FCC Passes Net Neutrality

[woolybug25]

I am the one paying the bill. My internet access bill pays for the pipes. Comcast would be using their ISP monopoly to hold a gun to Netflix's head and make them pay to even be available. It's using an infrastructure monopoly to prop up their content monopoly.

Or allow them to exist period. If Comcast wanted to stream their own version of Netflix, they could simply take away their access to resource that frankly doesn't belong to them.

That's the thing people keep forgetting as well. They don't have to "price them out of the market", they would have the power to restrict access. To only allow the usage to whom they choose. It would be like if Sprint and AT&T merged and could somehow control all access to cell phone frequency. Then telling every other cell phone company that they have to either pay what they want or not at all. Also... only the accesses they choose for them.

It's completely noncompetitive.

 

[wizards8507]

What everyone seems to be missing is the dynamics of the telecom industry in 2015. The traditional model of content distribution says ESPN gets to the consumer through Comcast. The future model of content distribution says ESPN gets to the consumer "over the top." We're currently at some kind of middle ground, with services like SlingTV allowing access without becoming a full "corded" customer. The conflict of interest is that the ISP you use to access SlingTV, Prime, Netflix, and Hulu is the same company that provides the cable you're trying to cut. Net neutrality forces the cable companies to be complicit in their own demise. Comcast's ISP business is being forced to help you no longer need/want/desire Comcast's distribution business. I hate Comcast as much as the next guy but that doesn't sit right with me.

ETA: The solution to all this: Disassemble the barriers to entry in the telecom space and force Comcast, Time Warner, COX, etc. to compete with one another on price.

 

[woolybug25]

What everyone seems to be missing is the dynamics of the telecom industry in 2015. The traditional model of content distribution says ESPN gets to the consumer through Comcast. The future model of content distribution says ESPN gets to the consumer "over the top." We're currently at some kind of middle ground, with services like SlingTV allowing access without becoming a full "corded" customer. The conflict of interest is that the ISP you use to access SlingTV, Prime, Netflix, and Hulu is the same company that provides the cable you're trying to cut. Net neutrality forces the cable companies to be complicit in their own demise. Comcast's ISP business is being forced to help you no longer need/want/desire Comcast's distribution business. I hate Comcast as much as the next guy but that doesn't sit right with me.

ETA: The solution to all this: Disassemble the barriers to entry in the telecom space and force Comcast, Time Warner, COX, etc. to compete with one another on price.

Save it. Avoiding net neutrality doesn't force them to participate in their own demise by allowing access to a resource they do not own. There is a misrepresentation that your argument underlies, in which the Comcast's of the world somehow "own" the internet. They do not.

We as consumers are also not paying in kind for corporate America's higher usage of the resource. If we did not take action, our access would actually decrease. Right now, I can have the same access to the internet that Amazon utilizes. What would happen if Comcast had their way, would be them giving me a scaled down version at the same cost, while increasing the cost to larger users.

The final part, which you haven't addressed, is that if Comcast chose they could simply turn off access. Don't like Hulu users taking away from your cable usage? Turn it off. Don't like people streaming Dan Patrick online? Turn it off. Don't like Netflix taking away potential premium cable customers? Turn it off. That's the world if net neutrality doesn't exist.

 

[wizards8507]

Save it. Avoiding net neutrality doesn't force them to participate in their own demise by allowing access to a resource they do not own. There is a misrepresentation that your argument underlies, in which the Comcast's of the world somehow "own" the internet. They do not.

We as consumers are also not paying in kind for corporate America's higher usage of the resource. If we did not take action, our access would actually decrease. Right now, I can have the same access to the internet that Amazon utilizes. What would happen if Comcast had their way, would be them giving me a scaled down version at the same cost, while increasing the cost to larger users.

The final part, which you haven't addressed, is that if Comcast chose they could simply turn off access. Don't like Hulu users taking away from your cable usage? Turn it off. Don't like people streaming Dan Patrick online? Turn it off. Don't like Netflix taking away potential premium cable customers? Turn it off. That's the world if net neutrality doesn't exist.

It's THEIR infrastructure. THEIR bandwidth. This isn't the government regulating the government's infrastructure, it's the government regulating someone else's infrastructure.

 

[woolybug25]

I completely agree, but this isn't the way to get there. Where I live, I have one choice for television. Comcast is the only provider that services my home unless I wanted to go with one of the satellite companies but that would leave me without internet. If Comcast, U-verse, FiOS, COX, and Time Warner were all operating in the same geographic footprint, they'd be forced to compete with one another and prices would fall dramatically. The reason Comcast has me by the nuts is because there's no other choice. This does nothing to solve that problem.

Don't Blame Big Cable. It's Local Governments That Choke Broadband Competition | WIRED

Do you think there would be MORE cable providers without net neutrality? Why would Comcast give access to the internet to a competitor if it wasn't in their best interest?

A new cable provider would need access to cable lines, access to the internet that now sends our television programming to our homes. If Comcast didn't want a new provider to exist, they simply would restrict access and force them to invest in their own infrastructure, which no company could or would be feasibly able to do. Keep in mind, that same cable infrastructure wasn't something that big cable provided on their own. Our tax dollars subsidized our modern cable delivery infrastructure. Now those same companies are crying that they can't unilaterally restrict access how they choose fit.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

It's THEIR infrastructure. THEIR bandwidth. This isn't the government regulating the government's infrastructure, it's the government regulating someone else's infrastructure.

You understand how public utilities work, right?

In the United States of America, public utilities are often natural monopolies because the infrastructure required to produce and deliver a product such as electricity or water is very expensive to build and maintain. As a result, they are often government monopolies, or if privately owned, the sectors are specially regulated by a public utilities commission.

That applies directly to ISPs, and the FCC made the right call in choosing to classify them as common carriers.

 

[woolybug25]

It's THEIR infrastructure. THEIR bandwidth. This isn't the government regulating the government's infrastructure, it's the government regulating someone else's infrastructure.

See above, it's not THEIR infrastructure. Our tax dollars subsidized the infrastructure that carries our internet. It's not like Comcast went out and invested Trillions of dollars in cable lines across the country and now the big, mean government is stealing their investment.

Honestly... I don't believe that you have the basic understanding of how the system works that you are so adamantly arguing on behalf of...

 

[wizards8507]

Do you think there would be MORE cable providers without net neutrality? Why would Comcast give access to the internet to a competitor if it wasn't in their best interest?

A new cable provider would need access to cable lines, access to the internet that now sends our television programming to our homes. If Comcast didn't want a new provider to exist, they simply would restrict access and force them to invest in their own infrastructure, which no company could or would be feasibly able to do. Keep in mind, that same cable infrastructure wasn't something that big cable provided on their own. Our tax dollars subsidized our modern cable delivery infrastructure. Now those same companies are crying that they can't unilaterally restrict access how they choose fit.

Then why not just have the government take over the internet completely, because that's what you're advocating in principle? That's communism, my friend.

I don't know why peoples' minds are clouded when it comes to something abstract like "the internet"... it's really no more complicated than something much more tangible. Let's say I own a trucking company. I haul goods from Chicago to New York and back. If I don't want to ship explosives, I'm not going to ship explosives. If I want to charge extra to ship firearms, I'm going to charge extra to ship firearms. It's that simple. Don't like it? Find a different trucking company. Except, oh wait, I'm the only trucking company that ships from Chicago to New York because I bribed city officials into making me the exclusive carrier.

 

[woolybug25]

EXACTLY! Congratulations on accurately diagnosing the problem.

Subsidies and government bullshit created a problem and now we're going to rely on government bullshit to fix it. What could go wrong?

We wouldn't have our modern internet without it. There is no way a company would have every invested in this type of infrastructure without it.

Then why not just have the government take over the internet completely, because that's what you're advocating in principle? That's communism, my friend.

I don't know why peoples' minds are clouded when it comes to something abstract like "the internet"... it's really no more complicated than something much more tangible. Let's say I own a trucking company. I haul goods from Chicago to New York and back. If I don't want to ship explosives, I'm not going to ship explosives. If I want to charge extra to ship firearms, I'm going to charge extra to ship firearms. It's that simple. Don't like it? Find a different trucking company. Except, oh wait, I'm the only trucking company that ships from Chicago to New York because I bribed city officials into making me the exclusive carrier.

I don't even know where to begin... but i'll try. No one is making the claim that they want government to control access, and this bill doesn't do that. In fact, it does the opposite. It makes it so no one can restrict access. That it's open and free. That is what has made it great and spawned our modern web economy.

Your analogy is exactly what net neutrality guards against. It makes it so that hypothetical trucking company decides who gets to access the highway and on what terms. They ship what they want and other people can only ship if they allow them to on their highway. You analogy is exactly our point.

 

[Buster Bluth]

Then why not just have the government take over the internet completely, because that's what you're advocating in principle? That's communism, my friend.

This is why it's often a fruitless endeavor to have a conversation with a libertarian.

 

[Buster Bluth]

Your analogy is exactly what net neutrality guards against. It makes it so that hypothetical trucking company decides who gets to access the highway and on what terms. They ship what they want and other people can only ship if they allow them to on their highway. You analogy is exactly our point.

Isn't that exactly what Standard Oil did with railroads?

 

[woolybug25]

Isn't that exactly what Standard Oil did with railroads?

Kinda, but Standard Oil didn't provide access to the railway, they just worked out back room deals on rates which gave them an noncompetitive advantage. They didn't "restrict" companies from access like Comcast wants, but rather priced them out of the market.

Yet, I doubt our libertarian friend would argue on Rockefeller's behalf in that case.

 

[wizards8507]

COMMUNISM

If you're going to caricature me, at least get it right. Programs like this at the municipal level are federalism, not communism.

 

[DonnieNarco]

I chose not to argue about this because I didn't fully understand the topic, and it might be wise for some others to do the same.

 

[JadeBrecks]

The truth is, if the FCC ever tried to censor/regulate the Internet there'd be outcry like there was over net neutrality and hopefully #democracy would work.

I wish we could fall back on this but how much crap being passed now would have caused massive outcrys 10, 20, or 30 years ago passes without a chirp anymore?

 

[pkt77242]

I wish we could fall back on this but how much crap being passed now would have caused massive outcrys 10, 20, or 30 years ago passes without a chirp anymore?

I think the complete opposite is true, in fact I would say that you are off by a wide margin. Almost everything gets significantly more scrutiny now then it use too, thanks to things such as 24 hour news channels, 8 bazillion bloggers, etc. The truth is we probably get more information now then we have ever gotten before (though there is still plenty of room for our government to be more open and transparent).

 

[Irish YJ]

This is a very good thing for small business. I'm not sure I buy Cuban's argument about the extent of the regulation here. This just says that when you pay for data, the cable company doesn't get to double bill to decide who gets access to the 50gb a month or whatever you're paying for. Amazon doesn't get to pay extra to have preferred bandwidth while the local bookstore down the street has a website that you can't load since he can't afford to pay the cable company's rates.

All you gotta know is that Comcast and Time Warner were against this. Screw them.

I also consider myself conservative/libertarian and it really pisses me off that the Republicans stuck in like this. There are many regulations that hurt the American people. This is not one of them.

Yes, and both Comcast and TW sell both "content" and "delivery". They want to either a) give themselves a competitive advantage, or b) make money off of some else's content. Conflict.....

IMO, paying access $$ for a "pipe" should be unfiltered and un-throttled. Let's not forget Netflix and other content providers pay access $$ for connecting themselves.

I ran into a similar situation setting up an office in Belize. The incumbent ISP (BTL, which was nationalized in a hostile takeover) would not allow VoIP over it's lines to give themselves the ability to charge crazy high rates for their own voice services, or they would charge fees for VoIP access. We ultimately found ways around it (via VPN and competition) until they changed their tune a few years ago.

 

[Circa]

Just in case it doesn't show up: John Oliver explains it the best.

After this 13 min explanation I find It absurd to read anyone agreeing to this monopoly. I can remember when I would call my cousin 8 houses down the road (1/10th of a mile) and It was considered a long distance phone call, yet call the suburb 35 mins. away and It was local. It wasn't until cell service became prevalent that we finally had good home phone rates... The beat goes on.. and on.. and... what is going on with greedy.. Nevermind

 

[Circa]

I chose not to argue about this because I didn't fully understand the topic, and it might be wise for some others to do the same.

You my friend; absolutely right!
I will disagree with the simplicity of this statement tho. The nuts and bolts of this situation comes down to information and knowledge. If you, or anyone else had the ability to 'limit' someone's ability to discover new things, learn to read, watch the history of all of us etc.. I would want to argue with the best of em. Taking information and using it as a weapon Is a scary idea even for us not-so-smart-guys

 

[Rhode Irish]

I can't believe this is an argument. What the ISPs wanted to do is objectively bad and evil. Net neutrality is therefore good. It is simultaneously amusing and infuriating to listen to idiots like Mark Cuban, (some) republicans and Wizard twist themselves into knots to argue against it. If you really try to parse out what these people are saying, it becomes clear that they are either real dumb (i.e., Cuban), are bad people who think you're real dumb (i.e., Ajit Pai) or just regurgitating nonsense they don't understand because they are good company men (i.e., Wizard).

 

[Cackalacky]

So I just read 68 posts of wizards misunderstanding the fundamental issue, arguing vehemently against it, then getting corrected, and the claiming "Exactly!!! That is what I was saying". Fail...

Correct decision by the FCC IMO. The real division though here was between the ISPs and the investors in tech companies and startups and the large internt companies.. Lots of money is currently invested in small projects that require unfettered access to the Internet. This victory was still over monied interests, it just so happens that the result is currently beneficial to the public.

 

[IrishInFl]

At this point I feel that only people who label themselves as contrarian would argue against net neutrality.

 

[GoldenDome]

So I just read 68 posts of wizards misunderstanding the fundamental issue, arguing vehemently against it, then getting corrected, and the claiming "Exactly!!! That is what I was saying". Fail...

Correct decision by the FCC IMO. The real division though here was between the ISPs and the investors in tech companies and startups and the large internt companies.. Lots of money is currently invested in small projects that require unfettered access to the Internet. This victory was still over monied interests, it just so happens that the result is currently beneficial to the public.

Yeah, Cuban probably has invested money in the "future" capabilities of the Internet. He specifically stated that this would deter innovation from things like bitrate and virtual reality streaming. This ruling puts a damper on his investments and gives smaller startups the same advantages as the large ones with capital and he will lobby like crazy to get the votes against it. He specifically cited that a person streaming a video should not have the same bit rate as a person streaming virtual reality.

 

[alohagoirish]

This is an amusing thread, clearly internet users like us, rather then internet providers and businesses, should be in full support of net neutrality unless they want to seed more control to the big brother corporate state. Yet some have such a blind dedication to oppose government regulation in any form they argue against the very principles and liberties they would normally advocate for....as I said, its amusing when that happens.

 

[GoldenDome]

This is an amusing thread, clearly internet users like us, rather then internet providers and businesses, should be in full support of net neutrality unless they want to seed more control to the big brother corporate state. Yet some have such a blind dedication to oppose government regulation in any form they argue against the very principles and liberties they would normally advocate for....as I said, its amusing when that happens.

Yet government deregulation led to the financial crash of 2008 where financial institutions ran red light after red light because there was no regulation. Free market economics is all fine and dandy if they are ran by ethical people. People don't realize that if it weren't for the FDA big corporations would probably feed us dog shit and get away with it.

 

[Irish YJ]

Yet government deregulation led to the financial crash of 2008 where financial institutions ran red light after red light because there was no regulation. Free market economics is all fine and dandy if they are ran by ethical people. People don't realize that if it weren't for the FDA big corporations would probably feed us dog shit and get away with it.

And our government is full of those.

 

[MNIrishman]

Yet government deregulation led to the financial crash of 2008 where financial institutions ran red light after red light because there was no regulation. Free market economics is all fine and dandy if they are ran by ethical people. People don't realize that if it weren't for the FDA big corporations would probably feed us dog shit and get away with it.

Oh man let's not get started on the FDA. That thing is owned by big companies and is designed against startups. There's a reason why it takes billion(s) to develop a new drug and a reason why most of them cost a small fortune.

Monsanto had a key role in determining FDA GMO regulations in the 70s, which were never designed to protect people, but to keep the cost of development so high that only large companies like Monsanto can really compete in the space.

 

[connor_in]

We are arguing net neutrality as a concept. Which is fine, but do we know the exact wording of the 300+ pages of regulation and why the FCC head wouldn't come before Congress to discuss it before the vote.

The way you paint it makes it seem like Moses freed all of us slaves again, and maybe it is. However, I gotta admit the lack of information gives me pause.

 

[woolybug25]

We are arguing net neutrality as a concept. Which is fine, but do we know the exact wording of the 300+ pages of regulation and why the FCC head wouldn't come before Congress to discuss it before the vote.

The way you paint it makes it seem like Moses freed all of us slaves again, and maybe it is. However, I gotta admit the lack of information gives me pause.

Because he has addressed the issue in the past and not mandated to do so. Maybe they just wanted the FCC to simply do it's job and vote yes or no on the document they provided. They weren't creating changes, they were protecting current rights. The information was provided and they had all of the information they needed to make a decision. They have had plenty of time to dissect the issue on the floor and debate. The damn document was released on May 15th of last year. Is that really not enough time?

Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet NPRM | FCC.gov

What you are proposing is changing the mandated process for this to be reviewed in Congress. It's silly to believe that there is some conspiracy theory because the process didn't include one final soap box Q&A where they could bang the same questions that have been answered over and over again so some politicians could talk to simply to hear themselves talk.

They didn't just come up with the idea this morning and rush it to vote. The proposal has been available since last year.

 

[connor_in]

Because he has addressed the issue in the past and not mandated to do so. Maybe they just wanted Congress to simply do it's job and vote yes or no on the document they provided. They weren't creating changes, they were protecting current rights. The information was provided and they had all of the information they needed to make a decision. They have had plenty of time to dissect the issue on the floor and debate. The damn document was released on May 15th of last year. Is that really not enough time?

Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet NPRM | FCC.gov

What you are proposing is changing the mandated process for this in Congress. It's silly to believe that there is some conspiracy theory because the process didn't include one final soap box Q&A where they could bang the same questions that have been answered over and over again so some politicians could talk to simply to hear themselves talk.

They didn't just come up with the idea this morning and rush it to vote. The proposal has been available since last year.

What are you talking about? The vote was 3 to 2 and was not voted on in Congress. See OP of thread