F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility • Hacker News Board

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#251

Post by greiskul » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 9:58 PM UTC

greggyb wrote: post #218

lbenes wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, of course if most American were as lucky as you, net neutrality wouldn't be an issue. But the reality is that most of us are under a monopoly.[1] And it will take years and billions of dollars in infrastructure to enable the kind of competition that you are already enjoying. After suffering under Comcast's Netflix throttling last year, I don't want to hear utopian talk about encouraging competition. I want laws…

The point of my post is not "Hooray for me!", but was to point out that my good service comes from competition, and that the focus on rate-limiting of net neutrality is just a red herring. The thing with regulation is that it is pernicious, and once created becomes very difficult to get rid of. Let's walk through a hypothetical: Rate-limiting becomes illegal today, and simultaneously some arbitrarily effective incent…

And once this new company that limits everything that is not Facebook, Twitter and Netflix gains a large market share, how will any new company ever compete with Facebook, Twitter and Netflix?

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#252

Post by tormeh » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:00 PM UTC

ohitsdom wrote: post #212

greggyb wrote: post #169

To me, net neutrality is pretty much a red herring. I have had good and bad internet service in my life. The least reliable was at my somewhat rural childhood home from TWC. The best is my current connection from that most reviled of companies, Comcast. I have had no service interruptions, and I get a reliable 50Mbps at all times of day (I check regularly with speed tests and checking Torrent activity). The reason my…

DSL speeds "similar" to 50mpbs? How similar? The fastest AT&T offers DSL is 6mbps (it's my only option). I thought that was a hard limit on the technology, but googling it produces varying results.

Nah, there's no real limit. It all depends on the longest distance between a sender and a receiver (there might be more than one on your last-mile) the quality of the cable and output power on the sending end. European cities seem to have settled one 15mbps as both standard and max, American ones seem to have settled on lower. The phoneline infrastructure was probably not as good.

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#253

Post by lkbm » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:01 PM UTC

mbreese wrote: post #101

sliverstorm wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're missing a lot of context. San Antonio is in Texas, which means these could have been rolling blackouts, one of the last-ditch efforts employed by power companies during record summer temperature spikes (which translate to monumental load spikes in the form of A/C)

Or it could be weather related (like most outages), or a bad transformer, or a car running into a pole, or a ton of things... So, you're right that we're missing a lot of context - including the duration. A 30 min outage due to an accident is very different from a 3 day outage due to a storm. And like you said, AC can be a big drain on the grid during the summer. (Disclaimer: I'm not sure what the weather in San Anto…

Not very rainy. No hurricanes or blizzards. Very hot. Usually in a drought, and not to uncommonly 50+ days exceeding 100 Fahrenheit in a year.

(I'm in Austin, which is pretty close to San Antonio, but I see now is considerably hotter: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/ewx/?n=100degreedays.htm ww.usclimatedata.com/climate/san-antonio/texas/united-states/ustx1200 )

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#254

Post by jarin » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:02 PM UTC

droopybuns wrote: post #227

Netflix traffic and some hypothetical future tech like Surgery-over-IP traffic should not be prioritized equally.

This is kind of a red herring.

1) Surgery-over-IP would be designed within the limitations of the existing infrastructure, which is more than capable of handling high resolution real-time video.

2) Surgery-over-IP would be useful mostly in areas that are unlikely to have reliable high speed internet access (poor countries, battlefields, etc.).

3) Netflix traffic is streamed to the customer using a strategy that tries to minimize the number of hops it has to take (i.e. content delivery network). This reduces congested links for something that would be a point-to-point application like remote surgery.

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#255

Post by greggyb » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:03 PM UTC

lbenes wrote: post #236

greggyb wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of my post is not "Hooray for me!", but was to point out that my good service comes from competition, and that the focus on rate-limiting of net neutrality is just a red herring. The thing with regulation is that it is pernicious, and once created becomes very difficult to get rid of. Let's walk through a hypothetical: Rate-limiting becomes illegal today, and simultaneously some arbitrarily effective incent…

> New entrants are trying to compete in the market place. One proven effective way to gain a foothold in a market with entrenched players is to offer a loss leader. We could more than make up for this hypothetical disadvantage by regulating the big players to share their last mile infrastructure like we've done with cell towers and land lines. A MUCH bigger issue than ISPs startups is that the next Facebook, Twitter,…

First, offering an alternative solution is not a necessary component of arguing that a given proposal is objectively bad.

Here's an excerpt from another point in this thread:

>If regulation must occur, then I would prefer to see it happen in a manner that increases rather than decreases my choices. Forbidding a certain pricing strategy does not increase my choices. If regulation must occur, then I'd like to see something along the lines required sale of excess infrastructure capacity. This could happen in terms of utility pole access (the majority of which are not owned by telecoms to my understanding[0]), or through sale of excess bandwidth in an ISP's network.

This is definitely an "if" for me though. It seems that the majority of ISP monopolies we see grew out of the exclusive cable franchises offered by many (most?) municipalities when cable TV was becoming a thing. Since public rights of way were/are (depending on current status of these franchises) and pole access can be granted without adding new regulations, and permission from the city is all that's needed to bury wire, it would seem that these are the best first steps. If it turns out that the advantage granted to incumbents by their past franchises are too great (i.e. we do not see improvements in ISP service/quality), then the idea above of mandatory leasing of excess infrastructure capacity starts to make more sense.

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#256

Post by freehunter » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:05 PM UTC

IanDrake wrote: post #66

freehunter wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>market forces that encourage those improvements. Like a Comcast monopoly? You mean those market forces?

Comcast is not a monopoly. This is the sort of misunderstanding that I'm talking about. AT&T was a monopoly and the USPO is still a first class mail monopoly. I suspect Comcast is just the best option in your location and you're dissatisfied with it. Bummer for you, and I sincerely mean that. When industries get regulated by the government they get "protected". Protected from upstarts with new and better technology,…

>I suspect Comcast is just the [only broadband] option in your location [due to their non-compete agreement with Time Warner and the city council not letting other service providers lay cables] and you're dissatisfied with it.

That's a bit more accurate. If somethings the only provider of a service, that's a monopoly. Plain and simple. There's no exceptions, there's no misunderstanding. The definition of broadband is 25/3, and Comcast is the only company offering that. There's no chance for upstarts with newer and better technology. There's no chance for cheaper alternatives. There's no chance of market forces. If you want to be an ISP in this city, you have to go through the city council who says no one but Comcast can lay cable and only utilies companies can use their utility poles. Guess what, if Comcast is Title II and everyone has access to their poles and conduits, well here comes the competition.

http://www.engadget.com/2015/01/01/google-letter-fcc-title-i...

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#257

Post by fnordfnordfnord » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:07 PM UTC

skylan_q wrote: post #103

0xdeadbeefbabe wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst part is involving the FCC at all.

I'll have to agree to this. Electricity is electricity, water is water, natural gas is natural gas. But Internet traffic isn't a homogenous substance.

I think I'd like it fine if my ISP treated my internet traffic as if it were.

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#258

Post by tptacek » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:08 PM UTC

tw04 wrote: post #196

grellas wrote: post #55

Law does not operate in a vacuum because, in the end, it is closely tied to power - to fine, to jail, to sanction, to regulate and restrict - and that makes it scary when it becomes unhinged from a sense of principle in its application. Is it wise, then, to grant unchecked, plenary power over the internet to the government in the name of trusting that those who currently exercise the F.C.C.'s power will exercise that…

Except for the part where ISPs were regulated under Title II up until the late 90s. >The free internet we know today will be utterly dependent on their good graces. That may be the single most uneducated statement about Title II I've seen to date. What SPECIFICALLY in Title II allows the FCC to restrict what content the ISPs provide to the public? Hint: there isn't any language whatsoever giving them that ability.

We were? 90s ISPs regulated by Title II? What? No we weren't.

I started managing ISPs during the dialup era and played shepherd to a field of Livingston Portmasters. I migrated us to racks upon racks of Ascend boxes during the 56k modem wars. I set up ISDN PRIs and DS1 terminations. I turned up our DS3s and set up our first default-free peering. I left just before the DSLAMs went in.

At no point were we ever subject to Title II regulations. We priced however we wanted to price, we shaped traffic however we needed to (we virtually never did that).

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#259

Post by patronagezero » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:11 PM UTC

IanDrake wrote: post #33

IanDrake wrote: post #23

That will be a sad day. Internet technology still has a lot of room to improve before the government steps in and kills all market forces that encourage those improvements. If you don't like your current service levels now, just wait until the government gets involved.

I realize HN is full of idealistic kids who never lived through the government taking control of something to "improve" it, so your down votes are forgiven.

No worries, plenty agree with you, but few fight the flood here on HN any longer. I never vote and rarely comment. The whole premise of comment voting is groupthink 3.0.

I cherish down-votes on HN, just like I cherish disagreeing with the idiocy that has plagued the progress of the US for decades, they'll keep swimming with the flow and wondering why things only get worse. It's like being the stern of the boat and wondering why wherever the country has been is shit, and looking at the bow as being to blame. You'll all get your turn at the bow of the ship, and I promise you it'll be far worse than your parents or grandparents.

Re: F.C.C. Is Expected to Propose Regulating the Internet as a Utility

#260

Post by thedufer » Mon, Feb 02, 2015, 10:13 PM UTC

jchendy wrote: post #210

TheHypnotist wrote: post #179

One part of me hates this because the idea of our government dipping their hands into what has become the major source of information, entertainment, conducting business, etc. is quite scary. We all know their tendency to fuck things up because of politics, money, stupidity, or a combination of any and all of these. On the other hand, I look at my other utilities and realize I have absolutely no complaints. Yeah, the…

I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm honestly curious: why is pay-for-use bad for internet access but okay for water, electricity, and phone?

Water, phone, and, to a lesser degree, electricity, are all reasonable for the average person to understand. A shower obviously uses more water than a tap, and when it's off it uses none. A phone costs me minutes while it's off the hook and doesn't when it isn't. And I know about how long a minute is. Turning on my computer, lights, or microwave costs electricity (although I may not have a great idea of how much, I can make decent guesses to the ratios).

But do even the most tech-savvy have a reasonable intuition for how much bandwidth a computer uses while idle with a given set of applications running? How much a game of StarCraft uses? How much streaming video costs? (The last one is a trick question - it can change dynamically depending on your downstream speed.) It's just unreasonable to ask people to make good decisions about these things.