In the age of zero cost "letter writing" why would anyone consider the count of letters received as a valid indicator of sentiment? There are other legitimate means to determine public opinion if that is what the FCC really wants to know. My fear is that they don't really care what the public thinks.
One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
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Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#12I don't see how this is different to all the pro net neutrality activism and lobbying going on, except that it's an opposition opinion. It also seems to play on the narrative that people who are against expanding regulation are not rational individuals, they are instead reduced to mere tools controlled by a pair of Koch villains intent on destruction of earth and society to make themselves richer.
The Republican Party and to a greater extent, the Tea Party, have mobilized a mostly-white, mostly-male, mostly-middle-to-lower-class pool of voters who are in many cases irrational - voting against their better interests in the name of conviction, mostly based on race and religion. It's why there is constant saber-rattling about "wedge issues" like abortion and "takers" despite a significant portion of Tea Party vot…
I don't see how this is different to a gullible online youth mobilized through videos and petitions. You just have to say evil corporations want to control and make you pay for things you want for free, devoid of details for people to make a rational decision with. This is from 2006: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOJnKgsWPGw
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#13A follow up post: http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2014/12/17/clearing-up-th...
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#14Meanwhile, here's how American Commitment spins the Sunlight Foundation report: 'CONSERVATIVES OPPOSED TO INTERNET REGULATION WON FCC COMMENT PERIOD BY LANDSLIDE.' “We’re pleased that the Sunlight Foundation is finally confirming that American Commitment and Americans opposed to regulation of the Internet won the FCC comment period. Better late than never,” said Phil Kerpen, president of American Commitment. http://w…
It's hard to reconcile the widespread success of this blatantly and openly manipulative horseshit, with the claim that America is a self-governing nation by the people.
It's interesting reading some of the form letters in opposition. Here's an excerpt.
Regulating the Internet would be a job killer. All those who are employed as tech support, companies that make and deploy servers, routers, coax and fiber-optic cable will suffer job losses if the FCC chases billions of dollars of investments away by regulating Internet services as if they were a public utility. Every time Washington bureaucrats have grabbed massive new powers for themselves, they have created economic and human wreckage in their wake. Obamacare regulations on the healthcare system have cost millions of Americans their health insurance, and raised the cost of insurance and deductibles to millions more.
That's just an outright lie. Here's a rhetorical question. If a DDoS is classified as an attack because the client consuming server resources doesn't actually care about the resource, then what is flooding a comment board with identically wrong and manipulative letters?
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#15I don't see how this is different to all the pro net neutrality activism and lobbying going on, except that it's an opposition opinion. It also seems to play on the narrative that people who are against expanding regulation are not rational individuals, they are instead reduced to mere tools controlled by a pair of Koch villains intent on destruction of earth and society to make themselves richer.
The Republican Party and to a greater extent, the Tea Party, have mobilized a mostly-white, mostly-male, mostly-middle-to-lower-class pool of voters who are in many cases irrational - voting against their better interests in the name of conviction, mostly based on race and religion. It's why there is constant saber-rattling about "wedge issues" like abortion and "takers" despite a significant portion of Tea Party vot…
voting against their better interests in the name of conviction
Yes, that's called having principles.
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Republican Party and to a greater extent, the Tea Party, have mobilized a mostly-white, mostly-male, mostly-middle-to-lower-class pool of voters who are in many cases irrational - voting against their better interests in the name of conviction, mostly based on race and religion. It's why there is constant saber-rattling about "wedge issues" like abortion and "takers" despite a significant portion of Tea Party vot…
voting against their better interests in the name of conviction Yes, that's called having principles.
...and believing things without a shred of evidence is called "faith." And neither "faith" nor "principals" is an inherently good thing by definition - in fact some people might call "principals" based on "faith" or "religion" or "race" or "gender" or "greed" or "lack of education" or any other reason "dumb."
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's hard to reconcile the widespread success of this blatantly and openly manipulative horseshit, with the claim that America is a self-governing nation by the people.
It's interesting reading some of the form letters in opposition. Here's an excerpt. Regulating the Internet would be a job killer. All those who are employed as tech support, companies that make and deploy servers, routers, coax and fiber-optic cable will suffer job losses if the FCC chases billions of dollars of investments away by regulating Internet services as if they were a public utility. Every time Washington…
None of that is a lie, it's just looking at particular pieces of the overall issue. Obamacare has cost a lot of people their (existing, non-ACA compliant) plans, and it has raised the cost of insurance for other people. That's inevitable with the ACA: covering people with pre-existing conditions, etc, means some people will pay more (particularly younger people). I think the ACA is a good thing, by the way, but I'm not deluded enough to believe that you can cover more of the sickest people without paying more money.
The point about telecom jobs isn't a lie either. What was the impact of local-loop unbundling, which made investment into DSL unattractive, on DSL installers? The mechanics of the telecom industry aren't any different than that of Silicon Valley: people aren't going to spend a bunch of money hiring people to build things unless there is a potential for a big payout at the end. Companies like Verizon are already under the gun from investors for the billions they spent deploying fiber. Making it less attractive to be in the business of building infrastructure isn't going to increase the amount of investment and jobs in the sector.
Now, you could argue that Title II might nonetheless be beneficial on the net, but it's not a lie to point out the things that could be hurt by the Title II regulations.
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#18I don't see how this is different to all the pro net neutrality activism and lobbying going on, except that it's an opposition opinion. It also seems to play on the narrative that people who are against expanding regulation are not rational individuals, they are instead reduced to mere tools controlled by a pair of Koch villains intent on destruction of earth and society to make themselves richer.
The Internet is going to be regulated either way. I would rather see it regulated by the FCC as a utility than by Comcast as an extortion racket.
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#19I don't see how this is different to all the pro net neutrality activism and lobbying going on, except that it's an opposition opinion. It also seems to play on the narrative that people who are against expanding regulation are not rational individuals, they are instead reduced to mere tools controlled by a pair of Koch villains intent on destruction of earth and society to make themselves richer.
The Republican Party and to a greater extent, the Tea Party, have mobilized a mostly-white, mostly-male, mostly-middle-to-lower-class pool of voters who are in many cases irrational - voting against their better interests in the name of conviction, mostly based on race and religion. It's why there is constant saber-rattling about "wedge issues" like abortion and "takers" despite a significant portion of Tea Party vot…
What we need is that people vote not for their own self-interests, but for the common good. Otherwise, we will destroy our civilization while we each fight for a bigger piece of the pie.
Re: One group dominates the second round of net neutrality comments
#20I think this article overlooks one teensy weensy tiny little event that may have an effect on conservatives writing in to oppose Net Neutrality:
[President Obama Urges FCC to Implement Stronger Net Neutrality Rules|http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2014/11/10/president-obama-ur...]
The fact of the matter is most people don't understand a lot of the nuances behind the issue. They don't understand the telcos actually leverage various forms of local, state and federal regulation to reduce competition and they cry to the public about excessive government regulation when anybody threatens their duopoly benefits.