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We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

wired.com

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Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#251

Post by npsimons »

Spooky23 wrote: post #181
nickff wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The utility market used to be competitive, then municipalities began "licensing" them, which eventually led to the current state of affairs.[1] Even lighthouses, which have large externalities, can be built and operated without government intervention, as they did for a very long time.[2] [1] http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/ElectricityandItsRegulati... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lighthouse_in_Economics

The utility market moved towards a regulated model in the very early days of electric and gas transmission. There were lots of really good reasons for this around safety, universal service and public good. Most states today have a model where delivery is tightly regulated, but electricity generation is a competitive marketplace. At the end of the day the government exists to serve the public interest.

At the end of the day the government exists to serve the public interest.

I would add to that that the free market definitely does not exist to serve the public interest, as far too many fans of it tend to forget.

Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men, for the nastiest of reasons, will somehow work for the benefit of us all. -- John Maynard Keynes

There are places where the free market is ideal - utilities, such as Internet service (which requires either right of way on private land or permission to transmit and receive without interference on public airwaves) is not one of them.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#252

Post by ska »

Patrick_Devine wrote: post #166
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.

As a Canadian living in the US, I'd have to say it works a lot better than up north. I realize that's probably heresy for a lot of people, however, it's hard to stomach seeing your parents having to wait multiple years to get in to see a doctor. Particularly when they have debilitating health issues. That said, I'm not sure what the right answer is; I want everyone to have access to good health care. I'm not sure I n…

Having lived and worked in the health care industry in both countries, I'll have to respectively disagree. I can see how your personal experience must be very frustrating, and I'm not attempting to belittle that.

However on the whole the Canadian system is better at delivering the health care that is needed. Overall, it works better for more people, more of the time, and much more efficiently (i.e. cost effectively). The latter point means that sometimes people with non-critical issues have to wait -- usually not very long notwithstanding the stories people sometimes focus on (the dramatic failure modes of the US system are much, much worse).

That being said, if you a) have the right insurance, b) live in the right state, c) have money, and d) live in the right part (typically urban) of the state -- you can get very good care very quickly in the US. Unfortunately that leaves out an awful lot of people.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#253

Post by atmosx »

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…

Hm, practically we don't get a choice and by we I mean the tech-community. We're less than 10% of the voting population in ANY country.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#254

Post by burntsushi »

betterunix wrote: post #178
burntsushi wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who decided that the automobile would replace the horse and buggy for most modes of personal transportation? Consumers.

Who decided that automobiles should have seat belts, collapsable steering columns, and the numerous other safety features that save lives today? Hint: not consumers.

Was there something I said that implies that consumers decided everything? No? Okay then.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#255

Post by andrewflnr »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #236
andrewflnr wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should serve the public interest, which is good enough for policy debates.

It should serve the public interest, which is good enough for policy debates. This is absolutely false. Policy debates universally assume that it will serve the public interest, despite experience and extensive research in public choice economics. The result is that we get policies that aren't crafted to be robust to corruption and bad incentives, and that gets us to the state we're in today. Any policy debate should…

I guess I wasn't clear enough. My point is that, in a policy debate, whining about how government has not served the public interest in the past is counterproductive except insofar as it helps to prevent all the crap you enumerated. What we're both saying is that policy debates are about how to write policies that actually serve the public interest, instead of falling into some perverse incentive trap.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#256

Post by declan »

amarv1n wrote: post #220
declan wrote: post #172

Marvin, the author of the Wired.com opinion piece, is a smart fellow. But what he ignores is that Congress never handed the FCC the authority to impose Net neutrality regulations on the Internet. Such legislation actually came up for a vote in Congress, and it came close to passage: it was reported favorably out of a Senate committee but was defeated in a House floor vote in 2006: http://news.cnet.com/2100-1028_3-608…

There's a lot I disagree with in Declan's comment. We disagree on what Congress gave the FCC authority to do. The 1996 Telecom Act clearly classified DSL and dial-up as something called a "telecommunications service" which was subject to a host of rules including nondiscrimination rules. On the other hand, things like Yahoo.com would be "information services," not subject to all those rules. The FCC, adhering to a de…

Marvin: No need to guess about my identity! My comment to which you replied said "as I wrote here in 2005" when linking to my CNET article. You did read my comment in full before replying, right? :)

Also I have links to my homepage and Twitter screen name in my HN profile: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=declan

In terms of the merit of your arguments, nobody claimed that Markey can do anything on his own; the point I made is that if there are actual NN problems -- as opposed to hypothesized handwaving ones -- Markey and others in Congress can and will advance legislation. In terms of the rest of your points, I think you're reaching. I look forward to continuing this conversation after the court rules!

PS: My last name is spelled "McCullagh."

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#257

Post by tracker1 »

npsimons wrote: post #251
Spooky23 wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The utility market moved towards a regulated model in the very early days of electric and gas transmission. There were lots of really good reasons for this around safety, universal service and public good. Most states today have a model where delivery is tightly regulated, but electricity generation is a competitive marketplace. At the end of the day the government exists to serve the public interest.

At the end of the day the government exists to serve the public interest. I would add to that that the free market definitely does not exist to serve the public interest, as far too many fans of it tend to forget. Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men, for the nastiest of reasons, will somehow work for the benefit of us all. -- John Maynard Keynes There are places where the free market is id…

Utilities, and communications which rely on scarce distribution channels as you mention are not, and will not be truly free markets and should be regulated.. how tightly they should be regulated is up to interpretation. IMHO such utilities should not be allowed to be owned by companies that have inherent market verticals and/or conflicts of interest that do not serve the public good. Time-Warner is a prime example.

As far as outside utilities, and similar services... I feel the government's role should be to limit monopolies, not eliminate, but only so much as to allow for competition to happen. The rediculous extent of IP protectionism, specifically patents on design, algorithms and business processes are counter to that. Corporate personhood as a legal concept is against that. For that matter, corporations should probably instead have limits on unutilized/underutilized assets for a given length of time, and enforce distribution back to investors in those cases.

A free market is a market is one where upstart competition can generally succeed, and entrenched incumbents are regularly surpassed, or continually growing.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#258

Post by quadrangle »

allochthon wrote: post #56

I hate to say it, because I don't consider myself a radical, but the US congress is in the pockets of big business, US law relating to technology is broken, and US intelligence agencies have taken liberties beyond their mandate. The consequences seem fairly straightforward. The Internet will route around the damage to the system. The outcome is predictable and the dysfunction that is leading up to it is regrettable.…

What you're saying is: you don't like admitting the truth if it makes you seem radical. I don't respect that attitude, but thanks for doing the right thing here anyway.

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#259

Post by quadrangle »

staticelf wrote: post #184

The author seems to think the internet is all about America. We in Europe doesn't give a shit whatever your court decides. The best case scenario is if the US was disconnected from the rest of the worlds connectivity. Almost all evils that has generated hate from the public has been american corporations.

Well, for those of us in the US, that's not the best case! Sheesh! Leave us to rot in our awful insular spoiled rotten hellhole? The best parts of the internet in the US are that we can interact with and engage people and culture from the rest of the world! Sorry about sending our garbage to you as a side-effect…!

Re: We’re About to Lose Net Neutrality

#260

Post by alexeisadeski3 »

dkuntz2 wrote: post #248
alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're talking about a population which elected both Bush II and Obama.

The population didn't elect Bush II the first time [1]. The electoral college did, making it the fourth time a candidate winning the popular vote didn't win the electorate vote. Would the alternatives of McCain or Romney have resulted in the current NSA scandal not happening? No, it's silly to think that way, especially because it was happening (on a slightly smaller scale) when Bush was president. How it's being han…

Whew.

1) Yes, the population did elect Bush II. According to the rules of the game, the population picked him. If you want to get all picky over it, you can note that XX% of the population didn't even vote - so technically the population didn't pick any of them! Har har.

2) The alternatives of McCain, Romney, and Gore were also chosen to be the alternatives by the population.

3) I'm not sure what this all has to do with the NSA.

4) You seem to think that net neutrality would be in their interest. Yet they seem to have selected politicians which oppose it. So that would be one (possible) example of the population acting against their own interests (as you see it).

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