Senate Set To Vote On the Repeal of Net Neutrality 345
An anonymous reader writes "The United States Senate will vote sometime today on the bill that would repeal the net neutrality laws that the FCC has put into place. The bill passed the US House back in April, so it only has to be approved by the Senate before it is sent to the President's desk. President Obama says that he will veto the bill. The debate over net neutrality has largely been split on party lines, with the Democratic party mostly being for keeping net neutrality laws in place, and the GOP looking to avoid them."
Slight problem in summary (Score:5, Informative)
The debate over net neutrality has largely been split on party lines, with the Democratic party mostly being for keeping net neutrality laws in place, and the GOP looking to avoid them.
They aren't laws right now, they're regulations. In a conflict between laws and regulations, laws win.
Re:Another Kink (Score:2, Informative)
Which way? For or against Net Neutrality?
Pro NN: Netflix and Google Win.
Anti NN: AT&T and Comcast Win.
Pro NN: The End User will end up paying more for service.
Anti NN: The End User will not have fare access to other services
Pro NN: You cannot offer a service with a connection that included internet as a secondary option... Lets say I am a Small provider and I am offering TCP/IP Streaming of services to customers using my infrastructure, my Infrastructure allows up to 1000mbs transfer and my internal network can handle it. But my Internet connection to the outside is more limited say peaking at 10mbs per customer (we need to keep the users balanced) Now I am breaking NN laws because I am offering my service faster to customers and internet access as a secondary service is slower.
Anti NN: ISP can decide who they want to slow down or block just because they are in competition with them. So lets block Vonage or Skype because it Interfears with their Telephone business. Or netflix or hulu.
Now without Net Neutrality a lot of companies wouldn't go too far to block too much just because it will piss off the customers and they switch. Only Comcast hates it customers so much to do this. For other companies they may be doing this for good reasons such as blocking or slowing down traffic to some sites that isn't evil or greedy.
Re:Please repeal! (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Another Kink (Score:5, Informative)
But that's what i wonder : why is there no competition ? You would think that, if a company screws it's customers for long enough, someone would see a the market opportunity to do things differently. Why is this not the case ?
Clearly no one explained natural monopolies to you. Here's how it goes: in certain markets, barriers to entry are so high that one of two things happen. One, people just don't bother entering it. Two, if they do enter it, the start-up costs are so high that they pretty much have to take out loans to enter it, which adds significantly to the initial running cost. During that time, the incumbent simply drops prices to their operating cost - or lower, depending on their cash reserves - waits until the competitor runs out of cash due to their inability to attract enough new customers, and then gobbles up the competitor for pennies on the dollar.
Which is exactly what is happening in the telcom industry. Even Google can't do a nationwide roll-out without bankrupting itself. ATT and Comcast, on the other hand, are operating on pure profit by now. So there's no incentive for anyone to enter the market, because the chances of even surviving long enough to make a profit are slim to none. The only reason Google is even marginally in it is because they understand the existential threat that the telecoms pose to it. Google only exists for as long as the telecoms, for whatever reason, cannot discriminate between their service and Google's service. As soon as they can, it's game over for Google.
Now it comes down to surrendering your Internet connection to either a large corporation ( no net neutrality ) , or to the government ( net neutrality ).
You really ought to not take your talking points from organizations that are actively lying to you. Net Neutrality explicitly means that no one, not even the government, has control over what services you can and cannot access through your Internet connection. The government regulating ISPs is not the same as the government telling you what you can do with your connection. It can be, but it doesn't have to be.
Bill number? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Another Kink (Score:5, Informative)
Not that far fetched. In Canada some years ago during a strike Telus (second largest telco in Canada) blocked the employee’s union's website. Telcos can never be trusted not to censor things they don't like.
Re:Another Kink (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sure that your arguments make perfect sense within some definition of network neutrality. If you could, please reply to this stating what you think network neutrality means because I would like to know how you came to your conclusions. Unfortunately, the term keeps getting hijacked by companies with a political agenda. Network neutrality is supposed to mean that ISPs cannot modify or shape internet traffic. And based on that simple rule, your conclusions are not correct. Let me explain:
Pro NN: Netflix and Google Win.
Anti NN: AT&T and Comcast Win.
No one "wins" if NN is repealed. Currently, we have NN and everyone is doing just fine. If we lose NN, AT&T and Comcast can cheat by blocking a site then charging an extra fees to get it back. This is how they plan to make money off of it, without having to upgrade their infrastructure. I think calling that "winning" is a bad idea, since nothing good comes out of it.
Pro NN: The End User will end up paying more for service.
Anti NN: The End User will not have fair access to other services
This is really the same issue as the first point. If we retain NN, the end user pays exactly what they are paying now. If NN is repealed, it means that ISPs can provide unfair access, then charge a special fee to get fair access back. It means the end user pays more to get the same thing. Or they just get unfair access.
Pro NN: You cannot offer a service with a connection that included internet as a secondary option... I am breaking NN laws because I am offering my service faster to customers and internet access as a secondary service is slower.
Network Neutrality does not state that you cannot offer a service faster to customers and internet access as a slower service. *All* networks are this way. The internet network is always faster than the external network.
Anti NN: ISP can decide who they want to slow down or block just because they are in competition with them. So lets block Vonage or Skype because it Interfears with their Telephone business. Or netflix or hulu.
This a the big ticket, but you only hit the smallest piece of it. Some other examples: ISPs could change advertisements on pages. Imagine a mom and pop advertises their local toy shop, but WalMart pays an ISP to remove those ads and replace them with ads for WalMart. Or an ISP alters pages that are critical critical about the ISP. Or perhaps they redirect websites that are critical of their political agenda to sites that are in favor of their view. Or even if they don't go this far, they could slow down sites that they don't like.
Based on your statements, I think that you believe Network Neutrality places rules on how fast internet is, and how much ISPs can charge for it. I've heard that version of it a lot on various anti-network-neutrality sites. I can assure that that it does not mean that, except to those lobbyists who are trying to redefine the term to make it sound bad. The politicians have made it look like a debate between two approaches, when it isn't a debate, it is simply hijacking a common sense rule.
Re:Please repeal! (Score:5, Informative)
You're seriously citing a Free Republic post and an American Spectator article called "EPA Jackboots" as sources? Rush Limbaugh is more reliable.
Oh, and that lovely conservative lie about Mr. Pozsgai is bunk. Here's the truth of what happened.
Mr. Pozsgai wanted to build a 12000 sq ft garage on some land near his business. He hired an engineer to survey the site. That engineer warned him that the site met the government's definition of wetlands, and he would need a permit before filling the land. He hired another engineer for a second opinion, and then a third. Each told him the same thing. Note that he had not yet bought the land. He could have just accepted the law at this point, and only been out the cost of the surveys.
Instead he purchased the site, negotiating a 20% discount because he wouldn't be able to build there. He then immediately began an illegal filling operation. The Army Corps of Engineers came out and warned him to stop, in writing and in person. He claimed that the site was already like that, and he had been fixing it. However, the Corps came out again the next month, and found even more landfill than before. They warned him to stop it, and gave him a cease and desist letter. They came out again the next month, and the month after that, each time finding more landfill and each time telling Mr. Pozsgai to cut it out. This went on for over a year, from April of 1987 to May of 1988.
In May of '88, witnesses living next door reported hundreds of dump trucks showing up to pour more landfill into the wetlands. The Army Corps of Engineers installed a video camera and captured footage of another 25 such dump trucks pooring landfill into the site, completely demolishing Mr. Pozsgai's claim that he was trying to clean up existing dumping. He was brought to trial, where he did not even bother to deny the dumping anymore. Instead, he claimed that since the phrase "wetlands" isn't explicitly mentioned in the Clean Water Act, wetlands must not count as water! This defense was understandably rejected, and he was sentenced to 3 years in a minimum security prison.
Re:Because "chink" means something else (Score:4, Informative)
chink 1 (chngk)
n.
A narrow opening, such as a crack or fissure.
tr.v. chinked, chinkÂing, chinks
1. To make narrow openings in.
2. To fill narrow openings in.
"Chink in the armor" has nothing whatever to do with the Chinese. You would refuse to use the word "spade" because it can also mean a black person, besides a certain type of digging tool?
Ever heard the phrase "call a spade a spade?" That phrasee has nothing to do with black people, just as "chink in the armor" has nothing to do with Chinese people.
Re:Another Kink (Score:5, Informative)
A *liberal* concept? Hast thou forgotten which President *created* the TSA and the DHS?
It just failed by 52-46 (Score:2, Informative)
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/senate-votes-down-anti-net-neutrality-resolution.ars?comments=1#comments-bar [arstechnica.com]
Re:Please repeal! (Score:4, Informative)
If I may contribute to your post, here's a link to the Third Circuit United States Court of Appeals ruling [justia.com] which explains Mr. Pozsgai's behavior in detail.
There are a few more details from the case I'd like to point out. Mr. Pozsgai himself stated in that the police came to his property in August 1987 and showed him the EPA order to cease and desist dumping landfill on the property. In December 1987 the EPA sent Mr. Pozsgai an umpteenth letter which, aside from yet again informing him his activities were illegal, also informed him that he could remedy the situation and get permission to proceed with his landfill if he merely obtained a Water Quality Certification from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Resources.
But my favorite part is how on August 26 1988 a Court issued a temporary restraining order explicitly ordering him to cease. And how Mr. Pozsgai flagrantly defied that court order two days later, when he was videoed dumping 25 additional truckloads on the property and personally driving a bulldozer leveling the fill.
But of course only a wildly biased treehugger commie liberal would pay any attention to "facts" from the court record. A true conservative will go by the FreeRepublic account. [freerepublic.com]
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