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Comcast Proves Need For Net Neutrality By Trying To Censor Advocacy Website (fightforthefuture.org)
Reader mrchaotica writes: As most Slashdot readers are probably aware, the FCC, under the direction of Trump-appointed chairman Ajit Pai, is trying to undo its 2015 decision to protect Net Neutrality (PDF) by classifying ISPs as common carriers. During the recent public comment period, the FCC's website was flooded with pro-Net-Neutrality comments from actual people (especially those who heeded John Oliver's call to arms) as well as anti-Net-Neutrality comments posted by bots using the names and addresses of people without their consent. The fake comments use boilerplate identical to that used in a 2010 press release by the conservative lobbying group Center for Individual Freedom (which is funded by Comcast, among other entities), but beyond that, the entities who perpetrated and funded the criminal acts have not been conclusively identified. In response to this brazen attempt to undermine the democratic process, the Internet freedom advocacy group Fight for the Future (FFTF) created the website Comcastroturf.com to call attention to the fraud and allow people to see if their identity had been misappropriated. Comcast, in a stunning display of its tone-deaf attitude towards free speech, has sent a cease-and-desist order to FFTF, claiming that Comcastroturf.com violates its "valuable intellectual property[sic]." According to the precedent set in Bosley Medical Institute, Inc. v. Kremer , websites created for the purpose of criticizing an organization can not be considered trademark infringement. As such, FFTF reportedly has no intention of taking down the site.
"This is exactly why we need Title II net neutrality protections that ban blocking, throttling, and censorship," said Evan Greer, campaign director of Fight for the Future, "If Ajit Pai's plan is enacted, there would be nothing preventing Comcast from simply blocking sites like Comcastroturf.com that are critical of their corporate policies," she added. "It also makes you wonder what Comcast is so afraid of? Are their lobbying dollars funding the astroturfing effort flooding the FCC with fake comments that we are encouraging Internet users to investigate?"
Could there be a better example to illustrate why ensuring strong Net Neutrality protections by regulating ISPs as common carriers is so important?
And they already have. Part of the big Network Neutrality push came when Comcast slowed speeds to Netflix down and threatened to slow it down more if Netflix didn't pay up.
Why should I pay extra for Netflix to be as speedy as possible? I pay for Internet access and all sites should be as fast as they can be. Obviously, server speed, network issues, etc. will affect site speed, but a site speed factor shouldn't be my ISP deciding that SITE X should go slow unless someone (me or Site X) pays for speedy delivery.
This assumes a healthy market. The ISP market is NOT a health market. It's a realm of monopolies. I currently have Internet access from Charter (Spectrum, previously Time Warner Cable). They are my only option in the area I live in. Suppose Charter told me that I'd need to pay an additional $5 a month for Netflix data to flow at a reasonable speed - otherwise it would slow down to the point that the service would be useless. What would my options be? Pay Charter and suddenly using Netflix is $5 more expensive a month (through no fault of Netflix's)? Don't pay and stop using Netflix (possibly paying for Charter's cable TV package which we subscribe to now)? How do I vote with my wallet?
And what if Charter decides to do this with groups of websites? Want to use social media? $5 a month. Online video? $5 a month per site. News sites? $5 a month.
What - beyond Net Neutrality rules - would prevent an ISP from doing this if they are the only ISP in the area?
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
And they already have. Part of the big Network Neutrality push came when Comcast slowed speeds to Netflix down and threatened to slow it down more if Netflix didn't pay up.
Comcast didn't slow speed to Netflix; it just didn't spend more of its own resources to make Netflix have an easier time of profiting off of Comcast's customers.
Netflix chose a route to Comcast's network that was unable to handle the traffic well, and then Netflix complained the Comcast wasn't upgrading the route Netflix itself selected.
It wasn't a harm but merely declining to bear the cost of Netflix's business model, and forcing even non-Netflix subscribers to pay for Netflix traffic in the process.
Unfortunately, all too many misconstrued the incident to push for policies that tilt the playingfield in favor of Netflix.
The Netflix incident was traced to a dispute over peering on a transit partner, not an issue of an ISP slowing traffic as so many have claimed.
So yeah, that was fake news.
No it wasn't, and stop using bullshit phrases to shut down the conversation. Netflix had to go to a peering partner because Comcast refused to discuss in good faith a direct linkage at the bandwidth levels that Comcast's own customers required. Then Comcast starved the peering partner by refusing to provide the proper throughput, even when the peering partner offered to pay all expenses related to it.
Comcast turned down offers of reasonable recompense and instead attacked the quality of the service in order to promote its own OTT video offering.
In short: They degraded another service in order to make it appear worse than of their own. This behaviour is exactly what Net Neutrality is designed to prevent.
News. Not Fake.
People who honestly question the need for Network Neutrality simply don't understand how an internet works. They latch onto a single convenient datum and ignore the system itself. Those who dishonestly question it are just assholes.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
It wasn't a harm but merely declining to bear the cost of Netflix's business model, and forcing even non-Netflix subscribers to pay for Netflix traffic in the process.
Comcast's customers were already paying for that traffic. Making Netflix/Level3 pay again is double-dipping.
Level3 offered to meet all costs involved in upgrading the connection. Comcast still refused. It was a bad faith interaction, and no amount of apologism and misconstruction will change that. Comcast wanted Netflix back on Akamai and other CDNs, and was willing to play dirty to get them back there.
Within a week of Netflix knuckling under and paying Comcast for access to its customers, video quality returned to pre-dispute levels. That means that this was never a hardware issue. It was Comcast deliberately slowing an information provider's traffic in order to extract more money from them.
Even if you grant—and I don't—that Comcast was right to demand more money, using artificial congestion to degrade their own customers' internet experience was an unethical move, and one that Net Neutrality would not allow. It's the business equivalent of holding a gun to the baby's head. Only an asshole would do that.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.