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We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

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Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#91

Post by shawnee_ »

If net neutrality was truly working, nobody would need to renew their contracts with Verizon or TMobile or anybody else. Contracts would be deprecated and all the telecoms would be forced to compete on something other than lock-in and "whatever the latest trendy device is" promotions. But that's hard to do when you're selling what essentially amounts to a homogeneous product like bandwidth. They don't wanna do that. They like guaranteed income and they especially like it when people go over their contract data allocations.

In 2013 there is absolutely _zero_ rationale for contracts to play a part in either the wireless or the pipeline infrastructure. Telecoms know this and are doing everything they can to drag out the death sentence, making it as painful and expensive as possible for everybody involved.

If we let the telecoms do with fiber what's been done with mobile networks not only is the web going to be less neutral, the bias will naturally lead to the dissemination of news and information as being more easily controlled and piped to the masses in sinister ways.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#92

Post by altcognito »

alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #2

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

I find it amusing that those think freedom is only about their ability to pay for things, not to be FREE from paying additional money for things they have already bought.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#93

Post by Theodores »

hayksaakian wrote: post #49
pvnick wrote: post #20

I consider everybody here very smart. In many cases smarter than myself. Therefore, could somebody please explain why we would give the government, which has shown itself to be terribly incompetent with technology issues, the ability to enforce net neutrality? Seriously, I can't get over the dissonance here. If it's such a shitty idea, let consumers decide. Google Fiber et al will just eat the major telecoms' lunch s…

Your argument is that the free market will favor ISPs that support/don't oppose net-neutrality. I argue that most people won't care about their "choice" (air quotes, because most people can't pick from more than 2 ISPs) of ISP until it's too late. Already you have ISPs throttling access to streaming video sites (netflix, youtube, twitch) with little to no REAL blowback. With the barriers to entry as high as they are,…

My ISP - Virgin in the UK - has a transparent proxy cache for streaming video sites. If I want to watch an episode of Breaking Bad then it is there, instant. However, that 1992 B-side tack with 200 views 'buffers' for a while. That probably is because it is not cached down the road or further upstream at some Akamai CDN. It probably has to come straight from the heart of the GooglePlex, Sergei's very own hard drive...

Given that most people watch what they are told to watch, i.e. the same stuff as everyone else, and, since almost all of that can be cached by the ISP, why would they throttle? The final mile I pay for, I could buy the basic 'throttled to 5Mbs' service but they kindly let me pay for a sensible level of bandwidth. How is this throttling thing different in the USA?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#94

Post by johnpmayer »

pvnick wrote: post #20

I consider everybody here very smart. In many cases smarter than myself. Therefore, could somebody please explain why we would give the government, which has shown itself to be terribly incompetent with technology issues, the ability to enforce net neutrality? Seriously, I can't get over the dissonance here. If it's such a shitty idea, let consumers decide. Google Fiber et al will just eat the major telecoms' lunch s…

Some of us believe that broadband should be considered a public utility, in which case it is appropriate to subject providers to these regulations.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#95

Post by raverbashing »

Houshalter wrote: post #71
raverbashing wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How's the 'invisible hand' working for healthcare again? I'm very against government regulation, but something it's necessary.

You can just cherry pick examples unless you can explain how it's analogous. For example, healthcare suffers from natural monopolies to an extent. Hospitals don't really have to compete with each other, and it's really difficult to build a new hospital. The same principle applies to telecommunications. On the other hand, healthcare is heavily regulated and hardly a free market, so it's pretty terrible comparison in t…

Hospitals have a limited competition as well in other countries. Healthcare is also regulated in other countries, maybe not as much

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#96

Post by Benferhat »

jjoonathan wrote: post #88
argumentum wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 bu…

You love the phrase "regulatory capture", don't you? :)

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#97

Post by cmircea »

aragot wrote: post #66
blhack wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That has absolutely nothing to do with net neutrality. Forbidding servers on their network is a completely rational stance for them to take. Do you also get upset at "all-you-can-eat" buffets when they don't let you fill a barrel full of food to take home and eat later?

How can they distinguish personal vs pro servers? They have to inspect the contents, which to me seems related to net neutrality. The comparison should rather be "Do you get upset at buffets when they don't let you have the main dish after dessert?" They use content inspection to increase their revenue.

Bandwidth and number of incoming connections.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#98

Post by coldtea »

pvnick wrote: post #20

I consider everybody here very smart. In many cases smarter than myself. Therefore, could somebody please explain why we would give the government, which has shown itself to be terribly incompetent with technology issues, the ability to enforce net neutrality? Seriously, I can't get over the dissonance here. If it's such a shitty idea, let consumers decide. Google Fiber et al will just eat the major telecoms' lunch s…

>I consider everybody here very smart. In many cases smarter than myself. Therefore, could somebody please explain why we would give the government, which has shown itself to be terribly incompetent with technology issues, the ability to enforce net neutrality?

Because it's not a technology issue, it's a business fairness issue. You know, the same way we let the government handle contracts.

>Seriously, I can't get over the dissonance here. If it's such a shitty idea, let consumers decide.

One's the genie is in the corporate box, there will be no turning back. The consumer cannot decide if he is not even provided with an alternative -- or if any alternative is more expensive. Like you couldn't decide about carrier-locked phones all those years.

You either push for fairness to be regulated in law, or let the 4-5 top players divide the pie as they like.

>Google Fiber et al will just eat the major telecoms' lunch sooner or later anyway.

And who told you that Google WONT take advantage of crashing net neutrality itself?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#99

Post by [deleted] »

Benferhat wrote: post #96
jjoonathan wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 bu…

You love the phrase "regulatory capture", don't you? :)

[deleted]

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#100

Post by jjoonathan »

Benferhat wrote: post #96
jjoonathan wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 bu…

You love the phrase "regulatory capture", don't you? :)

Not as much as I despise both the thing it refers to and the propensity of self-styled libertarians to pretend that it's the only problem in the world :)
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