Topic: Net neutraility and the FCC

[Quemaqua]

https://www.battleforthenet.com/countdown/

I'm not too vocal here about causes, but I know this is one you guys all have a vested interest in. Figured I should do more than just yell at people in IRC about it. So here you go.

[idolminds]

This is looking good.

That is why I am proposing that the FCC use its Title II authority to implement and enforce open internet protections.

Using this authority, I am submitting to my colleagues the strongest open internet protections ever proposed by the FCC. These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services. I propose to fully apply—for the first time ever—those bright-line rules to mobile broadband. My proposal assures the rights of internet users to go where they want, when they want, and the rights of innovators to introduce new products without asking anyone’s permission.

Title II for broadband, including mobile networks? I figured they wouldn't touch wireless.

[Quemaqua]

It's definitely looking good, though god knows what may happen between now and the 26th. You know Comcast is in the middle of shitting itself and will be mustering their forces to do whatever they can between now and then. Along with all the other companies.

[scottws]

I am a staunch supporter of the federal government's regulation of the Internet.  While ISPs started out as dumb pipes, here is small list of some crap they've been doing lately:

• Adding special tracking information in HTTP headers leaving your home network.
• Injecting their own adds in unencrypted HTTP sessions.
• Purposely bottlenecking traffic for large bandwidth services like Netflix in order to extract payment to alleviate the bottlenecks.
• Throttling traffic from services that compete with a service the ISP provides.  Of course the ISP's version of the service is unthrottled and even has QoS rules that make it prioritized over other types of general traffic.
• Selling consumers higher bandwidth plans in order to alleviate service slowness issues when the actual problem is the ISP's throttling of services and they already have plenty of bandwidth to run the service. Example: My mother-in-law works from home and does all meetings and phone calls via Microsoft Lync (like a corporate version of Skype, but it also includes features from GoToMeeting and WebEx like screen sharing and presentations). She had a 20 Mbit plan from Comcast, but had lots of jitter on her Lync calls (VoIP).  According to this page that describes the bandwidth required for Lync audio calls, even 1 Mbit is more than enough, but Comcast tried to sell her a 30 Mbit plan.  She switched to an AT&T U-Verse 12 Mbit plan and the problem disappeared.
• Pressuring states into writing laws that prevent municipalities from setting up their own ISP for their residents.
• Forcing municipalities into exclusivity agreements that make certain ISPs the exclusive provider in certain areas.

The biggest problems are the lack of regional competition and the fact that virtual every ISP is also a content provider of some sort.  When your ISP is a cable company, they really don't want you to be a cord-cutter and will punish you by jacking up the cost of your Internet access and throttling video streaming way down if you cut the cord on the cable services.  If ISPs were just like the water company, there would be no threat to net neutrality because they wouldn't be trying to constantly monetize you, promote their own service to you while harming competitors, etc.

The recent saber-ratting by the FCC chairman is a step in the right direction and it does preserve at least some aspects of net neutrality by limiting a lot of the paid prioritization stuff, but I don't think it goes far enough.  ISPs really need to be forced to split from their content companies and last mile unbundling needs to happen to open the door for regional competition.

[Quemaqua]

Completely agreed.

[idolminds]

But if they are regulated how can they possibly make money on their slim profit margins?

[idolminds]

This hurts to watch. You've been warned.

[Quemaqua]

Man, I couldn't even finish that. I don't have even remotely enough energy to address everything that's wrong with everything that was said in that video.

[idolminds]

Lets try to be funny while also still being totally wrong!

[idolminds]

Oh come ON!

Congressional Republicans are accusing the White House of having "an improper influence" over the Federal Communications Commission's decision on net neutrality, and are launching an investigation.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform wrote to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler today demanding documentation of all communication between FCC personnel and the White House, as well as calendar appointments, visitor logs, and meeting minutes related to meetings with the White House, and all internal documents discussing the views and recommendations of the White House.

[Quemaqua]

I have no words. I mean I have lots of them, but mostly furious rage that I don't need to let loose this early in the morning.

[scottws]

I don't get why people that aren't rich vote Republican. They are so clearly bought and paid for by large corporations and rich individuals it is sick. Every single thing they do is to boost large corporate profits and wall street investments at the expense of everything and everyone else.

The one thing they have on their side is Fox News, which indoctrinates people into going along with their agendas.

[Cobra951]

The thing is that there is no common-sense party, no populist party.  Is like not being able to steer your car straight down the road.  You are only allowed to jerk the wheel violently to the left or to the right.  So you need to do it often, both ways, or you end up in a ditch.

This is a whole other conversation, but right now, we're headed for that left-side ditch in an alarming hurry.

[idolminds]

Verizon used Title II to build out their internet business. Kinda hard to see why then they would be against actually following those rules.

In examining Verizon's financial accounting over the last five years, we uncovered that Verizon's entire fiber to the premises (FTTP) networks are being constructed as "Title II", common carriage to get the state-based utility rights-of-way as well as charge phone customers for 'massive deployment of fiber optics' -- I.e., Verizon New York's local phone customers paid for the construction of some, if not most of the costs of upgrading the networks.

(I note that Verizon has claimed that "Title II harms investments" and this issue is at the center of the Net Neutrality fights. We found Verizon failed to disclose these facts about Title II to the FCC, courts or public and we filed a Petition for Investigation against Verizon with the FCC over this.)

Based on the financials from Verizon New York (and filings with the NY Public Service Commission, etc.) the FiOS cable TV line of business did not pay for construction of the fiber networks, nor did the 'Internet-broadband-ISP' part of the business. It was paid for by the Title II voice/telephone part of the business. Moreover, the revenues from the FiOS cable service and ISP services appear to go into different financial corporate buckets, not back to fund the networks' upkeep.

[Quemaqua]

Well that's a handy demonstration that these people are all lying sacks of shit, and also that their argument doesn't hold water. Convenient! Thanks, Verizon!

[scottws]

Ongoing joy from the Republican party continues.

[Xessive]

Why are politicians deciding the fate of a technological venue they don't understand?

[Cobra951]

Because they are pro-business, and see it as the government clamping down on private enterprise.  They are also in the pockets of the big lobbyists.  Lose-lose, for the common man.

[Cobra951]

I guess we win, for now.  Legal challenges are sure to follow, and a GOP win in '16 will likely undo it all.  With guarded optimism, it's a hell of a birthday present.

[Quemaqua]

Time will tell, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

[scottws]

ArsTechnica: Republicans’ “Internet Freedom Act” would wipe out net neutrality

“Once the federal government establishes a foothold into managing how Internet service providers run their networks they will essentially be deciding which content goes first, second, third, or not at all. My legislation will put the brakes on this FCC overreach and protect our innovators from these job-killing regulations.” -Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)

The "Internet Freedom Act"?  Shouldn't it be something like "ISP Freedom Act"?  Because the FCC just ensured the Internet was free.  This bill does the opposite.

Also, I'm getting tired of the jobs, children, and terrorist comments in politics as a way to make something toxic.  If you are for something, it means you are for terrorism or against people getting jobs.

[Quemaqua]

All politics ever manage to be is a bunch of lies twisted around to make people feel guilty or somehow pressured into doing something.

[idolminds]

Their knack for naming bills to be the exact opposite of the content of the bill is amazing.

[Cobra951]

If it passes, hopefully it will get vetoed.  I doubt the supporters have enough votes to override that.

[scottws]

And the thorough fleecing of the American people begins.

[Quemaqua]

Just gets worse and worse.

[scottws]

FCC Republicans vow to gut net neutrality rules "as soon as possible"

Joy.

[Cobra951]

Dammit.  Why can't we choose our governments a la carte?  It's either the fish with the broccoli or the steak with the mashed potatoes.  If we want steak and broccoli, we ain't gonna be happy no matter what.

[scottws]

There was no chance I was going to vote for any Republican for President given the fact that both houses of Congress are already Republican and that the Supreme Court would flip to heavy Republican, mainly due to issues like this.  At least if Congress was controlled by Democrats, they could make 'Net neutrality into law.  But with both Congress and the FCC Republican controlled, I knew we'd be absolutely screwed given how Republicans were responding to the FCC's decision to make ISPs common carriers.

[Quemaqua]

They've been talking about this for quite some time already. The writing was on the wall. Two former telecom jerks were nominated to oversee FCC policy, in addition to all the other rumblings from others.

http://fortune.com/2016/11/21/trump-net-neutrality-fcc/

[scottws]

Well, to be fair, the current FCC chairman - Tom Wheeler - was a lobbyist for wireline and wireless ISPs and previously, i.e. he was also a "telecom jerk".  That said, he took his job as the head of the FCC seriously and looked out for consumers.  The leftover Republican FCC board members pretty much toe the line of the industries they are supposed to be regulating, and they've been fighting Wheeler every step of the way.

You're right, the writing was on the wall with regards to what would occur if Trump (or really any Republican) got elected President in 2016.

[Quemaqua]

I'm not one to hold someone's past against them if they prove they can operate independently of it. The difference between these guys and Wheeler, so far as it appears given their stances on things, is that he's a former telecom jerk. They're still telecom jerks. Which is not to say he's perfect or anything, but there's a clear line of demarcation here.

[Quemaqua]

Relevant:

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/12/net-neutrality-faces-extinction-under-trump.html
www.forbes.com/sites/seanlawson/2016/12/02/the-law-that-could-allow-trump-to-shut-down-the-u-s-internet/
http://www.freepress.net/sites/default/files/resources/sign-on_letter_to_clinton_and_trump_11_2_2016.pdf

[scottws]

Well, NN is going to die soon thanks to the damn 2016 election.  The best we can do at this point is implore our congressional representatives and senators to make NN law or avoid gutting the regulatory authority of the FCC.

Start here:

https://democracy.io/#!/
https://www.gofccyourself.com/

[MysterD]

3-2 on the vote, the FCC repeals Net Neutrality:
https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/14/16776154/fcc-net-neutrality-vote-results-rules-repealed

[idolminds]

Hopefully this gets blocked by all the incoming lawsuits.

[Cobra951]

We knew this was a done deal from its inception, right?  The whole comments thing was a sham, a way to keep people under control until the last minute.  RIP internet as we know it, I guess.

[Quemaqua]

Just shameful. Makes me extremely angry.

[gpw11]

You guys should probably beat this man in the streets. 

[Cobra951]

The fight continues, so there's yet hope.  There will be investigations into the required FCC comment-period sham, lawsuits against the FCC, and Congressional action. 

I can't believe how stupid this whole thing is.  Midterm elections are coming up next year, and this obvious government corruption at the expense of the people is going to have repercussions then--unless those in power get behind protecting net neutrality.  They're shooting themselves in the groin by allowing this cartoonish villain to fuck up the connected world for everyone.  (The foot isn't a strong-enough metaphor.)  At this point, I have no idea where this will end up, but what's clear is that it's far from over.

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