Net Neutrality

[SacredWarrior]

Man, my computer is slow enough already. Best of luck, Americans!

You should probably clean it out? XD You're not American? O_O

 

[Greenie]

Ok, so, thanks to Vardoger's post, I've finally managed to wrap my head around what this is about. Man, my computer is slow enough already. Best of luck, Americans!

Same

Thanks for the easy explanation, @Vardoger

 

[IntrusivePenDesperateSword]

You should probably clean it out? XD You're not American? O_O

Though I try...

Nope! This guy's a european eurobean.

 

[Trial by Fire]

Well, I've always wanted to be a rebel.

On a more serious note, I'm concerned how often Net Neutrality has been mentioned in recent years. Losing Net Neutrality will not be beneficial to any party aside from those looking to gain more money (Verizon, Comcast, AT&T, etc). This should literally not be a partisan issue. I'm confused how any Republican can back this when it'll endanger small businesses. The same is true for Democrats who have frequently sought equality for all.

Now, will we lose Net Neutrality?

Honestly, my stomach sinks at the possibility that we will. On the bright side, I don't think that these companies know who they are dealing with. The Internet has shown to be a particularly powerful force when it wants and/or needs something. If we can find Shia LaBeouf's protest flag six or seven times around the world, then I have no reason to doubt that the Internet will put up a fight.

 

[Hatsune Candy]

I was genuinely shocked to find out that there are actually people out there in favor of abolishing net neutrality. I very much doubt that they even understand how important net neutrality is and what effect its removal would have on the entirety of the Internet. Most of them seem to view it as just another case of government overreach, which is ridiculous. And it's also kinda absurd just how trusting these people are of large corporations when they have shown time and time again that they cannot even be trusted with the power they have now, let alone the power that will be available to them should net neutrality ever go away.

 

[ᴛᴏᴄᴋᴀ]

A few more useful links.

Comcastroturf

This will allow you to check if there have been any comments posted under your name. It's not completely effective since people do share names, but it doesn't hurt to look.

Comcast wants to control what you do online. Do you want to let them?

This will help you email MOC and call them, along with other useful links to make comments.

 

[IntrusivePenDesperateSword]

So... Wasn't the vote today? How'd it go, Americans?

 

[ᴛᴏᴄᴋᴀ]

So... Wasn't the vote today? How'd it go, Americans?

The actual vote isn't until December 14th I believe. The head of the FCC is laying out what they'll be voting for. Still have to wait to see if we're screwed or not.

 

[SacredWarrior]

Most of them seem to view it as just another case of government overreach, which is ridiculous. And it's also kinda absurd just how trusting these people are of large corporations when they have shown time and time again that they cannot even be trusted with the power they have now, let alone the power that will be available to them should net neutrality ever go away.

Anyone who knows me knows that I despise big government and love capitalism, personal rights, and shit but only when it's done right. Without net neutrality, crony capitalism will happen which is complete trash and NOT real capitalism. If these companies want to get rid of competition and become monopolies (which is why they hate net neutrality), then they should do it fair and square. Competition makes companies improve and apparently the corporations have their heads too far up their asses and think they don't need to improve.

 

[Shiri]

Competition makes companies improve and apparently the corporations have their heads too far up their asses and think they don't need to improve.

The AT&T-TIme Warner merger is pretty damn horrifying if that goes through. Pops up the same week as the Net Neutrality fiasco, hm...imagine that.

 

[Shiri]

Talked more people into signing support for Net Neutrality. Every little bit counts.

 

[Shiri]

I can't speak for every small town, but mine is low income and we get high speed internet. I think we might have to pay more than big cities, but that's an entirely different issue.

 

[SacredWarrior]

It's only fair that we properly hear what the other side thinks instead of shutting them down.

Plus a good point has been raised by the other side as well.

If the ISPs tried that blocking and throttling shit now, they would be facing lawsuits up the ass from all of those sites and there's no way that they would be able to survive. Google alone could probably sue the pants off of all the big ISPs. Plus with the way the internet is nowadays, the ISPs would also be facing hell from their consumers.

That's what I've been hearing from the opposition anyways.

 

[Vars]

If the ISPs tried that blocking and throttling shit now, they would be facing lawsuits up the ass from all of those sites and there's no way that they would be able to survive.

They've throttled shit before and they've been sued before, doesn't seem to have stopped them and it doesn't seem like they're having any trouble making a profit.

Google alone could probably sue the pants off of all the big ISPs.

The same Google that had to stop their Google Fiber ISP project because they couldn't deal with all the bureaucracy the other ISPs put into place to stifle any competition? [Also see the links in my first post here about TN's Gigcity and the challenges they had to put up with?]

Plus with the way the internet is nowadays, the ISPs would also be facing hell from their consumers.

The ISPs are ALREADY facing hell from their consumers. The problem is THERE IS NO COMPETITION!!!!
SO IT DOESN'T MATTER HOW MUCH COMCAST (OR ANY OTHER ISP) FUCKS SHIT UP AND PEOPLE HATE THEM
BECAUSE THEY CAN'T GET INTERNET OUTSIDE OF COMCAST
AND THE ISPS SET IT UP THAT WAY PURPOSEFULLY
AND EVERYONE KNOWS YOU'RE FUCKED
AND EVERYONE KNOWS YOU CAN'T SURVIVE WITHOUT INTERNET THESE DAYS
SO THE ISPS DON'T HAVE TO PLAY NICE WITH YOU
BECAUSE THEY KNOW YOU CAN'T LEAVE

That's what I've been hearing from the opposition anyways.

Yeah well the opposition is looking for ways to fuck you over, repeatedly, all the time.
We still have large sections of the USA without broadband internet access (there are still places that only have 56k or only satellite). Is it really hard to argue that at this time, internet is necessary? How many places will even let you hand in a paper job application these days? How many things are there that you have to do that you pretty much have to do online?
The internet should be a public utility.
.
.
.

Unless you live in a city, it's very likely you only have one ISP to choose from. And this isn't viewed as a monopoly because Satellite internet and non-broadband internet are viewed as fair alternatives to broadband. And they... Are not. So you get in these situations where it's either comcast or "lol fuck you" so you go with comcast because you have to, and you get ripped off.

For instance, when I was in Hawaii, I had, I think 2 or 5Mbps internet. Which is a little slow, but enough for my needs. I could stream games online with it with few problems, as an example. And it was only $20/mo. Awesome! I loved it. It was with Time Warner. When Spectrum took over, they killed all the slower plans. their slowest plan is something like 60mbps now. You can't go lower. So there's a lot of people who are priced out. They don't need that speed (not even touching the fact that they probably won't even get that speed half the time), but now they have to pay for it because there's nothing else.

I live in Upstate NY now. There is one ISP. They want $80/mo for some shitty internet. They laughed when I said I can't buy. Because they knew they were the only ones to buy from. Fucking nobody serves here. I have Satellite internet now. I have a 20GB bandwidth cap. Your phone's data plan probably has more than my internet connection does. Even if my bandwidth weren't so low, I can't watch videos, play online games, or do VoIP or video calls, because the latency is too high. I usually get a blank screen/no audio. Or if I do get anything, it's super garbled, assuming it even connects at all. And all this is totally ignoring the fact that I just don't have any internet at all if there's too many clouds in the sky at that particular hour.

And I pay $66/mo for this.

Edited to add:
To hammer home why Satellite is unacceptable as a good alternative to broadband internet (aside from speed and inconvenience), do you know that any job that requires internet requires a stable internet connection that conveniently only includes broadband/cable? Satellite doesn't count.
Ever got told to do a video interview for a job over skype? Can't do it over Satellite!
There are plenty of medical things you can do over what amounts to webcam. And LOL I can't do that, because I have fucking Satellite internet.
So now they(The VA Hospital) pay me for gas and car wear when I have to drive 30+ miles to see my [specialist] doctor.
Wow, wouldn't that suck if I couldn't drive??

My situation is NOT unique.

EDIT2:
I mean, I wouldn't be so gung-ho about net neutrality if we realistically had options. But we don't. We're stuck with whatever ISP decided to go with wherever we live, and if they have no competition then they get to do whatever they want and you don't have any alternatives.
If ISPs actually had competition, if we actually had choices, then I could dump the ISP who doesn't like net neutrality and sign up for the one that treats all internet traffic the same.
But I can't do that, because there's ONE (maybe 2 if you're lucky) ISP in the area so "lol fuck you" if I don't like how they serve me internet.

so tl;dr
I can't vote with my money against a company I don't like if I HAVE to use said company because there is no competition

 

[SacredWarrior]

The problem is THERE IS NO COMPETITION!!!!

Net neutrality won't fix that. Stop shitty practices yes but it's not gonna stop monopolization. I'm from Memphis, TN (where there are multiple ISPs as expected) and I've been living in Brighton for the past three years. The only internet I can get here is AT&T which I'm currently using now. I don't like it anymore than you do trust me. I'm just playing Devil's Advocate here.

Remember this isn't 2005. The internet (and the internet companies) are far bigger than they once were. Like someone stated before, when the internet wants something, a lot of noise can and will be made and there will be hell to pay. Times have changed and the internet along with it.

If Google, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft (the Big Four as of right now) all banded together against the ISPs and stood up to them, do you REALLY think the ISPs would win? Let's not forget other companies like Netflix that might join the party. That alone would mean suicide for the ISPs especially since they're struggling to keep up with the times which is why they're throttling and blocking as is.

 

[Vars]

If Google, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft (the Big Four as of right now) all banded together against the ISPs and stood up to them, do you REALLY think the ISPs would win? Let's not forget other companies like Netflix that might join the party.

Netflix and Google already went against ISPs and they lost. (<-- that article is pretty neutral also, so I guess it's debatable but I think everyone knows by now how biased I am on this issue)

Do I think the ISPs would win? I don't know. A lawsuit? Probably not. But there's nobody to replace them. So they would still have customers and would likely not go out of business (my big [paranoid?] fear is they'll be "too big to fail" ) Until codes/statutes are rewritten so they're more competition-friendly, even if everyone decided tomorrow to drop their ISP, there would be no underdog that would be able to come in and make use of the frustrated consumers ready for a new ISP.

That's why (well, part of the reason) Internet should be a public utility.

Everyone concentrates on how the consumer is affected by anti-Net Neutrality practices. And it's good to concentrate on that, because it's easier to understand. But because there's no competition, the real losers are companies like Google and Netflix. Because, in order to be treated well by an ISP with a competing service, they will have to pay that ISP (and in fact Netflix already did this with Comcast).

Netflix et al can't survive without customers, and those customers need internet to use their service. If the only way those customers can get internet is through an ISP that doesn't like Netflix (for example, Comcast since they want to push Hulu), then Netflix needs to pay some extortion money to stay alive.

So, this ends up hurting everyone because the outcomes are basically:

- Pay extra for this package which contains Netflix at a throttled speed because we don't like hearing you complain but also don't want you using Netflix
- Pay extra for this package with Netflix that's not throttled + your netflix subscription price is higher because you need to help Netflix pay the ISPs for the priviledge of being connected to them
- Fuck you and fuck Netflix, lol, all our packages only allow you to play Hulu at reasonable speeds.

I mean, yeah sure there's probably a few ISPs who won't extort services like Netflix for money. But let's be real here, the big 4 ISPs totally will, and have demonstratively done so already before Net Neutrality went into effect.

 

[SacredWarrior]

That's why (well, part of the reason) Internet should be a public utility.

Agreed but I'm pretty sure we can all agree that the government shouldn't get too close to the internet.

Until codes/statutes are rewritten so they're more competition-friendly, even if everyone decided tomorrow to drop their ISP, there would be no underdog that would be able to come in and make use of the frustrated consumers ready for a new ISP.

How do you propose that happens? The U.S. government, the FCC, and the FTC are sleeping with the corporations instead of breaking up with them and keeping them at a reasonable distance. Crony capitalism at its finest.

But because there's no competition, the real losers are companies like Google and Netflix. Because, in order to be treated well by an ISP with a competing service, they will have to pay that ISP (and in fact Netflix already did this with Comcast).

That's extortion which is technically illegal but obviously the ISPs can bribe the government and get away with anything.

 

[Vars]

How do you propose that happens? The U.S. government, the FCC, and the FTC are sleeping with the corporations instead of breaking up with them and keeping them at a reasonable distance. Crony capitalism at its finest.

Well when Obama was in office it really looked like we were moving in that direction for a while and the FCC was really consumer-friendly.
Now? I have no idea. Kind of just trying to hold on to the meteor and hope I don't burn away during the ride.

I guess my hope is that Trump invigorates a lot of people to vote for a much better leader in 2020. I know that the presidential election already inspired a lot of young people to get into politics, there's a lot of new faces running in local elections now due to the upset.

I'm not totally educated on this issue, I don't have all the facts, but I think that you really don't need the FCC to at least foster competition in ISPs. What could happen is a lot more municipalities just form their own ISPs to get around the issue (Much like Chattanooga). There was some google fiber article I linked in a past post that mentioned getting municipalities to accept some "touch and go" installation of new fiber for new ISPs, so they could vote on this and that'd help foster competition, at least. But iirc that article also said the big ISPs fought back really hard. So who knows.

Agreed but I'm pretty sure we can all agree that the government shouldn't get too close to the internet.

Not sure what you mean by this. Government manages to deal with other things well enough. But maybe I'm just being optimistic.
I feel like federally, we generally do okay, and do things in the public interest. It's the local governments that really drop the ball on things.
At least, this is how it has appeared to me.

My personal takeaway is:
get involved in your local elections. state senate, congress, etc. We have a lot of power here. So many people don't vote in local elections that the right people aren't going to DC to represent us.
February 2018 is the next election.
Google "february 2018 election [your state]"