Net Neutrality is Dead.

Wake up! This involves everyone.

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Net neutrality is dead. Bow to Comcast and Verizon, your overlords

Advocates of a free and open Internet could see this coming, but today's ruling from a Washington appeals court striking down the FCC's rules protecting the open net was worse than the most dire forecasts. It was "even more emphatic and disastrous than anyone expected," in the words of one veteran advocate for network neutrality.
The Court of Appeals for the D.C. circuit thoroughly eviscerated the Federal Communications Commission's latest lame attempt to prevent Internet service providers from playing favorites among websites--awarding faster speeds to sites that pay a special fee, for example, or slowing or blocking sites and services that compete with favored affiliates.
Big cable operators like Comcast and telecommunications firms like Verizon, which brought the lawsuit on which the court ruled, will be free to pick winners and losers among websites and services. Their judgment will most likely be based on cold hard cash--Netflix wants to keep your Internet provider from slowing its data so its films look like hash? It will have to pay your provider the big bucks. But the governing factor need not be money. (Comcast remains committed to adhere to the net neutrality rules overturned today until January 2018, a condition placed on its 2011 merger with NBC Universal; after that, all bets are off.)

"AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast will be able to deliver some sites and services more quickly and reliably than others for any reason," telecommunications lawyer Marvin Ammori (he's the man quoted above) observed even before the ruling came down. "Whim. Envy. Ignorance. Competition. Vengeance. Whatever. Or, no reason at all."
The telecom companies claim their chief interest is in providing better service to all customers, but that's unadulterated flimflam. We know this because regulators already have had to make superhuman efforts to keep the big ISPs from degrading certain services for their own benefit--Comcast, for example, was caught in 2007 throttling traffic from BitTorrent, a video service that competed with its own on-demand video.
Amazingly, even after Comcast was found guilty of violating this basic standard of Internet transmission, the FCC greenlighted its acquisition of NBC, which could only give the firm greater incentive to discriminate among the content being pipelined to its customers.
ISPs like Comcast are only doing what comes naturally in an unregulated environment, the way a dog naturally scratches at fleas. "Cable and telephone companies are simply not competing for the right to provide unfettered, un-monetized internet access," wrote Susan Crawford, an expert on net neutrality, around the time of the Comcast case.

This wouldn't be as much of a threat to the open Internet if there were genuine competition among providers, so you could take your business elsewhere if your ISP was turning the public Web into its own private garden. In the U.S., there's no practical competition. The vast majority of households essentially have a single broadband option, their local cable provider. Verizon and AT&T provide Internet service, too, but for most customers they're slower than the cable service. Some neighborhoods get telephone fiber services, but Verizon and AT&T have ceased the rollout of their FiOs and U-verse services--if you don't have it now, you're not getting it.

Who deserves the blame for this wretched combination of monopolization and profiteering by ever-larger cable and phone companies? The FCC, that's who. The agency's dereliction dates back to 2002, when under Chairman Michael Powell it reclassified cable modem services as "information services" rather than "telecommunications services," eliminating its own authority to regulate them broadly. Powell, by the way, is now the chief lobbyist in Washington for the cable TV industry, so the payoff wasn't long in coming.

More at: http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-mh-net-neutrality-20140114,0,522106.story#ixzz2qUjS0G8B
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Comments

  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910
    When I moved I could only get TWC, they were the ONLY internet provider unless I want crappy satellite service which I've tried. Looks like they have even more power now... awesome (sarcastic)

    always comes down to $, always
    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • backseatLover12backseatLover12 Posts: 2,312
    edited January 2014
    what is net neutrality?

    noun
    1.
    the principle that Internet service providers should enable access to all content and applications regardless of the source, and without favoring or blocking particular products or websites.

    This article explains what it is and how it affects all of us.

    http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/01/14/262454310/feds-cant-enforce-net-neutrality-what-this-means-for-you

    ...The Open Internet

    Net neutrality is an idea that's governed the Internet since the beginning: that all Internet users deserve equal access to online information, no matter whether you use Verizon or Comcast. Internet service providers should be "neutral" to the content their customers consume.

    As things are now, the FCC regulates net neutrality by "policing" an open Internet. Its chairman just this week doubled down on the importance of this role, too.

    The current rules, passed in 2010, prevent broadband Internet service providers from blocking lawful content and other Internet services.

    What This Means

    What you see depends on where you sit. Net neutrality advocates fear that if the federal government stops enforcing rules to keep the pipelines free and open, then certain companies will be able to get greater access to Internet users. That, they say, creates a system of haves and have-nots — the richest companies could get access to a wider swath of Internet users, for example, and that could prevent the next Google from getting off the ground. Judge David Tatel, who was part of the three-judge panel, said that striking down net neutrality could have negative effects on consumers.

    "The commission has adequately supported and explained its conclusion that absent rules such as those set forth in the Open Internet Order, broadband providers represent a threat to Internet openness and could act in ways that would ultimately inhibit the speed and extent of future broadband deployment," he said, adding that broadband companies have "powerful incentives" to charge for prioritized access or to exclude services that competed with their own offerings.

    "Verizon also said that net neutrality rules violate the First Amendment, since broadband companies transmit the speech of others. That gives the providers 'editorial discretion,' according to Verizon.
    "The FCC argues that it has the authority to enforce net neutrality under provisions of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and the Communications Act of 1934.
    "Internet rights groups believe the open Internet is what lets companies like Twitter, Facebook and Skype flourish. Supporters say net neutrality prevented existing market players from slowing down or blocking the connections of Skype calls, for instance, to protect their businesses."
    Post edited by backseatLover12 on
  • Fucking Verizon.
  • unsungunsung I stopped by on March 7 2024. First time in many years, had to update payment info. Hope all is well. Politicians suck. Bye. Posts: 9,487
    I'd be happy to go back to dial up. $8 a month and unlimited access. It'll force me off the computer which would be a good thing considering I'm working at lessening my online footprint.
  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910
    I don't have cable TV, watch everything online and download what I want. This is a great plan for them to block and throttle those sites and *force* me back into getting cable to see the shows I want.

    Just wait until they start censoring whatever the big money pays them to.
    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • IdrisIdris Posts: 2,317
    unsung said:

    I'd be happy to go back to dial up. $8 a month and unlimited access. It'll force me off the computer which would be a good thing considering I'm working at lessening my online footprint.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMgqTWdk3tw
  • cincybearcatcincybearcat Posts: 16,488
    Yeah, this seems very bad.
    hippiemom = goodness
  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910

    Yeah, this seems very bad.

    yeah and the thing is is that it's confusing to a lot of people. Try explaining it to someone. So most ppl don't know, or care, about what's happening.
    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • backseatLover12backseatLover12 Posts: 2,312
    a5pj said:

    Yeah, this seems very bad.

    yeah and the thing is is that it's confusing to a lot of people. Try explaining it to someone. So most ppl don't know, or care, about what's happening.
    Yeah, most ppl don't care now, but if it happens, the internet will be nothing like it is now. Nothing. And then ppl will care. too late.
  • rgambsrgambs Posts: 13,576
    we will tell stories to our grandkids about how the internet was free in the old days...there were billions of sites and you could go wherever you wanted and do what you wanted...it was like the wild west..
    Monkey Driven, Call this Living?
  • rgambsrgambs Posts: 13,576
    they won't believe it let alone understand
    Monkey Driven, Call this Living?
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,304
    I "discovered" a really amazing writer earlier this year, Bohumil Hrabal. Hrabal was a Czech writer whose work was banned as recently as the 1970's. At that time he published his works underground. We rarely think conditions like this for writers expressing their thoughts could occur today. Think again.
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • Drowned OutDrowned Out Posts: 6,056
    How many bills were shot down in how many countries over net neutrality? How many petitions and protests? This is like Walmart trying to move in to your neighbourhood....they don't give a shit if you want it or not, they will continue to try every means possible to force their way into your 'hood. It is clear that NO ONE but the ISP's wanted this to happen. Our entire media has been monopolized and corrupted, the revolving doors between the private and public sector have destroyed oversight, and in turn, the democratic process....just like virtually every other big industry.
  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910

    How many bills were shot down in how many countries over net neutrality? How many petitions and protests? This is like Walmart trying to move in to your neighbourhood....they don't give a shit if you want it or not, they will continue to try every means possible to force their way into your 'hood. It is clear that NO ONE but the ISP's wanted this to happen. Our entire media has been monopolized and corrupted, the revolving doors between the private and public sector have destroyed oversight, and in turn, the democratic process....just like virtually every other big industry.

    yup pretty much, very well said. and don't forget it's all about the $$$

    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • backseatLover12backseatLover12 Posts: 2,312
    edited May 2014
    http://www.freepress.net/press-release/106278/fcc-moves-forward-two-tiered-internet-plan

    FCC Moves Forward With Two-Tiered Internet Plan

    "WASHINGTON – On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission voted to propose a new “open Internet” rule that may let Internet service providers charge content companies for priority treatment, relegating other content to a slower tier of service."

    Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the FCC before the vote to condemn the plan and urge the FCC to protect Net Neutrality. Beating drums and chanting “Save the Internet,” they heard speeches from Internet freedom advocates and social justice activists before streaming into the meeting.

    Free Press President and CEO Craig Aaron made the following statement:

    “Millions of people have put the FCC on notice. A pay-for-priority Internet is unacceptable. Today, both Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel stated that they support prohibitions on paid prioritization and other forms of unreasonable discrimination. Tom Wheeler spoke passionately about the open Internet, but his rousing rhetoric doesn't match the reality of his proposal. The only way to accomplish the chairman’s goals is to reclassify Internet service providers as common carriers.

    The Commission says it wants to hear from the public; it will be hearing a lot more. This fight will stretch into the fall, but there’s one clear answer: The American people demand real Net Neutrality, and the FCC must restore it.

    “We’re encouraged by much of what was said during today's meeting. But words amount to little without the rules to back them up. If Chairman Wheeler is sincere in his objections to a fast-lane, slow-lane Internet, then reclassification is the only way to prevent this terrible scenario from becoming a reality.”

    Make your voice heard to protect and open and free internet!
    Post edited by backseatLover12 on
  • backseatLover12backseatLover12 Posts: 2,312
    "People from all walks of life are awake to the possibility that the Internet as we know it could disappear. Dozens of members of Congress, hundreds of companies and organizations and top technology investors have all come out against the FCC's plan. Educators, librarians and artists are speaking up.

    Net Neutrality has finally become a kitchen-table issue."

    http://www.freepress.net/blog/2014/05/21/fcc-net-neutrality-and-stirring-hornets-nest
  • Kel VarnsenKel Varnsen Posts: 1,952
    Maybe I don't know enough about the issue, but when it comes to this problem why don't the people who are producing the content realize they pretty much have all the power (don't they). I mean look at TV. A little while back some stations including AMC realized that the cable companies were jerking them around. So they pulled their content so that if you had a certain provider you couldn't get their channel.

    I wonder if say netflix could or would do the same thing. I mean if a certain ISP was jerking them around, slowing down their speed and charging them extra, couldn't they just make it so that the people who subscribed to that ISP no longer received Netflix at all? Do that for a week and the customers would probably revolt, and the ISP would have to fix things.
  • backseatLover12backseatLover12 Posts: 2,312
    edited May 2014
    If you think about the content AMC used to air - American Movie Classics, which was old movies, you'd realize that corporate takeover of the station happened years ago. The original goal of the station was to air nothing but old movies, not unlike MTV that used to play music videos and the Weather Channel that used to do nothing but post the weather conditions and forecast. Yes, they can control which cable corps air them, but they're all new owners, 6 owners, to be exact, that own all the cable channels.

    They're here: http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4923173

    FACT: Comcast owns NBC; Disney owns ABC; and News Corporation owns Fox Broadcasting Company.

    Comcast owns NBC, Telemundo, E Entertainment, Versus, 14 television stations, Universal Pictures, and Hulu. Disney holdings include 10 television stations, 277 radio stations, ABC, ESPN, A&E, the History Channel, Lifetime, Discover magazine, Bassmaster magazine, Hyperion publishing, Touchstone Pictures, Pixar Animation, and Miramax Film Corp. Viacom owns 10 television stations, The Movie Channel, Comedy Central, BET, Nickelodeon, TV Land, MTV, VH1, and Paramount Pictures. CBS owns 30 TV stations, Smithsonian Channel, Showtime, The Movie Channel and Paramount Network Television. News Corp. owns 27 television stations, the Fox Network and Fox News Channel, FX, National Geographic Channel, The Wall Street Journal, TV Guide, the New York Post, DirecTV, the publisher HarperCollins, film production company Twentieth Century Fox and the social networking website MySpace. Time Warner owns HBO, CNN, the Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. Time magazine, Turner Broadcasting and DC Comics.

    Currently, six major companies control most of the media in our country. The FCC could decide to relax media ownership rules, which would allow further consolidation and put decisions about what kinds of programming and news Americans receive in even fewer hands.
  • Kel VarnsenKel Varnsen Posts: 1,952

    If you think about the content AMC used to air - American Movie Classics, which was old movies, you'd realize that corporate takeover of the station happened years ago. The original goal of the station was to air nothing but old movies, not unlike MTV that used to play music videos and the Weather Channel that used to do nothing but post the weather conditions and forecast.

    Your comments about AMC and MTV aren't entirely true. The reason AMC started showing original programming, was because back when they were just showing classic movies there big competitor was TCM (Turner Classic Movies). Since AMC makes a big chunk of their revenue from carrying fees from the cable companies, they were worried that if the cable companies had to pick one classic movie station to carry they would pick the one that is owned by the same company that owns TNT, TBS and CNN. So they decided that they had to come up with some original programming to create buzz about their station so that the cable companies wouldn't dare drop them.

    With MTV the reason they don't play videos is because there is no money in it. MTV's target audience is young people. How many people in their teens and 20's are going to sit around and watch a block of music videos hoping to catch one that they really like, when they can call up any music video they want pretty much on demand on their phone? Plus even before the advent of Youtube, when MTV first started out they were basically playing music videos for free without paying any royalties (calling it a promotional thing). When the record companies realized they were providing MTV with most of their content free of charge, they decided to start charging for it. At that point it was much less profitable to run videos all day and they started looking for other, cheaper programming, that they owned that they could run in its place.
  • It's coming.

    http://www.freepress.net/blog/2014/08/29/the-internet-slowdown-is-coming

    Don't Say We Didn't Warn You: The Internet Slowdown Is Coming …

    If you’re reading this you probably already know that the fight for Net Neutrality is coming to a head. So here’s the deal: September will be epic, and it will all start with the Internet Slowdown.

    On Sept. 10, Free Press and our partners at Battle for the Net will launch the Internet Slowdown — 24 hours that will show the world what the Web will look like if the sites we know and love are stuck in the slow lane.

    This is going to be huge, and we want you to be part of it.

    FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s proposal to allow discrimination online is a disaster. Everyone from the companies to the artists to Congress to the president knows that we need real Net Neutrality to prevent broadband providers from discriminating against content or applications.

    When Wheeler released his proposal earlier this year, support for his plan was scarce. Net Neutrality advocates from across the country slammed the rules, and people camped outside the agency’s doors in protest. Hundreds gathered at rallies in D.C. and at FCC field offices across the country.

    Four months later, support for Wheeler’s plan is basically nonexistent.

    In July, protesters greeted President Obama on fundraising trips to the Bay Area and Los Angeles. Activists have turned out in record numbers to lobby their members of Congress. And don’t forget the millions of comments people filed in opposition to the FCC’s proposal — and in support of Title II reclassification. The influx crashed the agency’s website (twice).

    The momentum has been building for months and on Sept. 10 companies, individuals and websites will inundate the Internet with our message: We demand real Net Neutrality and nothing less.

    So consider yourself warned: The Internet Slowdown is coming. Now we need you to pitch in. Have a website or blog? Put the sloading (get it? slow + loading?) code up on your site. Or help spread the word by sharing this image on social media.



  • Net Neutrality is far from dead. The President Might Have Just Saved the Internet.

    http://act.freepress.net/call/internet_obama_nn_thanks/?t=3&akid=5014.9503304.iP-X64

    Continue to bash him, that's what people do. But while continuing to peruse the free internet, remember, it is he who stood up to the corp giants and stopped the end of net neutrality. At least for now.
  • Yesterday, President Obama made it clear that he really loves his Internet time and also really loves net neutrality.

    COUGH, WHAT’S NET NEUTRALITY, COUGH?
    The idea that all content on the Interwebs should be treated equally – meaning broadband companies shouldn’t be allowed to speed up or slow down content based on who is providing the content. We don’t actually live in a net neutral world right now; there’s currently no regulation over how Internet providers treat traffic from different websites. Earlier this year, a federal court decision cleared the way for broadband companies (like Comcast) to cut deals with content providers (like Netflix) to give them faster connections. The FCC’S been trying (and trying) to come up with new rules for the Interwebs ever since.

    WHAT DO BROADBAND COMPANIES WANT?
    Rhymes with honey. Companies like Verizon and Comcast want to reap the benefits of getting paid to provide a fast lane. They also say it promotes competition and innovation.

    WHAT’S ON CONTENT PROVIDERS’ MINDS?
    Rhymes with honey. Companies like Netflix and Google don’t want to pay up for faster access, and think the Internet should be free for all. They also say pay-to-play would actually stifle innovation, since it would put startup sites at a disadvantage.

    WHAT DOES THE FCC WANT?
    Please hold, buffering. It hasn’t made up its mind yet and it’s playing Switzerland, trying to make everyone happy. It’s now considering a “hybrid plan” that would err more on the side of net neutrality.

    SO WHAT DID OBAMA SAY THEN?
    That the Internet should be reclassified as a public utility. Meaning it would be seen as a necessity like electricity, rather than a pay-to-play option like cable TV. Also meaning more regulation on broadband companies from the FCC, which is a big change to an industry that hasn’t had a lot of oversight in the past. No surprise his critics aren’t loving this.

    theSKIMM
    This is about the future of the Internet and who holds the keys. Though the FCC’s new rules probably won’t be out until next year, they will decide how often and on what sites you will see the spinning wheel of death.
  • rgambsrgambs Posts: 13,576
    Did you see Sen. Ted Cruz said the President wants "Obamacare for the internet"... What a serious douchenozzle...and the FoxNews idgits all grunt their assent in unison...they only use their words when they have to, too taxing.
    Monkey Driven, Call this Living?
  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910
    I'm glad Obama made the speech about how internet providers should be regulated like utilities. His speech only pissed of Republicans and internet providers. The rest of the population who understand how big of an impact this could have are on his side. Let's see if money and special interests get their way, or if we the people do for once. Oh and there's what some 4 or 5 million public comments directed at the fcc saying to protect net neutrality. It always comes down to money, thing is people aren't going to complain until they have to pay double for internet...
    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • The thing also is that not enough people even bother to care about net neutrality or know what it is. That is, until their speed goes down or their service is interrupted. Is that what it's going to come to?
  • a5pja5pj Hershey PA Posts: 3,910

    The thing also is that not enough people even bother to care about net neutrality or know what it is. That is, until their speed goes down or their service is interrupted. Is that what it's going to come to?

    I wouldn't be surprised in the least, ever since I've been following politics and news it always comes down to $. And the wealthy almost always end up getting their way, despite whatever protest might be thrown in their way.
    Wouldn't it be funny if the world ended in 2010, with lots of fire?



  • gimmesometruth27gimmesometruth27 St. Fuckin Louis Posts: 23,303
    as much as i hate the fcc, i completely agree with their ruling here.
    "You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry."  - Lincoln

    "Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
  • callencallen Posts: 6,388
    edited February 2015
    Obama grunt taxes grunt Muslim grunt grunt Obamacare grunt not US citizen grunt grunt illegals grunt grunt amnesty grunt grunt Muslim grunt grunt entitlements grunt grunt.
    Post edited by callen on
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