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Comcast Hints At Plan For Paid Fast Lanes After Net Neutrality Repeal (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For years, Comcast has been promising that it won't violate the principles of net neutrality, regardless of whether the government imposes any net neutrality rules. That meant that Comcast wouldn't block or throttle lawful Internet traffic and that it wouldn't create fast lanes in order to collect tolls from Web companies that want priority access over the Comcast network. This was one of the ways in which Comcast argued that the Federal Communications Commission should not reclassify broadband providers as common carriers, a designation that forces ISPs to treat customers fairly in other ways. The Title II common carrier classification that makes net neutrality rules enforceable isn't necessary because ISPs won't violate net neutrality principles anyway, Comcast and other ISPs have claimed.
But with Republican Ajit Pai now in charge at the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast's stance has changed. While the company still says it won't block or throttle Internet content, it has dropped its promise about not instituting paid prioritization. Instead, Comcast now vaguely says that it won't "discriminate against lawful content" or impose "anti-competitive paid prioritization." The change in wording suggests that Comcast may offer paid fast lanes to websites or other online services, such as video streaming providers, after Pai's FCC eliminates the net neutrality rules next month.
But with Republican Ajit Pai now in charge at the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast's stance has changed. While the company still says it won't block or throttle Internet content, it has dropped its promise about not instituting paid prioritization. Instead, Comcast now vaguely says that it won't "discriminate against lawful content" or impose "anti-competitive paid prioritization." The change in wording suggests that Comcast may offer paid fast lanes to websites or other online services, such as video streaming providers, after Pai's FCC eliminates the net neutrality rules next month.
We're gonna turn into Portugal, and it's going to be a big fuckin mess.
Vonal Declosion
to grasp that concept that if there is prioritization, then de-prioritization must be occurring at the same time. "Fast Lanes" create de-facto "Slow Lanes"
Sounds like scope for a very small white-list of very large companies to me.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
You didn't think they spent a ton of money on political donations and PR for nothing, did you?
What was that about Obama instituting policies that were unnecessary and unneeded?
Wasn't that one of the major arguments against NN?
Looks like next election Democrat sites and ads might get de-prioritized and blocked legally to thank the republicans.
This is Comcast stirring up pro-NN political pressure.
These companies that are in favor of the rules & regulations they call NN do so because they benefit and protect their monopolies and bottom-line.
Don't forget that classifying ISPs as common-carriers places them under the requirements CALEA laws & regulations.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
The prioritization is mostly in last mile since that is where comcast has relevance. Why is comcast relevant in the last mile? Because no one but the big ISPs are allowed to lay cable to the last mile.
The solution has and will continue to be ensuring Right of Way access to Poles and Conduits for alternative infrastructure providers.
to prove this is a shit show, examine that even Google... one of the richest and most powerful companies in the world frequently cannot lay last mile cable.
Think about that.
They have the resources.
They have the connections.
They have the ability to do the paper work and the regulations.
But they can't get access to poles and conduits to lay last mile cable.
Why?
And if they can't, what chance does a smaller company have to compete? It has NOTHING to do with net neutrality. It has everything to do with corrupt franchise license agreements that lock out everyone but the local duopoly.
People need to stop clapping like trained seals and see what is actually been going on all along. Rather than fixate on NN, focus on ACTUAL Right of Way access to poles and conduits for alternative service providers.
Do that and Comcast and say or do whatever they want. Worst case they'll make themselves poor service providers and will lose market share.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Because I'm sure someone will foolishly argue against the obvious:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2...
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Lots of companies offer faster services, fast lanes does not equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
I was at the movie theater the other day with my family. There was a long line at the concession stand. I noticed a sign that said "premium members" pointing to an empty set of ropes. I reminded my wife that we were premium members. We got in that line and were called to the next open cashier - ahead of at least a dozen people who where waiting before us.
Unless there is no line at all, fast lines absolutely do equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
Interestingly, back in the old days the common carrier status was what the ISPs used to argue that they shouldn't be held responsible for material like child porn, regular porn, copyrighted material, hate speech, etc. that traversed their networks. Now they want to relinquish the common carrier status. How long do you think it's going to be before some attorney or DA figures this out and goes after them?
All the "What if" scenarios are simply what the ISPs have been stating they want to do. It's not crazy tin foil conspiracies. It's planned reality.
Why do you think fast lanes would be necessary? Because they will throttle you if you don't pay more!
They're already throttling OpenVPN and ssh connections globally under the pretense that all encrypted traffic constitutes unlawful use. Why have they still been allowed to get away with this while claiming they're not doing it?
I don't think you understand how networks work, you cannot overclock your bandwidth.
And please stop muddying the discussion with "the real issue", that is not what this is about (which you acknowledge). I'm not saying it's not important, however, that is not what is being "debated". Save it for when that issue actually is up for "debate" and stop shifting the discussion. All you are doing is muddying the water, either on purpose or on accident, but it is not what is needed right now.
All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up.
This whole hysteria over "Comcast could do X" is just that. If you read TFA, that's what you see. Comcast could do X. Comcast could do Y. If you get rid of law A, Comcast could do Z. Comcast didn't repeat their previous promises verbatim, so that means they intend on doing now what they promised not to then.
Hate for what they do, if you must, not for what you think they could do. You only weaken your arguments against what they do when you go off into predictions and coulds.
Lots of companies offer faster services, fast lanes does not equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
Er what? That's like saying there's plenty of Google fiber in the country. Just not in my neighborhood or many other neighborhoods, but man, is Google Fiber fast.
With LTE 5 and ViaSat 2 that just went up, and Viasat 3 going up in 2019, Facebook & Google offering internet access, within 5 years, Intenet access will be even more accessible and global.
Again what? Mobile isn't a replacement for broadband. Fiber that isn't in my neighborhood isn't a suitable replacement. Like many Americans, all we have limited broadband options. It isn't also about money. For example, broadband availability for 90210 shows 1 viable cable and 1 DSL provider (Time Warner Spectrum and AT&T) for most of the zip code. There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area. There are 2 satellite services. There is no fiber option. I would say that 90210 is a pretty affluent zip code. And yet they can't get more than 2 choices.
FCC is working on guidelines to communities to allow new community ISPs and new companies to run services to the pole.
Are we talking about the same national ISPs that sued local municipal ISPs from providing service to towns that they themselves didn't service?
The FCC deregulating ISP's so smaller ISP's dont have the same regulations as big carriers and can now evenly compete again.
Again the history of ISPs shows that the big carriers will not tolerate smaller ones. This has the opposite effect of what you are saying.
All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up. Its all "What if" scenarios, for a bill that's only been in place for 2 years and didn't fix the monopoly issue.
So your argument against net neutrality is that it was put into place for 2 whole years and it didn't break up monopolies that have been in place for decades besides the fact net neutrality was never meant to break up the monopolies. Ever. The regulations were in place to keep the monopolies from gaining an unfair advantage, not to break them up.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
...ISP to offer 'fast lanes', and it's all over. Everyone else will follow suit. Then the blocking and throttling of competitors services.
Ready yourselves for Intersplit.
Great fucking job. I hope those of you that voted for this got what you wanted.
My kingdom for some mod points!
I'm 100% for the free flow of packets, but doing it via title 2 is potentially a VERY bad idea, and yet there's a hysterical reaction to all this that title 2 is the only way to save the internet (when in reality, it could be it's death knell). Tell the legislators to get off their lazy asses and make a title 3 especially for it, so the internet is not regulated by a law from 1934.
You are aware that it was the ISPs that forced themselves into being Title II right? Verizon in particular sued the FCC saying that it had no right to regulate them under Title I. The court agreed and said Verizon could be regulated under Title II. Thus that's what the FCC did. There is no Title III but do you want to rest your hopes on Congress passing something? This Congress?
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
.. and it would be immoral for them not to use and abuse them.
It's our fault that we are where we are, and we can hardly blame a company for gouging us while we sleep at the wheel.
No, not bitter at all.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Follow the money. Comcast and other providers don't care about what you post on Facebook et al. They want to create prioritized "lanes" (really routing) between high-bandwidth providers and consumers. Think "I want to charge Netflix to stream faster on my network, then turn around and charge people who stream from Netflix a 'premium access fee' because they use more bandwidth." This has nothing to do with speech and everything to do with identifying and milking high-bandwidth users of their network.
All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up. Its all "What if" scenarios, for a bill that's only been in place for 2 years and didn't fix the monopoly issue.
Need I remind you that Comcast doing fuckery to the net is exactly why Net Neutrality was enacted and made into law? It's painfully obvious ISP's *WILL* engage in fuckery when the gloves are off. The hyperbole isn't. The sky is indeed falling, bro.
Sample list of things ISP's have done and are not just "what if" scenarios:
Madison River blocking Vonage
Comcast blocking p2p
AT&T/Apple blocking Skype/Google Voice
Windstream Communications hijacking search queries
MetroPCS tried to block streaming video
Cavalier, Cogent, Frontier, Fuse, DirecPC, RCN, and Wide Open West hijacking search queries
AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon blocking Google Wallet
Verizon blocking tethered connections
AT&T blocking FaceTime
People need to stop clapping like trained seals and see what is actually been going on all along. Rather than fixate on NN, focus on ACTUAL Right of Way access to poles and conduits for alternative service providers.
It's not an either/or situation. We can push for Right of Way access but that will take years to build out the infrastructure. In the mean time, we can ensure the ISPs don't mess with the existing Internet. Also I have to point out that even if there was more Right of Way, that doesn't stop any ISP from prioritizing traffic according to their own guidelines.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
The summary is biased, and the story already has 8 different versions of it in the last 3 days (i.e. Pai is the devil incarnate). Enough is enough.
Also, Just for the record, reclassifying the internet as title 2 has other implications. The FCC gets the same power over it as radio. That means anything from forced "decency filters" to "providing equal time for opposite view points" (hello fairness doctrine).
I'm 100% for the free flow of packets, but doing it via title 2 is potentially a VERY bad idea, and yet there's a hysterical reaction to all this that title 2 is the only way to save the internet (when in reality, it could be it's death knell). Tell the legislators to get off their lazy asses and make a title 3 especially for it, so the internet is not regulated by a law from 1934.
Sigh. It's misinformation like this that propagates the need to repost the issue OVER AND OVER, cuz idiots like you just don't fucking get it.
The NN rules enacted in 2015, classifying ISP's as Title II common carrier had MANY MANY exemptions to Title II's so as to not apply stupid nonsense telecom rules to ISPs.
Title II is exactly the correct classification with the built-in exemptions. They are common carriers, and should be treated and behave as such.
If you're expecting new laws out of the Republicans, you'll be waiting an awful long time. Repubs are so disorganized and disagree with each other on everything, because deep inside, they know they're defending undefendable positions. It's fucking hilarious. They've done absolutely nothing since Trump took office, they're no less deadlocked than they were with Obama was President. Except now, all the excuses are used up, they have no excuse other than outright incompetence. I don't want that incompetent congress passing laws.
And while we're at it, what was wrong with the fairness doctrine? All I hear now on the radio is loudmouth right-wing the sky is falling armageddon is here bullshit, ever since that was revoked.
Look at the VPN products that can escape the best China and its global contractors could do with the Great Firewall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
What new things could a US ISP do that China did to do to control all its domestic networks? The best VPN products got around some of the most well funded and intrusive global network tracking by Communists governments.
Given a level playing field a VPN with the best staff will win and offer its users the freedom to enjoy fast networks int he USA every day.
How will a politically well connected ISP stop a VPN that can change to any attempts to detect, slow or block its encrypted products?
Call in the US federal government to track US VPN CC payments? To block CC payments to a VPN service detected been active in the USA?
To report VPN users who attempt to pay for a VPN with a US CC?
What a ISP cant win on a network they will enforce with new federal network use and CC payment regulations?
Federal color of law changes will keep the USA in the slow lane?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
They will not create fast lanes, they will use the exact same infrastructure to create slow lanes while charging for the non-slow ones. If you thought they didn't invest enough in infrastructure, imagine if they could extract more money for the same installed base.
Slashdot: Where the sig outsmarts the comment
Go right ahead, Comcast, kill the golden goose if that's what you really want to do. People will put up with all sorts of crap, but as soon as you start literally hamstringing the basic service they're paying for, then demanding what amounts to danegeld to put it back the way it was, there will be a revolt. I'm already prepared to ditch you and the Internet in general if it comes to that, rather than put up with this sort of bullshit.
Walled Garden Reloaded. Working in one of their callcenters 15 years ago still gives me the willies.
In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is king--and the two-eyed man is a heretic.
This is exactly what Slashdot was created for.
But you must be one of those new people
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
And whom might I pay for this faster internet speed? Spectrum and AT&T don't seem to want my money, or at least, provide it. I live 2 blocks from a major medical research facility and I have 25mb AT&T for $75 or 50mb Spectrum $99. Bundled. I stopped at 12 for $50 since I couldn't tell the difference in the two and I could only have the higher with Uverse. Which I don't want. My next option is business fiber: 12k to run it and $1600 a month for 100mbs. Is this a viable option?
Is this the sort of mental gymnastics people go through to convince themselves that NN is bad?
So you want a free market enforced by government regulations and infrastructure built by municipalities?
And you also want a free market that lets Johnny/Jane Q get the minimal amount of resources together to create a competing "service" that totally screws over existing infrastructure?
What kind of insane cognitive dissonance is this?
No its not, I said companies offer faster services, its called priority services and its not just internet related. Saying ISP's can only offer faster services for medical, is the only one needing faster priority is a weak argument. Traders want faster service and built out their own networks.
Which is relevant and helpful how to millions of Comcast customers, how? Most people can't build their own network you know and don't do high speed trading.
Well actually it is. There are many communities that dont have high speed broadband, not everyone lives in the the cities, many live in rural america. Wanting things to be real vs what is real, I'm talking about is current and real.
Did you even read my post? You don't get many options for broadband in Beverly Hills, CA not to say middle of nowhere, Alaska. Please tell me how the one example of 90210 doesn't destroy your argument?
ViaSat 3 and LTE5 is a contender with terabyte speeds. Try doing some damn research on where the tech is going.
So how fast do you max out your mobile cap at supposed "terabyte" speeds? Or did you think that most mobile having a data cap really limits what you can do thus mobile isn't a substitute for broadband. As for satellite, you are aware that Viasat 3 will not provide "terabyte" speeds? Or have you not done your research?
Again, no, the history of ISPs show you are wrong. The history is many cities gave them monopoly because they had no IDEA what the Internet was. Some cities went the other way and put in dark fiber and even allowed community ISPs. There is no universal access. States are widely different.
What? Are you not aware of the multiple instances where a city tried to build broadband to service their towns because there was no broadband only to be sued by the major ISPs to prevent them from doing so?
My argument is what exactly I said it was. Deregulation and competition is a good thing, more choice is good. And your hyperbole of "the internet is gonna die!" is bullshit.
Ah the deregulation == good, regulation == bad argument. That's extremely simple thinking especially since you are rooting for less choice not more. And you don't even know it. But to be clear, you fault net neutrality for not taking down monopolies even though that was never the intent?
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
My fucking phone company doesn't get to charge me for the privilege of calling a certain area code
You mean like long-distance calling?
actually, given the history of these companies I think it is rather likely they *will* create fast lanes. I get that this is the FUD/Vaporware level at the moment, but I would be completely unsurprised if (when) it comes to pass. I'll wager it'll happen before the end of Trump's first term so that it is harder ("you'll hurt business!") to re-implement NN when Trump's out.
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Hahah I never said I like it. See until we somehow convince our own citizens of the fact that we have the most powerful military in the world by far, they're going to keep demanding that we sink unlimited money into it to "keep up" with the rest of the world.
The idea that the rest of the world doesn't take us serious because we're too soft is also popular.
The fact is that the rest of the world is terrified of us and if we took nukes off the table we could probably conquer more of the globe than the axis power and soviet union combined. Americans are somehow the last people to believe it.
Comcast: "We only want the option to throttle and block content...we would never, ever actually do that but we want the ability to do it even though we never would. Trust us, we'd never do that but we still want to be able to do it even though we'd never really do that, even though we want the ability to do it..."
It's like when my 5-year old son said he just wanted to "hold the candy" and he assured me that he wouldn't eat it, he just wanted to hold it...
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
The ISP will respond as China has. By watching, locating and then crippling IP traffic that *they* determine is a VPN traffic.
This will then create an arms race between new VPN protocols and ISPs. But since the ISP controls the access of the VPN to other nodes they can just look for traffic patterns that they've identified as a VPN traffic (which will became a violation of the customers terms of service) and block it or better yet flip a few random bits to make it slow or fail randomly.
When the duopoly makes VPNs a violation of the terms of service unless you pay EXTRA $$$ (Hello Business Customers! Cha Ching!) you'll have to pay EXTRA to be allowed to use a VPN. Oh you, want the VPN to be fast? That will also cost extra.
Deep packet inspection is cheap enough that when tied with contract law the loss of Network Neutrality will allow ISPs who are in Duopoly or Monopoly markets to do what ever they want to those "locked in" customers and the content providers that want access to those customers.
Facebook is billions of individual "Skinner Boxes." And if you use it you are the pigeon!
Thanks alot.
Apparently your tax cuts and Hillary emails were more important than the freedom of your countrymen.
You didn't do research at all on his party or his views. Of course he is going to put in cronys and foxes to watch the henhouse. Every Republican since Reagan hates government and supports big business and doesn't believe in regulation as freedom == communism for some reason. Now we will end up like Portugal and have to pay addons for websites and services you use in addition to your cable bill.
You all get what you voted for. For the rest of who didn't vote for him a big FU and I hope your job and life is impacted hard by this so you can see what he/his party stands for rather than good soundbites on FoxNews.
http://saveie6.com/
This has nothing to do with speech and everything to do with identifying and milking high-bandwidth users of their network.
Why shouldn't the high-bandwidth users pay more for their use? If 1% of the people are using 50% of the available bandwidth, why shouldn't they be charged a lot more than the 99% who split the other half? Yes, I deliberately put this in terms of the "1%-ers".
There are already tiers of access, so how is charging high-bandwidth users more changing anything? It isn't against net neutrality to charge more for more service.
You mean like long-distance calling?
And in the same vein, I get a "fast-lane" because I pay extra for "extended local area" calling. OMG, the telephone sky is falling!
Like many Americans, all we have limited broadband options. It isn't also about money. For example, broadband availability for 90210 [broadbandnow.com] shows 1 viable cable and 1 DSL provider (Time Warner Spectrum and AT&T) for most of the zip code. There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area. There are 2 satellite services. There is no fiber option. I would say that 90210 is a pretty affluent zip code. And yet they can't get more than 2 choices.
If the incumbent ISPs really do end up jacking rates for full internet access like all the Chicken Littles fear, that price differential will create a market incentive for one of the nearby providers to come in to your neighborhood and poach the hell out of the disaffected customer base. This seems pretty basic.
Put your tin-foil hat on with me and hang on . . . . .
Now this is going to be giving the government a LOT of credit in the smarts department ( unwarranted in their entire history, but bear with me ).
What if, the removal of Net Neutrality is a litmus test to see how bad things will get once the restrictions are removed ? You know all the big players are salivating at the mere IDEA that they can do as they please once the rules are removed. I'm sure entire Business Strategies are being developed around it. It would be naive for the government not to realize this.
What if the whole thing is designed to see how the players are going to act once they believe no one is watching them any longer ?
A test, of sorts, to prove that given the opportunity, the big ISP's absolutely cannot be relied upon to self-govern because their greed knows no limits. Thus, the reason ( and need ) for regulation to begin with. They fuck this up and they'll have nothing to fall back on this time. The Second Coming of the Regulation Hammer will leave few unscathed.
You and I know that those who own the pipes are going to do everything in their power to screw over the competition in favor of their own services. This is practically a given as this was one of the big reasons for establishing NN to begin with.
What if the plan is to use all of the bad behavior we're going to see in the near future as evidence for breaking these behemoth companies up into smaller ones once again ? ( Aka: Divestiture II ) Or, at the very least, use that threat to make sure these idiots don't get too stupid with their heavy-handedness. Pretty sure they'll agree to play nice if the threat of losing their Mono / Duopoly status is at risk.
Just a fun thought :D
If the incumbent ISPs really do end up jacking rates for full internet access like all the Chicken Littles fear, that price differential will create a market incentive for one of the nearby providers to come in to your neighborhood and poach the hell out of the disaffected customer base. This seems pretty basic.
What nearby providers? I think you're under the assumption that there are providers nearby. That the big ISPs won't sue and obstruct any kind of competition like they currently do now.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
The internet as we know it in the US has existed for a very long time with limited laws and regulations. Most laws and regulations simply do not work as technology finds ways around them. I understand technology has evolved to grant ISP's the ability block and throttle specific connections, but vice versa the free market approach along with technology like tunneling and encryption also work around most anything ISP's can do. This is why the internet is so great.
With the repealing of NN, ISPs are quite capable of throttling all packets that are not in their priority paid list.
I would rather governments create laws to open up telephone poles, wireless spectrums and enable municipality built networks vs laws which really do not mean much and are easily circumvented. If there were more competition in the free markets companies that throttle, block or have fast lanes will lose to those companies that do not. Again free market.
You seem to think you live in a Communications 'free market'. If Google can't do it, startups won't be able to either. Until there is tangible benefits to your politicians, they won't bother doing anything about that - and current donations by incumbent telcos could be quite hard to beat.
User name checks out, comments confirm; prepare for a brave new world.
I think you're under the assumption that there are providers nearby.
Um, I'm under no assumption at all. Seems to me you're the very same UnknowingFool I replied to who said "There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area." You're apparently now just splitting hairs on what you consider "nearby" to be (apparently it's somehow different than in "the area").
What is wrong with the Portugal arrangement? You can have a plain old data plan, but for streaming media apps you can have extra bandwidth so you can use them without worrying about running out of data... if you don't buy any of them you can stream data from any service you like with no speed reduction or other issue. All it does is give the user a bargain price for data to some destinations which is what 95% of people actually want (see: Netflix). It's not blocking anything, it's not throttling anything.
What is honestly so bad about this, when it's what so many people want?
If Net Neutrality would have blocked what is happening in Portugal then was it actually a good thing when it would block something so many people wanted...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Lots of people paying for extra bandwidth for specific purposes funds infrastructure that benefits all traffic, especially in off-peak times.
For example, right now everyone is on Comcast streaming Netflix, right? So that means that at common viewing times the whole system slows down - that is today, with none of the extra paid traffic stuff in play.
Now let people pay some small amount for guaranteed levels of service for Netflix. If most people in my neighborhood did that, then all of the sudden Comcast has to add equipment to provide a higher base level of service to the area at peak times. It's true my own service would stay capped to the levels I had bought it at and so would not get any faster, but it would also mean there would be far fewer dips in my own service during peak or other times because of the upgraded equipment maintaining a consistent feed to others around me.
I don't see how people can look at extra money going into a network provider over what they get today and imagine any way to see worse service. That is the real mystery to me.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
OK, 976.
Whatever the big isp's want, the end result is that everyone else isn't allowed to run the cable. So my point is literally accurate.
I see your point... but if we are to quibble it is also that there is corruption from local and state government to support the big ISPs. The bribes are there and it is very hard to extract bribe money from a large collection of companies without it getting out. It is very easy to maintain a corrupt relationship between a couple companies especially when in return for the bribes they get a monopoly which more than compensates the companies for the graft payments.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
NN does nothing. If anything, I want the monopolies that NN enshrines in law to do bad things to piss people off. I want the monopolies crushed.
I'm very happy to create a shit show that lasts a couple years to get a long term solution to the problem.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
NN ultimately is about treating the ISPs like old ma bell. I do not want that. It is either/or.
If you accept the existing NN concept, then you're conceding the monopolies get to be monopolies indefinitely.
No. I don't want NN. I want competition. I want right of way to the poles. Anything less is a farce.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
What part of 3% is hard to understand? That's essentially the same as no competition. Would you take 3% of your salary if a competing company offered it to change jobs? Also did you not understand that is is 90210. These people could afford more expensive internet if they wanted. But even in a rich affluent zip code they really only have 2 providers.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
There is plenty of pole space to run additional wires.
And the only reason they don't lease their wires to other people or portions of their bandwidth is because they have a monopoly on the wires.
Imagine if other people were running wires. Then the big ISP would have two choices... either lease none of its wire and get ZERO from the traffic flowing over the OTHER wires... or open access to their wires simply to get SOMETHING from the traffic by attracting it back to their own network.
And if there were ever any bullshit, people would just stop using their wires.
It solves the problem.
We have plenty of space for additional wires. What does the ISP pay the city per pole? I'm sure there is a calculation on that. Whatever that rate is, open that up so that anyone else running cable pays the same rate... per pole.
If there are so many wires on the poles that there actually isn't room... which is very unlikely. But lets say that happens, you'll be getting enough money from the pole fees to pay for a more elaborate solution.
Possibly conduits. Certainly in metro areas there isn't much reason to have poles at all. And again, the pole fees collectively would make the whole thing pay for itself.
And even IF what I'm saying is wrong... and I don't think it is... but EVEN IF... try it. Why forbid the experiment if you're so certain it will fail? Let it happen.
I think it will succeed and people are afraid it will work and prove all the doom and gloom to be bullshit.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
What part of 3% is hard to understand?
What part of "if... then" is hard to understand?
Also did you not understand that is is 90210. These people could afford more expensive internet if they wanted.
Perfect -- then in the highly unlikely event that any of these doomsday scenarios come to pass and the beautiful people become dissatisfied with the incumbent ISPs, that willingness to pay will provide plenty of incentive for others to come in and fill the void.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Unless you know of a company that has completely separate networks for their fast lanes, faster service comes at the expense of the rest. Note that faster is different from higher bandwidth.
What part of "if... then" is hard to understand?
So to be clear you'll take another job that pays you 3% of your job?
Perfect -- then in the highly unlikely event that any of these doomsday scenarios come to pass and the beautiful people become dissatisfied with the incumbent ISPs, that willingness to pay will provide plenty of incentive for others to come in and fill the void.
Well now you're assuming that people are not dissatisfied now and don't have an incentive now? That's are rather major hole in your logic. I don't know where you live but Time Warner is generally hated everywhere.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
NN ultimately is about treating the ISPs like old ma bell. I do not want that. It is either/or.
No, NN was about treating the ISPs like the jerks that they were. It's like a noise ordinance. Nobody really wants a noise ordinance telling you when you can and cannot play your music. That is until you get that one jerk neighbor who insists on playing his music full blast all night for weeks straight. Most rules are not in place because of the considerate people; they're in place for the jerks. Why is either/or? Are you saying that the FCC under a different director can't do both? It seems like there's no legal or technical reason they can't both.
If you accept the existing NN concept, then you're conceding the monopolies get to be monopolies indefinitely.
Logical fallacy: argument by assertion. You have to show how NN would advance monopolies; I don't.
No. I don't want NN. I want competition. I want right of way to the poles. Anything less is a farce.
No you don't want regulation. You think that is the only path to competition. It is not.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
There is no fiber option. I would say that 90210 is a pretty affluent zip code.
Indeed, because Beverly Hills is building out their own fiber to every premise in the city, including multi-family units and businesses. The project has a 5-year (2017-2021) timeline from ground-breaking to service online throughout the city. The goal is to offer basic internet services at a monthly cost of around $55. No contracts and no installation fees will be required except in rare cases where the set-back from residence to street is beyond the norm, or should home construction materials present unusual challenges.
"We said what? Oh right, well fuck that, we changed our mind, just pay up!"
Most countries have forced the companies owning the last mile infrastructure to open it up on fair terms to competitors.
For example, in the UK it's BT that owns the shitty copper cable running into your house. You have to pay them rent for that, but at least you can choose which ISP you want to deliver your data. And BT can't charge that ISP more than it charges its own ISP, BT Internet.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Well, enjoy your post-NN world when you (expensively) buy a 100Mb/s line to your local ISP so you can post on facebook like a teen, thinking that with that much bandwidth you'll always have plenty spare and will never use it all. Then you fire up Netflix and it stutters and scrapes like hell.
You call up your ISP and ask what's going on - they tell you "oh, for Netflix you have to pay extra", but then you protest that you're using less than 10% of your total bandwidth, and you even tried turning everything off so it was just Netflix running and it still didn't work. "Sorry sir, to use Netflix you have to pay extra".
Grudgingly, you pay the extra on top of your very hefty monthly fee for your "power user" connection. Then, magically, Netflix works just fine - yet none of the technology has changed. You don't get more bandwidth, no different equipment, you even get to keep your IP address. Somewhat confused, you try running a few other things at the same time as watching Netflix and it works just fine because you're still not actually saturating your bandwidth.
Helpfully though, your ISP tells you that you're on the "movie package", which also gives you super-fast access to uttershit.com, completetosh,com and braindumberingcrap.com, and over a hundred others. Sites you've never heard of, never want to use, but are now somehow paying for even though you never heard of them before.
Americans already pay way, way more for Internet access at home than pretty much any vaguely industrialised nation. It's about to get a whole world worse though - you're not going to get a discount because of NN going away, you're going to keep paying the same, but get worse service. To get better service, you'll have to pay for additional 'bundles' on top of your service.
Well they'd have to change how they market it, since it is sold as bandwidth.
Our local Old Navy now has a fast checkout lane for store credit card holders. Seems everyone is jumping on the "premium" bandwagon.
For the record -- I'm ALREADY paying for my high-bandwidth. $50 a month is a LOT more than the $14 for dial-up I used to use.
I do have an issue with companies committing fraud. For example : those that offer "unlimited" bandwidth now lying and saying "you should pay more". (I did pay more...I bought unlimited for a reason)
Because there are such things as minimums and terms of service. My parents don't watch a lot of Netflix, but when they do, it should be at the speeds Comcast advertised when they signed the contract. The stream shouldn't be slower because Comcast wants more money from Netflix or that Comcast wants them to buy the same content from them instead of Netflix.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
best way to do this is get a lawyer with a Daedric Pen to write up a set of contracts to include Service Level Agreements in the various tiers (and this would most likely make more money for the ISPs anyway)
the way it works now is they advertise Up to 200mbps (but no minimum) even with NN in effect they could setup the SLAs for either percent of uptime ( in say 75% 80% 90% 99.99%) or a minimum percent of your package speed (most likely 50% 70% 80% 90%). So instead of paying for different services and risking them oopsing during random months you would be paying them to ensure your connection works.
Except it limits what services you can use. What if I create netmovies.com as a competitor to Netflix?
Then anyone can use it since they are not limiting services in any way.
If you want to get in on a bundle they are offering for extra bandwidth for YOUR service, you can pay them just like all the other content providers.
But look at the real world case of T-Mobile - your new net movies.com service can implement the reduced bandwidth feed for free, and instantly you are part of Binge-On where using your service does not count against your data cap.
You can't use duck duck go as your search engine
Again, in Portugal they are blocking NOTHING AT ALL. you can use any service; it's just that with some services in a package you get extra bandwidth.
Lastly I pay the isp for a pipe. It provides me with an average of 50Mb persecond of service 24 hours a day. I get to choose what i stream over that
That is correct, except that pretty much anywhere that is a cap on speed, not a guaranteed rate (nor can it be since you don't know what kind of network the content you are trying to reach is on).
Portuguals system says i have to pay for that
NO. It says that in addition to what you described, you can have EXTRA bandwidth for specific content you like to access all the time, or in the case of your example it would probably mean something like 100Mbs for Netflix. But all your other traffic would be what you had paid for - how is extra bad? It cannot be.
In the end under portuguals system you pay 3-4 times what you shou is be paying for the same thing.
I think you are really confused about what they are offering, read the full linked article. You can access any of the services in the bundles without buying the bundles. If you don't want the traffic from, say, Netflix to count against your data cap then you buy that bundle. But you could easily use it without the bundle if you don't watch enough to care about it using up data.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So to be clear you'll take another job that pays you 3% of your job?
I'll be happy to answer that after you spell out the chain of logic (cough) leading from anything I actually said to your above conclusion. I'll not hold my breath.
Well now you're assuming that people are not dissatisfied now and don't have an incentive now? That's are rather major hole in your logic.
You really need to try to focus on my original point rather than whatever sort of caricature you're trying to twist my point into. Right now, all ISPs are basically providing the same service in the same general price band. As a simple economic matter, that tends to favor the incumbent that has already built out infrastructure. If (and this is where you really need to try to focus) at some point in the future conditions change (like rabid NetNeut proponents are convinced will happen) and other providers are able to sufficiently differentiate on either price or content to make them think they'll be able to pull over a large enough chunk of that customer base, they'll expand their own infrastructure and do just that.
Two bottom-line points I'll leave you with: (1) market forces still exist even if you personally don't believe in them; and (2) excessive governmental regulation is what gave the incumbents so much of a head start and have prevented market forces from working as smoothly and quickly in this space as they otherwise might. Yet more regulation would take us in precisely the wrong direction.
Hear me out ...
Do you really think the vast majority of people are going to pay extra on top of their already somewhat expensive Internet plans to browse Slashdot, YouTube, Reddit, etc, FASTER? I for one, despite being in the tech field, will not. I think you're going to find a lot of people that will not. Site usage will go down, and the lawsuits and injunctions will start to pile on. If they screw with my net connection too much I will either try to route around it (proxies, port trickery, etc) or just go without.
Legally the FCC can't classify them as title 1 (due to that damn court decision), so they classified the FCC classified the internet under title 2. That's not a good fit for it either though. I'm not blaming the FCC here for doing what it did.
No that's not what the court said. The FCC can classify ISPs as Title I but the court said that under Communications Act of 1934, the FCC could not enforce the regulations they wanted to enforce. The court specifically said under Title II the FCC could do that. Thus the FCC classified ISPs under Title II.
The ideal solution is for congress to amend title 1 (or make a new title 3) to include the internet. Will that happen? Probably not with this dysfunctional congress. Doesn't mean it's not the preferred solution though.
No because Title I has a specific provision. What you are saying is you need a Title VIII as other titles have been created. But not with this Congress.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
To sincerely feel this sentiment, one must actually be a Liberal — not an Authoritarian masquerading as such...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
It is very frustrating to see how ignorant most people are about this. The big telcos have apparently done an excellent job confusing you.
I'm sure it wasn't hard. The most recent 'man on the street' joke posited the question "Should Hillary be impeached?" I don't know how many citizens pointed out that Hillary wasn't president but there was no shortage of people who insisted that her actions warranted impeachment. (Among those who actually knew what impeachment was.)
Please.
You're citing them under title 2, citing them as a "common carrier"... and that is what gas line, power lines, etc are filed under. Effectively it treats last mile internet service as a public utility.
The problem with that is that last mile internet service is not like power, natural gas, water, etc. Yes, there is a local infrastructure that connects to your home but generally speaking it is unreasonable to have more than ONE water delivery system... ONE power delivery system etc.
What is more, these systems are generally socialized public utilities where as telecommunications are not.
It is both practical to have many providers laying cable in the same area and they are basically never owned by a quasi government agency.
In treating the duopoly in much the way that you treat interstate gas transport lines... you are presuming this similarity at a regulatory level. There is no interest in providing competition in such infrastructure because it is logistically counter productive.
This is again, not the case with telecommunications.
I want MANY choices. I want any company that lays cable in the area to know that if it provides bad service... all it takes is enough capital to lay the cable in the area with bad service... invested by practically anyone... to simply steal the market share of the area away from them.
I want pole and conduit right of way access to REASONABLE third party ISPs.
We saw recently that Louisville Kentucky was not able to get Google Fiber on its poles. Google Fiber is having a hard time getting pole Right of Way despite the city of Louisville wanting them to have it.
This is what is going on.
Competition is being stiffed at ground level.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
And if your socialized internet is shit what am I supposed to do then?
With my system we have choices.
With yours we not only have no choices but even if we choose nothing at all we're probably still going to be subsidizing your dumb system through tax dollars.
Your idea is even worse.
the existing system is a corporate monopoly. You want to resolve the matter with a government monopoly.
Hurray.
No. I want choices. Jumping from "lets trust a mega corporation" to "let us trust a corrupt/incompetent local government" is not helpful.
Proving your position is not helpful is that much of the current problems are the result of corruption and mismanagement by local and state governments. Your idea would empower the very agencies that have effectively created the problem to make them all powerful.
This is a failing UP scenario. If someone fucks up... you don't give them MORE power unless you are yourself a fool.
Consider NOT empowering agencies that consistently make mistakes.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
holy hyperbole batman... so anyone that argues for more than the duopoly is arguing for an infinity of cables...
How many brands of peanut butter are there in the grocery store?
is it an infinity of peanut butter or are you an idiot?
Don't get mad... you don't have the right. You said something stupid.
I'm not asking for infinity... what are you even saying ... there aren't even an infinity of people on the planet. I mean... what the actual fuck?
I envision somewhere between 3 and 10 providers depending on population density in any given area. Three being what I'd hope we could maintain in a rural environment and 10 being something you could probably maintain in a dense urban environment. We could well go beyond that which I would be fine with... within reason naturally. Everything I am saying should be understood to be within reason. I'm not a fanatic.
I'm foreseeing companies build out, some do well, some do poorly, different companies selling their cable to each other outright... the typical market back and forth.
The ACTUAL cost of equipment is relatively low. The relevant costs for rolling out these things and maintaining them is labor and licensing.
Labor is the problem of the ISP and from what I can see that isn't stopping anything. The LICENSING is stopping thing... call it what you will... franchise license... right of way access... whatever. The rubber stamp from the government that lets a company lay cable. I want that extended to anyone that can be shown to understand and respect the infrastructure and can pay the standard per pole rate.
If you have more people that want to run cable in an area than there is room on the pole then that is very exciting. It means that maybe we need to upgrade the pole. People would say "hey no one wants a bunch of ugly wires". Totally agree. So if we're getting that many people that want to run cable and they're all willing to pay the old per pole rate... and two carriers paying that per pole rate paid for the old poles... what does 5 times that rate pay for? Maybe a conduit? Who knows. The point is that if you have a higher traffic right of way cable corridor... then how you're stringing that cable can change based on demand. We may have a version of the high way system for cable. So poles for low traffic areas with few enough carriers that those poles are sufficient. And we might upgrade to a more robust infrastructure in cases where more cable needs to be run than can be supported by that system.
Here is where the government does a decent job. I think they do an okay job of maintaining poles and pipes. And in so far as I see them having a role in maintaining infrastructure, that is what I want them to do. I want them to provide space for other people to run wires. And I want them to lease that space out to the highest bidder. And then I want them expand the space as they run out of space so that there is always space for everyone that wants to run the cable that can afford the rate.
Keep in mind what I said there... afford the rate. There should be a standardized per foot or per pole rate for using the conduits and poles. Whatever the big ISPs pay is what the rate should be for everyone metered by use... as measured by distance and poles.
I want to put REAL pressure on these companies to provide good service or risk losing market share.
NN does not do that.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Imagine giving equal time to opposing view points on something like the Huffington Post. Or some climate change news website. Do you want a climate research website have an equally sized section by law dedicated to "climate deniers"? The site doesn't want that, the patrons of the site don't want that, and the gesture wont bring in any new people either.
I was referring to Fairness Doctrine related to radio, not websites. It doesn't even make sense for websites.
But I dunno, maybe it really does need to come back, for radio, cuz as a result of it getting repealed, we got left-leaning NPR and everything else is right-wing loudmouths whipping their listeners into an angry frenzy of distrust and hatred of...everything! Doesn't really seem like a good result.
I'm not closed minded, I do occasionally tune into the right-wing bullshit, just to hear the other side, and it's just so much nonsense and anger, and trying to make me feel angry too. Not really a good experience. But I guess the right likes to be angry and pissed off all the time, no wonder they're so unpleasant. I would be too if I was whipped into a frenzy of anger and hatred for 3 hours a day.
I'll be happy to answer that after you spell out the chain of logic (cough) leading from anything I actually said to your above conclusion. I'll not hold my breath.
You should scroll up and read what I wrote. If you're too lazy to do that, why should I bother?
You really need to try to focus on my original point rather than whatever sort of caricature you're trying to twist my point into. Right now, all ISPs are basically providing the same service in the same general price band.
That's the first flaw in your logic. Not all ISPs provide the same service. In the exact example of 90210 that I provided:
How are they "the same" service? Then there's the inconvenient fact that not all 4 can provide service to the entire area. At best only 3% of the consumers can get all 4.
. If (and this is where you really need to try to focus) at some point in the future conditions change (like rabid NetNeut proponents are convinced will happen) and other providers are able to sufficiently differentiate on either price or content to make them think they'll be able to pull over a large enough chunk of that customer base, they'll expand their own infrastructure and do just that.
So what you're saying is that I cannot use the reality which exists TODAY and instead focus on your wild hypothetical which may or may not exist tomorrow. Or ever.
Two bottom-line points I'll leave you with: (1) market forces still exist even if you personally don't believe in them; and (2) excessive governmental regulation is what gave the incumbents so much of a head start and have prevented market forces from working as smoothly and quickly in this space as they otherwise might. Yet more regulation would take us in precisely the wrong direction.
You need to demonstrate any of that is actually true. This is an argument by assertion logical fallacy. Otherwise your points are moot.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
In treating the duopoly in much the way that you treat interstate gas transport lines... you are presuming this similarity at a regulatory level. There is no interest in providing competition in such infrastructure because it is logistically counter productive.
I never presumed that. Please present any evidence that you know what I think.
We saw recently that Louisville Kentucky was not able to get Google Fiber on its poles. Google Fiber is having a hard time getting pole Right of Way despite the city of Louisville wanting them to have it.
And that was Google's only problem? You again are asserting a false dichotomy: It's only this right of way that is the "only" thing preventing many other ISPs from coming into Louisville.You don't think that the existing ISPs aren't doing everything within their power in other ways to prevent Google from coming in. This is extremely simplified thinking.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I don't think latency will be that much of an issue, since I think any kind of extra ability consumers would purchase would be more related to things like 4K video content - so they wouldn't need improved latency, just more bandwidth and a higher cap for some content.
Theoretically ISP's could offer a Gamer package which sought to improve latency, but there's only so much the ISP could do to shape traffic before it reached the shitty EA servers and died anyway. So I don't think we'll see that.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley