FCC Votes To Punish Comcast

MaineCoasts brings news that three out of the five FCC commissioners have voted in favor of punishing Comcast for their P2P throttling practices. The investigation of Comcast has been underway since January, and FCC Chairman Kevin Martin made clear their conclusion a couple weeks ago. Ars Technica has coverage as well, noting: "The initial report on the vote said nothing about which way Republican commissioners McDowell and Tate might lean. FCC watchers wouldn't be at all surprised to see both vote against the order; the really interesting moment could come if they support it. Having four or even five commissioners support the order would send a strong bipartisan signal to ISPs that they need to take great care with any sort of discriminatory throttling based on anything more specific than a user's total bandwidth."

Finally!!!

[Zosden]

The Government is doing their job by stopping the ISPs from abusing their power. Costumers paid for unlimited bandwidth and that's what they should get. If Comcast doesn't like that they should change their plan.

Re:Finally!!!

[Martin Blank]

That's not what this is about. Comcast was found by the FCC to be interfering in the traffic of specific application types, violating principles established by the FCC to allow customers open access to the Internet. The customers were not charged for the bits that were blocked, so it had nothing to do with bandwidth caps.

Re:The Republicans are correct

[Anonymous Coward]

No it isn't legal. They deliberately forged messages ( RST packages ) that were sent over the phone lines. That is a federal crime.

Re:The Republicans are correct

[mindstrm]

It's not at all a stretch.. thats' why they call them "Forged Packets"
They *very clearly* do not come from the source that compcast pretends they come from.

Re:The Republicans are correct

[cpu_fusion]

I'm going to assume for the moment that you do not have a legal education. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The FCC is -- and should be -- both an enforcement and legislative arm of the Government. This is because it is an ADMINISTRATIVE body created by CONGRESS. Congress delegated [limited] rulemaking and ordermaking power to the FCC. That's not unusual: go look at the Enabling Acts of the other administrative agencies who handle a huge chunk of the rest of the way our Government functions. The Supreme Court has upheld the Constitutionality of agencies like the FCC again and again.

Now as to whether Net Neutrality is "already law", you would need to define what you mean by "law". Court made law? Statutes? Agency rules/orders? You do see the title of this, "FCC Votes to Punish Comcast" right? Guess what -- that's the action of the law. You may think the "law" is purely statutory, but then you'd be leaving out the Constitution, administrative bodies, common law, executive orders.

But hey, it's not surprising for me to see a subject line like "The Republicans Are Correct" spouted by someone who appears to know little about the law.

(Law student.)

Re:"Throttling"

[jim.hansson]

read his post one more time and you may see that he does not need to call comcast every time he changes the MAC address because he do not change MAC address on the MODEM only ROUTER

Re:The Republicans are correct

[Alrescha]

"Regardless of your stand on Network Neutrality, the fact of the matter is that what Comcast did was absolutely legal."

I don't think that has been established. Actively forging packets may qualify as an act of impersonation, which might be considered illegal. This may or may not be the case, but I suggest that the legality of what Comcast did is not yet a 'fact'.

A.

Re:alignment

[Gewalt]

So whose side is the FCC on? they seem pretty two-faced to me.

As always, they are on the side of the administrations loyal pets, the incumbent telcos.

Re:It looks good, but its not.

[Corbets]

"The government would never do anything to hurt a corporation."

Um, AT&T, Standard Oil, and a few other examples come to mind... plus, if you run a small business and have ever dealt with OSHA, you'll have plenty of other more modern examples ready.

While it's certainly true that the government supports corporate interests from time to time, it would behoove you to understand why it happens instead of making blanket assumptions.

the vote hasn't happened yet

[not_anne]

"The Wall Street Journal reports tonight that commissioners Copps, Adelstein, and Martin have decided against the cable giant, paving the way for an official vote when the order is publicly voted on next Friday."

Re:The Republicans are correct

[ScrewMaster]

This was a man-in-the-middle attack. Such efforts are illegal. Period.

Consequently the FCC is (rather surprisingly, I admit) enforcing the law as written. That's actually a good thing.

Re:alignment

[arth1]

Telcos? You're talking like they were plural. Yeah, Ma Bell was forcefully split up, but what has happened since is that all the baby bells have merged again, like metallic droplets flowing together to reform a blasted monster. With the SBC/AT&T merger, the monster is back with a vengeance.

Re:The Republicans are correct

[cpu_fusion]

The FCC can make law within the bounds of its enabling act. Rulemaking and orders have the force of law. The FCC can't pass a rule that forces ignorant people to actually learn about the law before they speak, but they can create an order to punish Comcast, and they can make rules regarding network neutrality. You can go read the enabling act at: http://law.onecle.com/uscode/47/151.html [onecle.com]

If it is arrogant to point out how wrong you are, then anyone with any education must seem arrogant to you. I guess that's the "liberal elite" hate we see from Republicans. Your statements are just as annoying as someone who comes to Slashdot apparently not knowing shit about computers, but still wants to talk like they do. Do yourself a favor and stop seeing knowledge as arrogance. It's not my job to coddle your ignorance.

And in regards to whether the "real legislature does not believe that network neutrality is existing law", there again you are clueless. Go read up on Antitrust law (tying), or the policy statement in section 230 of the CDA. Congress has been quite clear, throughout its history, that preserving competition is more important than preserving competitors, and that the Internet in particular deserves preservation as a free market.

Re:"Throttling"

[AsnFkr]

True. If I change my router mac (or put a different PC on the "gateway" position, I do not need to call. If I change my modem, they do require a call.

Re:alignment

[ShinmaWa]

hat has happened since is that all the baby bells have merged again

It is definitely going that way, but they aren't quite there yet. They haven't ALL merged together again.

After the breakup, there were 7 "baby bells". There are now 3 left: AT&T, Qwest, and Verizon.

- AT&T is SBC renamed after SBC acquired AT&T. SBC (formerly Southwest Bell) also acquired the baby bells Ameritech, Pacific Telesis, and BellSouth.

- Qwest was an independent which became a de facto baby bell when it acquired U S West.

- Verizon (formerly Bell Atlantic) acquired baby bell NYNEX.

Re:FCC no longer an "expert agency"; now political

[Brett Glass]

The lobbyists have made so many false statements -- to the media, on their Web site, to members of Congress, and directly to the FCC -- that it's hard even to know where to begin! I could spend an hour or two writing a message that goes through just the ones I've seen. But to save time, I'll refer you to a document filed by Comcast which describes and refutes some of the most egregious false statements that they made on the record to the FCC. See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520034944 [fcc.gov]

Re:Finally!!!

[budgenator]

I'll see that blazing speed if I download the linux ISOs via an HTTP link, or from an FTP site.

No you will not, those files are to big to get much out of the "powerboost", my last system update was on a comcast connection and today the KDE update came in in the neighborhood of 375 Kbs, but the files under 2MB flew in around 1.5Gbs. What cable ISPs hate is uploads, it kills their systems, they are happy when you download a 1000 times more than you upload.