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What Will Come of the FCC Comcast Hearing
Posted by
kdawson
on Mon Feb 25, 2008 11:33 PM
from the rhymes-with-bombast dept.
from the rhymes-with-bombast dept.
The FCC held its hearing on network neutrality and Comcast today at Harvard. One commentator not afraid to predict what will come of it is O'Reilly's Andy Orem, who writes: "The mere announcement of an FCC hearing on 'broadband network management practices' was a notch in the gun of network neutrality advocates. Yet to a large extent, the panelists and speakers were like petitioners who are denied access to the king and can only bring their complaints to the gardeners who decorate the paths outside his gate. What we'll end up getting is a formal endorsement of non-discrimination as a policy that Internet providers must follow, leading to continual FCC review of current practices by telecom and cable companies."
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Technology: Comcast Gets Hard Up At FCC Meeting 163 comments
alphadogg notes a story over at portfolio.com claiming, and presenting evidence, that Comcast paid people off the street to take up room at yesterday's FCC hearing in Massachusetts. Comcast acknowledges that it paid people to hold places in line for its employees. But Save The Internet claims that people were bussed in by Comcast and then took up almost all available seats in the meeting room 90 minutes before the meeting opened, blocking scores of interested people from attending. Such tactics are not unheard of in Washington DC, but how appropriate are they in a regional meeting on a college campus?
[+]
Your Rights Online: FCC Considers Taking Action Against Comcast 181 comments
Presto Vivace writes "According to CNet the Federal Communications Commission is considering taking action against cable operator Comcast modifying peer-to-peer traffic, a subject we've discussed here in the past. 'It looks like Chairman Martin, and by extension the commission, sees Comcast as going beyond simply managing its network. But even if the FCC decides that Comcast has violated Net neutrality principles, it's unclear what the agency can actually do to Comcast. The principles are not agency regulation.'"
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The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Not according to the Telecoms. Apparently we're perfect just as we are, and have no need of your "progress" and infrastructure repairs/replacements.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't need notches in my gun (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Ars brings the Audio (Score:5, Informative)
Comcast sucks (Score:5, Interesting)
1 ) Bell telephone companies.
2) Congress
3) dot-com commerce sites.
4) Internet2
5) "And finally, I'm mad at the public for taking the lazy route and accepting the cheapest form of half-crippled Internet access instead of a high-capacity bidirectional connection that could make us full Internet citizens. Let's not blame the telcos--or at least not stop with them. No one in a position to care has cared enough."
I don't know. I myself can see all those as part of the big problem, of course, but I'd rather just point my finger at guys like this:
Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen: "I don't think we're restraining the customers from using the service in accordance with the way we're selling [sticking] it to them."
Re:Comcast sucks (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Comcast sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
As long as the majority of the American public has access to Youtube and Myspace (and now Facebook), they're largely happy campers, apathetic to every other aspect of the internet, especially the technical ones or the ones that require any amount of thought. It's just like television; as long as there's American Idol and Lost, everybody's happy. Nobody cares about matters of substance like what's being reported on the major news outlets.
Parent
Re:Comcast sucks (Score:5, Funny)
Nobody cares about matters of substance like what's being reported on the major news outlets.
They report on matters of substance on the news channels? When did this start?
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
We should probably note (and point out to the participants in the hearing) that in most of the US, the customers are in no position to care, because they aren't permitted any choic
it's simple (Score:2)
But if they can't cap BitTorrent, they have to cap volume, and I expect that's what's going to happen.
Re:it's simple (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Yes; that's basically what "volume caps" mean: a monthly subscription rate for some base volume, plus the ability to purchase more.
There is no way they can keep up. For example, if everybody could actually run 100Mbps in/out of their homes for $30/month, you'd see mass
Capping volume solves NOTHING. (Score:3, Insightful)
Volume caps are a lie. The sad truth is that Comcast is acting as if they can't actually deliver what they say they can - all the Internet you can ask for. The truth is
Stop misusing "Network Neutrality" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Stop misusing "Network Neutrality" (Score:5, Insightful)
They weren't doing any kind of classic traffic shaping, since that takes much more processing power to do.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
A "Network Neutrality" issue -IS- what this is. (Score:3, Insightful)
In your example, the incentive is MONEY gained by charging content providers extra fees for carriage and then giving their traffic preferential treatment.
However, in the Comcast example, the incentive is MONEY saved by eliminating BitTorrent traffic and then putting off
I disagree (Score:3, Insightful)
What Will Come of the FCC Comcast Hearing (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Not now...but soon enough - try sometime after the Bush administration hears a flushing sound.
Re:I disagree (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, Bush has been a disappointment, but you're kidding yourself if you think his exit will have any measurable effect on policy.
I can think of a few hundred other people (congress and even the people that continue to vote these shills into office) to blame for lack of positive change along with the president, and they're not all related to the administration. In fact, last I looked, the Democrats controlled congress. If they really wanted to, change could have been long since happening.
As long as the money stays in Washington and we have career politicians, things will remain the same.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
What' you got...?
Juliet Sierra (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Or, as in the case of telephones, it can take a century or more. Here in the US, the telephone monopolies were allowed to exclude "foreign" devices until -- when was it, the 1980s or so? When the FCC finally relented and allowed users to attach non-phone-company equipment, there was the huge explosion of new and useful devices. A lot of this development could have happened many decades earlier, but the phone compan
Reasonable explanation... (Score:3, Interesting)
Not perfect, but at least the article gets the core idea mostly right. Usually, it gets totally butchered, you know?
Here's what will happen (Score:2)
2. Such traffic shaping and blocking of torrents have not financially harmed anyone so far. (this is why you geeks should file a complaint with FCC stating a specified amount of money. No need to prove it.).
3. Such behavior by comcast is not prohibited by law. (FCC forgets that there is no law that forces me to smile and call every cop an officer, although i have to do).
4. FCC declines to decide either way (much like the supreme
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Verizon doesn't block BitTorrent, they won't even send you so much a letter for downloading over 1 tb.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
In
My take on this (Score:2)
What Will Come Of The FCC Comcast Hearing? (Score:2, Insightful)
Poll (Score:4, Interesting)
If companies offered a choice would we still care?
Or are we worried that all providers will go the way of #2 and the price of #1 will inflate as supply dwindles?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm curious what the /. community thinks... what if a company such as Comcast were to offer two plans:
If companies offered a choice would we still care?
Or are we worried that all providers will go the way of #2 and the price of #1 will inflate as supply dwindles?
Ummmmm they'd just then increase the rates $5 about every 3 months until the internet as we know it was $45 and the non-neutral internet was $30.
Re: (Score:2)
Part of the problem with network neutrality isn't just that it is not fair. It is that the people who are on the non-neutral internet get a biased view of the world around them. Suppose for a moment that the only news you could see is Fox News. Or if the only online music store you could access was iTunes. That would be a very scary world because people's political and social view
Chill (Score:2)
Even if it is FTTC.
TorrentFreak article (Score:2)
TorrentFreak had a nice blog post [torrentfreak.com] summarizing various expert opinions expressed in the hearings.
I'm so conflicted!!!! (Score:2)
Then add in the issue of their false pa
speaking of which.. (Score:2)
I literally can't load www.google.com in my browser. I also can't load a few other sites, tpb included.
I don't pay for comcast's shit services like their homepage, or their "chill" games useless turd. I certainly don't give a crap about their new mobile portal.
To those of us who want Internet access, we want Internet access.
We want fast, unfiltered, unfettered access to the Internet. That was what I thought I was getting.
Re: (Score:2)
Here are the things I "NEED"
1) food
2) more food
3) mountain dew (occasionally water)
4) a roof to protect my computer from the rain
I passionately hate what these companies are doing and am just as frustrated as the next guy but trivializing real needs by emphasizing wants/desires to need level should be avoided. If you truly need the bandwidth are you willing to pay more for it? Most ISPs set
notch in a gun? (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
What if the electric companies did this? (Score:2)
What if the power companies let customers opt in to a system that would turn off certain devices during peak usage? OMGWTFSANDWICH power companies already do this. In my area
Obvious (Score:2)
Re:Comcast in hot hot heat (Score:5, Interesting)
Look, Comcast is just being pissy because they dont want to put in new lines. End of story. In my area (as with MANY others) cable companies are bought out all the time. Comcast bought Adelphia, who had bought GE Communications probably 5 years before that. Comcast KNOWS that if it puts the money into upgrading its capacity, it will bankrupt, and some new, fancy cable company will come in, but its newly installed lines for pennies on the dollar, and take over. Problem solved for 5 years.
I don't care for Verizon personally, but they're doing the right stuff with this FiOS. They're laying down fresh fiber to eventually replace their old copper lines. The interwebz aren't getting any smaller, so this is the way all ISPs will have to go sooner or later (without some miracle in wireless tech).
Furthermore, I am paying for an unlimited service. Thats what its called and advertised as, unlimited. Well, fucking with my speeds and sending fake reset packets, well, that seems like a limit to me, doesn't it?
I envy you people that CAN bitch about other sucky ISPs, because Comcast is the only one I'll ever be able to bitch about here.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If you utilize any of your Speakeasy services in a manner which consumes excessive bandwidth or affects Speakeasy's core equipment, overall network performance, or other users' services, Speakeasy may require that you cease or alter these activities.
So there is the possibility that they will ask you to throttle your own speed during the day or something. Not likely, I know, but another paragraph gives some hope:
Speakeasy believes in the right of the individual to publish information they feel is important to the world via the Internet. Unlike many ISP's, Speakeasy allows customers to run servers (web, mail, etc.) over their Internet connections, use hubs, and share networks in multiple locations. Any service that causes a disruption in the network integrity of Speakeasy or its vendors, whether directly or indirectly, is strictly prohibited and could result in termination of service. This may include but is not limited to: IRC servers, adult-content servers, bots, webpages hosted on any Speakeasy servers, servers connected to a Speakeasy provided Internet connection, or shared networks. Speakeasy reserves the right to modify or terminate services at our sole discretion.
There is one other restriction:
Speakeasy respects the intellectual property rights granted under the US copyright laws and the interests of subscribers and content providers on the Internet. You may not store material on, or transmit material over, Speakeasy, Inc.'s information systems or servers in any manner that infringes the intellectual property rights of any entity or individual. All notices received by Speakeasy indicating any activity suspected to infringe upon third party intellectual property rights will be re-routed to the primary account holder on file, accompanied by a request to verify and possibly cease and desist. Speakeasy Inc.'s policy of service suspension or termination of members deemed to infringing the intellectual property rights of a third party is in accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") as well as US copyright law.
So no seeding illegal content. But legal content (Vuze, for example) would seem to be acceptable.
Don't think FIOS is some kind of savior (Score:2, Insightful)