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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?
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.
Netflix is already paying for bandwidth. They are paying their ISP for the bandwidth they consume.
Verizon, Comcast, et al are already being paid for they bandwidth the use. Their customers pay them $x/mo for y Mbps and increasingly z GB/mo. Them charging Netflix is nothing more than double-dipping - charging Netflix for something that the ISP's customers have already paid them for. This is like you going to a restaurant, ordering and paying for steak, and the restaurant claiming that this somehow entitles them to charge the cattle rancher a steak processing and butchering fee. Even though the rancher has already paid those costs via the slaughterhouse which he took his cattle to.
The only reason the ISPs able to get away with it is because local governments have granted them a local Internet service monopoly. If there were actually competition among cable and DSL Internet services, any ISP which threatened to throttle Netflix if Netflix didn't pay them would be shooting themselves in the foot. Their customers would complain to their neighbor that Netflix has been really flaky lately, and their neighbor would say Netflix streams just fine at his house. And the customers would simply cancel service and switch to the neighbor's ISP.
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.
Netflix offers media hosting servers so that Netflix traffic doesn't have to travel over the ISP's upstream link - Netflix's library can be hosted and served locally within the ISP's network. Netflix offers this for free to larger ISPs. Verizon and Comcast refused Netflix's free offer just to manufacture a false argument for fast lanes
False. Netflix "offers" those boxes "for free", on condition that the ISP provide space, cooling, power and bandwidth to it, never look inside it, and ignore the fact that it hosts data other than the expected data related to Netflix's normal service offerings. And if you didn't accept the "offer" Netflix artificially limited features and told users that the ISP was to blame (despite the customer of the ISP having plenty of bandwidth). They even made websites with fake speed tests naming and shaming ISPs who dared to deny Netflix's offer. Netflix was artificially preventing users from getting the highest quality stream if their ISP hadn't bowed down to Netflix to get on the "nice list".
They were forced to stop this bullshit because a few ISPs didn't back down and threatened legal action over their bullshit. https://www.usatoday.com/story...
Netflix pulled the whole stunt in the first place because ISPs asked Netflix to pay for all the bandwidth it was using. So Netflix threw a tantrum. (Hint to Netflix: You're not a fucking peer for the purposes of any equal peering agreement, you don't carry as much bandwidth for others as they do for you. Not by a long shot. Pay for your bandwidth.)
Netflix tried to use those boxes as a wedge to become a full-fledged CDN without having to pay for the network. They had plans to sell space and service on those boxes to anyone and everyone, for any purpose.
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.
I can guarantee you passing fees to customer will not result in a good outcome future wise.
That is a lie. Nobody is required to peer with anybody else. If an ISP doesn't want to peer with Netflix, they don't have to. They can still get the data through transit, and Netflix pays for that, just like ISPs pay for transit. What net neutrality means is that an ISP can not single out on a link and throttle that data to "encourage" Netflix to buy direct access to the ISP network or to pay to get unthrottled.
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).
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]
If ISPs will use their new powers to hamper competition to FB/Google why did FB/Google lobby so hard for Net Neutrality? You can bet that they studied and projected everything in far more detail than we here have. And I can bet they are not doing it out of love for humanity. The only reasonable answer is FB/Google feel they -- their profits -- could be in danger. How can that be bad for us?
Me, I personally believe that nothing significant will change, and some people will get a break in their fees while some heavy users will pay more. That is my wild guess after pretending to look at the crystal ball and saying what *will* happen, in some imaginary future none of us are able to conceive because the system is too complex.
And yet I can use the internet just fine without google, without twitter and without reddit having any kind of interference with whatever I try to do there, as long as I don't plan to use any service they offer.
Now please show me how to do the same concerning my ISP. Bear in mind that many people don't have the option to simply switch to another one, lacking any other ones.
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
So ignore YouTube and use one of the many other video platforms? That's the great thing about this, you actually have a CHOICE.
It ain't that easy when your ISP decides you can't see YouTube anymore and have to use his video service. Because for many people, it's this ISP or none.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You mean documents stored on google servers. Did you even read the article?
You are a lying sack of shit.
Here is the video of Ajit Pai being a dumbass. On YouTube. Right now.
https://youtu.be/JqONIPwidQw
You are welcome on my lawn.
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.
Plenty of left leaning accounts get hit too. Especially on YouTube.
In fact it's so bad that the alt-right on 4chan have weaponized it, organising mass flagging campaigns against people and videos they don't like.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC