Threat To Net Neutrality In Europe 147
Narcissus writes to tell us that the European Parliament is planning a vote in the Industry, Transport, Energy (ITRE) committee that could reintroduce amendment 138 (currently amendment 46) which deals with safeguards to user rights on the internet and graduated response schemes. There are several online campaigns trying to drive awareness and action already but there is limited time to act. "The Council may propose a compromise version of amendment 138/46 that is completely neutralized, or that may even become the opposite of the original by allowing the 'three strikes' scheme instead of preventing it. According to the latest negotiations, am.138/46 wouldn't anymore be an article (that must be transposed by Member States in their law) but a mere recital that has just indicative value. It is urgent to contact the members of the ITRE committee to advise them to reject compromise with the Council that failed to respect the intent of the original amendment. The best would be once again to approve the amendment."
Give it Up! (Score:5, Insightful)
As long as carriers can set their own policies for traffic carried across networks that they own, Net Neutrality is a dead topic.
Free Enterprise dictates that the carriers have the right to price services according to market demand. If your carrier starts adopting tiered pricing or starts prioritizing your traffic in ways that it sees fit, then let your feet do the walking to another carrier.
Free Markets do eventually work their way around to providing the services people want for the price they're willing to pay.
European Parliament Elections very soon... (Score:5, Insightful)
Send a clear message that this nonsense will not be tolerated... to help make an intelligent decision when voting in European elections, see:
http://www.laquadrature.net/en [laquadrature.net] [laquadrature.net]
Check out the Political memory resource:
http://www.laquadrature.net/wiki/Political_Memory [laquadrature.net] [laquadrature.net]
especially the "List of recorded votes" section to see who voted for what - before you reward them with your vote for them.
Also of interest, the Telecoms Package section: http://www.laquadrature.net/wiki/Telecoms_Package [laquadrature.net] [laquadrature.net]
Stop it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Give it Up! (Score:4, Insightful)
The end of the Golden Age of the Internet (Score:5, Insightful)
It's quite clear to me that the end of the Golden Age of the Internet is drawing near.
The internet has finally drawn the attention of the huge money and power brokers of the world. These people are going to make sure that the Internet serves their ends as much as possible.
Oh, there will be the few geeks who know how to set up a proxy to secure a tiny bit of anonymity until one of the Big Fish get wind of you and get interested in tracking you down, but for the most part, all connections are going to be monitored. They are going to know who's on each end of every communication channel, and they are going to know what is being communicated, and to a large extent, they will control it. Whether it's priority transmission speeds, bandwidth capping, or outright censoring, there's too much money at stake on the Internet now to leave the playing field "neutral".
Re:Give it Up! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, because free markets did such a good job with the banking industry.
The rational equilibrium model of the free market fundamentalists has gone tits up. Move on, and wise up. Collusion, misinformation, and group think are quite capable of doing for the IT sector what they have done for the financial sector.
There needs to be citizen participation in both politics and economics. Economies are not worthwhile aims in themselves, they are merely tools we use to coordinate society - whenever they don't work for people, we should seek to change them.
Re:Give it Up! (Score:4, Insightful)
I have at least 3 hard-wired choices to my home, both high speed. There's at least 4 3G wireless carriers I can deal with so I think I do have some choice at least where I'm at, so YMMV. I do agree that there needs to be a healthy market though but why then do we in the US give monopolies to companies that just run cables to your house or buy a set of frequencies? To give them incentives to build out the infrastructure. I believe that that system needs to change a bit and only allow them full monopoly power over that investment for a certain period of time.
If you look at Time Warner's recent "Tiered" evaluation flop you can see that people can and do influence these decisions as well.
Why would they want to... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:maybe, maybe not (Score:5, Insightful)
Call back later? Wrong answer. Once the amendment's passed, it's too late to call your representative. We Americans have discovered this from personal experience wherein today's proposal suddenly passes the Congress tomorrow, and now we're stuck with the law. Too late to whine after it's a done deal.
NOW is the time to call your reps.
Re:maybe, maybe not (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes. The vote hasn't happened yet.
Generally speaking its best to raise awareness of an important vote before it happens, so that you can contact your representatives and make it clear what you expect them to do. You know, so that your representatives actually represent you. Believe it or not democracy doesn't have to happen with elected officials doing what they want while you mutter under your breath, you are allowed as a citizen to actually participate in the process by making your opinions clear to those people who make the vote.
Re:European Parliament Elections very soon... (Score:3, Insightful)
It's about free speech, which even for you should weigh heavier than your job, the inflation and the safety of your family.
What if you get abused by your employer but are unable to say anything about it, or even warn others from accepting positions there? What if the government imprisons your family but you are unable to voice your protest?
Nothing weighs heavier than free speech and freedom of expression. Internet should be a free, uncensored, unmonitored channel of communication that adheres to no rules.
The Internet is larger than the clowns in the Parliament, it can never be controlled and even the intent of trying to control it should be made illegal.
(I will be voting for the Swedish Pirate Party)
Re:The end of the Golden Age of the Internet (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh no, the big bad moneymen are here to they'll rape and pillage our Internet and there's nothing we can do to stop them. The end is near! Boo-hoo. If you don't like the way the wind is blowing, stand up and fight against it you fucking pussy. You're not helpless so stop acting like you are.
That probably sounds like a troll but I'm so sick of hearing the defeatist attitude of people who could actually prevent these things if they stopped whining about them for five minutes and stood up for their supposed beliefs. The entire point of the news post and TFA is that this vote hasn't happened yet, so there's still time to do something about it.
Re:maybe, maybe not (Score:5, Insightful)
And if they don't get what they initially wanted, they'll try another law, and if that doesn't go through, they'll try another law... Until they finally manage to come up with the perfect timing when nobody is paying attention and it goes through.
That or they'll just declare that it's in effect, they can get away with that more and more these days. It's not like voting them out would change anything.
Re:European Parliament Elections very soon... (Score:4, Insightful)
>>>voting for people who can keep me in a job, keep inflation low, keep me and my family safe and prospering in the future.
What you're looking for is not "politicians" but "parents", and since I presume you are not a child, my advice is that you need to "put away your childish things" and stand on your own two feet as an adult. The purpose of the government is not to babysit you and/or raid your neighbors wallets like Daddy Soprano & give you their money (which I call theft of labor). The purpose of government, to quote the founder of the Democratic Party, is to "prevent one man from harming another. And that is all the government should interfere." - Thomas Jefferson.
Another person, not sure who, said "A government powerful enough to give everything you need is also powerful enough to take everything you have. Including your property, your liberty, or your life." Just ask the American citizens who President FDR forced into concentration camps. FDR had become so powerful, he was able to imprison millions of Americans with just a word from his lips, like a living reincarnation of the Roman Emperor and completely contrary to the Supreme Law of the Land.
The bigger the government becomes, the smaller your liberty becomes, until you might as well be living like a child, who must constantly ask permission. I don't want to live in such a society.
Re:Why would they want to... (Score:3, Insightful)
The answer is obvious. They don't want us getting stuff for free. They want us to borrow even more money, go even deeper into debt, and buy more DVDs, CDs, and books. It's all about the $$$.
Re:Give it Up! (Score:3, Insightful)
your idea is completely broken because under your idea a bank could make known bad loans and barrow on margin (thats what fractional reserve banking is all about) from other banks in a circle until then all go down at once and the CEOs take the cash. This is basically what happened.
The problem with zero regulation is that it creates a boom and bust cycle where the banks repeatedly give you a lolli-pop and then slam a pineapple up your ass. And zero regulation is impossible with a modern system, it will always be based upon faith of some government.
You either have to completely get rid of fractional reserve banking and return to hard money (with creates a boom and bust system) or you have a well-regulated central banking system. Elizabeth Warren said this well on the Daily Show. The US has had a boom and bust cycle of every 20 years until the great depression. Then finially we had a sne regulatory system and had a clean system for 50 years, then we started pulling out threads and creating a hybrid private interests/public money system: S&L and then Enron. I think regulation is really scary because it requires work on making sure it is enforced correctly and consistently, but its really the only way to both have a stable economy without boom and bust, and to have a have any market for credit.