Net neutrality

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Indus

Lifer
May 11, 2002
10,410
7,046
136
This is what I thought it was all about, tired speed and packaged services. The proponents claim it's nothing of the sort, that there will be no throttling, that this just allows some sights to pay more for faster service. Obviously someone isn't being honest.
I guess were going to find out.

In Asia the ISP's throttle websites unless you pay more. They advertise 30MB/s down and sure google search loads fast but if you try to play a youtube video, it stutters and stops constantly because you're getting under 100kb/s. Forget about watching that in 1080p.

This is exactly what the corporations want to make money off since they've figured out we don't buy cable tv but want to buy Netflix/ Amazon Prime/ Hulu/ HBO Go etc..
 

Mandres

Senior member
Jun 8, 2011
944
58
91
To me, it comes down to the idea that the content on the internet is not Verizon/AT&T/Comcast's to sell. They sell access to the network, at (ostensibly) a flat rate for a flat amount of connectivity. But the nature of those bits and bytes is none of the ISP's business, and should stay that way.

The gas company is not allowed to charge you more based on whether or not your gas came from a supplier that pays a kickback to the utility, and neither should an ISP.
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,415
14,307
136
Imagine if your electric company charged you different rates for plugging in different devices. Or if your water company charged you a higher rate for taking a shower than for flushing the toilet. That's what the internet without net neutrality is going to be like.
 

Amused

Elite Member
Apr 14, 2001
56,001
14,525
146
That's a wee bit out of date. Myspace?

Furthermore why hasn't this happened already without Net Neutrality?

Well, first off, the current Net Neutrality does not expire until June 11th.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...ules-will-expire-on-june-11-fcc-idUSKBN1IB1UN

Secondly, it was beginning to happen.

Here’s what happens when cable and phone companies are left to their own devices:

MADISON RIVER: In 2005, North Carolina ISP Madison River Communications blocked the voice-over-internet protocol (VOIP) service Vonage. Vonage filed a complaint with the FCC after receiving a slew of customer complaints. The FCC stepped in to sanction Madison River and prevent further blocking, but it lacks the authority to stop this kind of abuse today.

COMCAST: In 2005, the nation’s largest ISP, Comcast, began secretly blocking peer-to-peer technologies that its customers were using over its network. Users of services like BitTorrent and Gnutella were unable to connect to these services. 2007 investigations from the Associated Press, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others confirmed that Comcast was indeed blocking or slowing file-sharing applications without disclosing this fact to its customers.

TELUS: In 2005, Canada’s second-largest telecommunications company, Telus, began blocking access to a server that hosted a website supporting a labor strike against the company. Researchers at Harvard and the University of Toronto found that this action resulted in Telus blocking an additional 766 unrelated sites.

AT&T: From 2007–2009, AT&T forced Apple to block Skype and other competing VOIP phone services on the iPhone. The wireless provider wanted to prevent iPhone users from using any application that would allow them to make calls on such “over-the-top” voice services. The Google Voice app received similar treatment from carriers like AT&T when it came on the scene in 2009.

WINDSTREAM: In 2010, Windstream Communications, a DSL provider with more than 1 million customers at the time, copped to hijacking user-search queries made using the Google toolbar within Firefox. Users who believed they had set the browser to the search engine of their choice were redirected to Windstream’s own search portal and results.

MetroPCS: In 2011, MetroPCS, at the time one of the top-five U.S. wireless carriers, announced plans to block streaming video over its 4G network from all sources except YouTube. MetroPCS then threw its weight behind Verizon’s court challenge against the FCC’s 2010 open internet ruling, hoping that rejection of the agency’s authority would allow the company to continue its anti-consumer practices.

PAXFIRE: In 2011, the Electronic Frontier Foundation found that several small ISPs were redirecting search queries via the vendor Paxfire. The ISPs identified in the initial Electronic Frontier Foundation report included Cavalier, Cogent, Frontier, Fuse, DirecPC, RCN and Wide Open West. Paxfire would intercept a person’s search request at Bing and Yahoo and redirect it to another page. By skipping over the search service’s results, the participating ISPs would collect referral fees for delivering users to select websites.

AT&T, SPRINT and VERIZON: From 2011–2013, AT&T, Sprint and Verizon blocked Google Wallet, a mobile-payment system that competed with a similar service called Isis, which all three companies had a stake in developing.

EUROPE: A 2012 report from the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications found that violations of Net Neutrality affected at least one in five users in Europe. The report found that blocked or slowed connections to services like VOIP, peer-to-peer technologies, gaming applications and email were commonplace.

VERIZON: In 2012, the FCC caught Verizon Wireless blocking people from using tethering applications on their phones. Verizon had asked Google to remove 11 free tethering applications from the Android marketplace. These applications allowed users to circumvent Verizon’s $20 tethering fee and turn their smartphones into Wi-Fi hot spots. By blocking those applications, Verizon violated a Net Neutrality pledge it made to the FCC as a condition of the 2008 airwaves auction.

AT&T: In 2012, AT&T announced that it would disable the FaceTime video-calling app on its customers’ iPhones unless they subscribed to a more expensive text-and-voice plan. AT&T had one goal in mind: separating customers from more of their money by blocking alternatives to AT&T’s own products.

NETWORK-WIDE: Throughout 2013 and early 2014, people across the country experienced slower speeds when trying to connect to certain kinds of websites and applications. Many complained about underperforming streaming video from sites like Netflix. Others had trouble connecting to video-conference sites and making voice calls over the internet.

The common denominator for all of these problems, unbeknownst to users at the time, was their ISPs’ failure to provide enough capacity for this traffic to make it on to their networks in the first place. In other words, the problem was not congestion on the broadband lines coming into homes and businesses, but at the “interconnection” point where the traffic users’ request from other parts of the internet first comes into the ISPs’ networks.

An Open Technology Institute investigation that drew on the Measurement Lab’s data analysis found these slowdowns were the result of “intentional policies by some of the nation’s largest communications companies, which led to significant, months-long degradation of a consumer product for millions of people.” Major broadband providers, including AT&T, Time Warner Cable and Verizon, deliberately limited the capacity at these interconnection points, effectively throttling the delivery of content to thousands of U.S. businesses and residential customers across the country.

VERIZON: During oral arguments in Verizon v. FCC in 2013, judges asked whether the phone giant would favor some preferred services, content or sites over others if the court overruled the agency’s existing open internet rules. Verizon counsel Helgi Walker had this to say: “I’m authorized to state from my client today that but for these rules we would be exploring those types of arrangements.” Walker’s admission might have gone unnoticed had she not repeated it on at least five separate occasions during arguments.

https://www.freepress.net/our-respo...iners/net-neutrality-violations-brief-history

And I give you Portugal: The country that is the Net Neutrality nightmare where the internet is chopped up and served al la carte for fees that add up quickly... just like cable TV is now:

https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/22...nternet-packages-net-neutrality-ajit-pai-plan
 
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zerocool84

Lifer
Nov 11, 2004
36,041
472
126
Does every forget the obvious, Netflix having to pay an ISP to stop getting their streams throttled?

Comcast owns Universal, without net neutrality, they would prioritize universal movies, universal shows, and could charge you extra to watch Disney movies.

Even the most basic scenario, you are someone that is trying to create the next great app that is going to change the world and would be in direct competition to Google or Apple, but you can't afford the money to prioritize your app's internet data over Google or Apple's so your app fails because you couldn't pay enough.

Sent from my SM-T820 using Tapatalk
 

Amused

Elite Member
Apr 14, 2001
56,001
14,525
146
So is anyone still questioning why Net Neutrality is an incontrovertibly good thing?
 

yllus

Elite Member & Lifer
Aug 20, 2000
20,577
432
126
I'd like to provide a software developer's perspective on Net Neutrality.

As Greenman opened with, there are a few reasonable arguments in favour of Net Neutrality - mostly revolving around the fact that heightened amounts of regulation tend to lead to an oligopoly - the already-large companies that can, along with actually competing in their market, also afford costly government relations or regulatory compliance departments. I do agree that overregulation is harmful to the economy and the people.

The arguments for net neutrality in my mind far outweigh its potential harm, though. Let's set the clock back about ten years and pretend that the FCC didn't have a unstated net neutrality policy in place (no rule in the books, but they took actions to preserve net neutrality when ISPs acted in defiance):
  • Skype begins becoming popular, leading to the VoIP revolution we have today (a space that WhatsApp, Kik, Facebook Messenger and others compete in for allowing IP-based voice communication). Comcast, AT&T et all sense the threat to their land and cell phone monopolies and push rates for VoIP into the stratosphere, killing the innovation.
  • Netflix makes its big move to a streaming service and away from mailing DVDs. Comcast, owner of a cable TV provider and a competitor in Hulu, puts Netflix in a new premium price bundle for its subscribers and Netflix dies a slow death. More likely, Netflix executives foresee that this would happen and the idea never leaves the Netflix boardroom.
  • Countries that do believe in the concept of Net Neutrality - probably conglomerates of nations like the EU - naturally end up hosting all of the tech startups that are bandwidth-intensive and Silicon Valley's Web 2.0 growth spurt takes place in London, UK instead of California. Or maybe Toronto, Canada but that makes no sense with our small population. American consumers and business are left behind.
Net neutrality is just good business. There isn't a small-c conservative on the planet who shouldn't be backing it to the hilt.
 
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SMOGZINN

Lifer
Jun 17, 2005
14,218
4,446
136
the already-large companies that can, along with actually competing in their market, also afford costly government relations or regulatory compliance departments. I do agree that overregulation is harmful to the economy and the people.

There is a few industries where this argument makes sense, but broadband ISPs is not one of them. In an industry where it takes a billion dollars to get your first few customers* there is no small players that would be crushed by having to have a compliance department.

*Note: The Net Neutrality rules only apply to Cable and satellite providers. Data carried on copper phone lines like some ISDN and all dial-up providers are still regulated under Title IX.
 

yllus

Elite Member & Lifer
Aug 20, 2000
20,577
432
126
There is a few industries where this argument makes sense, but broadband ISPs is not one of them. In an industry where it takes a billion dollars to get your first few customers* there is no small players that would be crushed by having to have a compliance department.

*Note: The Net Neutrality rules only apply to Cable and satellite providers. Data carried on copper phone lines like some ISDN and all dial-up providers are still regulated under Title IX.
Yeah, I personally agree with you, but there is a possibility of small regional ISPs who resell and would get stamped out by regulation. An exceedingly small possibility.
 

Greenman

Lifer
Oct 15, 1999
20,642
5,328
136
I've been educated, thanks to all of you for taking the time to share your thoughts, information, and opinions.
 

Jhhnn

IN MEMORIAM
Nov 11, 1999
62,365
14,681
136
There is a few industries where this argument makes sense, but broadband ISPs is not one of them. In an industry where it takes a billion dollars to get your first few customers* there is no small players that would be crushed by having to have a compliance department.

*Note: The Net Neutrality rules only apply to Cable and satellite providers. Data carried on copper phone lines like some ISDN and all dial-up providers are still regulated under Title IX.
Where does fiber to the home from Centurylink, for example, fall into that?
 

boomerang

Lifer
Jun 19, 2000
18,890
642
126
I've been educated, thanks to all of you for taking the time to share your thoughts, information, and opinions.
One thing that hasn't been touched on is that the same people that brought us the terms "Overseas contingency operations", "Man-caused disaster", "Workplace violence", "Kinetic military action", "Strategic patience", "Dynamic global security posture", "Leading from behind" as well as other terms, also coined the term "Net Neutrality".

Something to think about.
 
Last edited:

brycejones

Lifer
Oct 18, 2005
26,679
24,988
136
One thing that hasn't been touched on is that the same people that brought us the terms "Overseas contingency operations", "Man-caused disaster", "Workplace violence", "Kinetic military action", "Strategic patience", "Dynamic global security posture", "Leading from behind" as well as other terms, also coined the term "Net Neutrality".

Something to think about.

This list speaks to a ton of projection and a special kind of crazy.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
84,807
49,496
136
In my opinion the best answer is a relatively simple one, to just force telecoms to lease the ‘last mile’ to anyone who is willing to pay the market price for it. The main reason we need net neutrality is because giant, monopolistic telecom companies have huge incentives to destroy competition and promote their own (almost universally shitty) services. If anyone can provide home service then competition will prevent most telecom fuckery.

While some net neutrality principles are probably still needed to prevent extortion at the levels above the last mile, most of the part people hate about telecoms could be remedied relatively easily.

Or of course we could always just break up the telecoms (yet again) too or truly regulate them like utilities. I’m all for that.
 

Commodus

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 2004
9,215
6,818
136
One thing that hasn't been touched on is that the same people that brought us the terms "Overseas contingency operations", "Man-caused disaster", "Workplace violence", "Kinetic military action", "Strategic patience", "Dynamic global security posture", "Leading from behind" as well as other terms, also coined the term "Net Neutrality".

Something to think about.

No, actually, it's not.

It's an extremely simple concept: telecoms should not be allowed to hinder competition by blocking or slowing down access to services that rival theirs. It's funny how people like you will lie about supporting a free market when you're really just interested in mindless deregulation that protects monopolies.
 

Jaskalas

Lifer
Jun 23, 2004
33,574
7,637
136
I'm curious, what were the anti-net neutrality arguments you heard that were reasonable and logical?

They make it sound like they want to save the internet from the evil government and its evil regulations that'll crush and destroy the net.

Similar to the patriot act obliterating your civil liberties.
 

kage69

Lifer
Jul 17, 2003
28,042
38,540
136
Or of course we could always just break up the telecoms (yet again) too or truly regulate them like utilities. I’m all for that.

This. It should be the same as electricity. It's the key to success for rural America, and why it is losing out when it comes to starts ups and attracting (and importantly keeping) a younger demo. I think it's too important, the way competition in China is. Republicans, as usual, are not just failing to think long term, they're stuck in the damn 80s and 90s.
 

compuwiz1

Admin Emeritus Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
27,113
925
126
There was no net neutrality before Obama. So, we're going back to same ol same ol, and we're whining about it? Good grief!
This is truly a first world problem that I don't gig a shit about.
 

Commodus

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 2004
9,215
6,818
136
There was no net neutrality before Obama. So, we're going back to same ol same ol, and we're whining about it? Good grief!
This is truly a first world problem that I don't gig a shit about.

Did you not see Amused's past examples of ISPs using the lack of regulation to block services before net neutrality. It's not the "same ol same ol," it's worse.

You will give a shit about it when your ISP decides Netflix or another competing service is 'inconvenient' and starts charging extra for access, blocks it or throttles it to make it seem unappetizing.
 

K1052

Elite Member
Aug 21, 2003
46,861
34,808
136
There was no net neutrality before Obama. So, we're going back to same ol same ol, and we're whining about it? Good grief!
This is truly a first world problem that I don't gig a shit about.

Thank you for your post. The fee will be $5/mo to continue accessing this site.

Have a nice day!
 
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sdifox

No Lifer
Sep 30, 2005
96,166
15,775
126
There was no net neutrality before Obama. So, we're going back to same ol same ol, and we're whining about it? Good grief!
This is truly a first world problem that I don't gig a shit about.


I hope your ISP is liberal minded and put all the far right website on their slow lane.
 
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