Entire Broadband Industry Sues California To Stop Net Neutrality Law (arstechnica.com)

Four lobby groups representing the broadband industry today sued California to stop the state's new net neutrality law. From a report: The lawsuit was filed in US District Court for the Eastern District of California by mobile industry lobby CTIA; cable industry lobby NCTA; telco lobby USTelecom; and the American Cable Association, which represents small and mid-size cable companies. Together, these four lobby groups represent all the biggest mobile and home Internet providers in the US and hundreds of smaller ISPs . Comcast, Charter, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile US, Sprint, Cox, Frontier, and CenturyLink are among the groups' members. "This case presents a classic example of unconstitutional state regulation," the complaint said. The California net neutrality law "was purposefully intended to countermand and undermine federal law by imposing on [broadband] the very same regulations that the Federal Communications Commission expressly repealed in its 2018 Restoring Internet Freedom Order." ISPs say the California law impermissibly regulates interstate commerce. "[I]t is impossible or impracticable for an Internet service provider ("ISP") offering BIAS to distinguish traffic that moves only within California from traffic that crosses state borders," the lobby groups' complaint said.

Comments

Re:California must be doing something right ...

[Jzanu]

What 163,696 square mile area of the US has a lower rate? You can combine states, just keep the area the same. That's what matters for raw numbers, and population density or number of people in an area is what matters for raw rates. Still, just find an equivalently sized area with a lower simple rate. Try it. Then find the same with an equivalently sized base population. Try it.

Still not sure it matters

[rsilvergun]

I still think internet regulation is a federal issue and the courts are likely to think so to. The courts are pretty stacked with pro-corporation judges anyway. Guys like Gorsuch & Kavanaugh are going to side with the ISPs. Meanwhile our Senate and Electoral college means that California's voting power is heavily diluted (somebody in Montana has 46 times more voting power than a California voter). This is by design.

Baring a sea change in American politics I think NN is dead. It's not an issue that people vote on. As always it's Jobs, jobs, jobs, low taxes, hating on Bureaucracy and the classic wedge issues (guns & abortion) that drive people to the polls. And the anti-NN party does a better job of getting their folks to the polls.

Re: ha! that got their attention

[chaboud]

As long as that candidate doesnâ(TM)t evasively dodge simple questions and completely blow it in their hearing, they should be okay.

Kavanaughâ(TM)s performance was baffling. The senators on the judiciary committee were ready to be incensed for him. He just needed to be measured, above the fray... judicious, even.

We are not where I expected to be. Partisan conspiracy theories? Leave that to Graham and Grassley.

Re: ha! that got their attention

[rgmoore]

During the Obama admin CA applied for tougher emissions standards for the car and was granted permission. (Was revoked this year.) The outsize influence of CA means they can't do whatever they want if they want to be a state in the union.

This is arrant nonsense. When the first automobile emissions standards laws were passed, California was explicitly granted the right to set its own, stricter standards as a response to the terrible pollution in the Los Angeles area. Other states have the right to adopt either the national standards or the California standards.