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Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

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Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#21

Post by splintercell »

fredley wrote: post #16
hartator wrote: post #15

I don't see what this fuss is all about. If Facebook wants to offer cheaper Internet with their services prioritized, why not? Plus Internet is far from being neutral right now. Emails got deliver depending on your server IPs. CDNs already pay to be hosted by ISPs for a fast lane. Torrents don't reach the full capacity of your bandwidth. Etc. The case against government regulations for the Internet is easy to make: E…

Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV: you can't buy access to 'TV', despite the fact there's no technical limitation. You have to buy packages, from different providers in order to get what you want. You have to sign up to hefty subscription packages with loads of bundled shite just to watch 7 hours of Game of Thrones. Currently you buy access to the internet, and that's all internet , at equal p…

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV

But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time.

I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it results in a losing prisoner's dilemma for ISPs (take for instance the popularity of Al Jazeera during Iraq War).

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#22

Post by fredley »

splintercell wrote: post #21
fredley wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV: you can't buy access to 'TV', despite the fact there's no technical limitation. You have to buy packages, from different providers in order to get what you want. You have to sign up to hefty subscription packages with loads of bundled shite just to watch 7 hours of Game of Thrones. Currently you buy access to the internet, and that's all internet , at equal p…

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time. I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it result…

That's an interesting perspective. Do you not think in times of war greater access to information is a great advantage of the internet? I'm curious as to why you would think that in wartime restricting information might be a good thing (other than persisting the propagation of propaganda!)

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#23

Post by rotten »

Non-neutral internet bandwidth packages will only be offered if there is profit to be made. Cell phone companies didn't give us free long distance out of the kindness of their heart - it was simply too expensive to administer the billing. So, the trick is to make non-neutral packages very expensive to maintain or support for the ISP's. How? By making it too hard for them to implement in a way that isn't easily subverted or disrupted. (And by simply not buying the premium packages in the first place.) Too few customers with too much maintenance and software and administrative overhead, and the companies will flee from this idea except in the cases where they are intentionally engaged in censorship of some sort.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#24

Post by scaryclam »

hartator wrote: post #15

I don't see what this fuss is all about. If Facebook wants to offer cheaper Internet with their services prioritized, why not? Plus Internet is far from being neutral right now. Emails got deliver depending on your server IPs. CDNs already pay to be hosted by ISPs for a fast lane. Torrents don't reach the full capacity of your bandwidth. Etc. The case against government regulations for the Internet is easy to make: E…

If facebook start up a service that offers fast network access to their own stuff, that's fine, it wouldn't break net neutraility rules. If facebook pretend to be an ISP and actively degrade performance from other social networks, then they are breaking the rules.

Spam filtering etc isn't against NN rules. No-one is delivering emails from marketing firms immediately, while holding back your emails from your aunt Mavis for an additional hour because she won't pay the premium service charge, even though they're coming from the same mailserver. All traffic that is getting delivered is being treated the same, as per NN.

CDNs aren't paying for a fast lane, they're paying to be closer to the source of the request. That just makes the hops smaller, it doesn't change the priority of the delivery. If I hand deliver a postcard to you vs putting in the mail 500 miles away, I'm not getting preferential treatment from the postoffice, I'm just closer and hence more able to deliver it faster.

Torrents are all slower than your capacity. That's a neutral network. Now, if some were unthrottled because someone paid off the ISP to do so, that would be against NN.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#25

Post by burkaman »

splintercell wrote: post #21
fredley wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV: you can't buy access to 'TV', despite the fact there's no technical limitation. You have to buy packages, from different providers in order to get what you want. You have to sign up to hefty subscription packages with loads of bundled shite just to watch 7 hours of Game of Thrones. Currently you buy access to the internet, and that's all internet , at equal p…

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time. I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it result…

What are the economic incentives to keep Internet free?

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#26

Post by emodendroket »

crispyambulance wrote: post #5

Net neutrality is dying because no one has been able to make a compelling case for it that can be understood by constituents, let alone politicians. There is one thing that just enough politicians do understand, however, and that's money. In their pockets. From ghouls who will profit handsomely when online access in the USA becomes effectively equivalent to shitty cable-tv service.

Even if the argument were quite convincing the money is what matters. In the world we live in today most issues that are actually contested have large business interests on both sides of them. If, as this article claims, the pro-neutrality guys no longer care, it doesn't really matter whether your average voter is completely convinced by the case for net neutrality.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#27

Post by splintercell »

fredley wrote: post #22
splintercell wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time. I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it result…

That's an interesting perspective. Do you not think in times of war greater access to information is a great advantage of the internet? I'm curious as to why you would think that in wartime restricting information might be a good thing (other than persisting the propagation of propaganda!)

I don't think that at all, I think you misread my argument. I'm saying that I'd trust the economic incentives to keep information flowing than to trust the political incentives. A company which delivers information to people who want it will make more profit over a company which does not do this.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#28

Post by emodendroket »

fredley wrote: post #22
splintercell wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time. I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it result…

That's an interesting perspective. Do you not think in times of war greater access to information is a great advantage of the internet? I'm curious as to why you would think that in wartime restricting information might be a good thing (other than persisting the propagation of propaganda!)

He doesn't think that; he thinks that Net neutrality is the first step on the road to government censorship of the Internet. I'm not sure by what mechanism.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#29

Post by emodendroket »

metalliqaz wrote: post #6
honestoHeminway wrote: post #4

The mistake was for the internet to grow on the ISPs infrastructure in the first place. Now they will murder anything new by slowing it to a crawl. So to succeed, on must have superior compression- and/or a alternative infrastructure. Or- one could try to hijack the fastlanes.

Sufficient competition in the market would be enough. Unfortunately, the government has allowed total monopoly on fixed line broadband. They've done it in two ways: first through exclusivity contracts with companies such as Verizon, ATT, Cox, and Comcast. They give fat payments in the form of cash, tax breaks, and local monopolies in exchange for the companies to build out infrastructure. Second, they have allowed co…

I don't think it's realistic to expect free-market competitors to build out massive infrastructure to compete with each other. They wouldn't even serve large swathes of the country at all if they didn't have to.

Re: Net neutrality is dying with a whimper

#30

Post by splintercell »

burkaman wrote: post #25
splintercell wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the fear is that the internet will become like TV But I would rather take that than Internet becoming like TV, where govt can pass 'fairness doctrine' and other stuff, or restrict it significantly during war time. I'd rather trust economic incentives to keep Internet free than political incentives. If people are willing to pay for full coverage of the War, then even though govt is pressuring ISPs, it result…

What are the economic incentives to keep Internet free?

There are economic incentives to deliver what people want. Fox news is hugely profitable because it delivers to people what no other media organization delivers, and that is a right wing perspective on events. Throughout the Obama years, Fox News made insane amount of money precisely for this reason.
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