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We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

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Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#81

Post by vacri »

cheald wrote: post #5
alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #2

I find it amusing that those in favor of net neutrality consider themselves on the side of freedom.

The sticking point for me is that the market is already regulated such that it makes it very difficult for a competitor to challenge companies who engage in exploitative practices (and for similar reasons, the incentive to collude is extremely high). In a free market, net neutrality wouldn't need to be regulated because companies who attempted to enact business plans like the AT&T plan described in the article would…

Why would a free market guarantee net neutrality? All the big players could still prefer to offer products that curtail it. There's no logical step ensuring net neutrality.

An example - in Australia, there is an ISP called Internode, which used to be run by a techie called Hackett. They were very much for user's rights and net neutrality, and were always at the forefront of lobbying the government for users. Their support centers are in-country, and the web tools they offer make techies happy.

But they only have a sliver of the ISP pie, despite the very high quality product - because that shit does not come cheap. They're 50-100% more expensive. Instead the public run towards big brands like Optus - who actively engage in tactics like obscuring the structure of your bill to make it harder to understand, or engage in openly deceptive marketing, and see users as cattle to manipulate. Or they'll go to bargain-basement ISPs with woeful service, then complain about that service and give you a hateful stare when you suggest they pay a little more for good service.

I can see zero evidence to suggest that 'net neutrality' is a killer feature that would be automatically enabled by a free market.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#83

Post by Houshalter »

jarjoura wrote: post #59

IMHO, this isn't about Netflix, YouTube, or even Amazon having to pay for higher tiered access to customers. They have the deep pockets and smart lawyers to construct contracts that work out for them in the end. So I see that as the same grumpy story as California and New York forcing Amazon to collect sales tax. BUT, because this does force deals to be crafted behind closed doors, they will turn out looking a lot li…

Is that necessarily a bad thing in all cases? I think it would be great if a company offered, say, really cheap or free access to wikipedia and other basic websites, but charged for actual service. Letting poor people access it or making it available to host cheaper free wifi. I think what people are afraid of is them throttling competitors, or charging more for normal service, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#84

Post by jjoonathan »

fleitz wrote: post #57
blhack wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the telcos are currently enjoying a "natural monopoly". The cost of entry to become a telco is so high, that normal competitive forces do not apply. In situations like this, one role of government is to regulate these natural monopolies to protect citizens. One such regulation, for instance, is that the power company cannot shut off your power in the middle of winter in Minnesota without fulfilling some prett…

Telecom isn't a natural monopoly, it's a government sponsored cartel.

While you are correct that telcos currently enjoy a certain degree of regulatory capture, they are also natural monopolies/oligopolies in the sense that competitors have an astronomical barrier to entry. It's tempting but naive to think that all we need to do in order to see the market right itself is to eliminate existing regulations.

What we actually need to do is to change regulations to encourage competition, both by eliminating explicit monopoly rights and by mandating and/or price-controlling B2B bandwidth/traffic sales so that incumbents can't kill new entrants without beating them on a level playing field.

Forcing telcos to act like "dumb pipes" is one type of regulation that forces them to compete against each other (otherwise they just lump their market power with media providers until they are once again too big to challenge).

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#85

Post by lotyrin »

wyager wrote: post #25
nostromo wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most rights are a balancing act. In this case, the freedom of the ISP is contrary to the freedom of the subscriber, so whose freedom is supreme? I could understand opposition to net neutrality if there were competition in the ISP market. However, I have no choice but to use Comcast, so the idea that they can decide what sites I visit and how fast they are is very scary.

Bullshit. The "freedom" of the subscriber is not on the line. The subscriber can do as they wish. I can't go into a hotel and claim I have the "freedom" to use my room as a distillery just because I paid for the room. The ISP can also regulate bandwidth as they wish. They're a company, not a public organization (depending on where you live). If you don't like it, choose another ISP. If you can't choose another ISP, w…

So... I'm supposed to move to another city, maybe even state, in order to place competitive pressure on my ISP?

Of course you mentioned the monopolistic ISP situation that creates that problem, but that seems to just be handwaving; I don't think you can point to angry consumers as a solution without explaining what exactly you think those angry consumers under a monopoly can possibly do to improve their situation without government intervention akin to the current FCC neutrality arrangement.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#86

Post by jarjoura »

Houshalter wrote: post #83
jarjoura wrote: post #59

IMHO, this isn't about Netflix, YouTube, or even Amazon having to pay for higher tiered access to customers. They have the deep pockets and smart lawyers to construct contracts that work out for them in the end. So I see that as the same grumpy story as California and New York forcing Amazon to collect sales tax. BUT, because this does force deals to be crafted behind closed doors, they will turn out looking a lot li…

Is that necessarily a bad thing in all cases? I think it would be great if a company offered, say, really cheap or free access to wikipedia and other basic websites, but charged for actual service. Letting poor people access it or making it available to host cheaper free wifi. I think what people are afraid of is them throttling competitors, or charging more for normal service, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Why would Wikipedia be given cheaper than say, dictionary.com or nytimes.com? Or what about this website and all of the links it provides access to? "Poor people" need access to high quality content too ya know :-P.

Unless you want to create a scholarship foundation to provide free unlimited access to everything for these folk? Then a nice lottery can make it so the lucky few get that scholarship.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#88

Post by jjoonathan »

argumentum wrote: post #75
blhack wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the telcos are currently enjoying a "natural monopoly". The cost of entry to become a telco is so high, that normal competitive forces do not apply. In situations like this, one role of government is to regulate these natural monopolies to protect citizens. One such regulation, for instance, is that the power company cannot shut off your power in the middle of winter in Minnesota without fulfilling some prett…

Not at all "natural". The cost is so high partially due to special agreements between these corporations and governments, from local agreements to lay down fiber, to national agreements regarding the use of the electromagnetic spectrum.

US Telcos = Natural Monopoly + Regulatory Capture

> The cost is so high partially due to special agreements

This is true, but it doesn't contradict the fact that telcos are also natural monopolies.

Let's play a game: pretend that all of these special agreements have suddenly become invalid and the market has become deregulated. Assume you have (or can acquire) the technical expertise to challenge them. What's your business plan?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#89

Post by xxpor »

zobzu wrote: post #63
joseflavio wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that telecom is already a heavy regulated area (for historical and technical reasons). Besides this, connecting to your competitor network is going to be always a rigged game, just a handful of players will connect between them, that leads to monopoly... So I think it is virtually impossible to setup your own new company... I live in France and it is quite interesting to see the raise of the provider F…

Free has traffic shaping for anything going through their peering, but in particular apple and google. Good luck using youtube via free's peering. it's nearly impossible. I don't know many people on free.fr that use youtube at all, because it's too terribly slow (1min load for 3s of video?). It's barely acceptable for things like google play downloads. Their peering isn't net neutral at all.

Why does Google continue to peer with them then? The whole point of peering vs. transit is that two networks will connect for free to each other to get better service.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#90

Post by vacri »

nightcracker wrote: post #74
alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously? Because they're demanding the freedom of the telcos be overridden in favor of our own personal interests.

I strongly am in favor of freedom, but not a fully free market. And exactly for reasons like this: a fully free market destroys freedom.

The Free Market of libertarianism reknown doesn't exist and can't exist. For such a market to work, each participant needs perfect information and capacity. If you've had any involvement with business should be enough experience to understand that there's no such thing as perfect information once the product is more complex than say, an orange, and even then it'd be a stretch (grown where? what pesticides? which labour? which transport company? where are all the other places I can purchase this orange? ...)
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