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FCC Plans December Vote To Kill Net Neutrality Rules (bloomberg.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: The U.S. Federal Communications Commission under its Republican chairman plans to vote in December to kill the net neutrality rules passed during the Obama era, said two people briefed on the plans. Chairman Ajit Pai in April proposed gutting the rules that he blamed for depressing investment in broadband, and said he intended to "finish the job" this year. The chairman has decided to put his proposal to a vote at the FCC next month, said the people. The agency's monthly meeting is to be held Dec. 14. The people asked not to be identified because the plan hasn't been made public. It's not clear what language Pai will offer to replace the rules that passed with only Democratic votes at the FCC in 2015. He has proposed that the FCC end the designation of broadband companies such as AT&T Inc. and Comcast Corp. as common carriers. That would remove the legal authority that underpins the net neutrality rules. One of the people said Pai may call for vacating the rules except for portions that mandate internet service providers inform customers about their practices. The current regulations forbid broadband providers from blocking or slowing web traffic, or from charging higher fees in return for quicker passage over their networks.
I remember when I got "@home" broadband; it was such a startling change from 56k dialup. Then there was 1.5Mbit asymmetric DSL, and then more cable-based broadband. I remember Napster, and downloading music 24/7 for *weeks*, and all the filesharing sites that were under the radar for a while. I remember being able to look up all sorts of stuff I never knew existed, and most of all, playing all the versions of DOOM, Duke Nukem 3D, Warcraft 2, and a plethora of other games, online, against total strangers, until the wee hours of the morning. Fun, fun, fun.
No matter. The Internet has been going to shit for a while now, and some piece of crap like Ajit Pai is dead set to pound the last nail into it's coffin. Sure, after Trump and his administration are all tossed out of office and/or convicted of some crime or other, we'll get someone else in the Whitehouse that will start to clean up the mess, but it'll take years, if not decades, to repair all the damage done to everything, all over the Country, and once the ISPs and other asshole corporations get their hooks into the Internet the way they've always wanted to, we may never be able to get things back on track again.
Well, guess when the end comes, I'll have more time to read..