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California Delays Net Neutrality Law's Enforcement Until After Court Case (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: California has agreed to delay enforcement of its net neutrality law until after litigation that will determine whether states can implement their own net neutrality rules. California's net neutrality law was slated to take effect on January 1, 2019. But the Trump administration's Department of Justice and broadband industry sued to block the law and were seeking a preliminary injunction that would halt enforcement until litigation is over.
The DOJ and broadband industry had a good chance of winning a preliminary injunction because the Federal Communications Commission had declared that all state net neutrality rules are preempted. As the DOJ argued, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California must presume that the FCC preemption of state laws is valid since that preemption has not been overturned by any court. In a U.S. District Court filing today, California agreed to take no action to enforce the state net neutrality law until after the U.S. Court of Appeals case is decided and all appeals have been exhausted.
The DOJ and broadband industry had a good chance of winning a preliminary injunction because the Federal Communications Commission had declared that all state net neutrality rules are preempted. As the DOJ argued, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California must presume that the FCC preemption of state laws is valid since that preemption has not been overturned by any court. In a U.S. District Court filing today, California agreed to take no action to enforce the state net neutrality law until after the U.S. Court of Appeals case is decided and all appeals have been exhausted.
When this is over, the cable companies are going to with they hadn't fought this.
Is it a good thing for the companies that when this bill takes effect 100% of the internet users in California (except dialup) will have broadband internet, or is it a bad thing? I seem to recall that the existing ISPs have an interest in getting the broadband numbers up, so if Comcast or Verizon can say that 100% of their customers have broadband I think it's a win for them.
Is it really broadband if the only sites that load at advertised speeds are those of the ISPs' partners?
Have gnu, will travel.
The FCC passed it in 2015 (or 2014) because the FTC lost a court case which said they could no longer enforce NN (and the court said the FCC should make those rules if they needed to be made.) In the interim, ISPs started pulling shady shit pretty fast.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
You're missing out on almost all of the history. Net neutrality was not first introduced in 2014; that wasn't even the start of legal battle over sustaining it.
We had net neutrality by default since the start of the internet, because the early internet was a highly competitive market, piggybacking on top of the phone network that was regulated as a common carrier under Title II, between the two of which no ISP could get away shit like breaking net neutrality.
When broadband happened, the last-mile providers (the phone and cable companies) BECAME the internet service providers, and thus internet service was no longer a competitive market, and internet service per se was not explicitly regulated as a Title II common carrier service, so they could start pulling shady shit like breaking net neutrality.
Then a law was passed saying no, in fact, they cannot pull that shit, and have to keep doing things like they always have been.
That law was later overturned because, as internet service was not classified under Title II, it was deemed to be beyond the jurisdiction of the FCC to regulate that way.
Later, in 2014, the FCC reclassified internet service under Title II after all -- as it should have been from the beginning -- and thus the law requiring ISPs to keep behaving as they always had, neutrally, was applicable again.
Now Pai's FCC has reversed that classification, invalidating that law, and once again clearing the way for the ISPs to start doing things differently than they always have been.
There has been a long war to keep ISPs from breaking the internet. 2014 saw one battle in that war won on the side of consumers. But the war is still going on, and now we, the consumers, are losing out.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
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Companies certainly don't mind a captive audience, but typically when the government hands you a government granted monopoly, they set caps on the amount of profit that can be generated as a public utility. I suspect that the cable companies don't want this because they already have a product that most people want (or maybe even need) and some already have a captive audience through exclusivity contracts with various municipalities. The don't get too many additional customers even if they're given a government granted monopoly, and they can't fleece the ones they already have like they've been doing for years now.
Is it really broadband if the only sites that load at advertised speeds are those of the ISPs' partners?
Under California law currently being dealt with in court, it is broadband.
but typically when the government hands you a government granted monopoly,
Which ISP is a "government granted monopoly"? Hint: federal law has made exclusive franchises (which is how government granted monopolies used to be granted) against the law. Forbidden by federal law. And that law was passed more than 20 years ago.
They may be defacto monopolies due to economic factors that limit competition, but government-granted no longer.
some already have a captive audience through exclusivity contracts with various municipalities.
If you can find one, please report it ASAP to the FCC and the FTC and the federal DOJ. That municipality is breaking federal law. And anyone who wants to compete has it spelled out in black and white in that law exactly how to break this exclusivity should it actually exist.
Wow, grasshopper, no knowledge of history or the Internet!
There is a difference between ICANN's policy of assigning domain names, DNS, and net neutrality. Perhaps some time spent learning (not skimming one Wikipedia article) would make you come across as more informed and therefore deserving of intellectual respect.
But hey, keep trolling by repeating propaganda tweets if it makes you feel good!
Nope, not long settle case law unless you have a very weird interpretation. A federal beaurocrat doesn't have pre-preemptive powers over the states. See gun laws for example - the constitution and bill of rights have preemptive power, but just some jerk in an office, not so much. The constitution - doesn't reserve that right totally for the feds. This is intra-state commerce even though the effects trickle out past the borders. No one can force a state to spend money on a private enterprise against their will. They can set any conditions they want, and that enterprise can decide not to do business there if they don't like it.
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
Enough with bullshit lie that net neutrality prohibited QoS. It also had exemptions for special services. You can get away with pushing you false propagranda on non technical sites, but here people know you're blatantly lying and will call you on your bullshit.