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How One Little Cable Company Exposed Telecom's Achilles' Heel (backchannel.com)
Reader mirandakatz writes: Forget net neutrality -- the real fight is over controlling price-gouging monopolies. As Susan Crawford writes at Backchannel, a little-known cable company, Cable One, just exposed the telecommunications industry's Achilles' heel: regulation. Cable One has been raising its data transmission prices quickly, and it's making cable giants very, very nervous. If people begin noticing that there's no competition, that Americans are paying too much for too little, and that the entire country is suffering as a result, that's a big problem for Big Cable. As Crawford writes, 'don't fixate on net neutrality... Even though the state of internet access is an issue that touches the bank accounts and opportunities of hundreds of millions of Americans and gazillions of businesses, very few people understand what's actually going on. Now you are among them. Do something about it.'
"Forget net neutrality - "
No. Paying attention to ANYTHING else does not justify forgetting net neutrality. Net neutrality SHOULD be a positive for anyone's political stance - it just means however imperfect the companies involved in providing services, they should have to treat content as just bytes, regardless of the source. That shouldn't be controversial, nor should it be forgotten, even 'for the sake of argument'.
Ryan Fenton
That's just another good reason why the network - the data center, the cables in the road etc. should be a public service like water pipes and electricity.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
Trying to co-opt public outrage over net neutrality to a related, yet still entirely separate issue, is despicable. Net neutrality is absolutely one of the "real" fights. The idea that there can be only one is absurd. Who the hell is this woman? "Forget net neutrality?" No, fuck you. I will fixate on net neutrality as much as I damn well feel like it. She's actively hurting the case for her issue by spreading this nonsense, and that's a shame, since it is an important issue as well. Most U.S. Americans have absolutely no clue just how much more we pay for so much less than the rest of the civilised (and often, even uncivilised!) world.
Nice strawman, that's obviously not what he said or meant. But by all means, just scream "communism" as loud as you can until you get your way.
That's just another good reason why the network - the data center, the cables in the road etc. should be a public service like water pipes and electricity.
Not the datacenter. Just a termination facility for the last mile that any ISP can hook into. The last mile, specifically, is what needs to be a public utility. That's where the natural monopoly is. The rest the market really could sort out, as the barrier to entry would be small.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
So, my datacenter that I have built and put together myself should be a public service for everyone to use without compensating me for things like startup costs and growing pains? I don't think so.
No. In this simile in which the internets are like roads (which is relatively apt, it's better than tubes anyway) your data center is analogous to a shopping center. People do retain certain rights which people expect in a public place when they enter a shopping center, like photography, or not having your car towed away unexpectedly. People retain certain rights in your data center, like privacy. But they don't get space in your data center for free. They get access to the digital network used to get to your data center for free, just as they get access to the road network used to get to a shopping center for free.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Actually the summary was so incomprehensible that I was successfully fooled into reading the article. Well played, OP!
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
Who told you that, and when will you get your own opinion?
Calling for the government to control infrastructure is not the same as calling for government to control everything.
Government already controls infrastructure, the only thing we have left to argue about is what that control should look like.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
You can pretend all you like, but you've been shafted twice to get internet access.
I got this from a 20 second search.
I fully agree, comrade. The answer is always to take public ownership of all private property.
What the fuck is wrong with you people? Do you really prioritise a company's ability to make as much profit as possible over your ability to get a fair and decent service? All the while you bang on about the free market fixing things while simultaneously doing everything to make the market as closed as possible. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you?
Wanna buy a shirt?
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That's EXACTLY what he said and meant.
So do you think, roads, power, sewage, water etc should all be in private hands with access to them charged at whatever rate the owner sets? Do you think they should be able to have any competition or be able shut it down with lawyers and lobbyist and buckets of cash (that they got from gauging you) instead of with, you know, competitiion? Is it that you don't see internet connectivity as essential as water, power and transport is? Or is it it more that you got yours and fuck everyone else?
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u