FCC plan would give Internet providers power to decide how you use your internet

[Vas Deferens]

(12-01-2017, 06:22 PM)bfine32 Wrote: The conservative in me asks: Why should government be allowed to regulate private companies simply for consumer's enjoyment? I'm a free-market guy and there was talk of how this may push satellite Communications in the future. That would be the route I would love to see.

Unfortunately our tax dollars have been prepaid to these corporations for fiber infrastructure that has not been provided to date. If these corporations were truly operating on within the free market, why do they need to lobby for tax dollars for infrastructure or to keep municipalities from creating their own networks? Shouldn't they be so much better than other alternatives that any competition is seen as lesser than?

Who owns the actual infrastructure our data travels across?

Somewhat related, I would suggest anyone here interested in this sort of thing check out one of the best biz docs I've ever seen. Just recently uploaded to YouTube. 'Long distance warrior'. It's the story of MCI's struggle to go up against ma bell.

https://youtu.be/qf2ox6imjzE

Can't embed on my phone unfort.

[*PhilHos*]

(11-22-2017, 12:26 PM)GMDino Wrote: This one has been floating around since 2014.

http://theoatmeal.com/blog/net_neutrality

"Net Neutrality" is Obamacare for the Internet; the Internet should not operate at the speed of government.

— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) November 10, 2014

"This is an extreme scenario and a not very likely one". Nothing like openly admitting you're fear-mongering.

[JustWinBaby]

(12-01-2017, 03:10 PM)Benton Wrote: But it's not just a national issue. Not all companies are as big as HBO and Comcast.

Fair enough...But Netflix and Youtube alone are over half of internet traffic.  Add in other big names like HBO, Hulu, etc... and you are probably north of 70%.  So most of the other stuff simply isn't worth trying to gouge, while collectively still big enough as a group to matter - cable is struggling to much to squeeze and kill the little guys. And price gouging really isn't NN, anyway - that potential exists in every industry, and generally only happens when there's a lack of competition or collusion.

People have been talking about this for 15 years since a professor imagined the concern and coined the term.  It really hasn't been a problem.  Maybe more regulation will be necessary in the future, but why pile on a bunch of regulations that might be completely unnecessary?  It's almost as if the internet was broken before the brief NN period, and now the repeal has broken the internet again.

[Benton]

(12-01-2017, 06:22 PM)bfine32 Wrote: They covered this topic for about an hour on PNR today and they seemed to think that the biggest concern would be to small businesses that tried to advertise on the web. They too said it should be considered a public utility; as this is the only (firmest) grounds for regulation.

They said the consumer would suffer because Cable companies have zero reason to seem streaming services such as Amazon Prime, Netflix, and Hulu thrive.

The conservative in me asks: Why should government be allowed to regulate private companies simply for consumer's enjoyment? I'm a free-market guy and there was talk of how this may push satellite Communications in the future. That would be the route I would love to see.

It sort of reminds me of the current electric company situation and the hurdles behind alternative sources. if the electric companies were deregulated do you thing alternate sources would suddenly become a whole lot more interesting?

The same could be said for electricity. 

If one giant electric company — with divisions handling everything from making cars to making movies — had the switch to turn people's electric off, or charge an 800 % markup, or only prohibited electricity to companies exploring other power options, would there be much competition? Profits dictate everything, so boosting the economy, providing for innovation, consumer interest, etc., would probably not factor into it. If big business mindset stays pretty consistent, the same folks who increased EpiPen costs 400% (it costs about $8 to make one, or about $300 to buy one) would be dictating what other businesses paid.

It's not just consumer enjoyment. Like electricity, a lot of businesses now require internet. They would either have to abandon their current models or pick a different business.

(12-01-2017, 06:56 PM)Vas Deferens Wrote: Unfortunately our tax dollars have been prepaid to these corporations for fiber infrastructure that has not been provided to date.  If these corporations were truly operating on within the free market, why do they need to lobby for tax dollars for infrastructure or to keep municipalities from creating their own networks?   Shouldn't they be so much better than other alternatives that any competition is seen as lesser than?  

Who owns the actual infrastructure our data travels across?

Somewhat related, I would suggest anyone here interested in this sort of thing check out one of the best biz docs I've ever seen.  Just recently uploaded to YouTube. 'Long distance warrior'.   It's the story of MCI's struggle to go up against ma bell.

https://youtu.be/qf2ox6imjzE

Can't embed on my phone unfort.

Man, this is something I hear about constantly in a rural community. In KY we've given state and federal money to mostly small companies to get X amount of people connected. Generally, the money runs out somewhere around half of X. Then city councils and fiscal courts get flooded with upset folks who've been on a waiting list for the last three months and told crews were 'almost in their area.'

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(12-01-2017, 08:04 PM)JustWinBaby Wrote: Fair enough...But Netflix and Youtube alone are over half of internet traffic.  Add in other big names like HBO, Hulu, etc... and you are probably north of 70%.  So most of the other stuff simply isn't worth trying to gouge, while collectively still big enough as a group to matter - cable is struggling to much to squeeze and kill the little guys. And price gouging really isn't NN, anyway - that potential exists in every industry, and generally only happens when there's a lack of competition or collusion.

People have been talking about this for 15 years since a professor imagined the concern and coined the term.  It really hasn't been a problem.  Maybe more regulation will be necessary in the future, but why pile on a bunch of regulations that might be completely unnecessary?  It's almost as if the internet was broken before the brief NN period, and now the repeal has broken the internet again.

I view it kind of like pop-up ads. We had the internet before pop-up ads existed. There was nothing keeping them from happening, they just hadn't been thought up and implemented yet. Then one person did it, and huh, would you imagine that... it worked! So then EVERYONE did it and it got progressively worse and worse until we had a pop-up apocalypse.

If you had the chance to go back in time and implement a "no pop-up ads" law before pop-up ads became that huge problem they grew into for awhile there, wouldn't you?

It really will only take one or two cases of someone attempting to throttle speeds to funnel towards their product/their promoted content, and if it turns out to be a huge success, everyone else will begin to adopt it. There was that one case with Netflix, but there was never a chance for a follow-up in the market because Net Neutrality was implemented. If it hadn't been, we might have been in "pop-up" hell by now. I personally wouldn't care to find out.

The internet has become such a huge focal point of people's daily lives, shopping, keeping in touch with friends and family (I almost never text or call my friends on the phone anymore, I use programs like Discord/Skype  for their free text/voice/video chatting. I mainly only go to physical stores for food and clothing anymore. Many people use it for their livelyhood now, and it's pretty integral to free speech these days too.

I just think it's become too entwined and integral into our lives to allow Net Neutrality to be ended.