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Steve Wozniak: Net Neutrality Rollback 'Will End the Internet As We Know It' (siliconbeat.com)
An anonymous reader quotes Silicon Beat:
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak penned an op-ed on Friday with a former Federal Communications Commission chairman, urging the current FCC to stop its proposed rollback of Obama-era net neutrality regulations. In the op-ed published by USA Today, Wozniak and Michael Copps, who led the FCC from 2001 to 2011, argued the rollback will threaten freedom for internet users and may corrode democracy... "Sometimes there's a nugget of truth to the adage that Washington policymakers are disconnected from the people they purport to represent," they wrote. "It is a stirring example of democracy in action. With the Internet's future as a platform for innovation and democratic discourse on the line, a coalition of grassroots and diverse groups joined with technology firms to insist that the FCC maintain its 2015 open internet (or 'net neutrality') rules."
In the joint letter, Wozniak and Copps write that "We come from different walks of life, but each of us recognizes that the FCC is considering action that could end the internet as we know it -- a dynamic platform for entrepreneurship, jobs, education, and free expression."
"Will consumers and citizens control their online experiences, or will a few gigantic gatekeepers take this dynamic technology down the road of centralized control, toll booths and constantly rising prices for consumers? At stake is the nature of the internet and its capacity to transform our lives even more than it already has."
In the joint letter, Wozniak and Copps write that "We come from different walks of life, but each of us recognizes that the FCC is considering action that could end the internet as we know it -- a dynamic platform for entrepreneurship, jobs, education, and free expression."
"Will consumers and citizens control their online experiences, or will a few gigantic gatekeepers take this dynamic technology down the road of centralized control, toll booths and constantly rising prices for consumers? At stake is the nature of the internet and its capacity to transform our lives even more than it already has."
What bugs me is that there so many enemies of freedom and so many enemies of 'Net neutrality. On one hand, every dictatorship wants to censor the Internet, and on the other, there are a few corporatists who want to kill it and turn it into a corporate media distribution system. Everyone else on the planet wants a free and open Internet. Yet we seem to have to be fighting these anti-freedom forces endlessly. Well, I'm staying - not breaking - staying - and will be donating - yet again - to a pro 'Net neutrality group.
It's only in the last few years that companies have created totally vertical integration with content creation to delivery. That is a major difference, in my mind; hence the need for laws.
-
Lets face it, American internet users are just cattle who need to be fed and exploited by a few walled garden corporations farming income for their billionaire owners. The idea that the internet is useful for anything but extorting money from its users is laughably left wing. Enjoy your slavery cattle!
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
But he's really gone over the top on this one. The Net Neut rules have barely been in place for a year and a half. For him and the vast majority of the rest of us, "the Internet as we know it" is the Internet that existed before these rules were put into place.
Who's freedom would that be? The freedom of companies like Google and Cloudfare to ban websites and confiscate domains they don't like? I sure hope it's the end of that internet! I liked the one we had before.
Oy vey! It's anudda Shoah, I tells ya! Anudda Shoah!
Perhaps you weren't born at the time, but it used to be that you could pick any ISP you wanted...by simply dialing a phone number with your modem. Since those days, technology has advanced, but policy has regressed. I should be able to connect to an ISP of my choice...over a high-speed broadband connection. That is what the FCC mandated for 'long distance' providers. The Internet should be no different.
Part of the problem is that while yes, there are many users of the Internet who want it to stay open and free, there is a segment of the Consumer population that wants it to be Cable TV, and Perhaps Gaming Distribution 2.0
The idea behind DRM, and video rental systems over the internet is just asinine. But you have to look at where a particular segment of the Computer using public is going: Android Tablets, which is Linux turned against iteslf, and iPads. What do both of these things look like? Portable Televisions. They don't have keyboards, they don't have mice. They are tools of Content consumption.
Steve Jobs, Woz's partner, was a huge part of this. Openness on the Apple Platforms ended with the Apple II GS series, and the Macs were all largely closed to the outside world until the advent of OSX. Many Pre-OSX Macs, had proprietary EVERYTHING, and even the speaker Jack was proprietary. OSX opened the Mac world up some by giving us a MacOS running on BSD.
This allowed Mac to Survive and gve us the Trusted Computing Nightmare that was iOS. All the sudden you have what the DRM Corps want: A Computing platform where everything is a Rental transaction, and consumers money can be funneled from their wallets constantly. Thats what is happening now with iDevice owners.
Apple should have died off back in the 90s. They should have gone out of business completely. Consumers should have resisted the introduction of DRM into computers and rejected networks like NetFlix.
"30+ years without "net neutrality" regulations, 2 years with" - bzzzzzzt. Wrong.
For the 1990's to mid 2000's ISPs and telecoms were typically separate entities. Telecom access was dialup or DSL - both regulated by Title II. Since the ISPs weren't in the telecom business they didn't require regulation - they had no reason to block/throttle based on service/source/destination/whatever.
From then until 2014 various FCC rules and regulations (including the "Open Internet Order") governed ISPs. In 2014 Verizon "ruined it for everyone" by challenging the OIO and taking the FCC to court. They won, but the judge suggested that if the FCC was going to police ISPs it would have to classify them as common carriers. So the FCC did.
Did not CompuServe, Prodigy, AOL, and many other internet providers have this same vertical integration?
I can still use the Internet without touching Facebook or Google. For the time being. The Net Neutrality laws were put in place to maintain the status quo in the face of possible breaking the 'net into walled gardens. 'But we would never block or restrict access to the Internet' many ISPs say. Fine. Then Net Neutrality rules won't affect the way you do business, so shut up.
Yeah, these rules are a prior restriction on certain business models. Which isn't really the American way. We'd rather leave the market open, allow businesses to develop their own products and structures and apply rules and legislation once some harm to consumers has been identified. But the Internet is a natural monopoly of sorts. There isn't another one that I could choose should the current one prove to be unsatisfactory. Even if I have multiple ISPs serving me, should Google, Sourceforge or the GOP fundraising websites end up on the other network, that would pretty much destroy the utility of the single interconnected network.
Have gnu, will travel.
Your argument is quite flawed. Firstly, you're implying that just because the regulation wasn't needed before means it wont be needed now or in the future. And if it wasn't needed because everyone is already playing nice then there should be no harm in having it, since the only way it would effect anything is if they decided not to play nice. Secondly you're trying to deflect to a different issue with a "two wrongs make a right" sentiment. Just because Facebook, Google and Twitter are bad for the health for internet doesn't mean it's OK for Comcast, Verizon and AT&T to screw over the internet even further.
"..videos being demonetized, certain subreddits being banned.." Those two things have to do with the operation of specific websites. If you do not like how YouTube handles streaming video, try your hand at your own streaming video website. 'Net neutrality enables you to give it an honest shot. But take away 'Net neutrality, then Google/YouTube pays the ISPs and those who own the wires to throttle your upstart, yet provide even more bandwidth for YouTube. That's would be the problem. 'Net neutrality means everyone works on a level playing field i.e. fairness, whereas the corporatists would like to see their own stuff have access to speedy lanes while innovators get throttled. What do you think would happen to a bunch of innovators' efforts if YouTube fully loaded in a millisecond while their new website took thirty seconds. They wouldn't stand a chance. That's the issue - and that's why you should morally support and financially support those fighting for 'Net neutrality.
Um... no.
FTFY
Not saying it's a good thing, one party impeding another party's freedom to express themselves basically isn't a good idea, even if for no other reason than it's far better to know what's actually going on around you than not, but your case is always better if you're accurate about describing what's actually going on.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Uhh...we actually did have net neutrality for most of the time that we had the Internet. Remember: the Internet operated over telephone lines for most of its existence, and those lines were regulated under the same Title II classification that Obama’s FCC simply extended to cable ISPs. It’s a matter of bringing Internet-over-cable in line with the regulations that have existed for Internet-over-anything-else for the duration of the Internet’s history.
That,or one could actively support - both morally and financially - those who are fighting for 'Net neutrality.
That's one company's set up, that's not the Internet. You can run your company, website, forum etc., however which way you want, the Internet, on the other hand, should be open and fair. 'And it is worth fighting for to have it that way.
Just to play devil's advocate for a moment, the other side of that coin is that goods and services can be funneled to the consumer constantly as well. That's sort of the whole idea of a consumer. It's not a one-way street. When it is, consumers aren't consumers any longer, and their willingness to let the funneling of their resources away will also go away.
At the most basic level, either you consume, or you die. Next step up, you consume and your life / lifestyle can be enhanced. These are all desirable to some degree. There are legitimate issues about reasonable and unreasonable levels and kinds of consumption, but what makes that really tricky is that it almost always varies from person to person.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
So true. There's ground with blood soaked into from people who fought so that we can speak, text and write freely.
Making the issue a left / right or Dem / Rep issue, or an Obama / Trump issue doesn't help. 'Net neutrality helps everyone: i.e. a fair playing field. Take it away and innovators and dissenting opinion (left, right or otherwise) gets throttled into oblivion. 'Net neutrality is worth fighting for, both morally, and with dollars.
Nonsense; we've had those kinds of companies since the earliest days of the Internet.
Most stupid comment already at the beginning. You probably do not realize that there is a dynamic to the behavior of anti net-neutrality entities as well.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
And the human race did fine for tens of thousands of years without any sort of regulation on nuclear weapons, so clearly we need to stop regulating them and let everyone have access to them... right?
Not sure why this is modded Troll. Agree or disagree with the his point, sure. But This is a perfect example of "Troll is not a replacement for "I disagree".
Beware of the Leopard.
Exactly. Say whatever you want about the EU but at least the don't fuck the common people in the arse like US corporations do.
sudo rm -r -f --no-preserve-root /
How? By site policies being neither here nor there with respect to net neutrality.
The whole point of net neutrality is to create a kind of unfettered competition between information sources, not to compel every information source to have a policy for its content that you approve of. The solution to your not liking Yourtube's monetization policy is to turn to a different site, something you'll be hampered from doing under a non-neutral Internet.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
foreverity
I think the word you're looking for is eterness or something like that.
Ezekiel 23:20
Both FB and Google have their little widget snitches all over the Internet. But the domains of these widget snitches are generally known and can be deadsunk in your hosts file. I have a lot of Google spying deadsunk, and on some of my computers all of Facebook deadsunk. The only reason I haven't complete deadsunk Google's divers domains is that I like YouTube and need some Google stuff to work to enjoy YouTube. If there was anything that could be considered competition to YouTube I'd use it, but as it is, websites like DailyMotion et al. are markedly limited when compared to YouTube. Facebook, I use on one computer merely to log into then promptly out of my FB account. All the other computers here do not even know facebook.com and all the other snitchy FB domains even exist.
Yeah, you can do what you want with your own website, that is a almost a completely separate issue from 'Net neutrality. So if Google decided their website would be bright purple on Tuesdays, every Tuesday, with loud blaring embedded audio screams to boot, that's Google's business .. and has nothing to do with the issue of 'Net neutrality.
How does it feel to have big companies refusing to transmit your bits because they don't like the content? Maybe you're getting a feeling of what the alt right has to put up with now. Don't worry though - they are private companies and they can do what they like. It's not the same as government censorship.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Since most people don't really understand how the net work, let alone how computers work, it's ridiculously easy to bullshit the masses. You can see this every day with phishing scams, "Your PC/phone/tablet is INFECTED!" scamware, social media hoaxes, and on and on. Unfortunately, this also gives big ISPs (and Hollywood for that matter) plenty of room to sling their own bullshit as well.
Oh, no! You have walked into the slavering fangs of a lurking grue!
Well, at this point I'm invested somewhat in Rogers Cable Internet. Here the lines are run either by Bell or Rogers. There are other providers, but they are tied into these two. Bell also built the telephone system. So they could even throttle that, not that they'd need to. So sure there are third party providers, but they basically piggy back, and I think you miss the point of 'Net neutrality. It's not just for the resource rich and super capable - it's for everyone who uses the Internet. If an innovative startup is throttled on all the main lines, in all reasonable practicality, they do not stand a chance. It's like saying if you do not like the electric company, build your own power grid. And while true, some folks might be in a position to throw up a power generating windmill, most are not. Moreover, in some regions legislation would prevent even that because the big providers have made sure. So it behooves major providers of basic and near basic services to act in fairness ..
I get the idea of a free market place .. and for most things where there's open fair competition - and where there's nothing blocking startups - that's the best thing. But telecommunications is already highly regulated. So the regulations should be keeping the systems fair for everyone if they are going to allow the divers companies - big, medium and small - to do business on those systems.
steve, you are not bill gates, steve jobs or linus torvalds. nobody has the status to say when or if the Internet will end.
They'be both perfectly cromulent words.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
I notice you conspicuously ignored the "domains registrations being seized" part of the post. Why would that be?
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Almost as if there were a level of nuance and complexity on the issue, dummy.
Very true indeed. We don't need laws until people seek to do things that are unfair and unacceptable - then we have to make laws to forbid those acts. However, any societies that has to make laws against X is likely already to be saturated with X; the existence of the laws strongly suggests that they are being broken wholesale.
The following extract from the Tao Te Ching is relevant, especially the final part about "thieves and brigands".
"The more prohibitions that are imposed on people,
The poorer the people become.
The more sharp weapons the people possess,
The greater is the chaos in the country.
The more clever and crafty the people become,
The more unusual affairs occur.
The more laws and regulations that exist,
The more thieves and brigands appear".
- Tao Te Ching
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
I can still use the Internet without touching Facebook or Google. For the time being. The Net Neutrality laws were put in place to maintain the status quo in the face of possible breaking the 'net into walled gardens. 'But we would never block or restrict access to the Internet' many ISPs say. Fine. Then Net Neutrality rules won't affect the way you do business, so shut up.
Uh uh. The way to regulate is to wait until anti-competitive or anti-consumer behavior manifests, THEN start rolling out the rules. Prospective regulation is a recipe for stifling innovation and locking in the status quo. Saying, "You won't be hurt so shut up" is not sufficient reason for slapping rules on people.
That's why the Internet wire should be - and should be kept - open, fair, and neutral for everyone who wants to make use of it.
Well then, the regulators should put out a statement outlining what exactly is considered a free, open and fair Internet and mail or email it to those who operate the wires so they are well aware of expected behaviour. And should any unfair, censorial and/ or anti-competitive practice(s) arise at the wire level there would be cause legitimate to regulate according to that statement.
'And he has no one to answer to but his creator either, which frees him up to speak his mind honestly.
You're right, it's not .. it's about 'Net neutality.
The US FCC doesn’t control Canada's Net Neutrality rules, does it?
Infinitysimum?
#DeleteFacebook
Good point; but particular mega-corps aren't sitting idly. They are actively attempting to slice up the Internet, not to improve it (although speeds for their own particular sites and products might increase) but to ruin it and transform it into their own narrow vision, with fairness, openness, freedom, 'net neutrality and any potential innovative competition kicked to the curb, censored, and throttled to oblivion.
IMHO, the people living in America are important.
Given that some U.S.A. companies are too lazy/cheap to have servers in Canada for their Canadian users, the FCC does control some part of our internet usage.
#DeleteFacebook
I guess the title "Net neutrality rollback will end the internet in the U.S.A. as we know it" makes it sound as if other countries could possibly be better, which is something you cannot tell to people living in that country. They'll either won't believe you or think you're lying to them.
#DeleteFacebook
I know right? Why do we even have speed limits on the road. It's not like a horse drawn carriage can do any more than 20km/h. Nothing ever changes. We as a species are in a perfectly stable equilibrium. We certainly don't need any regulations, every regulation anyone could ever need already exists.
Or maybe... and just hear me out... Maybe the world has changed, corporate interests have changed, and the reason the regulations were brought in to begin with was that the first 28+ years of the internet was actively under threat from corporate actors.
If I sound like I'm mocking you condescendingly, I am.
This is not about letting the government control the internet.
This is about giving the government power to stop companies from trying to control the internet.
#DeleteFacebook
I know. This is a clear sign that gay marriage laws aren't working. Wait what? What were we talking about? I mean none of the things you mentioned are related to net neutrality, so I assume you're talking about repealing the 9th amendment. Wait what?
We sure as hell will notice. Imagine not being able to have news about all their pointless political debates, the hollow bickering of hollywood stars, the religious zealots, the anti-science morons, the multiple failed reboots from J.J. Abrams...
Hum...
On second thought, let them close their internet borders.
#DeleteFacebook
The Internet is trans-national. When the mainland China's communist gov't censors my article, it affects me, my feedback, perhaps even the proper formation of my opinion, not just those who are blocked from reading it.
That's a couple of years away.
Governments are slow to react and even slower to change and put regulations in place.
Except when it puts them in power, in which case laws are quickly scribbled, pushed and passed via expansive bribes in only a few weeks.
"We are from the government and we are here to help you."
"Trust no one".
#DeleteFacebook
Why would you put your servers in reach of Canadian human rights commissions? That's just stupid. Pseudo courts with no presumption of innocence, no free speech defense. Not just no. FUCK NO!
I'm not putting up a version of my site in broken incorrect frog for the quebecees either.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Universal health care is about being decent human beings. Most first-world countries have it.
You guys have insane costs caused by letting corporations run your health care system so that needs to be fixed, but even lower costs could not be afforded by everyone. Your taxes are also wasted on the military, so fix that too and you'll have universal health care, universal income, ten times the budget for NASA, etc.
#DeleteFacebook
Who here really thinks that the internet is more free today than it was just a few years ago, ...
Everyone who thinks that the net was MORE FREE after the corporate takeover of independent providers of Cable services, raise your hand to your ass and insert.
Fuck them in the knife wound instead. EUrocrates want a fresh hole.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
What does that have to do with US Net Neutrality rules? The US FCC has no authority over Rogers Cable.
Naw, in the old days before the mainstream media content was online, everything was already vertically integrated. They create their giant silos of crap, but you can't even smell it from someplace decent.
They're way less integrated than AOL or Delphi were.
The reason it can't "end the internet as we know it" is because the internet is not only proprietary video services. Those are what will be harmed, but that was always a shit show. In the old days you had to pay bribes to RealMedia if you wanted your content to be full speed.
The problem is competition in the last mile, not the rules. Net neutrality is a great concept, but the only reason to make it a rule instead of a selling point is the lack of competition. That won't last forever; places that are freed and get competition don't tend to go back. It will slowly go away.
Hm .. you are bringing up the issue of why doesn't any and everyone get to set up their own grid. I think that is a different issue from the one of neutrality on the one existing grid that everyone has access to. Not that there aren't other network grids. There's Internet 2 etc., but most people can't hook into those. Most of us have only one inter-network which we can access. 'Net neutrality is about making sure that one grid operates in a fair, even, open, neutral manner and serves everyone, not just a few particular mega-corps.
:o) Trading, prospering, being productive and the like is part of freedom. I have no issue with people working with the Internet, so long as it's on fair, open honest grounds. Moreover, just because an event occurs on the Internet is no excuse should it be some sort of defrauding or theft. So things being on the up and up, no one really should have issue either way, and you are free to do as you please, and you shouldn't need suffer fear of legitimate authorities. If not, if you act criminally towards your neighbour virtual or no, Internet or no, you should fear the authorities.
I only dream the Ds nominate a full tilt loony lefty. Four more years!
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Can you, though? I just sent a gift to a friend on the opposite coast. The package weighed 52 lbs. I paid about $70 to get it there. Can you do that? I don't think you could even do it for fuel costs, much less pay the driver and the wear and tear on the transport vehicle(s.)
Yes, there's a lot of truth to this, especially since we now have a bought-and-paid for legislature. Net neutrality is definitely very high up on the list of things like this, too.
I'm not really suggesting that. I'm more suggesting that the consumers aren't the problem. IMHO, the regulators are the problem. The people that are supposed to be watching out for the best interests of the consumers. The post which I replied to was proposing that consumers were a significant part of the problem - I don't see it that way.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
"Think VERY carefully about what you're wishing for." Good point. It is certainly an issue that should be thought right through before any legislation - or no - is decided upon. Quick whips of the pen - Rep or Dem or otherwise - are probably not prudent enough for an issue that affects freedom, lives, fairness, prosperity, conscience, politics, religion etc. etc.
Yeah, mostly at this point in time, it is about the far right. Because they're very active right now. The nail that sticks up the furthest is the nail that gets hammered down.
Either way, it's bad to repress anyone's speech. Anyone's speech, IMHO. But what's going on right now is a flare-up being caused by some very prominent far, far-right-wing talk. Moderate ideas don't tend to lead to repression of speech. Extreme ones do, and right now, the extremists are mostly evident on the right facet of the spectrum. They're pissing people off not just on the left, but in the middle as well. This leads to muttering of the form "someone oughta shut those people up" because, to be blunt, it's irritating and people tend to want to scratch the itch without really thinking about the scab and scar that will result.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
P.S. if you will: 'Net neutrality' as I think of it may or may not entail governments legislating, but it does mean fairness for those who put up websites. That no one web domain is preferred over another when it comes to the wires. That a big established company with its billions cannot pay the line operators to throttle out an innovator who is perceived as a potential competitor. Somewhat like the road system. Your new innovative company, say, puts its trucks on the same road as Fed Ex does, with the same speeds and rules (and so on) as everyone else. Fed Ex can't use it's well established position and its collected billions to pay the road operator to have your trucks slowed or blocked. Moreover, both your new innovative company's trucks and Fed Ex's trucks have to respect the road rights of Ronnie Republican when he takes in his car on the road to go get a coffee at the BLM Leftist Cafe. The road's regulated, but it treats all comers the same way. That's my notion of 'Net neutrality. I'm not keen on the regulation part, if it can stay neutral without that, good. But it should be fair, open, even etc. etc. neutral. Then everyone is free to innovate, think, prosper etc. on the thing without fear of being throttled by some paranoid jealous perhaps even greedy mega-corp.
LOL I'm not entirely contrary to your sentiment. However, when it comes to the Internet - so far - the de facto gov't in Ottawa has been relatively good about it vis a vis human rights. Most judicial decisions have favoured free speech, unfettered use etc. Poor people aren't sued millions for their daughter's downloading of a few tunes. But it is important to note - and in line with your sentiment - there have been folks who've suffered 'commissions' and 'tribunals' here. You'd have to have strength to stand up to them and tell them to go jump in a Great lake.
It was an analogy. What affects the Internet in the U.S. can affect folks elsewhere. So, for example, if the rules or lack thereof in the U.S. prevent an American innovator from succeeding, for instance, it could affect someone in Canada, for instance.
Remember: the Internet operated over telephone lines for most of its existence
This is a gross oversimplification that elides the entire point of the Net Neut debate: Yes, the user's connection to the ISP was over a telephone line and was regulated by Title II. But so what? There was zero regulation of (1) the rate at which the ISP decided to send any particular piece of data over that telephone line; and (2) the rate at which the ISP decided to allow its customers access to the Internet at large. All that was handled by big scary market forces.
Net Neut regulations truly paralleling Title II would mean that the ISP (e.g., CableCo) has to send all data between itself and its customers down at the same rates, but that's not what anyone really cares about. As I've said before, this entire battle is generally a proxy for "stream as much as I want to without paying more," which involves not just data flow from the ISP to the customer but data flow to the ISP from the outside world. This puts ISPs in a position of having to set all-you-can-eat prices without any reasonable expectation of what a given customer can and will actually "eat." That's an unsustainable business model. Just because the FCC temporarily pretended there was a free lunch doesn't mean that there really is one.
You guys have insane costs caused by letting corporations run your health care system so that needs to be fixed, but even lower costs could not be afforded by everyone.
The biggest corporation of them all IS the government. Always wonder how people can look at a bunch of characters with profit motives and think they're somehow a worse or less moral gang than a bunch of characters with political motives.
You make a valid point -- I'm not necessary supporting regulation rather law making. And not even law making if the companies behave themselves (which doesn't seem to be the case). Making it unlawful to substantively throttle one website's content over another's. No need for regulation, merely the power to prevent it if need be. So if Google should ever ask the wire operators to throttle another company's website, despite the billions and billions they have to pay for such a thing, the wire operators would have to refuse and continue to give all content and traffic a fair shake.
Net neutrality is irrelevant today. Google, Facebook, and domain providers are engaged in far worse and nefarious activities.
Bifurcation. Everything is both fair and unfair. acceptable and unacceptable, right and wrong. Property is theft.
Hate to break it to you, but the whole world is that way.
I'm wondering what you use besides Google. For me, it has answers I just can't find anywhere else.
Expected behavior is a shifting target. Parts of the internet are like party lines carrying traffic for different groups of users. Should the Internet company provide QoS on some packets for you or not?
'But we would never block or restrict access to the Internet' many ISPs say. Fine. Then Net Neutrality rules won't affect the way you do business, so shut up.
Exactly. I wonder why no one has bearded Ajit Pai on the record -- preferably on camera -- and asked him outright, "Mr. Pai, if the Internet corporations say they're not violating net neutrality now, and they have no intentions of violating net neutrality, then the existence of net neutrality regulations has no effect on them. Why would you want to waste the FCC's resources in the repeal of something which won't affect them unless they want to engage in practices that are prohibited under its provisions? This creates the appearance of your acting solely for the benefit of the corporations, rather than for the citizens of the United States."
Yeah, solid logic. The guy with a 4 digit UID just got on the internet yesterday. Couldn't possibly be that I understand the difference between "network neutrality" and "Network Neutrality(TM) Inc, A Google Enterprise".
See that "Preview" button?
I've said this dozens of times: Find the local impediment that keeps competitive cable companies from moving into your area, and fix it. Your state government, state public utilities commission (government), county government or city government is keeping competition out. Figure it out and fix it.
See that "Preview" button?
perpetuanium
But of course, some will be more neutral than others.
A continuum exists between "trolling" and "serious, thoughtful discussion". The provocative language of the post is clearly further to one side of the continuum. Besides, if there were any thought put into the post, it wouldn't have glaring inconsistencies like attributing the rise of Facebook and Google to regulations that weren't in place until 2 years ago. Whatever argument he might have been trying to make has been totally thrashed repeatedly in this thread.
These days, we have genuine trolls who use "freedom of thought/expression" in the manner that a terrorist uses a human shield. Some of them don't even know they're trolling. Some have just been reading other troll posts and web sites and think this is the thing to do. There has been a lot of funny business surrounding the net neutrality issue, beyond the usual Telecom lobbying. like the flood of automated comments against net neutrality on the FCC's web site and their refusal to investigate it. Come to think of it, there's been a lot of similar funny business around the FCC chairman himself, and the man who appointed him.
You won't know a deceptive actor by his name or face or UID, but you will know him by his actions.
YouTube is the best example of how Net Neutrality is supposed to work. For those that don't remember, YouTube competed against Google and Google didn't make any headway. So Google bought them out. Without equal treatment of packets, that would never have happened.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
How? By site policies being neither here nor there with respect to net neutrality.
The whole point of net neutrality is to create a kind of unfettered competition between information sources, not to compel every information source to have a policy for its content that you approve of. The solution to your not liking Yourtube's monetization policy is to turn to a different site, something you'll be hampered from doing under a non-neutral Internet.
If you take away net neutrality, do you open the door to competition? Why can't your city do what is being planned for my city, that is free everywhere wifi. Our big cross-Canada ISP is rolling out fibre to remote villages, and to new subdivisions. It is fibre to the home. The interface is fibre to modem-router.
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
In case it was not already glaringly obvious, consider how amazingly applicable the extract from the Tao Te Ching is to today's USA.
More and more prohibitions... and the people (except for the 1%) have become steadily poorer.
The more "sharp weapons" (nowadays mostly guns, although knives are also common), the greater the chaos (mass shootings..., police brutality...)
The more clever and crafty the people become (in response to the cleverness and craftiness of politicians, Wall Street, and their pet lawyers), the more "unusual affairs" occur (Enron, Bernie Madoff, pretty much everyone on Wall Street, the Democratic Party, the Republicn Party, the CIA...)
The more laws and regulations, the more thieves and brigands. Well, just look at them!
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
I would agree with you....except there have been various blocking mechanisms in place and the net neutrality regulations only when some large ISPs began demanding payments so as to not throttle back speeds.
There were large content creators that were also large nationwide ISPs in the 1980s? Because that's what we're dealing with now.
Yea, I mean, if years ago, imagine how the net would be destroyed if a company like Time Warner and America Online had merged to become a mega.... Oh, wait...
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
The way to regulate is to wait until anti-competitive or anti-consumer behavior manifests, THEN start rolling out the rules.
Too late. And very difficult to do once a company has monetized some particular behavior. You'll get shareholders to come crying to their legislators to lay off, lest the proposed rules harm profits and their holdings value.
Prospective regulation is a recipe for stifling innovation and locking in the status quo.
Fine. I want to buy a product that meets some consistent and repeatable standards. Innovation can be provided by new entrants into new markets, selling their products as enhancements to the current baseline. I'd be really pissed if my power company started delivering 48 Vdc or 400 Hz power to my house tomorrow.
Have gnu, will travel.
I'm not sure why you'd say it wasn't commercialized. It was open and blossomed commercially from like, 1993 on.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
As someone who's been on 'The Internet' since 1992 via a dialup account at standard tool and die, I can say the conversation on both sides has merits, and it's not trolling. Personally, I happen to disagree, and think net neutrality is a power grab by the FCC to legislate something that the government should have no roll in.
The internet was created, NOT by the us government, but by the whole over time. Yes, the groundwork was founded, however, it was rightfully relinquished years ago. Why should the US government legislate something which has no legal definition.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
If I had mod points, this would get bumped up. People assume that there is no options, and as such, much be legislated all to hell. Fostering new ways to connect, and removing impediments to competition, is the true answer, so people can speak with their $$.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
However, people in Canada are free to set up their own alternatives. US doesn't like Chinas policies, and as such, don't use their services. No different. Being an open environment means, anyone can wake up tomorrow and provide something new and better then the alternatives.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
So, call your representatives, and make it a law, now an arbitrary rule.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
And with that, it also means that we need to regulate how you wipe your bum in the toilet. I mean, we haven't regulated it so far, but nuclear weapons are regulated, so obviously.........
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Yes, there were.
In any case, whatever problem you delude yourself into thinking exist in the marketplace, regulation by the FCC is not the answer.