41–50 of 136 posts
Politicians will always be voted into office for something that looks important to people but politicians do not care the least. Then they silently implement what they really care about.
Wouldn't getting rid of net neutrality actually be good for startups and smaller companies? People are effectively subsidizing the internet giants right now, if telecoms charged extra for them people would move on to different services? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's odd to see people banding together to defend Google, Amazon, Netflix, etc. Although the companies on the other side are obviously scum as wel…
Because ISPs are no longer required to be dumb pipes, they've started charging their customers a premium for access to video content. This is bad for Netflix, of course, because it cuts into their subscriber base.
They crunch some numbers and come up with an amount they're willing to pay the ISPs to exclude their subscribers from this segmented pricing scheme. The ISPs accept this mutually beneficial deal, and everyone's happy, right?
What about Notflix, though? We don't have the capital that Netflix has to pay into this protection racket, so our subscribers must choose between paying the ISP video premium + our subscription fee, or Netflix's subscription fee.
That's an uphill battle and straightforwardly anti-competitive, but is also the precisely the promise of a world without net neutrality.
I also disagree with your assessment that anybody is subsidizing internet giants. All those players pay for the bandwidth they consume to dump their data into the network. The end-user pays for the other end of the connection. Everything is being paid for, proportionally to the usage.
The last-mile ISPs simply want to double-dip. Comcast thinks Netflix should pay both Level 3 AND Comcast for using the pipes, which fundamentally undermines the architecture of the internet.
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.
I'm for free markets and competition but I have to agree with you here. Like the US interstate road system the fixed line broadband, especially the big fiber pipes, probably needs to be taken over by a quasi-federal program similar to the Post Office. There seems to be too much of a monopoly or oligarchy collusion taken place. Broadband is not improving with competition currently.
Wouldn't getting rid of net neutrality actually be good for startups and smaller companies? People are effectively subsidizing the internet giants right now, if telecoms charged extra for them people would move on to different services? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's odd to see people banding together to defend Google, Amazon, Netflix, etc. Although the companies on the other side are obviously scum as wel…
How so? Only very large companies are able to pay for getting high enough bandwidth and speed and, more importantly, also negotiate the corresponding deals with the few networks (who already have effective monopolies in many areas). Smaller startups can hardly compete against them when their services are too slow.
I can see no reasonable story according to which giving up neutrality would be beneficial to smaller companies. The best thing a small startup can do is to bundle up with one of a few large corporations, and the result are more quasi-monopolies and cartels, of course.
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…
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.
Funny, isn't it, that a free and neutral Internet is one of the key technologies that allowed the acerbic alt-right movement to bubble up from the fringes, to become grassroots, and then mainstream, finally to put Trump in office. Then, his team gleefully work to destroy it. I suppose they think that greedy, unfair measures that currently benefit themselves will never be handed to their opponents. That's a lesson the…
Trump voters were (mostly) Romney voters.[1] Clinton lost by failing to galvanize voters who turned out for Obama in prior elections[2] and neglecting to campaign in Rustbelt states.[3]
[1] http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/behind-trump...
[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/omribenshahar/2016/11/17/the-no...
[3] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/trumps-...
Is there any hope that some new ISP gets created that does follow net neutrality? What's likely to happen to an ISP that doesn't play the fast/slow lane approach?
That being said, it would make sense to me that scrapping neutrality might be the very thing needed to encourage Google to finish their fiber roll out across the US. Incumbent telecoms have incentive to restrict access to content. Google being an advertising company, has incentive to encourage the flow of content.
Google owning the internet is probably way worse in the long run but it might just be a great short term solution to the neutrality problem.
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.
I disagree, I think the case can be easily made but it is being drowned out by the ISP's and their supporters with a MASSIVE wave of disinformation, and false information.
I have spent the majority of my time in discussions not attempting to explain why Title II is needed, but simply attempting to cut through the bullshit that has been spread.
For example the most common attack is that "the internet was fine with no regulation" and the feeling is that opposing NN means no regulation with bumper sticker "Hands off my internet" type of sayings
When In reality is a Debate over Title I vs Title II regulations, and if a Internet Service provider is a Telecommunications company (clearly yes) or a Information Services companies (clearly no)
The ISP's and their supporters have tanked any opportunity for real debate with a massive propaganda and disinformation war.. which they appear to have won
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
The economic incentives are for the last-mile ISP monopolies to keep being last-mile ISP monopolies, throttling traffic in cases where it suits there interests.
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…
Incumbency advantage and the arbitrary consolidation of economic power. The one clear duty of a government in regulating an economy is to ensure competition. We had the same fight about railroads, and we had the same fight about telecom in the thirties. The economic principles have not changed since then, contrary to Telecom talking points.