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ISPs Won't Promise To Treat All Traffic Equally After Net Neutrality (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The FCC voted to put an end to net neutrality, giving internet providers free rein to deliver service at their own discretion. There's really only one condition here: internet providers will have to disclose their policies regarding "network management practices, performance, and commercial terms." So if ISPs want to block websites, throttle your connection, or charge certain websites more, they'll have to admit it. We're still too far out to know exactly what disclosures all the big ISPs are going to make -- the rules (or lack thereof) don't actually go into effect for another few months -- but many internet providers have been making statements throughout the year about their stance on net neutrality, which ought to give some idea of where they'll land. We reached out to 10 big or notable ISPs to see what their stances are on three core tenets of net neutrality: no blocking, no throttling, and no paid prioritization. Not all of them answered, and the answers we did get are complicated. [The Verge reached out to Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint, Charter (Spectrum), Cox, Altice USA (Optimum and SuddenLink), and Google Fi and Google Fiber.]
Many ISPs say they support some or all of these core rules, but there's a big caveat there: for six of the past seven years, there have been net neutrality rules in place at the FCC. That means all of the companies we checked with have had to abide by the no blocking, no throttling, and no paid prioritization rules. It means that they can say, and be mostly correct in saying, that they've long followed those rules. But it is, on some level, because they've had to. What actually matters is which policies ISPs say they'll keep in the future, and few are making commitments about that. In fact, all of the companies we contacted (with the exception of Google) have supported the FCC's plan to remove the current net neutrality rules. None of the ISPs we contacted will make a commitment -- or even a comment -- on paid fast lanes and prioritization. And this is really where we expect to see problems: ISPs likely won't go out and block large swaths of the web, but they may start to give subtle advantages to their own content and the content of their partners, slowly shaping who wins and loses online. Comcast: Comcast says it currently doesn't block, throttle content, or offer paid fast lanes, but hasn't committed to not doing so in the future.
AT&T: AT&T has committed to not blocking or throttling websites in the future. However, its stance around fast lanes is unclear.
Verizon: Verizon indicates that, at least in the immediate future, it will not block legal content. As for throttling and fast lanes, the company has no stance, and even seems to be excited to use the absence of rules to its advantage.
T-Mobile: T-Mobile makes no commitments to not throttle content or offer paid fast lanes and is unclear on its commitment to not blocking sites and services. It's already involved in programs that advantage some services over others.
Sprint: Sprint makes no commitments on net neutrality, but suggests it doesn't have plans to offer a service that would block sites.
Charter (Spectrum): Charter doesn't make any guarantees, but the company indicates that it's currently committed to not blocking or throttling customers.
Cox: Cox says it won't block or throttle content, even without net neutrality. It won't make commitments on zero-rating or paid fast lanes.
Altice USA (Optimum and SuddenLink): Altice doesn't currently block or throttle and suggests it will keep those policies, though without an explicit commitment. The company doesn't comment on prioritizing one service over another.
Google Fi and Google Fiber: Google doesn't make any promises regarding throttling and paid prioritization. However, it is the only company to state that it believes paid prioritization would be harmful.
Many ISPs say they support some or all of these core rules, but there's a big caveat there: for six of the past seven years, there have been net neutrality rules in place at the FCC. That means all of the companies we checked with have had to abide by the no blocking, no throttling, and no paid prioritization rules. It means that they can say, and be mostly correct in saying, that they've long followed those rules. But it is, on some level, because they've had to. What actually matters is which policies ISPs say they'll keep in the future, and few are making commitments about that. In fact, all of the companies we contacted (with the exception of Google) have supported the FCC's plan to remove the current net neutrality rules. None of the ISPs we contacted will make a commitment -- or even a comment -- on paid fast lanes and prioritization. And this is really where we expect to see problems: ISPs likely won't go out and block large swaths of the web, but they may start to give subtle advantages to their own content and the content of their partners, slowly shaping who wins and loses online. Comcast: Comcast says it currently doesn't block, throttle content, or offer paid fast lanes, but hasn't committed to not doing so in the future.
AT&T: AT&T has committed to not blocking or throttling websites in the future. However, its stance around fast lanes is unclear.
Verizon: Verizon indicates that, at least in the immediate future, it will not block legal content. As for throttling and fast lanes, the company has no stance, and even seems to be excited to use the absence of rules to its advantage.
T-Mobile: T-Mobile makes no commitments to not throttle content or offer paid fast lanes and is unclear on its commitment to not blocking sites and services. It's already involved in programs that advantage some services over others.
Sprint: Sprint makes no commitments on net neutrality, but suggests it doesn't have plans to offer a service that would block sites.
Charter (Spectrum): Charter doesn't make any guarantees, but the company indicates that it's currently committed to not blocking or throttling customers.
Cox: Cox says it won't block or throttle content, even without net neutrality. It won't make commitments on zero-rating or paid fast lanes.
Altice USA (Optimum and SuddenLink): Altice doesn't currently block or throttle and suggests it will keep those policies, though without an explicit commitment. The company doesn't comment on prioritizing one service over another.
Google Fi and Google Fiber: Google doesn't make any promises regarding throttling and paid prioritization. However, it is the only company to state that it believes paid prioritization would be harmful.
You think any company put money towards this to not benefit from it?
I truly believe in net neutrality. This is more about trying to exact fees from streaming services like Netflix. Netflix is currently set up as a networking peer. A network peer is a network provider that agrees to exchange traffic at a peering point with other service providers. Netflix is a content provider, not a service provider and therefore is not a peer and should be paying for bandwidth. That's the big thing that the ISP's are trying to get a handle on. I'm putting on the flame suit now.
I wonder if and how much this revocation could affect international visitors who are using USA based web services in case major US ISPs start throttling/prioritizing traffic.
To hear that ISPs won't promise to commit to all Net Neutrality tenets after paying so much money to get them removed...
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
And yet here you are writing things and I'm reading them without any of those companies being involved. But my ISP is still in the loop.
Check the news some time.
Google was recently caught reading the content of documents stored online, and locking people out of access to their own files because Google felt the content was inappropriate.
Twitter bans, shadow-bans, and permanently deletes accounts that have inappropriate content.
Reddit got rid of lots of conversations that had inappropriate content. Note that those conversations are opt-in; meaning, you have to seek them out to view them. People who don't participate in those conversations got those conversations banned because they don't like other people talking about certain things.
It seems conservative viewpoints are overwhelmingly censored for nothing, while liberal viewpoints that flagrantly violate the rules are given a wink and a smile (viz: "let's kill all white people").
Ajit Pai's recent video defending the NN decision was censored by YouTube.
You can post 1-line vanilla text is an anecdote.
The plural of anecdote is not "data".
Will the cable companies charge streaming providers like Hulu, Amazon Prime Video and Netflix for priority bandwidth to offset their losses of cable TV subscribers?
Really about slowing Netflix and getting you to keep/buy overpriced Cable TV.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
What is particularly worrying to me is how short the list of ISPs is (and this is after we include cellular providers, who are ISPs only in a wider sense of the word). There are more electricity generating companies out there than there are ISPs providing home broadband internet. USA truly does not have much choice here.
How is that an alternate view? The ISPs can now restrict you even further. For example, they could block you from any of the big players, or any website, or anything they don't like.
"If you have two enemies, fight the stronger one first." -- or something like that, Sun Tzu. Google/Facebook/Amazon are far bigger enemies to us than ISPs are. If NN repeal slows them down -- possibly since they lobbied for NN so much -- that will be the best possible outcome, then we can deal with ISPs. The fact that ISPs are forced to be transparent is in my opinion the only regulation we needed.
This is not a surprising response from the ISPs, but really what does this article really expect? Tell me now if you will ever do any traffic prioritization!! If you're getting information from a company, or our government, you're getting the PR department which is usually there to just pull the wool over our eyes. So even if they "promised" to never ever ever do bad stuff, they can always change their mind. Who cares if they say they will or they won't right now. Also, where did the list of official stances come from? I'm just curious who compiled it.
Clearly failed to click on the link.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Didn't understand the argument about competition, did you? Or maybe you failed to click on the link.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Wasn't the argument that Facebook Maximized evil by allowing Trump to be elected?
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
No I didn't understand the "argument". What does the fact that Facebook can censor the Internet have to do with NN????
Agreed. And Thank you for Winning the Prize of being the first person to comment on this *AFTER* reading the link.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Good luck trying to avoid these four.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Why not just make a cogent argument? Marxist, indeed.
Do you have any clue how many politicians they've bought at every level of the government?
From HOAs to townships to cities to countries to states to congress, they effectively own the fucking poles and the lines and were paid many of your tax dollars to own them and sit on them.
if they promise the FCC says they can be held liable for violating their promise.
So even if you intended to not violate NN, you would still not promise to avoid liability to the FCC.
So... consider that.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
This is troubling considering, since early Nov. of this year Comcast has throttled all devices on my network when 1 of my devices is connected to a VPN. Upload and download speeds are cut in half, until I turn off my work VPN connection. Within seconds the speed for all devices in my network doubles (phones, mac's, pc's, tablets, etc).
Datacollection does not equate to controlling other sites. Facebook does not control Slashdot.
Google might be the hardest to avoid, giving its status as a search engine. Alternative search engines would likely have to spread via word of mouth, or by a mass market shift away from Google, should Google decide to censor. Same goes for DNS providers.
Net Neutrality is about preventing much worse..
The truth is that your not going to know.
The current services will stay the same or get degraded and new services will be added that have faster speeds, its just going to get a lot more confusing as that is usually the business model. Confuse them so much that they will pick the most expensive plan, because it " lets you to do more, and your FB/Google/Youtube/Etc.. feeds will be that much better".
Once one company starts to do it, then they will all do it. But only after everyone forgot about all this in 6 months, when some new bigger news item is there.
You want fast access, pay for it. You want any access at all, pay for it. Let the market decide not the government. The less regulation the better off we are.
Ok. I'll go out and buy a spool of fiber right now. Can I walk across your property on my way to the peering location in my city? No? Then you're a fucking idiot and should shut up about things you don't understand.
A very satisfied customer here, full disclosure. Sonic.Net sent this out to their users. "Today, net neutrality regulations, which protect your right to an open and fair internet, have been repealed. For anyone who uses the internet (so, everyone), you may think this sounds really scary. And you’d be right. The protections that made it illegal for ISP’s to throttle certain websites or make you pay more to access others are gone. But, what we’re here to tell you is that no matter what, Sonic will remain committed to the principles of net neutrality. Sonic always has and always will keep our internet connections open and equal. You can watch what you want, when you want, on any content provider you choose (Netflix, Hulu, HBO, SlingTV-- it’s all the same to us). We will continue to protect your right to privacy, and your right to not have your own data sold or shared. Ever. We will never charge you more to access certain sites, and we will never slow down others for any reason. Sonic will continue to stand up for everything net neutrality stands for, whether the regulations require it or not. Since the beginning, Sonic has stood up for our customers. And that’s never going to change. For us, the responsibility we have to our members is not a passing trend. When we say there is nothing more important than the customers who make up the Sonic network, we mean it. We’ll continue to back up our words with official policies that benefit you. Please also share with your friends, family, and colleagues: you have a choice to support the ISPs that continue to support net neutrality and consumer privacy."
[UID-HeinzIntel]
They're "forced" to be transparent. As mud.
They don't have to disclose any blocking or traffic shaping or anything else - if it's done for "network management" purposes. Basically, multiple internet-is-a-series-of-tubes-with-trucks wide loophole in the forced disclosure.
So no, they're not going to disclose anything because they're just going to say it's all because they have to manage their networks appropriately.
Of course they won't promise that... they just paid a shitload of cash to buy the removal of impediments for them to earn tons more money.
I am 100% certain this is true. Today i was uploading files from behind mediacom in Des Moines to earthlink in Houston on my residential mediacom account. Files with different extensions transferred at different rates. A file with a .zip extension would upload at 100kbps average
A file with a .msi extension would upload at 2.5mbps average.
Tested this several times afyer noticing to confirm.
I won't promise not to hook Ajit Pai's nuts to a car battery and then use the lead to repeat the message in Morris code "Net Neutrality is fundamental to a free internet". Someday I hope regular people in the republican party realize that the party establishment only cares about corporate freedom, individual freedom and the protection of free market competition do not exist in their agenda. Just to prepare you in such an event, the dots are going hurt like hell, but the dashes will be truly and inhumanely excruciating.
An alternate fact, you mean?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I totally don't understand people continually bringing up the influence of these huge companies, except if they are trying to deflect the argument away what net neutrality really is.
None of these companies are essential to use the internet. You can even block their tracking with extensions. People can choose to use them or not. I've even switched to DuckDuckGo for search and it's pretty good. If Facebook suddenly vanished tomorrow, people would still use the internet and it would still be great. Even if you still use Google, there's nothing wrong with that and if one day they start to censor results in a way you don't like, just switch search engines.
If ISP's want to roll out their own Search Engine or Media Platform, let it compete on features rather than throttling.
"What lies behind us, and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
Having no net neutrality might be crap for the big guys because they will be first to be forced to pay for access to the fast lane. But this also ensures that they will have an important edge over any upstart newcomer. In the long run, NN repeal is good for them, as it protects the incumbents, albeit at a price. Without net neutrality it will be that much harder to fight the big players.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
...was put things back the way they were in halcyon days of 2015. I can kinda remember buying things on Amazon and using high speed internet then...
Ferret
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
Do you have any clue how many politicians they've bought at every level of the government?
You mean there isn't an APP for that? How Luddite-ish!
OP says: "T-Mobile makes no commitments to not throttle content"
Well, duh. It already does.
According to tests, it's preferred streaming service (I don't recall what it is called) throttles ALL media content.
Hint: you can tell by whether using a VPN makes the throttling go away.
Netflix pulled the whole stunt in the first place because ISPs asked Netflix to pay for all the bandwidth it was using.
The ISP has customers, the customers ask for data, and it's the ISP's job to deliver to them. It's not Netflix using the bandwidth, it's the ISP's customers.
This is the whole point of net neutrality: the ISP's customers ask for some bits, and it's the ISP's job to deliver them without fucking around with them.
It's the ISP's job to figure how to make money from their customers. If the customers are using "too much" data then break out the spreadsheets and change your price points.
What would you say why the big guys fought so hard for Net Neutrality then? If it's just PR they could have faked it like Comcast did. I will be cynical and rule out google/fb striving for what's best for the community even if it is at a detriment to their bottom line. If you join me in that cynicism then what other google/fb motive does it leave us with then?
Verizon indicates that, at least in the immediate future, it will not block legal content.
However later down the road.... well you know the common man forgets this stuff and then they can do what they want. Especially when ISPx impliments something they will have to stay competitive.
Just like the Tax Bill that sunsets Individual Tax breaks and keeps Corporate breaks in place - they are planning on people have short memories.
The fact that ISPs are forced to be transparent is in my opinion the only regulation we needed.
We also need regulation to prohibit monopoly deals between ISPs and governmental entities. Without competition, transparency is useless.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Nope all in the bullshit wording ie they will slow down everyone to crap but the lucky few will get extra as long as they pay for it. So everyone gets shit, only a few get more, so no notification except to those few who get more, they will be notified. So the lie is in the detail. Then of course, how soon they need to be notified, a month latter when their service changes, during the political cycle, that whole rigmarole of forward and backwards with communications, delay after delay in response and then perhaps simply notified and disconnected, they no longer have to provide a service at all. Mass political censorship and make no mistake, as well as of course choking out publishing competitors, well as much as they can for about a year max and wham, cost the morons an election big win dumb fuckers.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
That's plainly wrong, your assumption.
You have paid for a 50 Mb/s connection and your ISP decides that Google services must run at 16 kb/s; then I can asure you that ISP can censor effectively anything they want without Net Neutrality Laws.
I think T-Mobile is the opposite. They zero-rate certain video content.... stuff that they can recompress to save bandwidth. They also partner with Netflix to offer free content and exempt it from bandwidth caps.
As it exists, these violations of net neutrality are decidedly pro-consumer. So the issue is way more complicated than partisans pretend.
Instead we have regulation that requires monopolies or duopolies in most municipalities.
It is a mess. Maybe 5g or satellite constellations or freeing up TV spectrum can be the sword that cuts the Gordian knot.
Twelve different providers and probably twelve different policies eventually, each becoming more and more detailed and complex themselves. Complexity in all things continues to advance at a tremendous rate.
E Proelio Veritas.
"If you have two enemies, fight the stronger one first." -- or something like that, Sun Tzu. Google/Facebook/Amazon are far bigger enemies to us than ISPs are. If NN repeal slows them down -- possibly since they lobbied for NN so much -- that will be the best possible outcome, then we can deal with ISPs.
It's not an either-or, you can have both poor roads and poor destinations. Shutting down NN and setting up toll roads threaten Google/Facebook/Amazon's profit because they'd be paying a middleman, but in terms of competition they can afford it better than the small start-ups. So as consumers we get less choice and higher prices, it's a lose-lose for us. We still need better alternatives, but fighting against NN to achieve it would just be shooting ourselves in the foot.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Is it not better then to plug the hole that allows for Google/FB/Amazon's unchecked growth, and then start from there to bring regulation that gives us a better alternative?
I don't know if the ISP would now be able to throttle say Google/YT traffic specifically (on the ground of it consuming more bandwidth overall, or no reason) unless they pay to the ISP to bring their user-bound bandwidth to the same level as that of everyone else, including the small startup. That may be illegal or simply naive to consider but if that were to happen, or at least if it's possible in theory, I'd welcome it.
Comcast already has tiered service. You can get different internet speeds for different monthly fees.
If ISPs are already offering tiered service, what is all this stink about?!
I get that they might choose to block competition, which seems wrong.
Yet, then perhaps they need to spin-off that competing division.
This would de-monopolize these creepy behemoths.
It seems to just show that there needs to be rules in place that prevent any entity from obstructing another entity from freedoms to distribute.
They ought to call it mandatory neutrality!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
If ISP's want to roll out their own Search Engine or Media Platform, let it compete on features rather than throttling.
The ISP's WANT to "compete" by throttling, because that is easier than competing on features or innovation.
That's why they rammed this through, because a meritocracy is not what they are after.
Local ISPs have competition these days.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Ah, so even Putin recognized that facebook is a weapon, but you can't?
Pot, Kettle, Black.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
The point of the link is that there is already a good deal of competition at the ISP level. Want net neutrality? Buy the bandwidth that gives it to you.
Not so much with these monopolistic service providers.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
If you want to connect to a peering location, buy enough fiber to get there through the public right of ways, just like the ISPs do.
Where do you think those public rights of way come from? I'll give you a hint. It's GOVERNMENT! Fucking idiot. You and the original poster are cut from the same cloth, just blithely taking for granted thousands of government functions while bleating about "government overreach". The service we're talking about does not exist without quite a lot of government, from the rights of way to the permitting, to the very concept that they can still own wire that is installed on someone else's property. Oh, and by the way, none of them pay me for the access to their easement on my property, which is not a public right of way. It existed before I bought the property and either getting rid of it or charging them rent for it is effectively a legal impossibility. I can't even fence them out of it. They have the legal right to subvert my fence if it blocks their easement. In common law countries, there's some 400 years of jurisprudence giving them that right. They certainly do NOT pay, me or anyone else, for their use of private property for their own profit.
The other coward's response only applies in some jurisdictions. In my jurisdiction, it's technically legal for me to drag my spool of fiber around the public rights of way, as long as I can get a permit. Of course, in my jurisdiction, Charter will challenge my permit the moment I file it. They have people whose job it is to watch for all such filings and file challenges to prevent competition from even beginning to form. Where they haven't managed to subvert the local government to the extent that they own a legal monopoly, such as mine, they instead game the permitting system to effectively produce the same result unless the challenged party has very deep pockets indeed.
All of which is the long from of what I said in pithier form in my original post. You have to understand what a government actually is and does before you could understand the pithier form. You manifestly did not understand. Now maybe you have a hint.
Golly! And UPS and FedEx charge more for speedy delivery and for larger packages and for heavier ones.
We need Parcel Post Neutrality!
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.