Bill That Would Restore Net Neutrality Moves Forward Despite Telecom's Best Efforts To Kill It (vice.com) 190
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Last month, Democrats introduced a simple three page bill that would do one thing: restore FCC net neutrality rules and the agency's authority over ISPs, both stripped away by a hugely-controversial decision by the agency in late 2017. Tuesday morning, the Save the Internet Act passed through a key House committee vote and markup session -- despite some last-minute efforts by big telecom to weaken the bill.
"Net neutrality is coming back with a vengeance," said Evan Greer, deputy director of consumer group Fight for the Future said in a statement. "Politicians are slowly learning that they can't get away with shilling for big telecom anymore," Greer said. "We're harnessing the power of the Internet to save it, and any lawmaker who stands in our way will soon face the wrath of their constituents, who overwhelmingly want lawmakers to restore these basic protections." Greer told Motherboard that several last minute amendments were introduced by lawmakers during the markup period in an attempt to water down the bill, but all were pulled in the wake of widespread public interest in the hearing. "It seems like the GOP retreated a bit given after the huge swell of public support," said Greer, who told Motherboard that 300,000 people watched the organization's livestream of the markup process. That attention "really emboldened the Democrats and shored up the ones that were wobbling," Greer said.
"Net neutrality is coming back with a vengeance," said Evan Greer, deputy director of consumer group Fight for the Future said in a statement. "Politicians are slowly learning that they can't get away with shilling for big telecom anymore," Greer said. "We're harnessing the power of the Internet to save it, and any lawmaker who stands in our way will soon face the wrath of their constituents, who overwhelmingly want lawmakers to restore these basic protections." Greer told Motherboard that several last minute amendments were introduced by lawmakers during the markup period in an attempt to water down the bill, but all were pulled in the wake of widespread public interest in the hearing. "It seems like the GOP retreated a bit given after the huge swell of public support," said Greer, who told Motherboard that 300,000 people watched the organization's livestream of the markup process. That attention "really emboldened the Democrats and shored up the ones that were wobbling," Greer said.
It'll die in the Senate (Score:2)
And make no mistake, this is a partisan issue. The last time it came up for a vote it was split completely along party lines (IIRC one or two Repubs broke ranks, but not enough).
What this means is that if you want NN, you have to vote for a Democrat, or at least an Independent. And they have to win both chambers and probably the presidency to.
OTOH, I'm pretty sure it's a minor issue for even a lot of the folks on thi
Exactly (Score:4, Interesting)
It'll die in the Senate, on the plus side this puts the Republicans on record as opposing Net Neutrality.
Exactly... and that's the point.
they have to win both chambers and probably the presidency to.
2020 is coming along with another blue wave.
OTOH, I'm pretty sure it's a minor issue for even a lot of the folks on this forum; and whatever the GOP is selling outweighs the value of NN.
Fear, hate and tax cuts for the rich is what they are selling. However, they changed the intensity from being subliminal and liminal to being superliminal which has had diminishing returns.
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this puts the Republicans on record as opposing Net Neutrality.
Exactly... and that's the point.
What point? If politicians were judged on their voting records, reelection rates would be 20% or less, instead of the present day 95%
2020 is coming along with another blue wave.
LOL! Yeah, followed in 2021 by another disappointment like in 2009, 1993...
*sigh* the wishful thing never ends. The same mistakes will be repeated, and different results are to be expected, again...
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What point? If politicians were judged on their voting records, reelection rates would be 20% or less, instead of the present day 95%
For congressional districts, that's mostly the effect of gerrymandering and partisanship. However, an interesting effect of gerrymandering is that the side benefiting from the gerrymandering is vulnerable to opinion changes. If fewer people support that party than expected in an election they can lose everything, the party harmed by the gerrymandering, on the other hand, can swamp districts that have been cracked if general opinion changes, and they really can't lose districts that have been packed. It's
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Yeah, hussah for 2020 where you poor sons of bitches get to decided between "positive racist/sexist" corporate bought politicians and corporate bought Republicans, whom any sane person cannot stomach any better.
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2020 is coming along with another blue wave.
The last "Blue Wave" could have been more aptly described as a light mist. Unless they Democratic Party fixes their schism(s) and dumps the identity politics it's going to split in two and take everything down with it
democracy (Score:5, Insightful)
What this means is that if you want NN, you have to vote for a Democrat, or at least an Independent. And they have to win both chambers and probably the presidency to.
Or, you could, you know, engage your representative and senator (R/D/wutevr), and express your point of view in a clear, reasoned manner. Believe it or not, they do listen to your calls and read your letters/emails (at least someone on their staff does. There is a populist movement on both sides of the aisle and the incumbents better pay attention to it, or they will be looking for a new job.
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I don't think they listen anymore. Their only concern is being reelected and that means kowtowing to the party faithful so that they make it through the primaries.
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You are apparently unaware of a state named 'Texas'.
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Democrats blew the best opportunity we've ever had to get constructive NN passed.
Let me just stop you right there and let you know that there's a lot of Republicans who are fine with letting NN die a horrible death if that means their person gets another term to "protect the babies". I live in the deep south and on a list of top 50 things folks are concerned about, NN ranks about 246,789,122nd place. The moment people became so focused on single topic issues, was the moment voting records started to mean nothing. So literally Republicans are zero percent phased by this going on the r
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Let me just stop you right there and let you know that there's a lot of Republicans who are fine with letting NN die a horrible death if that means their person gets another term to "protect the babies". I live in the deep south and on a list of top 50 things folks are concerned about, NN ranks about 246,789,122nd place.
I'm not so sure anymore. Everyone is online these days. When you start talking about screwing with peoples Internets or raising price of said Internets as we have seen with FCC comments, Wikipedia campaigns, Facebook hearings..etc.. people end up caring and in significant numbers.
Internet policy from what I've seen is an issue politicians talk about and spend time on for the short time they spend any time giving a fuck about any policy in the first place. It isn't top of any list by any means yet like mos
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This shouldn't be a partisan issue, but it does points out how both parties are firmly behind the stance of "we're opposed to whatever they are for" as the only plank in their platform. The moderates who used to be able to see across the aisle are an endangered species.
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You are disingenous, posting an outright lie followed by extrao
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Don't come here with your bald faced lie that the FCC NN regs prohibited QoS
QoS off the QoS field bits doesn't work - because the backbone routers don't pay attention to them. The routers don't pay attention to them because, in the early days, Microsoft "improved" their IP stack's performance by lying about the QoS required.
So the router companies did QoS by deep packet inspection and applying software rules to what they found. And the same chips that enable doing GOOD with those rulesets also enable doi
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It'll die in the Senate. On the plus side this puts the Republicans on record as opposing Net Neutrality.
The Republicans aren't "opposed to Network Neutrality". They're opposed to using a broken fix that will break things further.
OK, fine. Why didn't they fix it then?
I'll tell you why: their corporate masters don't want it fixed.
Net neutrality and colocation (Score:3)
I have a general net neutrality question.
Consider that 1000 of my local ISP's customers want to watch a hot new Netflix show. My ISP is 1000 km from the nearest Netflix data center. The dumb solution is that 1000 customers sent requests to ISP who sends them 1000 km to Netflix who sends the show 1000 times over the backbone connection. The smart solution is that Netflix colocates a server in my ISP's small local data center which they send the popular shows to just once over the backbone, and this server sends it to the 1000 local customers.
For the smart solution to happen, there have to be incentives for Netflix and the ISP to do it. Without net neutrality, it could work: ISP gets to advertise that Netflix is 0 rated (or 0.5 rated or whatever) towards customer data caps, and benefits from being more attractive to customers and not paying for so much backbone data. Netflix benefits by not needing so much internet backbone. Customers benefit obviously, at least in the short term. (Customers may suffer in the long term through lack of competition.) Would-be Netflix competitors are very unhappy. Possibly money changes hands between ISP and Netflix to make this work, although I'm not sure in which direction.
With net neutrality, the ISP can't offer reduced rating on Netflix data. How do the incentives work in this case? The great reduction of data going over the backbone should provide savings, but who was paying this cost in the first place? Does the ISP want to pay Netflix to colocate a server, or to charge them for it?
Re:Net neutrality and colocation (Score:5, Informative)
If we are going to talk about Netflix, they already offer (or used to offer) your proposed solution. Many ISPs generally refused to accept these boxes because it undercut their arguments about getting Netflix to pay them.
https://openconnect.netflix.co... [netflix.com]
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Many ISPs generally refused to accept these boxes because it undercut their arguments about getting Netflix to pay them.
Well, it seems you think that the ISP should offer free colo service to Netflix, eating the cost of site maintenance and power. Of course Netflix should pay for a colo site since they're the ones profiting from the customers paying them, and they're using consumables that actually do cost money.
Sans a colo, a thousand Netflix customers all streaming the same hot new show creates congestion at the border gateways, which is not a violation of NN. It's also not a violation of the advertised speeds, since "up
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What a load of utter bullcrap.
Site maintenance and power? Trivial amounts of money. It's a 2U appliance. How about the ISP pays Netflix for their reduced cost of peering?
Republicans? I did not mention Republicans or any political parties. Perhaps you should pull your head out of whatever orifice it is in, while searching for a way to deflect criticism of what is obviously your chosen party. Criticism that you are obviously very sensitive about, because I did not write it.
I did not write many of the things y
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Site maintenance and power? Trivial amounts of money. It's a 2U appliance.
Power and air conditioning are not free. A 2U "appliance" doesn't hold much data. It's still takes space. TANSTAAFL.
Republicans? I did not mention Republicans or any political parties.
I didn't say you did. I was covering an additional topic.
I did not write many of the things you appear to be attempting to refute.
I didn't say you did. Please take a chill pill and let other people talk about things you aren't interested in, ok?
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Do you know how much it costs to collocate a 2U system in a datacenter? $400/month buys you a whole cabinet (42U) in a datacenter in California. As for the amount of data: go read the articles about Netflix's system.
What about my point that the ISP is saving a lot of money on peering costs? You can't talk about one cost while ignoring the other.
As for taking a chill pill -- you are the one who desperately needs it.
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What about my point that the ISP is saving a lot of money on peering costs?
What about your guesses? They're saving money they aren't necessarily going to spend anyway to upgrade a border gateway. How nice.
As for taking a chill pill -- you are the one who desperately needs it.
Yeah. Sure. When you stop stressing about my responses to other people (for example, the very first comment at the beginning of this discussion) you can lecture me about calming down.
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I have a straw man to burn.
FTFY.
My ISP is 1000 km from the nearest Netflix data center.
There is literally no where on the planet that Netflix is offered where they have relay servers that far away.
For the smart solution to happen, there have to be incentives for Netflix and the ISP to do it.
Yes, if they want to be functional and responsive to requests, Netflix will need to not do what you propose in you burning strawman argument. Your ISP doesn't have to do anything at all.
Without net neutrality, it could work:
Yeah, we've seen how it works without net neutrality. [businessinsider.com] It's pretty simple, they prevent you from doing business until they get a cut.
Your approach to the issue is naive to say the least because you think compan
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I'm in favour of net neutrality. Your vitriol is misdirected. I just want to know how incentives work in various systems.
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"There is literally no where on the planet that Netflix is offered where they have relay servers that far away."
Central Northern Russia, northern China, etc..
Yes, I looked. [lifehacker.com.au]
MOD Parent up (Score:2)
MOD Parent up
Re:Net neutrality and colocation (Score:5, Informative)
Both Netflix AND the ISP save tons of upstream bandwidth.
Or, without neutrality, ISP throttles the hell out of Netflix and zero rates CrapeeStreaming (a wholly owned subsidiary) and gives their customers the middle finger suggesting they go back to dial-up if they don't like it.
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Both Netflix AND the ISP save tons of upstream bandwidth.
Or, without neutrality, ISP throttles the hell out of Netflix and zero rates CrapeeStreaming (a wholly owned subsidiary) and gives their customers the middle finger suggesting they go back to dial-up if they don't like it.
Actually, zero rating is specifically permitted in the net neutrality regs. And folks forget, the reason comcast was throttling netflix was because they were overloading a public gig-e link in order to get to part of the comcast network. netflix didn't have a direct peerage agreement with comcast back then, nor did their ISP. (which is how ISPs get paid for sinking traffic, BTW). the bottom line is, that model has worked well since day 1. It only appears unfair if you don't understand that it does, in f
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Actually, zero rating is specifically permitted in the net neutrality regs. And folks forget, the reason comcast was throttling netflix was because they were overloading a public gig-e link in order to get to part of the comcast network.
The Netflix drama originally started with Netflix dropping normal bandwidth / CDN services people who need to distribute data at scale normally call upon and instead took it in-house.
As you can imagine this pissed off a lot of ISPs who saw bandwidth from Netflix going to plaid as result of cost cutting measure undertaken by Netflix.
Eventually over time Comcast started pushing back with TE policy that unnecessarily disadvantaged Netflix with side effects well beyond just Netflix.
This lead to the now infamous
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"By this standard Comcast should be paying Netflix because Comcast was receiving way more data from Netflix than was transmitted in the other direction."
You have this backwards.The penalties are because carrying traffic costs money, if Comcast is receiving way more data from Netflix, Comcast has to pay for more equipment to transit that hence Netflix gets the penalty.
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You have this backwards.The penalties are because carrying traffic costs money, if Comcast is receiving way more data from Netflix, Comcast has to pay for more equipment to transit that hence Netflix gets the penalty.
I've heard this argument many times yet still cringe whenever it is invoked. The concept you are conveying makes no logical sense and has no parallels to anything in the real world.
What you are saying is no different than a grocery store attempting to charge farmers for providing more fruit to them because more people want to buy apples and it costs grocery store more to hire staff to run checkout counters and stock apples. Therefore farmers have to pay!!
On what planet does this make any sense to anyone?
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In other words, you really drank the cool aid on the double dipping situation.
Mutual transit agreements are rightly predicated on a reasonable balance of traffic. It does indeed cost money to provide transit ( Allowing traffic from ISP A bound for ISP C to transit your network) and so free transit agreements need to be reciprocal.
Peering is an entirely different case. That's where traffic from ISP A bound for customers of ISP B is routed through a direct connection from A's router to B's router without 3rd
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The smart solution is that Netflix colocates a server in my ISP's small local data center which they send the popular shows to just once over the backbone, and this server sends it to the 1000 local customers.
...
For the smart solution to happen, there have to be incentives for Netflix and the ISP to do it.
This is a leap. Since when is this the smart solution? It's more efficient, yes, but that doesn't make it smart.
The seemingly inefficient way of doing it encourages the ISPs to up their game, build out more infrastructure to handle the loads.
Your smart solution just seems to encourage paid promotion of one streaming service over another, and that's bad.
And if you're concerned about price increases.. well, news flash, what they build or don't build has NO BEARING on the price they keep jacking it up by
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OK, substitute 'efficient' for 'smart'. I agree that is a better word.
If regulations favours inefficient solutions over efficient ones, this is not great. It might well be a price we're willing to pay (e.g. companies spending lots of money on advertising to get market share in a fixed sized market is inefficient), but it at least suggests there might be a problem with the regulations which could be fixed.
My non-net-neutrality solution was not put forward as 'smart' (efficient), just as a way in which non-ne
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The point remains: under the right circumstances, colocation is the efficient solution. Implementing the solution produces a surplus, which can be shared in some way between the participants.
The problem here is that you have failed to consider that improving the service and efficiency of Netflix (and other services) erodes their own cable broadcast model and thus their market position. If it were possible for a startup to provide internet connectivity and suffer no consequence for not having their own cable broadcast agreements then significant inroads could be made from every part of the country to dislodge their monopoly positions.
Bandwidth is cheap and market share is expensive. Do the mat
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We've been down this road already. We know where it leads.
It leads to exclusivity contracts. Ie: Netflix will colo with an ISP to ease the burden, if the ISP agrees not to colo anyone else's services.
You just know that's what's going to happen. No one wins but the big corps raking in the cash and creating artificial shortages.
I am HUGE on efficiency, myself, I don't like we have to organize this in an inefficient way, but the only way it's going to be fair is if no one can colo.
Net Neutrality is part of
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Consider that 1000 of my local ISP's customers want to watch a hot new Netflix show. My ISP is 1000 km from the nearest Netflix data center. The dumb solution is that 1000 customers sent requests to ISP who sends them 1000 km to Netflix who sends the show 1000 times over the backbone connection.
As time moves on I'm less and less convinced of this. Sounds quite reasonable and certainly makes sense in certain situations. Yet generally
given cost of bandwidth especially for those with easy hotel access at some point it's cheaper to be stupid and have dumb as bricks specialized hardware forwarding a lot more packets than to spend money on installing, operating and maintaining intelligence.
Possibly money changes hands between ISP and Netflix to make this work, although I'm not sure in which direction.
With net neutrality, the ISP can't offer reduced rating on Netflix data. How do the incentives work in this case? The great reduction of data going over the backbone should provide savings, but who was paying this cost in the first place? Does the ISP want to pay Netflix to colocate a server, or to charge them for it?
With CDNs like Akamai people I've talked to described it as a trade. Basically you give power and rack space and
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Thanks for a well thought out response, as opposed to those who take me for an evil anti-net-neutrality shill. (As stated in another response, I am pro net neutrality.)
To see if I understand correctly, I shall try to summarize. The colocation benefits are small and possibly non-existent. Designing regulations to encourage colocation is likely to have adverse effects (on competition) that outweigh the benefits. So enforce net neutrality, and let colocation fall where it may.
Is this about right?
I like the tra
One word: (Score:2)
Consider that 1000 of my local ISP's customers want to watch a hot new Netflix show. My ISP is 1000 km from the nearest Netflix data center. The dumb solution is that 1000 customers sent requests to ISP who sends them 1000 km to Netflix who sends the show 1000 times over the backbone connection.
One word: Multicast.
It's already in the Internet suite.
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One word: Multicast.
And when one sub wants to pause the stream so he can go refill the popcorn bowl, do all the other subs also get their streams paused?
No, sorry, multicast is not the solution, even if it is just one word.
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Nobody IRL cares about NN (Score:1, Offtopic)
Nobody in real life cares about what people call Net Neutrality.
In reality, NN is about corporations trying to force other corporations to pay for infrastructure and access. Everything else is just a sideshow, and it's pathetic how so-called geeks have gotten suckered into taking sides in this fight.
NN isn't about the consumer, it's about who pays.
Re:Nobody IRL cares about NN (Score:5, Insightful)
NN isn't about the consumer, it's about who pays.
This is an oxymoron. The consumer ultimately is footing the bill for everything one way or another.
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In this case they want the content to provider to pay AND the consumer to pay. It's like rinse and repeat. But it won't stop there. The biggest worries about net neutrality are subtle things you can't easily prove are even happening if you even know they are happening at all.
Re:Nobody IRL cares about NN (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody in real life cares about what people call Net Neutrality.
In reality, NN is about corporations trying to force other corporations to pay for infrastructure and access. Everything else is just a sideshow, and it's pathetic how so-called geeks have gotten suckered into taking sides in this fight.
NN isn't about the consumer, it's about who pays.
Believe you me, people in real life care about the inflated bill for crappy internet service from their local telecommunications monopoly and they are pissed off about the crappy service so they care about what people call Net Neutrality even if they might call the lack of it price gouging and crappy service.
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Believe you me, people in real life care about the inflated bill for crappy internet service
And NN as enacted by the FCC rules that the Dems want put back has nothing at all to do with prices or price controls.
You want full-time, dedicated gigabit service instead of a network that you share with others upstream from you, then prepare to pay for it. Once you start sharing, you need to understand you are sharing a limited resource, just like telecom planning has resulted in since Mr. Bell called his assistant to come help.
Re:Nobody IRL cares about NN (Score:5, Insightful)
NN is about removing extortion.
Netflix pays their ISP for their connection, I pay mine for mine. That's all there has to be. There's no reason for my ISP to care about Netflix, because whatever are the costs of my usage of Netflix should be covered by the money I pay.
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So you're saying it's about the consumer?
can't get away with shilling for big telecom (Score:2, Insightful)
this is just plain old crony-fascism when the government offers their services to the highest bidder
Save the Internet? (Score:2)
Last month, Democrats introduced a simple three page bill that would do one thing: restore FCC net neutrality rules and the agency's authority over ISPs, both stripped away by a hugely-controversial decision by the agency in late 2017. Tuesday morning, the Save the Internet Act passed through a key House committee vote and markup session -- despite some last-minute efforts by big telecom to weaken the bill.
Serious questions. What has been the overall impact since late 2017 when the FCC removed the rules? Are websites now inaccessible that once were accessible? Have upload & download speeds been reduced? Have costs skyrocketed? Is there any noticeable change that anyone can point to?
go find the memo from comcast (Score:2)
Comcast said they would hold off any big new plans after they killed neutrality. It is a wise move because the suckers will feel safe and think all the fear mongering was a bunch of hype. Then slowly little by little the ISPs turn up the heat and you'll ignore the complains by the haters as we all slowly come to a boil.
The ignorance is staggering... (Score:2)
Yay! (Score:2)
First I am a huge fan of the idea of three page bills. Hopefully they assert actual net neutrality and not Obama era rules.
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First I am a huge fan of the idea of three page bills. Hopefully they assert actual net neutrality and not Obama era rules.
You do realize that this bill is a "three page bill" that instructs FCC to reinstate their entire set of rules that were in place before and they can't ever change them. I didn't count, but I bet it's a lot more than three pages. It makes no changes at all to the previous FCC NN rules, so if you didn't like them this three page bill won't help. And if technology changes in the next few years, these NN rules cannot change to follow.
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You are aware that it's not legally permissible to actually compete with the current monopolists as things stand, right?
The only difference with Net Neutrality is that the monopolists can't screw us on a per domain basis.
The game is over, they won. The only question now is WHAT they won.
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I would further point out the issue with robocalls.
Telecoms are quite capable of clamping this down with an iron fist, but don't. There's overwhelming demand for that clampdown to happen, but --- somehow --- the telecoms just won't self-regulate like GP insists is possible.
It's almost like the proposed methodology just does not work in the real world or something.... /s
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Telecoms are quite capable of clamping this down with an iron fist, but don't. There's overwhelming demand for that clampdown to happen, but --- somehow --- the telecoms just won't self-regulate like GP insists is possible.
I suspect that you don't have much experience in telecoms. CallerID need to be settable by the calling end. This has been explained on Slashdot many times so your argument is weak. Just do your own research on why this need to be and you will easily find.
What we would really need is some kind of tracebility/digital signature of the calling end spoofing the CallerID.
Unfortunately, I am not aware of such provision in SIP or other protocols right now although somebody might already be working on this.
If nobody
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You are correct indeed, that's what I do too with some variation and I seldom get robocalls, say 1 a month on average and that's from direct lines that don't have to go through an IVR before ringing whichever device are close to me.
I don't use any apps although, I control this at the voip switch and most of my cell/copper line calls are routed through it in some way.
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What this means is that they're in on it.
For some reason the telecoms have an incentive to tolerate it, which means they're on the take.
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You seem to be proposing the novel idea that competition is possible in the current climate, or am I mistaken?
Not only is it possible, it is happening. You have to let go of the idea that the "cable company" is the only possible source of Internet service to notice it, however.
You are aware that it's not legally permissible to actually compete with the current monopolists as things stand, right?
Yes I am aware that this lie is floating around out there.
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There's 2 seperate problems here;
The first is allowing content distribution companies aka publishers to also own and create content on a massive scale and in turn, dictate the discussion in a democracy. We know historically how disasterous it is to eliminate the ability of a body politic to discuss their differences and figure out how to manage the economic and political system; its the whole reason we have the freedom of speech.
The second is a bigger issue with local pay 2 play franchising agreements; ISP
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Re:Restore NN and enjoy the gov approved network (Score:5, Insightful)
The market solution to insufficient competition is, in theory, more competition. When there's not enough competition, we have a market failure, and regulators should step in, in this case with Net Neutrality.
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When a telco monopoly uses federal NN rules to keep out new innovative networks?
Open the networks up to new ISP. Let a community create its own community broadband free from federal rules and laws.
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The answer to "the regulator is toothless" is not "remove the regulator". It's "give the regulator teeth". Similarly, the answer to "the regulator has been captured by providers" is "don't allow this to happen". See also: FAA & Boeing.
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The regulators have been taken hostage by lobbyists who successfully hijack state law to ban local competition.
One case where the feds *should* invoke interstate commerce to protect competition.
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Yeah, but no. We had free markets in the UK in the 1800s and we got potato famines, adulteration of food beverages and medicines, grotesque industrial injuries, kids being sent up chimneys, etc etc.
I'd focus on masturbating to the idea of free markets, because they're a fantasy that seem to turn you on. In real life, you can carry on living in a country that uses regulations to ensure your buildings don't fall over, your kids' toys aren't stuffed silly with cheap nasty chemicals that'll kill them, a gallon
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Ah yes... Parliament passes the Corn Laws, overtaxing grain imports so that corn and bread become prohibitively expensive, so people rely on eating potatoes instead, then a potato blight hits and the suddenly the over-reliance on potatoes is the "free market" in action and the government tariffs which created the situation are to be ignored.
The problem is that you're ignorant to the negative side effects of what really happens when people try to control vast swaths of the economy, not the least of which is
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You really do know fuck all about history, don't you?
The causes of the Famine included: the unchecked power of landlords over their tenants; the consequential splitting of tenant landholdings into ever small parcels, such that ultimately only potatoes could be farmed (Irish farmers at this time were subsistence famers, they could not afford to buy their main source of calories, because they were impoverished, not because of the price of grain); and the dominance of the potato as a staple crop (and especiall
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Hammurabi? Are you fucking kidding me?! Hammurabi created a *law*! with a *sanction*! That is regulation, you muppet! As the ruler of the country -- you know, the government -- he wrote a law that said builders whose buildings collapse and kill someone should themselves be killed. You should be *outraged* at Hammurabi interfering in the free market in that way, not parading it as though it's an example of the free market in action.
Jesus fucking Christ, you people try to be so clever and then you say such st
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Instead of talking about new strawmen as a distraction, it would be better if you simply acknowledged that you cited an example of a government using deadly force as a regulatory sanction as evidence of how free markets can operate successfully without regulation. If you can't be honest with me, at least be honest with yourself.
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So you're not going to admit you argued government regulation was bad by approvingly citing an example of government regulation?
I mean this is hardly fancy logic. This is the same as someone arguing "trains are always shittier than cars. Here's an example of a train that's better than car". It's just idiocy.
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That's great, and I generally agree, but you're not dealing in a free market in this case. When the vast majority of homes only have one cable provider, that's not a free market. The feds need to jump in whenever things are turning monopolistic, and we've lost sight of that ever since breaking up AT&T.
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I don't think that real competition is realistic in the ISP space. Why can't you choose your water provider? There is only one set of pipes entering your home. The situation with ISPs isn't quite that extreme, but it is an example of the same problem - there is expensive infrastructure that needs to be plumbed to every home and that naturally limits the number of competitors that can play. Therefore the "free market" cannot solve the problem on its own. If you only have one option for your ISP, wit
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And yet, you're still dealing with one ISP. That's not a free market.
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Listen, I'm a small government conservative. But, in the case of monopolistic behavior, there's no option but to have government step in and either break up the monopoly, or find some other way to open up the market.
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ISP's pay government, government grants monopolies,
Not in the US. It is against federal law for any cable communications company to be granted an exclusive franchise. Then the issue becomes that you don't have to be a cable communications company to be an ISP, and no ISP EVER has been granted an exclusive franchise.
States are attempting to retire their POTS cable and are finding out 911 emergency service goes away with it
Really? I can call 911 from my cell phone just fine. They even get my GPS coordinates when I do. Where is 911 going?
and begin seperating publishers from content producers,
Uhhh, huh? So if I write a book I should not be able to publish it and sell it myself? Freedom of speech, much?
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The average person blathering on about 'BUT MUH BANDWIDTH!' has no clue about the problems, its no wonder that various ISP want to be able to negotiate with the massive companies putting completely unrestricted traffic on their networks, now they are going to be hit with 4K game streaming on top of Youtube and Netflix and all the spam etc.
I want some version of NN too but not the short sighted heavy handed restrictive version that was imposed previously.
Its only the biggest companies putting massive traffi
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There's no need for 4k streaming of anything, IMO.
However, there *IS* a need for telecoms to stop hoarding their profits to make investors shit rainbows, and instead actually improve their networks. I wont hold my breath for that though.
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Shitting rainbows is fun. Nobody is going to pass up an opportunity to shit rainbows. Not even to save the world, or "restore" net neutrality or something something.
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"There's no need for 4k streaming of anything, IMO."
High-def microscopic research done remotely?
I mean, I was doing that a DECADE ago.
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"There's no need for 4k streaming of anything, IMO." High-def microscopic research done remotely?
You've fallen for the typical argument tactic of someone telling you what "you don't need". Doesn't matter what what's-his-name thinks you or I need. Nobody died and left him in charge of what we need.
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Your eyes lack the total number of photo receptors to accommodate 4k video. That is why you don't need it.
The human eye has between 6 and 7 million cone cells in it. That number is divided into 3, because each cone cell is receptive to only a single notch of the light spectrum.
This gives your eye a total "RGB" receptivity of about 2 million total "pixels".
4k video streams 8,294,400 ACTUAL, Fully RGB pixels every frame.
That is 4 times the resolution of your eyeball.
If you were capturing the high res data
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Its only the biggest companies putting massive traffic on the network that benefit from NN, not any users.
Um.. are you saying that when a user requests a youtube stream, that youtube is putting massive traffic over the network and not the user? The user benefits from the youtube stream, do they not?
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Yes, that's exactly what he's saying.
No, it doesn't make any sense, and no he will never realize exactly how idiotic his rantings are.
How sad. (Score:2)
Why would you think such blatant disinformation would succeed here? Do you really think so little of people?
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Welcome back to your copper insulated wireline that 100% NN ready and federally approved.
Yep pretty much. They could have written a clean NN bill that addresses competition.
What they elected to do instead was continue POTS era Title II bullshit with an insane number of administrative forbearances that can be dissolved at any time by the whim of technocrats.
Everyone who is cheerleading for this bill enjoy regressive Internet USF taxes coming to an account statement near you.
Democrats blew the best opportunity we've ever had to get constructive NN passed.
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Democrats blew the best opportunity we've ever had to get constructive NN passed.
Oh sweetheart, it's been a concerted effort on both sides. Democrats understand that a clean rewrite would suck resources their staffer can't provide and lobbyist won't pay for. Republicans ensured that independent consultation won't happen this lifetime. And do you think the FCC is willing to testify in commitee on this topic honestly? So unless come 2020 we elect bona fide IT folk into Congress (and I highly don't recommend that), a clean rewrite won't happen.
New legislation doesn't happen on timescal
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Democrats blew the best opportunity we've ever had to get constructive NN passed.
The probability of this bill passing the senate and being signed into law by Donald Trump is precisely 0%.
It is a political stunt for the sole purpose of framing the issue for the 2020 election.
The actual content of the bill is completely irrelevant.
Re:Restore NN and enjoy the gov approved network (Score:5, Interesting)
Welcome back to your copper insulated wireline that 100% NN ready and federally approved.
Welcome back to your one federal NN approved monopoly telco.
No more new competition. No new community broadband. No network innovation allowed.
Federal rules and laws protecting monopoly networks all the way down to the modem.
Nothing new for your gated community. Nothing better for your gentrified neighborhood.
Want community broadband? The exisiting NN approved network is the only network allowed.
Federal laws and rules slowing your internet since 2019?
Restoring slow gov approved networks all over the USA. No more new network freedom.
You really don't have the first clue about what the Net Neutrality rules did and did not do prior to December 14, 2017, do you? All this new bill does is reverse the Ajit Pai FCC fuckery from December, 2017 and sets it back to the way it was before that. Do you recall the Internet being slow before 2017? Do you really believe there was no network innovation before December 2017?
You really are a stupid sonofabitch, you know that?
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We can't trust the Government to control X effectively for the people. The power should be with the Businesses!
Democrats:
We can't trust the Businesses to control X effectively for the people. The power should be with the Government!
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Network neutrality says nothing about the underlying tech.
This should be true but isn't. The vehicle democrats are using to impose it (Title II) sure has a heck of a lot to say about a whole lot of unrelated things.
If the big telco's don't want to build the infrastructure if they can't screw everyone over then fuck em.
The problem is government regulation is actively being used to reinforce large monopolies. Examples include spectrum policy favoring large providers and pole attachment rights.
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In my State everybody has pole attachment rights. If I buy a house in the mountains, and I want to run a private fiber run, it costs something like $30k/mile. But none of that is for attachment rights, it is only to have the work done by a licensed contractor.
Don't let companies own the poles. That is as stupid as letting companies own streets.
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Will every community in the US be free to build their own community broadband an invite in on innovative and fast ISP?
Will only the existing monopoly wireline be able to prove to the US gov that it is NN ready ISP and is the only regulated ISP allowed to connect?
AC federal NN rules are what keep new networks and new innovative service out of communities all around the USA.
Time for some community broadband with new tr
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"Well when the telecom providers did the... uhhh.... the bad things.... with.."
There has been a ton of rate limiting and throttling, data collection, double charging for bandwidth. But nowhere near what it will be if they actually win the fight. Right now they are just dipping their toes in the water.
The most scary thing about not having net neutrality is that the worst things they can do will be transparent or otherwise appear normal. Especially if they are at all clever.
Your Playstation Vue, Hulu, Netflix