Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue • Hacker News Board

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#11

Post by edaemon » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:00 AM UTC

elihu wrote: post #3

Would a CRA force a House vote as well? (The House has another procedure called a discharge petition to force votes on things that are supported by a majority of representatives but opposed by a majority of the majority party -- it seems unlikely that there are enough votes in the House to force a net neutrality vote, though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition )

It only goes to the House if the CRA resolution passes the Senate. CRA resolutions function just like other resolutions or bills, being introduced and voted on in one house and approved via vote in the other.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#12

Post by pfooti » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:02 AM UTC

anfedorov wrote: post #10

What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole? At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

I'd bet that at least part of that is in response to competition on the ground. Monkeybrains and Sonic (disclosure: long time sonic customer) both are bringing high-speed broadband to SF. In particular, I have symmetric gigabit for like $50 a month.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#13

Post by AnimalMuppet » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:04 AM UTC

IIRC, the FCC commissioner's (stated) argument against net neutrality was that it was Congress's job to legislate things like that, not the FCC's job to just write regulations to make it so. Arguably, it's a defensible point.

Note well: I take no position on whether this was his actual reason, or just a smoke screen.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#14

Post by tfigment » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:05 AM UTC

anfedorov wrote: post #10

What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole? At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

Its an improvement but Comcast has been delaying real improvements for years but collect insane profits (afaik). I would love to see the numbers as well. The X1 DVR as far as I am concerned was horrible compared to the ReplayTV or Tivo circa 2001 (except for obviously HD improvement). It only took 15 years and lots of legislation mandating cablecards and whatnot to get them to get there. I don't have hope that they will act in our best interests given past actions but I have to use them because there are no other real options.

Honestly I would like to see the effective monopoly on physical layer internet broken up. Allow municipalities own the cables under the street and and not allow Comcast and others to block companies like Google from expanding by blocking access to the last mile. There is a lot of unused dark fiber in lots of places that could have supported 1Gbps a long time ago but doesn't

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#15

Post by mehrdadn » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:05 AM UTC

This is risky. If lack of net neutrality regulation doesn't result in clearly-out-of-bounds behavior by ISPs in the near term, Democrats will be the ones looking bad for trying to add useless regulation. I hope they've thought this scenario through.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#16

Post by arctia » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:09 AM UTC

anfedorov wrote: post #10

What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole? At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

SF-specific. Comcast has to step up because competition is fierce.

Even just 30 miles south from SF, Comcast is crap because there's less competition there.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#17

Post by wavefunction » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:12 AM UTC

mehrdadn wrote: post #15

This is risky. If lack of net neutrality regulation doesn't result in clearly-out-of-bounds behavior by ISPs in the near term, Democrats will be the ones looking bad for trying to add useless regulation. I hope they've thought this scenario through.

The people who care about "useless regulation" are already anti-Net Neutrality, so you might as well count them out.

It's important to fight for the things that matter to us.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#18

Post by chrischen » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:12 AM UTC

pfooti wrote: post #12

anfedorov wrote: post #10

What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole? At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

I'd bet that at least part of that is in response to competition on the ground. Monkeybrains and Sonic (disclosure: long time sonic customer) both are bringing high-speed broadband to SF. In particular, I have symmetric gigabit for like $50 a month.

I have 15 down 0.5 mbps up sonic for $70...

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#19

Post by CydeWeys » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:13 AM UTC

mehrdadn wrote: post #15

This is risky. If lack of net neutrality regulation doesn't result in clearly-out-of-bounds behavior by ISPs in the near term, Democrats will be the ones looking bad for trying to add useless regulation. I hope they've thought this scenario through.

The ISP bad behavior has already been going on for years and is now hitting a high-pitched fervor now that the FCC has repealed net neutrality. I don't see how it's risky; the bad behavior is already there and regulation is sorely needed.

Re: Net Neutrality to Get U.S. Senate Vote as Democrats Force Issue

#20

Post by rconti » Tue, Jan 09, 2018, 1:14 AM UTC

arctia wrote: post #16

anfedorov wrote: post #10

What's a good resource for understanding broadband markets as a whole? At least in SF in the past 5 years, Comcast seems to have upgraded 100Mbps connections to 1Gbps connections. Not sure whether that translates to a bigger shared pipe for the city as a whole, but it certainly looks like a good amount of improvement in $:bits, at least in comparison with $:sqFt.

SF-specific. Comcast has to step up because competition is fierce. Even just 30 miles south from SF, Comcast is crap because there's less competition there.

28.4 miles south from SF (according to Google Maps driving directions from "San Francisco"), I've got gig down/40 up from Comcast. And the only competition is ATT DSL (yes, I'm like 2000 feet from the CO and they'll only give me 40mbit).

Comcast advertises on broadcast TV all over the bay area "gigabit now available in your area". So I'd think penetration is pretty high now.

Now, I'd rather pay pretty much anyone other than Comcast, and in particular I'd rather not pay $170 for gigabit, and I'd rather have symmetric FTTH, but hey, someone finally brought the bandwidth and I put my money where my mouth is.