make your definition a thing. Don't think that your tiny corner of the world speaks for the rest of it. Though in actuality neither one of us knows how prevalent your usage is. I'm just making a strongly worded message to nip this thing in the bud. But when I typed define bandwidth, I got the definition I copy and pasted and something about brainpower and not yours, so it couldn't have gotten that far.