Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

blog.google

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

431–440 of 469 posts

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#431

Post by jerf »

intended wrote: post #401
jerf wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to point out that even if you disagree with this video that hearing it straight from the source is valuable. If you want to convince Ajit Pai that he's wrong, knowing what his current (public) opinion truly is (rather than just someone's strawman) makes it way easier.

If you've read his position and his article, you can clearly see that its just a position of convenience. He doesn't care, his goal is to get what he wants, while keeping his political "team" on his side, and thus its senators. His is a position of convenience and will change as the wind changes.

To be honest, I was mostly trying to short-circuit the "disagree -> downvote" cycle. If you want to convince people that they are wrong (not necessarily this one person in particular but anyone else he may have convinced), downvoting the explanation of their opinion so that nobody sees it is also guaranteeing nobody learns enough about it to counter it.

Real politicians do "opposition research" for a reason; they don't seal themselves into an echo chamber, despite the frequent accusations to the contrary, because they know they won't hardly last a week if they do seal themselves off from what their opponents are doing and saying.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#432

Post by thidr0 »

One thing I don't understand about net neutrality. Say I'm a toll road. I built the road when cars were relatively small and light. Now, some cars are getting really heavy and big (think semi trucks) and are the majority of my traffic. Because of this, they beat up the road and cause more congestion. So I want to repair the road and/or add more lanes by increasing the toll on these trucks. But all the trucking companies are complaining and preventing me from doing it, thus ultimately hurting the small personal cars that want to zip through.

Obviously this is an analogy to net neutrality, so why is this reasonable situation fundamentally different? In a free market, shouldn't I be able to increase the tolls on my private infrastructure for those that put the most stress on it?

(Now I will say, the fact that there's only one toll road option for many people is anti-competitive and against the free market, but that's not this topic)

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#434

Post by sagarm »

thidr0 wrote: post #432

One thing I don't understand about net neutrality. Say I'm a toll road. I built the road when cars were relatively small and light. Now, some cars are getting really heavy and big (think semi trucks) and are the majority of my traffic. Because of this, they beat up the road and cause more congestion. So I want to repair the road and/or add more lanes by increasing the toll on these trucks. But all the trucking compan…

Packets don't damage network infrastructure, and lack of competition is not a different topic.

ISPs' monopoly on access to broadband customers allows them to extract rents based on the marginal value of each transaction. There's no reason we as a society should allow this.

Imagine if the cost of your water supply depended on your companies profits. That's what we're talking about here.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#435

Post by lowpro »

thidr0 wrote: post #432

One thing I don't understand about net neutrality. Say I'm a toll road. I built the road when cars were relatively small and light. Now, some cars are getting really heavy and big (think semi trucks) and are the majority of my traffic. Because of this, they beat up the road and cause more congestion. So I want to repair the road and/or add more lanes by increasing the toll on these trucks. But all the trucking compan…

@sagarm 's comment clears this up pretty well, but to clear up the monopoly point: You can always drive on a different road. It might take you a lot longer, but you have many options. Many (most?) internet connections are not like this. Even in suburbs close to big cities any one ISP often has a monopoly. My entire town only has Comcast, and it's very close to a large US city. Personal example, but there's no options.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#436

Post by drcube »

sushid wrote: post #240
drcube wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's always a choice. Suppose your ISP started charging you $10,000 per month for the service you have now? Would you pay it? Could you? No, you'd probably just go without home service, or rely on your cellular data plan, or get dialup, or just take an internet sabbatical until the ISP cleaned up their act. For some people, their tolerance for bullshit is less than others. For those people, perhaps charging a doll…

That's a poor way of trying to weasel out of the actual definition of monopoly, which is defined as "a company or group having exclusive control over a commodity or service"[0]. What you're describing is a substitute good. When the "choice" is to not purchase said product/service and look to alternatives, you're literally describing the effect of a monopoly. [0] http://www.dictionary.com/browse/monopoly

I'm not trying to weasel out of anything. Of course they're monopolies.

My point is simply that a monopoly isn't some sort of God-emperor who can do anything without consequence. Even monopolies have to bow to customer pressure, they're just less sensitive to it than companies in more competitive industries. Supply and demand applies to monopolies, too, that's why their prices might be higher than they would be in a competitive environment, but their prices aren't infinite. "Going without" is always a choice, even if there are no competitors.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#437

Post by crucini »

While I don't have a good grasp on the larger issue, I hope we can protect small players from being squeezed. In my limited understanding, there are really two separate things here: Comcast vs Youtube and Comcast vs startup. As I understand it, Comcast gets mad that they have to invest in infrastructure so people can watch Youtube. They think Youtube is free-riding on their infrastructure. Comcast is envious of Youtube's profits and eyeballs. So Comcast wants to squeeze money out of Youtube. A battle between giants.

The other issue is that small sites including startups could get throttled almost incidentally in this war. They don't use much bandwidth, being small, but if Comcast enacts some "bizdev" process where it takes six months of negotiations to get into the fast lane, any deal below $1M is probably not worth their time.

This is how cell phone software worked before the iPhone - get permission before you can develop (IIRC). If we end up with fast-lane preferential pricing, it should really be available to the smallest players. Ideally it should be free, but the Apple app store model would work - $99/year for fast lane access until your bandwidth is really significant. But would the individual have to pay $99 to every major ISP out there?

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#438

Post by 7Z7 »

ekianjo wrote: post #420
valuearb wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the US military its not illegal to refuse to follow an illegal order. The US Marines have this drilled into them, not sure about the other services.

How is an order from the chief of the military ever considered illegal?

It worries me that this is a legitimate question. The chief of the military does not define law.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#439

Post by Bakary »

lmm wrote: post #423
ekianjo wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

as far as i know if deep sea subs cannot contact the headquarters for x amount of time they should assume their country was nuked and are supposed to retaliate.

That doesn't answer the question. Who do you give the command authority for that decision? Who gets to say "we cannot contact the headquarters", which amounts to being able to launch the nuclear weapons? And obviously if you want them to be able to launch under those circumstances you have to give them any "launch codes" or what-have-you beforehand.

In the case of the UK, there is a sealed letter in each Trident sub with instructions from the PM in case the nation's leaders have been terminated.

Re: Net Neutrality Day of Action: Help Preserve the Open Internet

#440

Post by Spivak »

Toast_ wrote: post #391
sumeno wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comcast is already despised by its customers. There is already demand for better service but most people don't have any other option. It is naive to think that the loss of net neutrality will be the straw that breaks the camel's back for Comcast.

Unpopular opinion: I've never had a problem with Comcast and I loved the fact that they allowed users (in my experience) in the same residence cash in on promos. promo ends -> cancel plan -> new roommate signs on.

So you're happy that Comcast allows you to not grossly overpay for their service if you have enough roommates? Kind of a weird endorsement.
Post reply on HN