We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality • Hacker News Board

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#121

Post by pdonis » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:35 AM UTC

nostromo wrote: post #13

alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #2

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

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.

It's not just the freedom of the subscriber: it's the freedom of startup founders who need a way for users to reach their sites. Suppose Comcast et al. had been able to decide that, say, Dropbox was "competing" with their own offerings of file space to subscribers, and either blocked or throttled access to dropbox.com, so subscribers couldn't even go there to view the "about" page without a lot of hassle (if at all)?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#122

Post by wycx » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:37 AM UTC

pnut wrote: post #9

The toothpaste is out of the tube already, people know what freedom online tastes like. Bad news for old money - the Internet has an appetite for rentier blood. This will not be tolerated long term.

The internet has an appetite for replace existing rent seeking with more scalable rent seeking.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#123

Post by dkuntz2 » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:39 AM UTC

alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #108

dkuntz2 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't you expect them to lose market share? They're actively hindering customers from their desired actions. Doesn't that typically mean customers will look for alternatives?

Most people prefer to buy cheap crap instead of quality.

Even if cheap actively hinders them from doing something they want to do?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#124

Post by Theodores » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:42 AM UTC

SwellJoe wrote: post #107

Theodores wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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..…

"why would they throttle?" Because they want to slow the demise of their television business unit. Many of the telcos here in the states not only also offer cable television service, they also directly compete with Netflix ( http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2012/0... ). If they can make Netflix slower than the Comcast online offering (and they can), then more users will often choose the Comcast o…

Thank you for that. The situation is different in the UK, at least with my ISP. They have teamed up with Netflix rather than throttled them.

http://about.virginmedia.com/press-release/9410/virgin-media...

In the UK cable TV took a lot longer to arrive than in the US. When it arrived it quickly merged into some monster debt vehicle that had to be refinanced somehow. Nobody really went for cable, it took on a new life with the Internet. This competes with ADSL copper from BT and various competitors. There is no local monopoly, if I go for Talk Talk instead of BT then the same wire to the door gets used. Sounds like we have a better market over here.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#125

Post by alexeisadeski3 » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:45 AM UTC

zobzu wrote: post #76

wyager wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 you say people will work to lay fiber everywhere til they can have a neutral internet? Oh yeah, right, that'll happen because it's totally possible! Freedom of saying this ain't right. Freedom of making laws against it. Freedom to steal. Freedom to pirate servers. Extend the thinking far enough til you get to freedom to kill people. Exactly the same thinking. This circular argument is useless. Freedom without mean…

My LTE is frequently faster than my home cable.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#126

Post by lsh » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:52 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #81

cheald wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 su…

Internode are amazing in every aspect and everyone I've switched to them continue to use them and continue to thank me to this day. The customer service is second to none: http://xkcd.com/806/

IIRC they were bought out by Adam internet. They were also among the first (the first?) to introduce naked DSL, which you still can't get here in the UK apparently.

http://on.net

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#127

Post by baddox » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:56 AM UTC

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…

> 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?

I think the key is the false assumption that this is how the origins and advancement of political authority works. This net neutrality issue is much easier to explain with a model of political authority that treats it as something the ruling class takes by force.

Social contract theory was just the best thing Enlightenment thinkers could come up with to settle the cognitive dissonance they experienced upon realizing that the existence of governments was a plain violation of their new ideas about natural rights.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#128

Post by ampersandy » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 1:56 AM UTC

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…

but at the loss of any other social network upstart that wants in on it

Who do you think is footing the bill for those Facebook-only plans? Covering the costs of all internet use sounds like an unsustainable business strategy.

Are 'social network upstarts' losing out on users in the USA because people don't want (or can't afford) to pay for a data plan? How is this any different?

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#129

Post by Patrick_Devine » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 2:03 AM UTC

This might not be very popular, but I'm going to say I'm in favour of the law being struck down. I'm totally on board with ISPs not throttling / extorting money out of web 2.0 companies, however, I'm not sure that trying to enforce a swiss-cheese law is the right way to do it.

That and I'm kind of biased, because I founded a company which is trying to level the playing field and make net neutrality de facto for internet services instead of de jure. Information is like water. Put a barrier in front of it and it will always try to find a way to flow through it.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#130

Post by nknighthb » Mon, Dec 30, 2013, 2:07 AM UTC

argumentum wrote: post #79

nknighthb wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's something that has been debated. Do you think telecoms and utilities sprang into existence fully-formed world-wide the day you were born? These issues are not new, they date back centuries .

Then how can you consider these companies to be truly private?

I don't. Neither, I'd wager, does djur, who you initially replied to. You should read his other posts in this thread.

He and I are both speaking of the practical problems of the mentality that governments shouldn't be involved at all, not arguing that telecom monopolies are a good thing.

You can't have a practical system of utilities of any sort without government involvement. That doesn't mean you have to have government-granted monopolies to nominally private companies. There are other options, like having the core utilities (e.g. fiber) be a public utility to begin with.