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FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

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Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#61

One of the biggest arguments I remember being made back when net neutrality was a hot topic was that ISPs would bundle and sell specific websites as tiered plans. Infographics like this one [1] were shared widely. Has this happened in the US? I’ve definitely seen ISPs start to apply data caps and throttling, but haven’t seen the aforementioned packaging (at least with the major ISPs). I ask because this is one of the…

The sky was supposed to fall if net neutrality were abrogated, and IME, that hasn't happened. The only change I (and people I know) witnessed was throttling once broad data limits were exceeded, which IIRC wasn't what was at stake, and which I for one didn't object to, i.e., that people would have to pay for what they use. In short, I have not seen bandwidth or pricing weaponized at all to target specific businesses…

This can't really be used to defend the abrogation of net neutrality, the sky might still fall, the only thing holding it up is how it's perceived in focus groups and that there is still some competition in the ISP market

The two are not set in stone

Give it a few years of throttling youtube to 480p if you don't have a premium plan and regular consumers will get used to more

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#62

One of the biggest arguments I remember being made back when net neutrality was a hot topic was that ISPs would bundle and sell specific websites as tiered plans. Infographics like this one [1] were shared widely. Has this happened in the US? I’ve definitely seen ISPs start to apply data caps and throttling, but haven’t seen the aforementioned packaging (at least with the major ISPs). I ask because this is one of the…

No it hasn’t. We’re fighting a boogieman.

Instead, we’re going to do is further entrench local monopolies, since only the large guys will be able to afford to comply with regulation.

You literally can’t force corporate Americas to act beneficial to their consumers of incentives are misaligned. It takes literal FDA-levels of regulation to accomplish that, and even that has failures while generally making the entire process expensive while consolidating things down to just a few market players.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Exempting services from data caps is not against net neutrality, and for example has been regular practice all across Europe (which has "net neutrality"). UPS doesn't care if it is a Nike shirt or a Gucci shirt in a box, They just deliver the box where it is meant to go. Why should it be any different for an ISP?

> UPS doesn't care if it is a Nike shirt or a Gucci shirt in a box, They just deliver the box where it is meant to go. Why should it be any different for an ISP? While I like NN there is a strict different between an ISP and UPS because of the digital/physical realm. When UPS delivers a Nike shirt they have to deliver that specific shirt to that specific person. An ISP needent deliver a specific shirt that originated…

My privacy is my own. The ISP does not have a right whatsoever to determine whether it has content I want. The content that the ISP has is tainted specifically because it's not the exact content that I wanted. It's not the same bitrate, it's not the same quality, it's not the same lack-of-advertisements, and it's not the same guarantee of privacy.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#64
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that remotely the same thing? The infographic above and others clearly claim that ISPs will be blocking services then requiring you to pay for them separately. Exempting services from data caps is not against net neutrality, and for example has been regular practice all across Europe (which has "net neutrality"). Isn't it just shifting the goal posts after the original claims of NN campaigners were discredited…

> Exempting services from data caps is not against net neutrality, and for example has been regular practice all across Europe (which has "net neutrality"). UPS doesn't care if it is a Nike shirt or a Gucci shirt in a box, They just deliver the box where it is meant to go. Why should it be any different for an ISP?

I would honestly be shocked if UPS didn't have different agreements with big shippers.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have gotten it, but with services not websites. Mobile providers will sell you an "Unlimited" data plan that throttles everything after 25GB a month. Streaming Spotify and Apple Music won't count against that soft data cap. Streaming other music services will count against it. Video streaming over YouTube, Netflix, etc is capped at 480p levels. If you pay an additional monthly fee, you get upgraded to "Unlimited P…

Didn’t arbitrary data caps start back in the day when torrenting was a big problem? The ISPs started cutting people off because only piracy could explain such heavy usage. That was in the early 00’s iirc, prior to the net neutrality debate.

You are right, but it isn't related with the argument made above.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#66
post #43

I don't see the point of NN as long as the only "service providers" it applies to are the ones implementing layers And with NN being championed by a lot of the same services that cut off the above-mentioned it seems less like something meant to preserve the freedom of the Internet and more like something meant to keep one group of corporations in control of it.

Kiwifarms was down for like 2 days. Side note: the Blocked and Reported podcast looked deeply into the allegations that led to that that site being initially shut down and they concluded they were bogus.

Cloudflare continues to run in front of literal DDoS selling sites, and animal crush sites, and more (you really don’t want to know).

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#67

One of the biggest arguments I remember being made back when net neutrality was a hot topic was that ISPs would bundle and sell specific websites as tiered plans. Infographics like this one [1] were shared widely. Has this happened in the US? I’ve definitely seen ISPs start to apply data caps and throttling, but haven’t seen the aforementioned packaging (at least with the major ISPs). I ask because this is one of the…

If it never happened no harm in making sure it doesn’t happen either.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have gotten it, but with services not websites. Mobile providers will sell you an "Unlimited" data plan that throttles everything after 25GB a month. Streaming Spotify and Apple Music won't count against that soft data cap. Streaming other music services will count against it. Video streaming over YouTube, Netflix, etc is capped at 480p levels. If you pay an additional monthly fee, you get upgraded to "Unlimited P…

Mobile providers are a different beast because there’s a limit on radio spectrum. Throttling is necessary.

Let's take the null hypothesis that these incentives push all video streaming to Apple+. The total bandwidth hasn't changed, all that's happened is that is it's only streamed over Apple+ now. How does this help with their spectrum constraints?

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#69

One of the biggest arguments I remember being made back when net neutrality was a hot topic was that ISPs would bundle and sell specific websites as tiered plans. Infographics like this one [1] were shared widely. Has this happened in the US? I’ve definitely seen ISPs start to apply data caps and throttling, but haven’t seen the aforementioned packaging (at least with the major ISPs). I ask because this is one of the…

If net neutrality is not relevant anyways, why are ISPs so dead set against it?

A concern from ISPs is that they will lose the ability to shape and prioritize traffic, something that is often necessary.

A concern from consumers is that services will be restricted or rendered unusable by throttling selectively driving customers away from services.

A concern from Service Providers is that they will have to make deals with ISPs to ensure quality of service.

They're valid concerns on all sides and without Net Neutrality we've seen service restrictions, though they're advertised as benefits (e.g. free OTT messaging on flights from certain providers). We've also seen ISPs bully providers like Netflix into paying to deliver traffic their customers are paying to access (double dipping). It hasn't been the doom and gloom that was hyped but has definitely impacted services.

Under net neutrality I expect we'll see a degradation of cellular services or forced consent agreements as WISPs will not be allowed to downgrade or shape traffic otherwise.

It cuts both ways and I will be surprised if it makes much difference.

Re: FCC aims to reinstate net neutrality after us Democrats gain control of panel

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn’t arbitrary data caps start back in the day when torrenting was a big problem? The ISPs started cutting people off because only piracy could explain such heavy usage. That was in the early 00’s iirc, prior to the net neutrality debate.

That was the guise to justify the caps but Comcast was setting caps around the data usage of someone streaming Netflix. The overage charges were ridiculous as well, if you used 2x your data cap it would cost you 100x your regular bill. I had some Nest cameras in addition to Streaming and ended up taking them down because I kept going over.

In Australia my first broadband internet connection worked like that - though when you went over, your bandwidth was heavily throttled until the end of the month unless you upgraded your plan for the month.

As inconvenient as it is, honestly I think data caps are fair pricing. The load difference between a light internet user and a heavy user is orders of magnitude of capacity for the ISP to deal with. Having a flat price for internet sounds similar to having flat price for electricity or water - where your grandma (who turns off all the light switches whenever she leaves a room) would pay the same for electricity as a frat house mining bitcoin in the cupboard.

Sure, customers pay for speed. But residential internet is overprovisioned based on 'reasonable' usage patterns. Thats a good thing - internet would be much more expensive, or forced to be much slower otherwise.

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