Stanford University study claims 99.7 percent of human-filed comments opposed FCC's net...

[MilwaukeeMike]

Those of us who favor NN have linked instances of abuse by ISPs that occurred before NN was in place, and is, in part, the basis that I see that makes NN a necessity.

Not true, and we've been through it. read wikipedia's entry on NN below. This is the best case for NN that the collective internet could come up with and it's extremely thin. Note in the reading below that a) the cases are so few you can count them on 1 hand, b) the FCC busted them anyway because violating NN rules was already illegal, c) the cases are from years and years ago because there are no recent cases that caused NN come about.

NN is Google and Netflix convincing the govt they shouldn't have to pay more for all their traffic, and 99.7% of people agree because they called it 'neutrality' and who can possibly against fairness?

If not having NN was really a problem we'd have a TON of stories about violations. It would be happening all over the place. As it stands - no one can tell the difference from before or after we've had NN. The rules are completely useless and they're nothing more than the govt helping out some big corporate donors Google & Netflix.

From Wikipedia:

'A widely cited example of a violation of net neutrality principles was the Internet service provider Comcast's secret slowing ("throttling") of uploads from peer-to-peer file sharing (P2P) applications by using forged packets.[11] Comcast did not stop blocking these protocols, like BitTorrent, until the Federal Communications Commission ordered them to stop.[12] In another minor example, the Madison River Communications company was fined US$15,000 by the FCC, in 2004, for restricting their customers' access to Vonage, which was rivaling their own services.[13] AT&T was also caught limiting access to FaceTime, so only those users who paid for AT&T's new shared data plans could access the application.[14] In July 2017, Verizon Wireless was accused of throttling after users noticed that videos played on Netflix and YouTube were slower than usual, though Verizon commented that it was conducting "network testing" and that net neutrality rules permit "reasonable network management practices".[15] A September 2018 report from Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst found that U.S. telecom companies are indeed slowing internet traffic to and from those two sites in particular along with other popular apps.[16]"

 

[Satish Mallya]

US is a Republic, not a Democracy.

Not really, it's not.
From the dictionary definition:
re·pub·lic
/rəˈpəblik/
noun

1. a state in which supreme power is held by the people and their elected representatives, and which has an elected or nominated president rather than a monarch.

In actual practice, 'the people' are misrepresented by gerrymandering, voter suppression, legislative capture, regulatory capture, judicial capture, outright bribery etc. And that's not even getting into problems with the original design (e.g how the House and the Senate represent the population by state).

There's a lot of rather large problems to overcome before the US can be an ideal republic.

 

[Satish Mallya]

...NN is Google and Netflix convincing the govt they shouldn't have to pay more for all their traffic, and 99.7% of people agree because they called it 'neutrality' and who can possibly against fairness?....

The requester of the traffic pays for the traffic. The requester being the consumer. The payment being to the ISP. The traffic being whatever the consumer wants, as long as someone is willing to send it to them from the other end.
ISPs have already been paid handsomely for the transit (look up bulk bandwidth rates sometime)
Their control on their cost is throttling bandwidth, as is their right - you get throttled to what you pay for, even if they have the technical capability to deliver far more (e.g. you pay for 75 mbps, you get no more than that, even if the network in your area can handle 1 gbps).
They already do this, and it is an eminently fair way to do business.
Now why should Google and Netflix have to pay for the traffic that's already been paid for by you? And, if, for some reason, you decide that they should, what exactly are YOU paying for?

 

[Satish Mallya]

....if they ever start regulating the Internet. Those regulations will become the same way. The people at the top will regulate the dollar in their pocket by any means possible.

You're unintentionally right in this - that's exactly what they're doing right now by trying to squash NN.
The regulation they want is 'nothing'.
This is against the interests of the vast majority of the public for the benefit of a few.

 

[Lifeispossible]

I wouldn't put it past a prestigious institution to put out a "paid" study, the price must have been right verizon and them have more money than God.

 

[MilwaukeeMike]

The requester of the traffic pays for the traffic. The requester being the consumer. The payment being to the ISP. The traffic being whatever the consumer wants, as long as someone is willing to send it to them from the other end.
ISPs have already been paid handsomely for the transit (look up bulk bandwidth rates sometime)
Their control on their cost is throttling bandwidth, as is their right - you get throttled to what you pay for, even if they have the technical capability to deliver far more (e.g. you pay for 75 mbps, you get no more than that, even if the network in your area can handle 1 gbps).
They already do this, and it is an eminently fair way to do business.
Now why should Google and Netflix have to pay for the traffic that's already been paid for by you? And, if, for some reason, you decide that they should, what exactly are YOU paying for?

( @treetops - here's the answer to your question from the other post. )

Well put, and exactly their point. They throttle to what you pay for, but all traffic is throttled the same - there's no favoritism.

I didn't suggest Netflix and Google should pay for the traffic - I said they started this NN fiasco because they didn't want to pay for it. The fact is though, it has to be paid for by someone. When streaming video became popular a few years ago it wasn't possible for a few million people to watch Netflix at the same time without there being slowdowns on the current internet pipelines. Improvements were needed to account for new demand.

Customers blamed ISPs for the slowdowns- ISPs blamed Netflix (since it was them flooding the lines). ISPs told Netflix "We're going to charge you more because we have to do upgrades because of you." Netflix (and Google/Youtube) didn't want that to happen so they went to the govt to get it prohibited.

Because this is the US, the govt isn't allowed to tell business what they can charge and to who, so the only way around it was re-classify the internet under a law from 1930 into a utility. They called it 'Net Neutrality' and everyone thinks it's a great thing without realizing the internet has been just fine without it.

So who should pay for it? We should follow Econ 101 - and allow the ISPs to charge Netflix more, Netflix should be allowed to charge us more. We should be allowed to pick whatever streaming service we want. The only role the govt should have is to make sure we have choices - I.e. don't let all the ISPs merge into a monopoly or anything like that.

Corporations shouldn't be able to go to the White House and ask for a rule to save them money. This does happen all the time - but in almost all cases it's to save jobs (price floors etc) Netflix and Google are swimming in money. Netflix just announced record profits again.

 

[wiyosaya]

Not true, and we've been through it. read wikipedia's entry on NN below. This is the best case for NN that the collective internet could come up with and it's extremely thin. Note in the reading below that a) the cases are so few you can count them on 1 hand, b) the FCC busted them anyway because violating NN rules was already illegal, c) the cases are from years and years ago because there are no recent cases that caused NN come about.

NN is Google and Netflix convincing the govt they shouldn't have to pay more for all their traffic, and 99.7% of people agree because they called it 'neutrality' and who can possibly against fairness?

If not having NN was really a problem we'd have a TON of stories about violations. It would be happening all over the place. As it stands - no one can tell the difference from before or after we've had NN. The rules are completely useless and they're nothing more than the govt helping out some big corporate donors Google & Netflix.

From Wikipedia:

I have heard your arguments before. Quoting wikipedia? Seriously? You are using a site that can be edited by anyone as a reference to back up your claims? What you quoted sounds like it is biased against NN, and being that the site can be edited by anyone, what it says there could easily have been written by anyone including Ajit Pai.

So let me provide a bit of perspective from other viewpoints (even though my bet is that you will say that these are biased for NN and contain links to liberal, fake news organizations):

https://wccftech.com/net-neutrality-abuses-timeline/

https://www.freepress.net/our-respo...iners/net-neutrality-violations-brief-history
Some repeats from the first article, but some different ones, and here's a very interesting quote from that article that is taken from public court records:

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

This one quote is, IMO, pretty much all that is needed to validate the arguments of those who support NN.

https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/net-neutrality-violations-history/

And further validation comes from this article on Wired which essentially says that there is not enough competition.
https://www.wired.com/2014/06/net-neutrality-missing/

The thing is, though, with laws that prevent competition, or prevent an ISP from being something like what the law in Tennessee prevents, https://www.techspot.com/community/...s-internet-until-the-state-stepped-in.234603/ competition is essentially quashed.

Personally, I don't know where you live, but the one primary option in my area is Spectrum, although, there is a little-known wireless data provider that is actually competitive to Spectrum. I should know, I just switched. However, without NN, this little-known wireless data provider is threatened by this https://www.techspot.com/community/...even-more-net-neutrality-rules-lifted.248340/

I have had personal experience with Spetrum's (at the time, Time-Warner's) abuses.

As I see it, though ISPs argue that these new rules will encourage competition and allow them to finance network upgrades, I have my doubts. ISPs have had years to upgrade their networks, and in my area, at least, this has not been done. Spectrum's wires on the poles are at least 20-years old at this time.

By all means, though, keep up the arguments in favor of letting ISPs do whatever they want as long as they post it on their web site. It is clear right now that I will never convince you of the pitfalls of this approach as you will never convince me that the approach you advocate is, in any way, shape, or form, better.

 

[wiyosaya]

Corporations shouldn't be able to go to the White House and ask for a rule to save them money. This does happen all the time - but in almost all cases it's to save jobs (price floors etc) Netflix and Google are swimming in money. Netflix just announced record profits again.

But corporations should be able to go to the White House and ask for a rule to allow them to charge whatever they want even if it means favoring some sites over others? Seriously?

BTW - I think you missed the point of the post that you quoted.

 

[wiyosaya]

Here's an interesting read on redit - https://www.reddit.com/r/DebunkThis/comments/7k2ab0/debunk_this_the_internet_was_finebetter_before/

When I first signed up for TimeWarner, like it says in that link, TW wanted to charge me for every computer I had connected to the internet even if my network used only one IP address.

 

[Bubbajim]

Why would I not be against some of them. Half of them limit people and serve to pad someones pocket. And I can guarantee; if they ever start regulating the Internet. Those regulations will become the same way. The people at the top will regulate the dollar in their pocket by any means possible.

This is a sensible position to take of course, but it's not the position you took to begin with. In this you've asked why would you not be against *some* of them, in your previous post you said you don't "open the door for regulation", which is to say you don't have any to begin with. They're very different concepts.

So allow me to rephrase - are you against the concept of law, like you seem to be against the concept of regulation?

 

[MilwaukeeMike]

I have heard your arguments before. Quoting wikipedia? Seriously? You are using a site that can be edited by anyone as a reference to back up your claims? What you quoted sounds like it is biased against NN, and being that the site can be edited by anyone, what it says there could easily have been written by anyone including Ajit Pai.

I'm happy to use your sources - they work fine to make my point.

Both of your sources listed the NN violations and again, there are very very few of them over 15 years, some even said the FCC busted the violators (without NN in place) One even said it was in Europe(?!) And one said Netlfix was forced to pay for their additional bandwidth, which is the reason for all this - as I said earlier.
There's no way these extremely few and far between examples justify NN rules. In order to justify NN rules we should have a graph on it with violations going into the hundreds in recent years... we should have backlogged cases in the courts and the FCC should be swamped with requests for a fix. And even then - Congress should write a bill - not this under-handed 'utility classification' they want to use.

As for competition among ISPs - it sounds like you, me and Ajit Pai agree completely. We all want more competition, and NN rules make it harder for Spectrum to grow and expand. ( I have them too in my area - they actual go door to door along with ATT to grab customers - the competition is great! I switch between the two every two years and always get the intro offer prices).

if you want Spectrum to expand their infrastructure they'll need some money - and NN makes it illegal for Spectrum to charge Netflix for all the extra bandwidth Netflix requires. Even worse - what if in a few years Netflix has 4K everything and everyone wants that, now Spectrum has to pay for new lines and the only people they can charge are their own customers - who might not even care or want 4K streaming. It would be illegal to charge Netflix for Netflix's own upgraded services.

 

[treetops]

( @treetops - here's the answer to your question from the other post. )

Well put, and exactly their point. They throttle to what you pay for, but all traffic is throttled the same - there's no favoritism.

I didn't suggest Netflix and Google should pay for the traffic - I said they started this NN fiasco because they didn't want to pay for it. The fact is though, it has to be paid for by someone. When streaming video became popular a few years ago it wasn't possible for a few million people to watch Netflix at the same time without there being slowdowns on the current internet pipelines. Improvements were needed to account for new demand.

Customers blamed ISPs for the slowdowns- ISPs blamed Netflix (since it was them flooding the lines). ISPs told Netflix "We're going to charge you more because we have to do upgrades because of you." Netflix (and Google/Youtube) didn't want that to happen so they went to the govt to get it prohibited.

Because this is the US, the govt isn't allowed to tell business what they can charge and to who, so the only way around it was re-classify the internet under a law from 1930 into a utility. They called it 'Net Neutrality' and everyone thinks it's a great thing without realizing the internet has been just fine without it.

So who should pay for it? We should follow Econ 101 - and allow the ISPs to charge Netflix more, Netflix should be allowed to charge us more. We should be allowed to pick whatever streaming service we want. The only role the govt should have is to make sure we have choices - I.e. don't let all the ISPs merge into a monopoly or anything like that.

Corporations shouldn't be able to go to the White House and ask for a rule to save them money. This does happen all the time - but in almost all cases it's to save jobs (price floors etc) Netflix and Google are swimming in money. Netflix just announced record profits again.

That quote completely disagrees with you....

Net neutrality makes it so only illegal websites under USA law can be banned. Everyone else has to be treated equally. With streaming services we pay our ISP to download the content. Streaming providers like Netflix also pay their ISP to upload content.

For example

With net neutrality
1 tb of data uploaded costs 100$. Varying upon region.

Without net neutrality
1 tb of data uploaded costs 20$ for home depot, 1,000$ for netflix, free for MSNBC, Fox news is blocked. All other ISP websites are blocked. Torrent technology is blocked. VPN's and Proxies are blocked. They do not have to give any reason to block a website\service, slow it down, speed it up or charge more money per TB for different companies.

If you want to upgrade your network because you have to much business. That's a good thing. Streaming services allow ISPs to sell more data\bandwidth.... It is a win win for everyone.

No one is forcing ISPs to upgrade their networks.... But if they want to make more money they will. You want more competition.... If a ISP cannot support their customer needs another ISP will come in and do it.

P.S. If you own a movie theater and it sells out every night because an amazing new film company keeps churning out winning movies.. You would likely build another theater to make even more money. Or by your reasoning you should charge a higher ticket cost for movies made by that company? And try to charge the company more for filling all your seats?

 

[Joe Blow]

99.7% of the commenters did not understand what Net Neutrality was about. It was about dictatorial control of the Internet, while it was being sold as something "free and open." Government speaks in Orwellian terms. I'd bet these same 99.7% believe that abortion is not murder.

 

[pit1209]

99.7% of the commenters did not understand what Net Neutrality was about. It was about dictatorial control of the Internet, while it was being sold as something "free and open." Government speaks in Orwellian terms. I'd bet these same 99.7% believe that abortion is not murder.

You should come and live in my third world country, I can see you will be happy letting the corrupts take decisions for you and religion dictating your actions or better yet we can give you a time machine and you can go to the middle ages where everything will be to your liking.