FCC To Rule On "Paid Prioritization" Deals By Internet Service Providers 126
An anonymous reader writes "After a record 3.7 million public comments on net neutrality, the FCC is deciding if the company that supplies your internet access should be allowed to make deals with online services to move their content faster. The FCC's chairman Tom Wheeler says financial arrangements between providers and content sites might be OK if the agreement is "commercially reasonable" and companies say publicly how they prioritize traffic. Many disagree, saying this sets up an internet for the highest bidder. "If Comcast and Time Warner – who already have a virtual monopoly on Internet service – have the ability to manage and manipulate Internet speeds and access to benefit their own bottom line, they will be able to filter content and alter the user experience," said Barbara Ann Luttrell, 26, of Atlanta, in a recent submission to the FCC."
We are fucked (Score:5, Insightful)
My guess is we are fucked.
Re:We are fucked (Score:5, Funny)
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Kind of like that silly do-nothing site petition.org , they only want your opinion so they can do demographics for the next elections. It doesn't really mean that your opinion will guide any future policies. This is the Repubmocrat party, they are here to govern us, we are here to enrich their wealth and power. Further, we best not speak too loudly about things that might upset corporate commerce, which is the backbone of political wealth. Remember who is the master and who is the peon.
They will ALWAYS do w
Yep. (Score:5, Interesting)
It won't be a straighforward result; "yes it's ok" or "no, net neutrality must rule." They'll hand us some mumbo jumbo legalese weasel-word bullshit the players involved will have to trouble navigating and the lawyers will rejoice.
Would you like Netflix with your Internet, sir?
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It's not just movies, though Netflix has been the visible player in all of this.
Imagine if Valve and Comcast can't reach an agreement. Whoops, suddenly your Steam library downloads at 10 KB/s. Or that MMO you play, their latest 10 GB download for the next expansion comes down at that speed because you're with Time Warner. Wanna try out a beta for a game? No agreement signed, you'll be ready to play in a week.
This is not just solved by RL rental stores or pirating. Oh, and if this non-neutrality goes through
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If only there were some way to download games offline, at a speed which doesn't particularly matter whether it's fast or not, rather than streaming them.
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Not entirely sure what you mean by downloading offline, whether you mean pirating for offline use or buying at a store.
Yes, let's go back in time twenty years to when brick and mortar stores were all the rage rather than following technological evolution because a few powerhouse ISPs want to have their cake and eat it too.
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The answer is simple isnt it?
Make sure the end user is GUARANTEED the bandwidth they are paying for (no over subscription, no 'up to', etc).
Then I would be happy for 3rd parties to pay the ISP to increase the bandwidth ABOVE that top level, as much
as they like.
That would be a win all round, but of course that is almost exactly the opposite of what they will actually do.
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That's called "dedicated". You can ask for it, but it's ridiculously expensive.
As in, two to three orders of magnitude more expensive, depending on the SLA that you want.
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Why can't we just have a guaranteed total bandwidth rather than a per second guarantee? Have a minimum amount paid to get access, with a bit of bandwidth associated with it, and if you go over that allotted amount you pay by the gigabyte. Simple and easy.
Re:We are fucked (Score:5, Informative)
My guess is we are fucked.
No. Being "fucked" implied some modicum of informed consent.
The proper term is "ass-raped without even the courtesy of a reach-around".
Re:We are fucked (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember when Gilmore said, 'the internet routes around damage'?
Remember when it was commonly accepted that censorship on an open network was virtually impossible?
Remember then?
All that idealism crushed with buyouts and consolidation, money thrown at the problem of uppity citizens using disruptive new technology to assert their pesky rights. And it worked. The Internet is nothing like what I remember twenty years ago. A free thought and open platform for exchange of ideas and technology. Now it's a marketing platform at best, global surveillance mechanism at worst.
My parents generation from the 60s had their idealism crushed too. What with the assassination of a president, a civil rights leader, and that president's brother murdered on the campaign trail while running for President. No wonder in the '70s people turned their backs on civics danced away their troubles.
And if you look back to the Wobblie generation - my great grandparents - at the beginning of the nineteenth century, so too did it happen then as well. Utterly crushed under the boot of money and violence. People danced during the roaring twenties too.
At least not too many 'net idealists have been killed this time 'round. Though it doesn't seem like it's time to dance either. The mood has gotten too ugly to party the bad news off.
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Anal lube will be available at an initial small additional monthly charge, for the first two years, then the price will rise to market rates.
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My guess is we are fucked.
Did you say "fucked"? Definitely, from the wallet to the waist, From the waist to the brain. Net Neutrality died and so has democracy. All roads are toll roads, and the providers have their hand in your pocket. Your thinking and what you can see is falling under more control. Sad sad sad is the day that the internet became toll road.
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Problem is they're pretty much the only channel by which you can get any access to the internet at all - either play their game or do without entirely (don't worry, I'm sure they'll be colluding with phone companies soon enough, if they're not already)
So. (Score:5, Insightful)
Overwhelming response telling our leaders exactly what we wanted through our only feedback system. And it is blatently IGNORED in favor of paid interests. It's not a surprise, considering that the FCC leader is ex-cable, and they are appointees directly from big business. However it obviously shows just how badly this country is broken. I'm not an alarmist, but it this simply isn't going to change with the current US government system. They have no REASON to change it.
Re:So. (Score:5, Insightful)
They are not "your elected representatives". They are "representatives of the elite pre-selected for you to choose from".
There is a huge difference.
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It's actually grimmer than that... (Score:2, Informative)
Write-ins are only allowed for candidates who have already applied, had sufficient votes to qualify as a candidate, but did not have sufficient votes to actually get printed on the ballot.
One of the common fallacies that's been perpetuated is that you can write in any random candidate and if they got enough votes they'd be elected. What would actually happen in such an instance is the votes would be disqualified and best case there would be a second vote with said candidate excluded, but more likely they'd
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3.7 million comments, even if all were rabidly in favor of "net neutrality", is a small fraction of registered voters in the US. Therefore, one can't draw the conclusion that the majority of the voters agree, or disagree, with net neutrality.
For example, many people may be fine with allowing Netflix to partner with their ISP to put Netflix servers in their ISP's datacenters to feed content directly onto the ISP's network - esp. if that would save money for everyone and increase service quality at the same t
Re:So. (Score:5, Informative)
Netflix will already put a caching server on an ISP's network.
They've been doing this for a long time.
This is about cable and telco ISPs extorting popular content providers to pay for bandwidth that the ISP's customers have already paid for.
What?
Me as a customer would like to use my monthly bandwidth quota to access Netflix?
Sorry, that's extra even though I already paid my ISP's monthly fee.
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Allowing caching servers on an ISP networks is NOT "net neutrality" (for example, Uncqual Streaming Svcs Inc is unlikely to be offered that because I offer, well, a byte a month to my zero subscribers). The point is,"every packet is identical" and "no packet is treated differently" and "no deals between ISPs and providers" -- all benchmarks of "net neutrality" zealots, PREVENT such deals which save EVERYBODY money and result in a much more efficient delivery system.
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This is about cable and telco ISPs extorting popular content providers to pay for bandwidth that the ISP's customers have already paid for.
No, that's where you're wrong. What they're doing is setting up a direct peering circuit to that provider, so that the traffic doesn't have to route out their existing internet edge points. Most of the time each company pays for their half of the direct connection, and everyone wins: it takes bandwidth off the regular internet edge points, reduces extra hops between networks, usually gets better latency, and is cheaper. The problem is when someone like Comcast uses their position to force a company like Net
Re:So. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So. (Score:5, Informative)
Especially if you compare it to the number of comments the FCC gets on other issues. I'd wager that most FCC comment periods net a few thousand comments at most. 3.7 million is a huge outlier.
Just to double-check, I looked at fcc.com/comments.
"Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet" (i.e. Network Neutrality) has 283,467 comments. (This doesn't count e-mailed comments.)
For contrast, "In the Matter of Connect America Fund A National Broadband Plan for Our Future High-Cost Universal Service Support" has 165 submitted comments.
This means that the Network Neutrality comment area received 1,717% more comments than the more normal "fund a national broadband plan" comment area.
No, 3.7 million might not be big compared to the entire voting public, but it's big compared to the usual FCC commenting group.
Re:So. (Score:4, Insightful)
But 3.7 million is big compared with the entire voting public. On average, only about 100 million U.S. residents actually vote in any given Presidential election, and even fewer in midterm elections.
There's a rule in politics that for every one person who complains about something, ten people dislike it, but didn't complain. So if 3.7 million people cared enough to complain about the lack of net neutrality, over 40 million people know enough to be strongly in favor of net neutrality. And most of those folks are likely to vote in the next election.
To put that into context, it is quite possible that net neutrality matters to 2.5 times as many likely voters as abortion.
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283,467 is 171,798% of 165.
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"Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet" (i.e. Network Neutrality) has 283,467 comments.
And here's the reason [youtube.com] for that.
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No, it is NOT necessarily representative. Those who feel strongly about an issue are more likely to comment. If 95% of the people believe in X, but it's not their primary goal in life (more worried about their kids, jobs, families), they won't even be aware of the offer to comment, let alone comment. So, the fact that 5% comment for ~X is NOT even remotely representative. It is a self-selecting sample and is, basically, completely irrelevant. In a (representative) democracy, we each get a vote and the fact
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And no, net neutrality would not forbid colocating servers, and prioritizing speed of everything based on protocol is idiotic, anti-innovation, would likely have more
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> In the next Presidential election, vote for the a candidate who will push for net neutrality if that's important to you.
The current president did say he was going to change a lot of stuff but changed his tune after he got in office.
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Well to be factually accurate Uncle Tom Obama the Choom Gang Coward, did not change his tune at all, it's just that his and his administration tune did not in any way shape or form match that tune. Admittedly Obama is not on his own in this as he only signs off on the voting of the senate and the congress. So the president is more of a look at the other hand magic thing to distract people's attention whilst the actual decisions are being made in the congress and senate. Remember this, the congress and sena
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If enough people agree with you, they will vote for the Green Party candidate, the Socialist Party candidate, or the Libertarian Party candidate. However, it seems they don't. (I, personally, haven't voted for a "major party" candidate for President for decades and I've voted in every Presidential election since I was 18).
Rinse and repeat for your Senate and House candidate(s).
Re:So. (Score:4, Informative)
We did "vote for the a candidate who will push for net neutrality". Pre-election, Obama was for neutrality. The following quote says it has not changed, at least as of August 5, 2014.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/... [washingtonpost.com]
So, we did what you said. 3.7 million out of 211 million is not a significant gauge of public opinion, but it shouldn't matter, because we voted for the right guy.
Are you going to change your statement to emphasize the word "push", as if they have to actively work on the issue? And then further clarify a chain of command where people have to listen to the President's opinion? Your logic checks out, but facts are lacking.
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Did you vote for the right guy? Maybe not. But, that's on YOU. Remember, Obama was re-elected after it was clear that "hope and change" was just that - "unfulfilled hope for change". Representative democracy is messy and inefficient. The alternative, based on various experiments over the past couple hundred years, is worse.
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It is a no brainier that the internet must remain neutral. Just as a highway is neutral to whomever wants to use it.
Should we vote out the incumbents? (Score:5, Interesting)
Overwhelming response telling our leaders exactly what we wanted through our only feedback system. And it is blatently IGNORED in favor of paid interests. It's not a surprise, considering that the FCC leader is ex-cable, and they are appointees directly from big business. However it obviously shows just how badly this country is broken. I'm not an alarmist, but it this simply isn't going to change with the current US government system. They have no REASON to change it.
Would you consider voting out the incumbents?
It's the only voting strategy that can make a difference, the only one that matters.
When congressmen realize that they can be voted out after a single term, we'll have pro-public policies.
And the best part is it's completely anonymous! No registration, no donations, no E-mail lists, no paper trail. Just resolve that "if this doesn't go in favor of the people, I'm voting against the incumbents".
Join the boot party - give 'em the boot!
(P.S. - Pass this along)
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once the issues are clear and a position is taken and the movement gathers steam, then a campaign of obfuuscation will be created to muddle the minds of a lot of weaker minded voters.
How can this be guarded against?
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Well, it's better than nothing. But as someone else also pointed out above we're basically given the option to chose between two candidates preselected by the large business interests that have their fingers deep in the party caucusses. So, you get your choice of pro-incumbent-business-tycoon candidate A, and pro-incumbent-business-tycoon B. Sure, they both know they may lose the next election if they piss off their constituency too badly, but they also know they won't even get on the ballot if they piss
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Don't blame me, I voted for for Kodos.
IMO, neither party cares about public opinion on net neutrality and if you want your voting day activity to matter show up and vote for none of the above by spoiling your ballet. If you can get even 20-30% of the vote to show up as spoiled ballets then politicians selfish interests require them to take notice and try harder again to care what the public thinks in order to gain those extra votes to increase their power base.
Too many issues (Score:2)
We, the electorate, have a laundry list of issues that are important to us. While the wealthy care about just one thing: their pocket books. It's easy to divide and conqueror us.
Re:So. (Score:4, Insightful)
However it obviously shows just how badly this country is broken. I'm not an alarmist, but it this simply isn't going to change with the current US government system. They have no REASON to change it.
The thing that's really broken is that we have government involved in this at all. Why, exactly, should only one cable company have been allowed to run wires to the houses in my area? Why shouldn't two or three of them have been allowed to do it? Why did the government mandate that there will be monopolies in cable, telephone, etc? That's ultimately the real problem: government took away my choice, so I can't vote with my wallet now. Now I have to plead to unelected FCC bureaucrats in DC to force my local monopoly provider not to throttle my service, when I could have simply voted with my wallet like I do with everything else.
It's probably too late to get to get the cable mess fixed now, but hopefully this can at least be a good cautionary tale moving forward: never, EVER let the government mandate monopolies in anything, whether it be public schools, post office letter delivery, utilities, media companies, mass transit bus service, healthcare, etc. It NEVER turns out better for the consumer, and you end up having to grovel to government employees that could not care less about you personally. Every area should be open to any company that wants to participate, and may the best one win.
A recent success story would probably be the opening of space exploration to private companies: what did NASA do in the last 30 years when it had a monopoly? What are private companies already doing in the 5-10 years they've been developing their technology? Look how far SpaceX has come with it's rocket technology. It will shortly have better, safer, more cost effective options than NASA ever did.
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the same reason you don't have three of four water companies all providing competing service to your house - because building out all that redundant infrastructure is horribly, horribly wasteful.
If anything it's an argument in favor of making the infrastructure common-carrier. Let the government manage the hardware, prefferably under the watchful eye of a citizen oversight committee with the authority to severely penalize the management if they're wasteful or corrupt (personally - let them hand out pay cuts
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Overwhelming response telling our leaders exactly what we wanted through our only feedback system. And it is blatently IGNORED
I think we might have used the *wrong* feedback system. We sent our feedback to the FCC when it should have gone directly to our representatives.
They already have paid prioritization (Score:5, Insightful)
to the Chairman's desk. Your opinions have been routed to /dev/null.
Re:They already have paid prioritization (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly this. They donated to campaigns and now the current FCC Chairman is the guy who used to run the head of the cable lobbying group, I'm not expecting a complete ignoring of our complaints - that might stir up too much of a backlash. Instead, they'll put a "fair process" in place to allow for this. The "fair process" will be designed to shut up Network Neutrality proponents while still letting the ISPs do whatever they want (so long as they hide it behind the smoke and mirrors for a bit).
Nothing New here (Score:5, Interesting)
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Not really telling us anything we didn't already know though, is it? They've been saying this for months.
Naturally. They're waiting for some crisis that has all the news in a foaming slather, so they can quietly drop it into a Friday night Take out the Trash Day [imdb.com] and hope the news organizations will ignore it.
Like, say, a shooting war between the US and Russia.
"You don't like our Internet . . . ?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Normally, when non-US folks whine, moan, bitch and complain about the US role in managing the Internet, the US folks answer: "You don't like our Internet? Build your own then!"
Well, I guess this retort applies to the US folks now. If you don't like your FCC Comcast Time Warner Paid Prioritization Internet . . . "Build your own then!"
I would suggest we start small, with a store and forward network, named after someone's dog.
My dog is named "Fido".
Re: "You don't like our Internet . . . ?" (Score:5, Insightful)
We did build our own-- or at least, we did pay these companies hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds to build it for us. I suppose we could build another one, and if we did, there's no reason to think that corrupt government officials won't just take it from us and hand it over to rich people.
I don't think we need to build our own internet. I think we need to build our own government, and outlaw bribery. Our current one has been taken from us, and has no interest in serving the common good.
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Without bribery, how do politicians know which constituents to support? The ones who can take off work to travel to DC for a personal meeting? The ones who can afford to donate to a political campaign to support the person they think is most qualified? Or do you get an "I voted for..." placard that gives you the right to a 5-minute audience?
Which bribery are you referring to? And after it is outlawed, how have you prevented anyone from spend
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Why should you even need a "I voted for" placard? A representative's job is to represent the best interests of ALL their constituents, not just the ones who voted for them.
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More people need to understand this.
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Yes, you're right. Let's just throw up our hands and accept things as they are. Hell, let's help it along. Why not change the laws specifically so that we don't have elections anymore, but we just allow people to bid on legislation at auction. Highest bidder wins. And then let's make the official rule that you don't even need to win the bid, you just need to bribe the auctioneer. Because fuck it, the having auctions sounds too close to being a just system, and might actually raise money for the govern
Re:"You don't like our Internet . . . ?" (Score:4, Informative)
In many cases, the ISP networks were built using taxpayer money. Sometimes, this money was given with the promise that everyone in the area would get high speed wired broadband. Then, in many cases, the promises were broken and nobody took the ISPs to task. (See Verizon and New Jersey.)
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Normally I'd take this stance. However, these companies received billions in state subsidies paid for by US citizens to build their infrastructure. The people own it. If the government wants to alter the agreement we should dismantle and jail the government leaders as traitors.
Re: Devil's advocate here... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Devil's advocate here... (Score:2, Interesting)
Are you really this dense or just playing the part ?
For most, we're lucky to have a single provider at all. I have Comcast because my only other choice ( no a 10gb capped satellite is not a choice ) is a Verizon DSL line which, last time I tried them, my download speed topped out at a blistering 45k. K as in KILO. I had better speed via dialup circa 1996 :/
They don't take care of the copper plant any longer, so that's the service you get :/ Don't like it ? Too bad, give Comcast a ring, maybe they care.
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Sometimes I like to think about what sort of country we could be if we didn't spend quite so much on our war toys :/
Not sure, but you'd be speaking either German or Russian.
And this assumes you're white, straight and a LOYAL PARTY MEMBER.
Otherwise, you're probably dead or chopping rocks in Siberia.
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What makes you think that? Is the USA military so inefficient that it can't deter attacks without spending several times more than its rivals? For example, the USA spends more than 7 times more on its military than Russia. Also, just before the second world war American military spending was only 0.8% of its GDP [wikipedia.org], showing that military spending can safely stay low in peace-time and still be rapidly ramped up if a major war appears. For comparison, it is currently about 3-4%.
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What makes you think that? Is the USA military so inefficient that it can't deter attacks without spending several times more than its rivals?
I can answer that for you. But I don't think you'll like that.
Basically, all that spending on "toys" provides a technological advantage.
This means that we can accomplish, through superior technology, things that USED to cost (large numbers of) human lives. And the correlation is QUITE direct.
In general, the US public *HATES* going to or being at war. Now throw a million casualties at it.
There's also the fact that other countries ARE spending to further their military technology. And WWII demonstrated th
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In my area, I have wired broadband access through Time Warner Cable. (Likely soon to be Comcast.) Let's run through some of your "competitors."
T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon Wireless: Wireless broadband is far too expensive for normal home use. It's only reasonable for "I'm on the go and need to check my e-mail" use. Try streaming a few dozen Netflix titles on your wireless connection and see what kind of overage fees you generate.
Verizon FIOS: Doesn't reach my area and Verizon has no plans on expanding.
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Re:Devil's advocate here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Its a little more complicated than that. First, these monopolies are piggybacking on infrastructure and right of ways granted by laws in most cases that were intended to remedy a public need as defined by the government. They recieved tax benifits, exclusivity, and the benifit of time before there ever was an ability to deliver internet on that infrastructure. Why it was ever considered separate is a question that muddles the mix.
Next comes the question of consumer protections. If you purchase service with speeds up to 10 meg, no matter how it is spun, you simply are not getting that if they slow your access down in order to make these fast lanes. Along these same lines, there are still benifits in yhe form of tax breaks and grants to expand infrastructure for delivering broadband to underserved areas. Now does the broadband definition still apply if the connection to your work or school VPN is slower because netflix paid for fast access and your neighbor is binging on movies the first four months of his unemployment?
Now do not get me wrong. If they can create a fast lane without slowing any other customer down below the speeds they purchased and it is optional, i do not have a problem with it. It likely will not be that way though.
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Of course, of course. But you know, that $7.99 "throw that other guy's laundry in the trash so you can do yours right now" fee, that's over the top.
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it should be. It could have been, but somehow lobbyists prevented public infrastructure build out because it would interfere with the business model of cable companies.
> A company paid to build your access to the internet
actually the government paid for a lot of it. They cable companies payed a lot in lobbying to prevent a lot of places from constructing public internet service.
> You didn't drop the copper for your a
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If I had power... (Score:1)
If I had power, I would create a system to force or at least standardize a way for larger ISPs to rent server space to content providers which was located near* the consumers. It would speed up and free up a lot of backbone bandwidth if for example the top 10% of Netflix content was available to 50% of the US population.
*Networking definition of near as in few hops.
Pay to slow competitors (Score:5, Insightful)
Plus this would then give comcast incentive to make an ever greater divide between the two speeds and keep slowing down the slow lane. I suspect that the ever shrinking legroom in economy is increasing first/business class ticket sales.
Basically allowing any form of non-network neutrality will only make a few scumbags richer and the rest of us greatly poorer in both money and quality of services.
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I wouldn't be surprised to see Hulu have exclusive "fast lane Internet video" access... given that they are owned by the cable companies who also want to offer fast lane access.
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This begs for something like ubiquitous TOR... (Score:2)
Sure, everyone running TOR on their gateway for all internet traffic would be horribly inefficient. Sure, it would preclude some things, like IP multi-casting and content geo-caching.
But you know what? It would pretty much make net neutrality a de facto standard, irrespective of what the horribly corrupt FCC decides. And you know what else? It would effectively end the NSA's collection of everyone online activity. Oh, and you would get all the privacy benefits for free, forever.
On balance, given the openly
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It's not just gold, you won't be able to use certain services I'll wager (VPN anyone) and I am almost certain there will some sort of "anti piracy" bullshit injected into it.
They want to turn it into TV, that way they have control again.
It took the Internet to show us just how much that Hollywood garbage is worth.
chairman Tom Wheeler (Score:1)
Chairman? Don't you mean corporate shill?
But they publicly annonce it! (Score:2)
transparent murder operations.
"commercially reasonable" (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, this notion of "commercially reasonable" scares me the most. I'm guessing you could cover a lot of very very bad behavior by companies if the regulatory standard is "commercially reasonable".
Remember, this is the FCC head and former cable executive who was appointed by someone who people on the Right call a "Marxist". Tom Wheeler should be shown the door immediately. In fact, he never should have been allowed anywhere near a regulatory agency. Whenever tells me they want people in government who have real-world business experience, I think how that's the last thing we want. Government and regulatory agencies should under no circumstances be run like a business world and experience as a business executive is the last thing we should look for in political leaders. It's like hiring a bank teller based on his experience as a former embezzler. Which reminds me, this is every bit as big a scandal as the recent story of the banking regulators who had the cozy relationship with Goldman Sachs.
If you don't know about the recent Goldman Sachs story, you really ought to take a look:
http://www.vox.com/2014/9/26/6... [vox.com]
Meet Carmen Segarra, whose 46 hours of damning audio tape make her sort of the Edward Snowden of the financial world. And she's every bit as heroic as Snowden. I'm sure the lawbreaking at Goldman could be said to have been "commercially reasonable" too.
Living in an oligarchy sucks balls. Godspeed to any future whistleblowers who decide to make the personal sacrifice to give us these glimpses into the lives of our not-so-benevolent overlords.
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Living in an oligarchy sucks balls.
It does not have to... but such arrangements eventually end up like this regardless.
Godspeed to any future whistleblowers who decide to make the personal sacrifice to give us these glimpses into the lives of our not-so-benevolent overlords.
What good do these glimpses do other than confirm that we are all thoroughly owned? No. There needs to be follow-up action. If you ever wondered how such a brutal group as ISIS/ISIL/Daesh ever found so many supporters or made it so far, it is because of shit like this: What else is there to lose? Everything short of life has been lost already. Of course, Daesh is wrong and wants to implement the same thing they are supposedl
Conversely, should I have to pay more to my ISP... (Score:1)
...because a bunch of my neighbors want to watch Netflix?
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=3355222 [market-ticker.org]
No FCC! (Score:2)
Should the government regulate the internet? (Score:1)
Trvth (Score:1)
I am fine with AT&T and Verizon charging Netflix for priority service...if they must list at the top of their contract with you, "We give you unlimited service for xxx dollars a month, except for when you try to use Netflix. In that case, we have threatened to slow down Netflix to irritate you unless Netflix gives us $2 of the $8 a month you give them."
Truth in advertising. Let's see how long these fraudulent extortionists last in their plan when their business model is dragged out in front of the fac
Re: (Score:3)
Well said. Not only does an ad-blocker protect you from having your attention diverted and your feelings manipulated to bias your future decisions, it also closes the largest channel for distribution of viruses and other exploits, improves your privacy and speeds up page load times. The only argument against is that it may reduce the income of the web-site operators. But in this case the grandparent wans that to happen by his own word! So it's win-win, really.
In fact, by continuing to use the site while usi
Re: (Score:1)
Yeah this basically is just a double charging scam.