Since I happen to be a constituent of Mr. Collins, I decided to write a letter. Feel free to copy and send it to your legislator if you so choose.
Mr. Collins,
I am appalled that you would introduce a bill to stifle free trade in Internet Services.
Specifically I am talking about your bill to overturn Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality is a major step toward allowing free trade to compete with large special interest groups such as Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Time Warner, Netflix and so forth. By stifling this FTC action you will kill the Internet for innovation and expansion in the United States.
No company is going to invest the amount of money needed to truly bring broadband into this nations homes without Net Neutrality backing up the endeavor. This means that Comcast and AT&T which are the only two providers in my area of Gainesville will never bring prices down and speeds up to par with what other countries now have to offer. Comcast currently charges me $99 a month for 50Mpbs speeds. If Google fiver were to be available, I could get 1Gbps speeds for $70 a month. That is a significant difference in speed versus price.
Not only will backing major ISP's bid to kill Net Neutrality hurt Internet expansion, it will also kill off any new companies that wish to compete with large existing businesses such as NetFlix, Amazon and others. When you open the door to businesses being able to pay for preferential treatment, you have stifled the small company which has been the cornerstone of American growth.
This bill seems to indicate that you are more interested in backing big business and not at all interested in your constituents. If you do kill off Net Neutrality, you will be doing more harm to the growth of this great nation. Please stop and think about the ramifications of what you are about to do. Whether big business agrees or not, Net Neutrality is good for the consumer by encouraging competition in the marketplace.
Comcast has already capped several markets at 300G with Atlanta being the latest. I got my first bill for usage over the 300G cap last month. I have already complained to the Georgia Trade Commission once on this and I plan to do it again. This is ridiculous given that my only other option is AT&T who can't even keep a DSL line functional at my house.
There are supposed to be laws that prevent predatory companies fro taking advantage of the public, but in this case no one seems to care.
Every time I see something like this I have to wonder what the person in charge is actually thinking. Then I remind myself that they aren't.
Group psychology will tell you that rewarding some at the expense of others only makes the rewarded outcasts. It will do the exact opposite of what they are trying to accomplish.
As my boss is so fond of saying; "Reward the behavior that you want to enforce." If you want better teachers, then reward them for bringing their classes up to par. Give them time to do their jobs. Get rid of silly practices like "No child left behind" and let the teacher actually teach.
Teachers know how to make learning fun, but they are not given time to do it because of all of the standardized testing. This testing is what they must teach the students how to master. It doesn't help the student one whit. Just because I can rip an algebraic equation down in thirty seconds doesn't help me a lot. Sure I use it in my job once every blue moon, but guess what? I don't need 6 semesters of math to be able to do it.
The second issue is that we need to quit treating little Johnny like he is exactly like Bill, Doug and the rest of the class. Little Johnny has an IQ of 80. Why are we holding back the folks who have an IQ of 112 just so little Johnny doesn't get his feelings hurt? Suck it up. Little Johnny is going to find out when he hits the employment market that no one gives a care that he can't figure out how to turn on a faucet and mop the floor. They will fire him and move on. So why are we pandering to try and make everyone equal when we know full well that they aren't? Sure, it's a sad situation, but don't punish those who can for the sake of those who can't.
We need full education reform. The system we have in the US is horribly broken and nothing is going to fix that with a major overhaul.
Honestly, I feel that it will end up like half of the games Cryptic announces. Dead in the water.
Emmert has too big of an ego and wants everything his way, regardless of what the playerbase wants. Citation: City of Heroes, Champions Online, Star Trek.
Atari needs to wake up and fire this clown or at least move him out of the development process and put him in sales and marketing where he belongs.
It's laughable at the number of people here who think that teachers get time to create anything during public school hours.
My wife is a third grade teacher. She spends literally all of her at work free time in meetings. Parent meetings. Administration meetings. Team meetings. She gets zero time to grade papers, produce teaching plans, or anything else at school during her regular working day.
She makes a whopping $45k a year which for the Atlanta area will barely rent a one bedroom apartment and keep up a run down car. If it were not for my job we would have to move just to make ends meet. Not to mention that she has $60k of education debt @$350 a month. Plus she still has to do continuing education and pay for it out of her pocket.
It takes roughly 15 to 20 hours of her time at home per week to grade papers and do lesson plans. It's just this school perhaps? Not on your life. She has worked at 4 different schools and every one of them is exactly the same. Ask any teacher, I bet you get nearly the same results.
I agree the public school system is crap. But it's not the teachers fault. They have to teach what the national, state and local school board(s) tell them to teach. Not to mention that they have to try and get Johnny who doesn't speak English and is dumber than a box of hammers up to the same level as the rest of the class. For which the rest of the class suffers, because the teacher has to spend one on one time with him.
Before you go bagging on how it's always the teachers fault, perhaps you should put your brain back in and actually think of who controls what the teacher does. Because they sure don't get to teach what they want to. If they did, kids might actually get a quality education.
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Since I happen to be a constituent of Mr. Collins, I decided to write a letter. Feel free to copy and send it to your legislator if you so choose. Mr. Collins, I am appalled that you would introduce a bill to stifle free trade in Internet Services. Specifically I am talking about your bill to overturn Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality is a major step toward allowing free trade to compete with large special interest groups such as Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, Time Warner, Netflix and so forth. By stifling this FTC action you will kill the Internet for innovation and expansion in the United States. No company is going to invest the amount of money needed to truly bring broadband into this nations homes without Net Neutrality backing up the endeavor. This means that Comcast and AT&T which are the only two providers in my area of Gainesville will never bring prices down and speeds up to par with what other countries now have to offer. Comcast currently charges me $99 a month for 50Mpbs speeds. If Google fiver were to be available, I could get 1Gbps speeds for $70 a month. That is a significant difference in speed versus price. Not only will backing major ISP's bid to kill Net Neutrality hurt Internet expansion, it will also kill off any new companies that wish to compete with large existing businesses such as NetFlix, Amazon and others. When you open the door to businesses being able to pay for preferential treatment, you have stifled the small company which has been the cornerstone of American growth. This bill seems to indicate that you are more interested in backing big business and not at all interested in your constituents. If you do kill off Net Neutrality, you will be doing more harm to the growth of this great nation. Please stop and think about the ramifications of what you are about to do. Whether big business agrees or not, Net Neutrality is good for the consumer by encouraging competition in the marketplace.
Holding a camera and recording video while in no direct danger does not make someone a hero. I don't think it means what you think it means.
Comcast has already capped several markets at 300G with Atlanta being the latest. I got my first bill for usage over the 300G cap last month. I have already complained to the Georgia Trade Commission once on this and I plan to do it again. This is ridiculous given that my only other option is AT&T who can't even keep a DSL line functional at my house. There are supposed to be laws that prevent predatory companies fro taking advantage of the public, but in this case no one seems to care.
The same thing happened in Atlanta about three weeks ago. An Amber alert went off at 2:44am on the Emergency Broadcast Network.
Every time I see something like this I have to wonder what the person in charge is actually thinking. Then I remind myself that they aren't.
Group psychology will tell you that rewarding some at the expense of others only makes the rewarded outcasts. It will do the exact opposite of what they are trying to accomplish.
As my boss is so fond of saying; "Reward the behavior that you want to enforce." If you want better teachers, then reward them for bringing their classes up to par. Give them time to do their jobs. Get rid of silly practices like "No child left behind" and let the teacher actually teach.
Teachers know how to make learning fun, but they are not given time to do it because of all of the standardized testing. This testing is what they must teach the students how to master. It doesn't help the student one whit. Just because I can rip an algebraic equation down in thirty seconds doesn't help me a lot. Sure I use it in my job once every blue moon, but guess what? I don't need 6 semesters of math to be able to do it.
The second issue is that we need to quit treating little Johnny like he is exactly like Bill, Doug and the rest of the class. Little Johnny has an IQ of 80. Why are we holding back the folks who have an IQ of 112 just so little Johnny doesn't get his feelings hurt? Suck it up. Little Johnny is going to find out when he hits the employment market that no one gives a care that he can't figure out how to turn on a faucet and mop the floor. They will fire him and move on. So why are we pandering to try and make everyone equal when we know full well that they aren't? Sure, it's a sad situation, but don't punish those who can for the sake of those who can't.
We need full education reform. The system we have in the US is horribly broken and nothing is going to fix that with a major overhaul.
America doesn't lack the ability, we lack the interest. Out apathy is strong, but I really just don't care.
Al Gore will be around shortly to sell the believers some carbon credits.
Good to see the old Broken Window Fallacy is still alive and well.
Honestly, I feel that it will end up like half of the games Cryptic announces. Dead in the water. Emmert has too big of an ego and wants everything his way, regardless of what the playerbase wants. Citation: City of Heroes, Champions Online, Star Trek. Atari needs to wake up and fire this clown or at least move him out of the development process and put him in sales and marketing where he belongs.
It's laughable at the number of people here who think that teachers get time to create anything during public school hours. My wife is a third grade teacher. She spends literally all of her at work free time in meetings. Parent meetings. Administration meetings. Team meetings. She gets zero time to grade papers, produce teaching plans, or anything else at school during her regular working day. She makes a whopping $45k a year which for the Atlanta area will barely rent a one bedroom apartment and keep up a run down car. If it were not for my job we would have to move just to make ends meet. Not to mention that she has $60k of education debt @$350 a month. Plus she still has to do continuing education and pay for it out of her pocket. It takes roughly 15 to 20 hours of her time at home per week to grade papers and do lesson plans. It's just this school perhaps? Not on your life. She has worked at 4 different schools and every one of them is exactly the same. Ask any teacher, I bet you get nearly the same results. I agree the public school system is crap. But it's not the teachers fault. They have to teach what the national, state and local school board(s) tell them to teach. Not to mention that they have to try and get Johnny who doesn't speak English and is dumber than a box of hammers up to the same level as the rest of the class. For which the rest of the class suffers, because the teacher has to spend one on one time with him. Before you go bagging on how it's always the teachers fault, perhaps you should put your brain back in and actually think of who controls what the teacher does. Because they sure don't get to teach what they want to. If they did, kids might actually get a quality education.
Good to know that I am one of the 0.2% that didn't buy SPORE because of it.