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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federal law by imposing on [broadband] the very same regulations that the Federal Communications Commission expressly repealed in its 2018 Restoring Internet Freedom Order."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.
"hmm, it seems that california won't just take what was tell them to. maybe we didn't think this coup thru well enough. shit, what do we do now? this is getting more attention and we want to BURY this, not call MORE attention to it"
yeah, good luck putting the genie back in the bottle. you angered some people and miscalculated how much you can get away with.
now, if there is a most hated industry, the telecom is surely one of them.
the fact that they are all 'angry' is a GOOD THING. when we piss off bad guys, they throw hissy fits, but its good to keep them in check. they need to be bitchslapped every now and then.
ajit can EABOD. most punchable person in recent history (so they say).
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
in the field of consumer protection if they have succeeded in all those who provide a service to act against them. It is quite simple: they think that they will be able to make more money but cutting deals all over the place; but the legislators understand that this would favour the powerful/rich over the smaller operators (web sites/services) and make innovation (startups) harder.
When multinational communications industries with vested monopolies in local state and federal government come together to craft a shit sandwich at the highest levels of regulatory government using a smear campaign of disinformation and botnets posting false public opinion, you'd better take a bite when the order is served.
the federal government, and every single telecom company in the US, is fighting like hell to make sure this dies. Not because it really hurts them on a national level, but because it lays the groundwork to circumvent and resist their monopoly control without crossing the interstate commerce clause at the federal level.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I actually hope California holds it grown and wins, then other states will all start their own Net-neutrality laws, each one slightly different. Enough for them to say. You know it would be much easier if we had a single rule to follow across all the state lines. Aka Net-neutrality.
Currently I really don't know if I am getting for what I paid for from my ISP. Sure running speed tests says I am good. But are they just keeping the pipe open on the speed tests, but slowing other sites which I may need to do real work with?
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
In the age of righteous indignation, you don't actually hear any people clamoring for the the removal of net neutrality. In fact, plenty of people want it back but the government doesn't listen (shocker).
The fact that no *actual human beings* (which excludes politicians ofc) are opposed to the law in cali should tell you something. Add in how much corporations hate it and you have a winner here. Keep in mind these are the same corporations that did things like charge for SMS messages which used to be a free and rarely-used messaging subsystem built into cell phones. It literally cost them nothing and one day they decided to charge people enormous amounts of money (measured in $/MB) for basic data that didn't even take up bandwidth streams in their service.
Or companies trying to impose data caps on broadband because they'd rather 'invest' their profits in dividends than upgrading their network to support their customers.
Or...the list goes on.
If telecom hates it and people like it, it's pretty much guaranteed to be a good law.
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
"[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 path of network traffic ought to be irrelevent. If you setup as a broadband provider Inside the state of California, then
the transaction involving the purchase of Broadband service is between You and your customer who lives inside the state of California. The
purchase of broadband services is an intrastate transaction, because you have to substantially exist within California to own or lease all the
outside plant in California required to connect your customers.
Because this is an intrastate transaction: the state of California has the right to regulate the quality of the goods you are selling;
regardless of any 3rd party interstate transactions required for you to supply the goods.
For example: The state can prohibit selling a product containing common additive X.
This applies to all sellers with a presence in California selling goods to customers in California.
As a Retailer or Service Provider it doesn't matter whether you buy the good from a local source or a wholesaler in-state
--- you may be able to obtain the good through interstate commerce but be Disallowed from reselling the product in your local store:
the interstate commerce transaction was separate, And the intrastate transaction must comply with the law.
The Intrastate transaction is a company owning or leasing the right to physical In-the-Ground Telecoms cabling or Wireless towers
mounted on the ground in the state of California connecting to a local customer to Offer broadband service (A service that in order
to deliver may require the provider have purchased a number of Wholesale products for re-sale from different providers In and Out-of-state,
BUT the Advertising and Sale of Broadband service is still between a company operating in California and a Customer operating in California).
In the same way that California can charge a tax to UPS for originating the shipment of a package or prohibit UPS from discriminatorily refusing service to
certain neighborhoods, despite the fact that UPS ships some packages out of state: If the Buyer of the service and UPS both have presence in the state, then there is an intrastate transaction subject to state authority involved.
It is true that network traffic may leave the state, and California's regulations are likely unable to make "End to End" guarantee across remote out-of-state
suppliers of no throttling ---
However, that was never what "Broadband Network Neutrality" promises. Broadband Network Neutrality is about regulation of that last mile:
that connection between the Consumer and Internet peering: No unequal prioritization based on application or competing business interests to obstruct usage of the last mile network to which the provider has a monopoly, for example: by prioritizing a partner, blocking or throttling access to a competitor, competing service, or unliked application or website, for censorship, to solicit a payment, or artificially make one service have poorer quality from the network.
California can require that a company in their state build in-state broadband networks that do not throttle traffic while it is in that state and make all reasonable accommodation to ensure they deliver an ultimate product to the local consumer that has a certain quality (fairness)
False dichotomy. Plenty of people have handled similar accusations with calm and dignity.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
California absolutely has the the right to do this within their own borders. The federal government foreclosed their ability to regulate this when they took away the title II regulation.
Remember when the Obama FCC tried to implement net neutrality rules while keeping data services outside title II designation? Well the court ruling that struck down those rules found the FCC has no authority to regulate unless they declare the service a Title II service. So when the new Trump FCC rolled back the Title II designation they removed all regulatory authority from themselves, so the little statement the FCC put in the rule that foreclosed all state action is actually as unenforceable as the the original net neutrality rules because the FCC doesn't have authority to regulate without a Title II deceleration.
This is what that original court ruling laid out in minute detail. Congress granted the FCC authority to regulate, but ONLY when it's a title II service. Everyone warned the new FCC that when they removed the title II designation that they were in fact opening up to state level regulation. I have no doubt in my mind that California is going to win this and it's all cause the Trump FCC rolled back the Title II designation.