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

To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

motherboard.vice.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 170 posts

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#151

Post by libertyEQ »

wongarsu wrote: post #141
libertyEQ wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to sound like a nationalist here (i'm not), but the US has 1/3rd the population of China yet still has the largest economy, and the goto reserve currency. China actually has an ownership stake in all of their IT companies. Contrary to a sibling comment, NN paves the way for the government to regulate what a private company can do with their IT assets, and therefore a great firewall situation.

>but the US has 1/3rd the population of China yet still has the largest economy USA is first by Nominal GDP, but second by PPP GDP (or third if you count the EU). I wouldn't declare a definitive winner based on that. And it's better to leave population out of that, because per capita the US is far behind countries like Norway or Switzerland, and at only half the GDP of Luxembourg (both nominal and PPP).

You people are unbelievable. Please tell me about the last tech startup from Switzerland or Luxembourg... I'm not trying to declare some definitive "winner" here, but if you don't recognize which country is clearly dominant in the world, I can't help you.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#152

Post by sundaeofshock »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #150
sundaeofshock wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This Congress has been trying to gut healthcare and is about to pass an extremely destructive and unpopular tax “reform” bill. It is obvious they don’t care about popular opinion or even their chances for re-election.

They care very deeply about reelection. In order to get reelected, they need money and to survive a primary. They won't get money from their big $$$ donors if they don't pass the tax cut bill. They won't survive a primary if they're seen as being 'soft' on the ACA by the true believers in their party. They don't have any idea how they're going to make it through the general election, but that's a fight for another da…

They also have to make it past the general election. GOP House members in blue states voting for the tax bill are basically acknowledging they don’t care about re-election. I suspect they hope to get a good job with their donors in exchange for committing political suicide.

I think the GOP knows they are going to get one bite at this apple, and they are taking advantage of it. Hello tax reform and good bye NN.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#153

Post by awalton »

As much as I love the idea of locally building network infrastructure and making it a true commonly owned system... it doesn't work for rural areas. As soon as you hit the city limits, it's no longer the city's problem.

We gave hundreds of billions of dollars to AT&T/Verizon to build infrastructure for everyone, and they took that money and told their shareholders "look how well we scammed the US!"

What we should do is go back to those companies, tell them they've failed and owe us it back plus interest, and use that money at a federal level to build an internet backbone for every single US citizen, period - like the Federal Highway Administration, but for broadband.

But, alas, the GOP will start screaming "Socialism" and that will never happen...

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#154

Post by awalton »

djmetzle wrote: post #11

I have a proposition: You know how Tor works? Onion routing? Send traffic encrypted multiple times through a list of nodes before exiting at an edge? What if everyone sent their traffic back and forth to eachother. One hop, encrypted, and then forwarded. Just like Tor, but a single hop. Not anonymized, just peer-to-peer distributed. If everyone did that (build it into browsers) the internet would function _full-mesh_…

It's really, really easy for ISPs to just start making peer-to-peer connections of any kind slower than molasses while making white listed IPs from people who've paid the "High Speed Lane" tax travel at normal speeds.

That kills your "Hey use a VPN/Tor/Other-Alternative-Routing-Mechanism" ideas dead.

If you could manage to tunnel traffic through [Huge Internet Company], like if they started offering a VPN service, then maybe... but there's not a lot of incentive for any of them to host such a service. It'd almost be cheaper for them to build their own, second Internet altogether at that point - something I'm sure Google is kicking themselves over on the Google Fiber scaleback.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#155

Post by awalton »

featherverse wrote: post #80

Rather than "build our own" we should take back what used to belongs to us in the first place. They say there's a shortage of qualified I.T. people. If you work for telecoms who support a non-neutral internet, then quit. Go on strike. Work only for companies who support Net Neutrality. Kill the enemy using free market capitalism.

> If you work for telecoms who support a non-neutral internet, then quit. Go on strike. Work only for companies who support Net Neutrality.

...you'll probably starve to death, though. Even with the immense shortage of technicians, there's also an immense shortage of ISPs that give a damn about Net Neutrality and are willing and/or able to give people jobs. We've foolishly allowed all of the ISPs to merge to the point that most areas are served by one or two ISPs total. And if you're lucky enough to be in a market with two ISPs, one of them is usually not classifiable as "broadband".

Your next best bet would to organize and implement a slowdown rather than quitting. At least then you're not going to starve waiting for something that will never happen... but then again given the state of customer service at most ISPs, it's also not likely to have any kind of noticeable impact - ISPs are already stupendously slow at completing tasks.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#156

Post by int_19h »

sundaeofshock wrote: post #84
int_19h wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One reason to raise stink now is to make it clear to any candidates for 2018 and 2020 elections that this is an issue to which they can pander for the sake of good PR and votes. That applies also (and, perhaps, especially) to the primaries.

This Congress has been trying to gut healthcare and is about to pass an extremely destructive and unpopular tax “reform” bill. It is obvious they don’t care about popular opinion or even their chances for re-election.

The vast majority of Congressional districts in US are non-competitive. This means that what matters in those is the primary, not the general election. So if you're a liberal in a solid red district, threatening your Republican elected representative probably won't do much good (unless it's a swing district - those guys actually listen to some extent, especially now that Dems won a bunch of special elections in the suburbs, and there's talk of a wave next year).

But if you're a liberal in a blue district, then you should write your rep and let them know that 1) you will vote in the primary, and 2) having a firm public position on this issue will be your litmus test for who gets your vote.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#157

Post by int_19h »

sundaeofshock wrote: post #152
aaronbrethorst wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They care very deeply about reelection. In order to get reelected, they need money and to survive a primary. They won't get money from their big $$$ donors if they don't pass the tax cut bill. They won't survive a primary if they're seen as being 'soft' on the ACA by the true believers in their party. They don't have any idea how they're going to make it through the general election, but that's a fight for another da…

They also have to make it past the general election. GOP House members in blue states voting for the tax bill are basically acknowledging they don’t care about re-election. I suspect they hope to get a good job with their donors in exchange for committing political suicide. I think the GOP knows they are going to get one bite at this apple, and they are taking advantage of it. Hello tax reform and good bye NN.

Just because it's a blue state, doesn't mean that it doesn't have red districts. Washington and Oregon are pretty damn blue, but it's because the western parts are ultra-blue. Eastern ones are very conservative in comparison, though. So their representatives very much care about re-election - which is why they're voting for, and very visibly supporting, the Republican agenda, because that's what their electorate demands of them.

The ones that are on shaky ground are those in areas that previously voted Republican primarily for economic rather than social reasons (i.e. for the sake of low taxes, not because they wanted to ban abortion etc), and are now flipping to blue because Republican social policies became intolerable. This is many suburban districts. And Republicans there are listening; for example, in my district (WA-8), Dave Reichert voted against AHCA.

The catch is, Republicans in those districts know that even if they pander to the new electorate somewhat, there are still enough reasons why their Democrat opponent will likely get their vote. They'd basically need to be liberal on everything except taxes (and given the nature of the tax proposal that Republicans unveiled, not even on that, since it hurts the suburban mid/high-middle class dwellers most!), at which point they might as well just switch parties. So you see a bunch of guys saying they won't run for re-election at all, and then they treat their remaining term as a means to squeeze the few last things in while they can.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#158

Post by aaronbrethorst »

int_19h wrote: post #157
sundaeofshock wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also have to make it past the general election. GOP House members in blue states voting for the tax bill are basically acknowledging they don’t care about re-election. I suspect they hope to get a good job with their donors in exchange for committing political suicide. I think the GOP knows they are going to get one bite at this apple, and they are taking advantage of it. Hello tax reform and good bye NN.

Just because it's a blue state, doesn't mean that it doesn't have red districts. Washington and Oregon are pretty damn blue, but it's because the western parts are ultra-blue. Eastern ones are very conservative in comparison, though. So their representatives very much care about re-election - which is why they're voting for, and very visibly supporting, the Republican agenda, because that's what their electorate dema…

How're you feeling about the choice of (someone) vs. Rossi, out of curiosity? (also, I see we have a bunch of shared connections on LinkedIn. I'm ex-Visual Studio.)

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#159

Post by drvdevd »

libraryatnight wrote: post #47

the nihilism that's infected HN is so disheartening. we're so screwed if this is what the conversation looks like on a forum for technologist entrepreneurs. Everything from, "protests don't matter," to "eh, it's not my country." This place used to be interesting. "Hacker" news, not really. "Grumpy programmers by trade" news fits better.

Yes we should be looking for technical solutions even if they seemingly don’t exist. I know political solutions do ... but this is Hacker News.

There’s always a way.

Re: To Save Net Neutrality, We Must Build Our Own Internet

#160

Post by int_19h »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #158
int_19h wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because it's a blue state, doesn't mean that it doesn't have red districts. Washington and Oregon are pretty damn blue, but it's because the western parts are ultra-blue. Eastern ones are very conservative in comparison, though. So their representatives very much care about re-election - which is why they're voting for, and very visibly supporting, the Republican agenda, because that's what their electorate dema…

How're you feeling about the choice of (someone) vs. Rossi, out of curiosity? (also, I see we have a bunch of shared connections on LinkedIn. I'm ex-Visual Studio.)

It depends on who that someone will be, of course, but I'm feeling rather optimistic - our district went for Clinton by 3 points, and I think by 2018 any Republican candidate won't be able to clearly distance themselves away from Trump and the federal GOP platform. Reichert had the benefit of being the incumbent, and being a fairly moderate Republican (or rather a very pragmatic one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIlizXcKVLY).

If you mean who I'd vote for, it would be the Dem candidate, no question. The parties are far enough now that I don't foresee a situation where a Republican candidate would be more closely aligned with me on the issues than a Democrat, even a particularly disagreeable one. But, more importantly and urgently, I think that this administration must have some counterbalance in the Congress to check it. But this is a moot question, anyway, because I'm not a citizen and cannot vote.

Post reply on HN