Internet Filtering Lobby Forms 140
mbone writes "Wired's David Kravets reports on a new lobbying effort to support the filtering of internet traffic called Arts & Labs. Coverage is available at PC World as well. The lobby's members include AT&T, Cisco Systems, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Viacom and the Songwriters Guild of America. Their web site says, 'network operators must have the flexibility to manage and expand their networks to defend against net pollution and illegal file-trafficking which threatens to congest and delay the network for all consumers.' Does it seem that this is an attempt to categorize P2P with spam and malware, or is it just me?"
Re:'must' (Score:5, Interesting)
Wait, disregard my above comment for dumbassery. This has nothing to do with children... I should go to bed.
But I'll try to salvage it:
Assuming there was consumer choice in the ISP market, why wouldn't you be able to choose 'granny ISP' that allowed email, websites, and iTunes but filtered porn, hack attempts, and would clean your computer for you if you got infected? And then there's the HARDCORE TORRENT provider with a (possibly) lower bandwidth, but no throttling and high upstream, with the assumption that people will torrent 24/7.
As it is, they're selling a 'one-size-fits-all' plan of high-bandwidth, but we'll cut you off if you use it more than we want, and charge you more than you should pay.
This is trying to shoehorn this strategy into a changing market. People are using IPTV and there are more people knowing how to use BitTorrent... but they don't want to upgrade their system to support new uses. So, to fend off the law knocking on their door, they're trying to get it named 'malware' because their system can't handle it and it hurts other people sometimes.
And what they really want... (Score:4, Interesting)
AT&T: Has a bussiness model based on overselling their bandwidth, and hoping that customers don't actually use it.
Cisco: Wants to sell filtering hardware.
NBC Universal, Viacom and the Songwriters Guild of America: Trying to save a business model that simply cannot survive in the age of digital distribution.
Microsoft...
Someone's gonna have to help me with that one. What's their role in this? Is it a continuation of their battle on software piracy?
If anything, piracy of *other people's* IP drives sales of Windows.
Re:'must' (Score:5, Interesting)
I like that, "think of the children."
ISP's need to be able to filter whatever they want because of the children...or because they could then charge content providers extra if they want. Once you do away with net neutrality, we can rely on big businesses to help themselves. But don't worry, the robber barons will donate some money to the poor unfortunates that will no longer be able to compete. Or maybe they'll donate condoms to Africa with some of that money. Sorry, but I'm not feeling overly optimistic about the ability of most big businesses to play fairly, without getting laws passed that favor them.
Maybe some year when I'm not being asked to bail out slimeball businessmen with my taxes, I'll feel differently. BTW, 700 billion isn't much. Just take the net worth of the richest man in the world, multiply it by 13 or 14, and you're in the neighborhood. I was looking at figures and comments about social security, and it's called the largest government giveaway program. I think it'll be surpassed shortly.
Re:technological unfeasability (Score:2, Interesting)
is there some horrible scarcity of fibre? is the network clogged?
It's not that it's scarce, but that it's expensive. And it's not just the fiber that is expensive, it's the additional routers with the higher bandwidth they also need to purchase to be able to receive and send the data.
And yes, the networks are clogged, if you ask them, with P2P traffic.
then take some of the money we fucking pay you, and lay some more fibre, assholes
It's not just that simple. You don't just string the fiber between telephone poles, you have to get rights to bury the fiber where necessary, and all that costs a lot more money than just the fiber itself.
Guess that's it for VPNs too then (Score:2, Interesting)
Sooo... if the idea is DPI and VPNs block inspection then it's either a clipper chip [wikipedia.org] for VPNs or no VPNs, cause after all if you've got nothing to hide ....
I can't blame them for trying this again but I really wish they'd prove they can act in the public good first. Hey - eliminate spam first, then you can take a shot at eliminateing my privacy.
Yeah right.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Clogging the lines, sure... because you can't build out the lines right? I'm hoping this [vikenfibernett.no] will be my next ISP. It's in Norwegian but what you need to understand is only before and now. They just upgraded their customers from 10/3Mbit to 10/10Mbit, 25/5Mbit to 30/30Mbit and 50/25Mbit to 50/50Mbit for the same price. They don't even deliver a slower line if you're one of the 110,000 (of 4,5mio) people that can get this, with an estimated increase of 25,000 or so next year. Within the next decade bandwidth will be so plentiful the argument will completely cease to make sense. Just like Napster didn't kill the Internet, YouTube didn't kill the Internet, piracy will never kill the Internet. It'll expand with headroom to spare to the point where you can send live HDTV if you want. In the dotcom days we laid the backbone, now we're laying fiber on the end mile. From there, anything is possible.
Re:Sounds like a ploy (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm suspicious of this. I concede that illegal filesharing is a problem, but it sounds more like an attempt to turn the internet into a tightly controlled broadcase medium, like television.
It's already well on the way there. The Internet in the "good ol' days" was like one gigantic public forum where anybody with a cheap modem, a shareware program, and a free web host could establish a beachhead from which they could proclaim their likes and dislikes, hopes and dreams, hobbies and avocations, opinions and rants to the world. And while, of course, that element is still a part of the Net, look how dominated it has become by huge corporate commercial websites. Some of us still search for the individual blogs and sites that enrich our lives, but increasingly a lot of Net users probably spend most of their time with the Big Boys.
I foresee an increasingly widening divide between content providers and content consumers. "Net neutrality" is just the tip of the iceberg in the effort to clamp down on and marginalize the little guys. See, technically right now, even TV and newspapers DO afford an opportunity for anyone to broadcast their thing to the masses -- IF you have the money. I see the Net heading in the same direction. I believe that eventually the ability to put up your own website is going to cost ya, and cost big.....no more cheapie/freebie blogs and such. Your internet connection will remain affordable -- on a par with cable TV or subscribing to a magazine -- as long as you are just consuming the content that the corporations want you to see and hear. But if you want to actually speak to the masses instead of being a passive lump, well, show us the money and we'll see. If you want to buy even a single 30-second ad on the smallest TV station, it will run you at least hundreds, probably thousands of dollars. I see the Internet as eventually degenerating into the same unbalanced affair -- it will largely cease to be an interactive medium, and become another mass medium for the dissemination of what the folks with the power and the money want you to see.
But it was fun while it lasted...
No it's not you. (Score:4, Interesting)
It's just the bourgeois finally waking-up and wanting to put back the genie in the bottle, so they get back to the times where only the very rich can afford a printing press or a radio station or a TV studio so they can tell everybody what THEY approve of and nothing else.
Re:Sounds like a ploy (Score:3, Interesting)
Could that possibly be because the last 3-5 years have seen huge drops in consumer spending overall? Correlation is not causation.
Believe you me, the government, it's various agencies and the big boys from the provate sector will find new ways to sort, catalog and search larger volumes of information, right after they find new ways to gather larger volumes of information about you.
Re:Sounds like a ploy (Score:3, Interesting)
Have you really paid attention? CD sales are way down, far more than online sales are up.
Could it be because oh I dont know... People have huge racks of CD's already? People didnt rush out to buy CD's when they came out because they still had lots on vinyl.
They're losing sales because guess what every single song is a formulaic ripoff. Who needs Brittany Spears Ripoff #2987 when you have Brittany Spears Ripoffs #1-8.
Or maybe it could be that people arent buying because they heard about the Sony Rootkit Fiasco? Who wants a CD that is going to $*&# your computer up?
Or it could be because of their strong arm tactics of the RIAA leaving a sour taste in people's mouths giving them a reason to search out and check out independent labels?
Its a disaster of their own making.
Re:'must' (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes "think of the children"
If they can filter illegal content then for sure they can filter child porn. Hold them responsible for all the content that passes through the network. Lets call these service providers Content Service Providers so the general public will not mix the 2 up. ISP are gust carriers and CSP will be responsible for ALL the content. If they can filter music then the can filter child porn.
Re:Yeah right.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:'must' (Score:4, Interesting)
see, i used profanity in this post. and i posted it with my own account and id, despite it is going to be modded down as flamebait.
grow some balls first, then blabber anti net neutrality crap. for that net neutrality thing is the most important thing that has created this internet as a second world as it is.