Comcast Hints At Plan For Paid Fast Lanes After Net Neutrality Repeal (arstechnica.com) 308
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For years, Comcast has been promising that it won't violate the principles of net neutrality, regardless of whether the government imposes any net neutrality rules. That meant that Comcast wouldn't block or throttle lawful Internet traffic and that it wouldn't create fast lanes in order to collect tolls from Web companies that want priority access over the Comcast network. This was one of the ways in which Comcast argued that the Federal Communications Commission should not reclassify broadband providers as common carriers, a designation that forces ISPs to treat customers fairly in other ways. The Title II common carrier classification that makes net neutrality rules enforceable isn't necessary because ISPs won't violate net neutrality principles anyway, Comcast and other ISPs have claimed.
But with Republican Ajit Pai now in charge at the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast's stance has changed. While the company still says it won't block or throttle Internet content, it has dropped its promise about not instituting paid prioritization. Instead, Comcast now vaguely says that it won't "discriminate against lawful content" or impose "anti-competitive paid prioritization." The change in wording suggests that Comcast may offer paid fast lanes to websites or other online services, such as video streaming providers, after Pai's FCC eliminates the net neutrality rules next month.
But with Republican Ajit Pai now in charge at the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast's stance has changed. While the company still says it won't block or throttle Internet content, it has dropped its promise about not instituting paid prioritization. Instead, Comcast now vaguely says that it won't "discriminate against lawful content" or impose "anti-competitive paid prioritization." The change in wording suggests that Comcast may offer paid fast lanes to websites or other online services, such as video streaming providers, after Pai's FCC eliminates the net neutrality rules next month.
Portugal (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Portugal (Score:5, Interesting)
This needs to be shared everywhere.
Nothing will clue people into what NN means faster than seeing that split pricing model for Social, Video, Email, etc.
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This needs to be shared everywhere.
Nothing will clue people into what NN means faster than seeing that split pricing model for Social, Video, Email, etc.
You mean the same people who happily welcomed DRM phones like IOS and appstores and paying for $3 .mid ringtones before the smartphone revolution? They had more rights on their pcs and didn't care about freedom. It was shiny.
They will continue to buy them thinking it's an extra service and watch TV at home and not care as always.
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We're gonna turn into Portugal [latimes.com], and it's going to be a big fuckin mess.
Let me introduce you to T-Mobile's Binge On [t-mobile.com] feature, which apparently is perfectly acceptable under the outgoing rules.
In summary: on capped mobile data plans, video streaming at 480p will not count against the cap, as long as the content is from a list of 100 streaming service providers. In the Portuguese version, you pay $6 for 10GB of additional data in the type you want.
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"Well wireless carriers have been doing it for years and that's legal!"
You don't think major ISPs have been dumping money into wireless carriers and creating MVNOs with them for no reason?
Nobody is using Comcast Wireless, that's just a money sink to avoid suspicion about financially jerking off Big Wireless.
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The EU (and thus Portugal) has Net Neutrality laws, and mobile zero-rating is not considered a Net Neutrality problem by the EU.
Even under current Net Neutrality via Title II in the US, mobile zero-rating is not considered a Net Neutrality problem, so you can get free unlimited music streaming [t-mobile.com] on T-Mobile with Pandora, Spotify, etc.
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Does your right to bear arms include going against corporations? Or is it just for going against the government?
These days corporations are acting a lot like government, so I think that right should apply to corporations as well as government. However, this is only my 0.02 and is worth that much or less.
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We can always expand it with an amendment...
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It's just for shooting yourself in the leg. The government has nukes, our little rifles won't mean squat. Also, corporations and government are effectively the same thing, so no, arms are not for use against either one.
Eh, not really. Even the government is not stupid enough to drop nukes on its own people. If they did that, there would be no country left to govern.
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Re: Portugal (Score:3)
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That was incredibly foolish
Besides, all they have to do is blow up the dams upstream of YOUR house.
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> Besides, all they have to do is blow up the dams upstream of YOUR house.
With a armed mobile populace, it is in the interest of everyone to maintain a rule of law respected by most as at least fair enough. If the rule of law breaks down, for example if the make a full frontal attack, they could easily kill me. Guns come in after that, IE after I die if my family sees no redress, and decides to fight back, they don't have to just go after the military or a politician directly, but they can go after the
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The government has nukes, our little rifles won't mean squat.
Our military has highly developed powers for laying waste to large swatches of territory, but is no more ineffective than King George's minions at beating lightly armed guerrilla irregulars. It lost to the Viet Cong, and keeps losing Afghan territory to the Taliban as soon as our massed forces withdraw from an area and return control to the locals we so carefully trained.
Re:Portugal (Score:5, Insightful)
No, we fight wars with kid gloves. If we fought like our enemies it would be bloody, swift, and one sided. Also the world would never forgive us.
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Fighting like our enemies would involve first having 1% of the money that we have presently, blaming foreigners for our impoverished state and lack of jobs, and then trying to strike out at them with whatever hand-me-down weapons and improvised explosives that we could scrape together. So... I guess we're partway there.
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There have been a lot of self-declared "kindest ways to make war." It's like history has this great big turd-polishing competition and everyone needs their chance to say, "No no, I have the shiniest piece of shit." But you buddy, you have the answer. You got it. First prize.
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No, we fight wars with kid gloves. If we fought like our enemies it would be bloody, swift, and one sided. Also the world would never forgive us.
Who are you kidding, the world hates us regardless. The sooner the US pulls back and lets the world that hates us so much go to hell the better.
We're the best, we're #1, fuck you all. (Score:2)
Hahah I never said I like it. See until we somehow convince our own citizens of the fact that we have the most powerful military in the world by far, they're going to keep demanding that we sink unlimited money into it to "keep up" with the rest of the world.
The idea that the rest of the world doesn't take us serious because we're too soft is also popular.
The fact is that the rest of the world is terrified of us and if we took nukes off the table we could probably conquer more of the globe than the axis po
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Hmm going by facebook comments most Americans think that the Russian and Chinese militaries are much stronger than our own. But who knows they could just be shills.
Re: I'll byte - why is this bad? (Score:3)
Except it limits what services you can use. What if I create netmovies.com as a competitor to Netflix? In Portugal that service can never start up as it won't be a part of a pre approved package.
You can't use duck duck go as your search engine because they didn't pay the isp like Google did.
That is what is at stake. New services can't compete because they won't get the bandwidth to the users.
Lastly I pay the isp for a pipe. It provides me with an average of 50Mb persecond of service 24 hours a day. I
How motherfucking hard is it (Score:5, Insightful)
to grasp that concept that if there is prioritization, then de-prioritization must be occurring at the same time. "Fast Lanes" create de-facto "Slow Lanes"
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In a relative way, sure, but it could be Faster Lanes and Same Speed As Always Lanes. It doesn't necessarily mean that the existing lanes will slow down, but there's also no reason to believe that they won't do exactly that to tout the fast lanes.
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That works out to 0.5 Mbits for all the providers.
Now say 10 of those providers gets 'faster lanes' at double the priority of the other 190. Those 190 providers will now only have a speed of around 0.476 Mbits, while the paying providers get 0.952 mbits. While it doesn't seem like much only a 4.8% decrease in speed for 190 providers, its still a decrease in speed.
Of course these numbers are picked to m
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Same Speed As Always Lanes
Unless there is new infrastructure built today these "Fast Lanes" will run over the same finite capacity as the rest of the network. They have to give up bandwidth or latency at peak hours to sustain the higher priority traffic.
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There's also the fact that even without new fast lanes, the same speed as always lanes will slow down as more people use them. Prioritizing some traffic will accelerate the process.
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Fast lanes have already been a thing for a long time.
At no point did NN actually stop them.
Take the communications enjoyed by New York investment computers for the larger trading houses that do high frequency trading.
Think there aren't fast lanes there?
NN stopped nothing. What it is all about is distracting people from the real issue which is Right of Way access to poles and conduits.
Google is having trouble laying fiber. That is how f'ed up access to poles and conduits is right now. One of the most powerfu
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Take the communications enjoyed by New York investment computers for the larger trading houses that do high frequency trading.
You mean like buying real estate as close to the trading house as possible for the extra nanosecond of speed? And buying the newest and greatest networking equipment? I never did either. Your example isn't exactly analogous to the situation of the American people.
Think there aren't fast lanes there?
They are not the point. If you want to build your own networking infrastructure to eek out nanoseconds, you can. Most people cannot do that. They have to rely on ISPs. For example, does everyone have access to fiber in the country? No. Not even rem
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Google is having problems laying fiber because they don't want to do it that badly. Google fiber was never really about Google making money selling Internet access to end users. It was to try and force the incumbent ISPs to move to 21st century technologies and bandwidth so google could sell and market new application like streaming video, online games, other things that required bulk content distribution that had to be done on disks in the past when none of us had more than 1.5Mbps at home, and many folk
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Google wants NN because (1) they know ultimately it will result in a lowest common denominator, which is helpful to some of their properties. (2) It make rules, that startups who have to buy internet access form tier 3 providers much the same way you and I do, have to follow. Google on the other hand is big enough that they can and do peer directly with the transport guys. So they will always have the FAST LANE, and you, me, and your small business won't even have the ability to purchase access at any price. So Google can lock out their competition forever!
So you're saying as a startup I have to buy Tier 3 access? Is that factually true?
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Maybe you're the shill, AC.
People can't lay cable because the government won't let them. Every time anyone but the big ISPs tries they get sued, a court shuts them down, the city council forbids pole access, etc.
Process that.
No. Stop. Process it.
What is stopping competition is the GOVERNMENT is stopping it. If it were really just logistics and economics that were doing it then why would the END of these companies and ventures always be the government stopping them rather than them going out of business due
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You know nothing.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fin... [telegraph.co.uk]
Stop. Do not respond. Read. Do not respond. Think. Then after you've read and thought about it... Then respond.
Your comments are utterly ignorant and thoughtless.
As to fiber not being cheap or easy... it is cheaper and easier to run fiber than it is to run anything else. It is the cheapest fucking cable out there.
Look, you think the reason something doesn't happen is because it is expensive? Well, then why prevent people from doing something that isn't econo
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Stop. Do not respond. Read. Do not respond. Think. Then after you've read and thought about it... Then respond.
Bahahahahaha. Do you even read your own article? "And HFTs were willing to pay through the nose to use it, with the first 200 to sign up forking out $2.8bn between them." That's $14M dollars a piece to sign up. That doesn't include any equipment. Can any consumer actually do that? Why don't you think about what you posted for a split second? Because no consumer could afford that.
Your comments are utterly ignorant and thoughtless.
What is your point about HFTs? It has nothing to with consumers and Comcast. Absolutely nothing. First consumers can't afford mill
Re:How motherfucking hard is it (Score:5, Insightful)
Take the communications enjoyed by New York investment computers for the larger trading houses that do high frequency trading.
Think there aren't fast lanes there?
Net Neutrality is about the Internet. You're talking about a private, leased line from a trading company direct to an exchange. Which has nothing to do with tiered Internet services, paid lanes, slow lanes, Internet providers, etc.
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In the "old days" that would be a switched line.
But yes, and in fact paying Comcast/Att/duopolyMember to run a private line for you also is just fine.
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It can also be a last mile private line from a given business to the trunk. That's as internet as anything. It is however, people bypassing a shit system.
What is more, the subversion is mostly taking place in the last mile.
In the backbone, the whole thing is generally a non-issue. There is also no monopoly in the backbone.
Where the issue is... is where the consumer has no choice.
Give the consumer a choice and the problem will go away.
Re: How motherfucking hard is it (Score:2)
"right" is determined by the social/historical context.
If internet is the key to primary services, education, decent life - then yes, it obviously becomes a right worth defending.
Also, such rights have squat to do on whether privates are involved. Baby food is sold in supermarkets - yet we think kids have a right not starve.
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Engineering your network to have fast speeds is different than giving someone 1gb of "full speed other" bandwidth a month for watching netflix.
You totally know this too, there is no way you can know about and understand the specifics about a high speed trading network and not understand net neutrality. Unless of course you're repeating something someone else said without understanding any of it.
Or maybe you could be a paid shill.
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Ignorant. Google is literally being prevented pole access.
Google.
The notion that setting up an ISP is beyond the means of smaller companies is proved wrong all the time as well as smaller ISPs operate just fine until they're ordered to close by court order.
Here:
https://www.wired.com/2013/07/... [wired.com]
I suspect you lack the integrity to admit you were wrong, I am not an idiot, and you were until I corrected you an unwitting ignorant dupe... but his post should make it clear what you are...
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Negative. I'm saying that given entities have been given the ability by paying enough money to bypass the bullshit. Which is exactly what they do.
Prioritization is not the issue. Competition is the issue.
Give people choices... give smaller companies access to the poles and the whole matter will be irrelevant. There are small ISPs all over the country that are very happy to provide service in various places. They do not do it more than they do because they are STOPPED. They don't get a license to run their w
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You assume that Comcast would have to add new equipment. While this will probably eventually be the case in many areas, before they resort to spending money, they will sacrifice their non-premium customers' speeds to accommodate the premium ones. This is doubly beneficial to them as they get more money without spending it and they encourage more customers to pay premium prices. It is also possible that an equilibrium will be reached before upgrades are necessary, resulting in permanent slowdowns for non-p
"Lawful content" (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like scope for a very small white-list of very large companies to me.
Of course they do. (Score:5, Insightful)
You didn't think they spent a ton of money on political donations and PR for nothing, did you?
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Looks like the true colors come out in the wash (Score:5, Insightful)
What was that about Obama instituting policies that were unnecessary and unneeded?
Wasn't that one of the major arguments against NN?
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Political Pressure (Score:2, Insightful)
This is Comcast stirring up pro-NN political pressure.
These companies that are in favor of the rules & regulations they call NN do so because they benefit and protect their monopolies and bottom-line.
Don't forget that classifying ISPs as common-carriers places them under the requirements CALEA laws & regulations.
Strat
Re:Political Pressure (Score:5, Insightful)
Only relevant because of the lack of competition (Score:5, Insightful)
The prioritization is mostly in last mile since that is where comcast has relevance. Why is comcast relevant in the last mile? Because no one but the big ISPs are allowed to lay cable to the last mile.
The solution has and will continue to be ensuring Right of Way access to Poles and Conduits for alternative infrastructure providers.
to prove this is a shit show, examine that even Google... one of the richest and most powerful companies in the world frequently cannot lay last mile cable.
Think about that.
They have the resources.
They have the connections.
They have the ability to do the paper work and the regulations.
But they can't get access to poles and conduits to lay last mile cable.
Why?
And if they can't, what chance does a smaller company have to compete? It has NOTHING to do with net neutrality. It has everything to do with corrupt franchise license agreements that lock out everyone but the local duopoly.
People need to stop clapping like trained seals and see what is actually been going on all along. Rather than fixate on NN, focus on ACTUAL Right of Way access to poles and conduits for alternative service providers.
Do that and Comcast and say or do whatever they want. Worst case they'll make themselves poor service providers and will lose market share.
Re:Only relevant because of the lack of competitio (Score:5, Insightful)
Because I'm sure someone will foolishly argue against the obvious:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2... [theregister.co.uk]
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People need to stop clapping like trained seals and see what is actually been going on all along. Rather than fixate on NN, focus on ACTUAL Right of Way access to poles and conduits for alternative service providers.
It's not an either/or situation. We can push for Right of Way access but that will take years to build out the infrastructure. In the mean time, we can ensure the ISPs don't mess with the existing Internet. Also I have to point out that even if there was more Right of Way, that doesn't stop any ISP from prioritizing traffic according to their own guidelines.
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NN ultimately is about treating the ISPs like old ma bell. I do not want that. It is either/or.
If you accept the existing NN concept, then you're conceding the monopolies get to be monopolies indefinitely.
No. I don't want NN. I want competition. I want right of way to the poles. Anything less is a farce.
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The internet as we know it in the US has existed for a very long time with limited laws and regulations. Most laws and regulations simply do not work as technology finds ways around them. I understand technology has evolved to grant ISP's the ability block and throttle specific connections, but vice versa the free market approach along with technology like tunneling and encryption also work around most anything ISP's can do. This is why the internet is so great.
With the repealing of NN, ISPs are quite capable of throttling all packets that are not in their priority paid list.
I would rather governments create laws to open up telephone poles, wireless spectrums and enable municipality built networks vs laws which really do not mean much and are easily circumvented. If there were more competition in the free markets companies that throttle, block or have fast lanes will lose to those companies that do not. Again free market.
You seem to think you live in a Communications 'free market'. If Google can't do it, startups won't be able to either. Until there is tangible benefits to your politicians, they won't bother doing anything about that - and current donations by incumbent telcos could be quite hard to beat.
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There is plenty of pole space to run additional wires.
And the only reason they don't lease their wires to other people or portions of their bandwidth is because they have a monopoly on the wires.
Imagine if other people were running wires. Then the big ISP would have two choices... either lease none of its wire and get ZERO from the traffic flowing over the OTHER wires... or open access to their wires simply to get SOMETHING from the traffic by attracting it back to their own network.
And if there were ever a
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Whatever the big isp's want, the end result is that everyone else isn't allowed to run the cable. So my point is literally accurate.
I see your point... but if we are to quibble it is also that there is corruption from local and state government to support the big ISPs. The bribes are there and it is very hard to extract bribe money from a large collection of companies without it getting out. It is very easy to maintain a corrupt relationship between a couple companies especially when in return for the bribe
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NN does nothing. If anything, I want the monopolies that NN enshrines in law to do bad things to piss people off. I want the monopolies crushed.
I'm very happy to create a shit show that lasts a couple years to get a long term solution to the problem.
Common carrier (Score:5, Interesting)
Interestingly, back in the old days the common carrier status was what the ISPs used to argue that they shouldn't be held responsible for material like child porn, regular porn, copyrighted material, hate speech, etc. that traversed their networks. Now they want to relinquish the common carrier status. How long do you think it's going to be before some attorney or DA figures this out and goes after them?
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Interestingly, back in the old days the common carrier status was what the ISPs used to argue that they shouldn't be held responsible for material like child porn, regular porn, copyrighted material, hate speech, etc. that traversed their networks. Now they want to relinquish the common carrier status. How long do you think it's going to be before some attorney or DA figures this out and goes after them?
I already pointed this out in another thread on this topic. Title II protects ISP's from litigation regarding facilitating criminal behavior on their networks. But no one seems to have an answer: Does revocation of Title II expose ISP's to legal liability regarding facilitating criminality? Does reclassification under Title I continue the same protections? Need someone familiar with the legalese to chime in here please. I am very curious.
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well, I can guarantee you that a CP suspect somewhere *will* grasp onto that straw.
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Fucking liars. (Score:2)
They're already throttling OpenVPN and ssh connections globally under the pretense that all encrypted traffic constitutes unlawful use. Why have they still been allowed to get away with this while claiming they're not doing it?
Only takes one... (Score:5, Insightful)
...ISP to offer 'fast lanes', and it's all over. Everyone else will follow suit. Then the blocking and throttling of competitors services.
Ready yourselves for Intersplit.
Great fucking job. I hope those of you that voted for this got what you wanted.
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Of course. Let's not pretend. "Fast lanes" will be created by slowing other traffic, not by offering you faster speeds.
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You can't possibly be as stupid as you look.
I'll
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Found a good VPN? How will an ISP respond? (Score:3)
What new things could a US ISP do that China did to do to control all its domestic networks? The best VPN products got around some of the most well funded and intrusive global network tracking by Communists governments.
Given a level playing field a VPN with the best staff will win and offer its users the freedom to enjoy fast networks int he USA every day.
How will a politically well connected ISP stop a VPN that can change to any attempts to detect, slow or block its encrypted products?
Call in the US federal government to track US VPN CC payments? To block CC payments to a VPN service detected been active in the USA?
To report VPN users who attempt to pay for a VPN with a US CC?
What a ISP cant win on a network they will enforce with new federal network use and CC payment regulations?
Federal color of law changes will keep the USA in the slow lane?
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The ISP will respond as China has. By watching, locating and then crippling IP traffic that *they* determine is a VPN traffic.
This will then create an arms race between new VPN protocols and ISPs. But since the ISP controls the access of the VPN to other nodes they can just look for traffic patterns that they've identified as a VPN traffic (which will became a violation of the customers terms of service) and block it or better yet flip a few random bits to make it slow or fail randomly.
When the duopoly mak
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Biting the hand that feeds (PAYS) them (Score:2)
The return of AOL (Score:2)
Walled Garden Reloaded. Working in one of their callcenters 15 years ago still gives me the willies.
Comcrap (Score:5, Insightful)
Comcast: "We only want the option to throttle and block content...we would never, ever actually do that but we want the ability to do it even though we never would. Trust us, we'd never do that but we still want to be able to do it even though we'd never really do that, even though we want the ability to do it..."
It's like when my 5-year old son said he just wanted to "hold the candy" and he assured me that he wouldn't eat it, he just wanted to hold it...
For the assholes who voted for Trump (Score:2)
Thanks alot.
Apparently your tax cuts and Hillary emails were more important than the freedom of your countrymen.
You didn't do research at all on his party or his views. Of course he is going to put in cronys and foxes to watch the henhouse. Every Republican since Reagan hates government and supports big business and doesn't believe in regulation as freedom == communism for some reason. Now we will end up like Portugal and have to pay addons for websites and services you use in addition to your cable bill.
Yo
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Maybe the game is deeper than realized (Score:2)
Put your tin-foil hat on with me and hang on . . . . .
Now this is going to be giving the government a LOT of credit in the smarts department ( unwarranted in their entire history, but bear with me ).
What if, the removal of Net Neutrality is a litmus test to see how bad things will get once the restrictions are removed ? You know all the big players are salivating at the mere IDEA that they can do as they please once the rules are removed. I'm sure entire Business Strategies are being developed around it. It
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I've seen that in a private college. They blocked all Democratic sites, redirecting dailykos to rushlimbaugh.com.
This is trivial to do, and I can see an ISP injecting malware into a HTTPS stream, Phorm style, in order to discredit a candidate.
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Lots of companies offer faster services, fast lanes does not equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
I was at the movie theater the other day with my family. There was a long line at the concession stand. I noticed a sign that said "premium members" pointing to an empty set of ropes. I reminded my wife that we were premium members. We got in that line and were called to the next open cashier - ahead of at least a dozen people who where waiting before us.
Unless there is no line at all, fast lines absolutely do equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
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All the "What if" scenarios are simply what the ISPs have been stating they want to do. It's not crazy tin foil conspiracies. It's planned reality.
Why do you think fast lanes would be necessary? Because they will throttle you if you don't pay more!
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All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up.
This whole hysteria over "Comcast could do X" is just that. If you read TFA, that's what you see. Comcast could do X. Comcast could do Y. If you get rid of law A, Comcast could do Z. Comcast didn't repeat their previous promises verbatim, so that means they intend on doing now what they promised not to then.
Hate for what they do, if you must, not for what you think they could do. You only weaken your arguments against what they do when you go off into predictions and coulds.
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actually, given the history of these companies I think it is rather likely they *will* create fast lanes. I get that this is the FUD/Vaporware level at the moment, but I would be completely unsurprised if (when) it comes to pass. I'll wager it'll happen before the end of Trump's first term so that it is harder ("you'll hurt business!") to re-implement NN when Trump's out.
Re:Fast lanes is not against Net Neutrality (Score:5, Insightful)
Lots of companies offer faster services, fast lanes does not equate to throttled or blocked traffic.
Er what? That's like saying there's plenty of Google fiber in the country. Just not in my neighborhood or many other neighborhoods, but man, is Google Fiber fast.
With LTE 5 and ViaSat 2 that just went up, and Viasat 3 going up in 2019, Facebook & Google offering internet access, within 5 years, Intenet access will be even more accessible and global.
Again what? Mobile isn't a replacement for broadband. Fiber that isn't in my neighborhood isn't a suitable replacement. Like many Americans, all we have limited broadband options. It isn't also about money. For example, broadband availability for 90210 [broadbandnow.com] shows 1 viable cable and 1 DSL provider (Time Warner Spectrum and AT&T) for most of the zip code. There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area. There are 2 satellite services. There is no fiber option. I would say that 90210 is a pretty affluent zip code. And yet they can't get more than 2 choices.
FCC is working on guidelines to communities to allow new community ISPs and new companies to run services to the pole.
Are we talking about the same national ISPs that sued local municipal ISPs from providing service to towns that they themselves didn't service?
The FCC deregulating ISP's so smaller ISP's dont have the same regulations as big carriers and can now evenly compete again.
Again the history of ISPs shows that the big carriers will not tolerate smaller ones. This has the opposite effect of what you are saying.
All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up. Its all "What if" scenarios, for a bill that's only been in place for 2 years and didn't fix the monopoly issue.
So your argument against net neutrality is that it was put into place for 2 whole years and it didn't break up monopolies that have been in place for decades besides the fact net neutrality was never meant to break up the monopolies. Ever. The regulations were in place to keep the monopolies from gaining an unfair advantage, not to break them up.
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Like many Americans, all we have limited broadband options. It isn't also about money. For example, broadband availability for 90210 [broadbandnow.com] shows 1 viable cable and 1 DSL provider (Time Warner Spectrum and AT&T) for most of the zip code. There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area. There are 2 satellite services. There is no fiber option. I would say that 90210 is a pretty affluent zip code. And yet they can't get more than 2 choices.
If the incumbent ISPs really do end up jacking rates for full internet access like all the Chicken Littles fear, that price differential will create a market incentive for one of the nearby providers to come in to your neighborhood and poach the hell out of the disaffected customer base. This seems pretty basic.
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If the incumbent ISPs really do end up jacking rates for full internet access like all the Chicken Littles fear, that price differential will create a market incentive for one of the nearby providers to come in to your neighborhood and poach the hell out of the disaffected customer base. This seems pretty basic.
What nearby providers? I think you're under the assumption that there are providers nearby. That the big ISPs won't sue and obstruct any kind of competition like they currently do now.
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I think you're under the assumption that there are providers nearby.
Um, I'm under no assumption at all. Seems to me you're the very same UnknowingFool I replied to who said "There are 4 broadband providers but 2 of them only service 3% of the area." You're apparently now just splitting hairs on what you consider "nearby" to be (apparently it's somehow different than in "the area").
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What part of 3% is hard to understand? That's essentially the same as no competition. Would you take 3% of your salary if a competing company offered it to change jobs? Also did you not understand that is is 90210. These people could afford more expensive internet if they wanted. But even in a rich affluent zip code they really only have 2 providers.
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What part of 3% is hard to understand?
What part of "if... then" is hard to understand?
Also did you not understand that is is 90210. These people could afford more expensive internet if they wanted.
Perfect -- then in the highly unlikely event that any of these doomsday scenarios come to pass and the beautiful people become dissatisfied with the incumbent ISPs, that willingness to pay will provide plenty of incentive for others to come in and fill the void.
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No its not, I said companies offer faster services, its called priority services and its not just internet related. Saying ISP's can only offer faster services for medical, is the only one needing faster priority is a weak argument. Traders want faster service and built out their own networks.
Which is relevant and helpful how to millions of Comcast customers, how? Most people can't build their own network you know and don't do high speed trading.
Well actually it is. There are many communities that dont have high speed broadband, not everyone lives in the the cities, many live in rural america. Wanting things to be real vs what is real, I'm talking about is current and real.
Did you even read my post? You don't get many options for broadband in Beverly Hills, CA not to say middle of nowhere, Alaska. Please tell me how the one example of 90210 doesn't destroy your argument?
ViaSat 3 and LTE5 is a contender with terabyte speeds. Try doing some damn research on where the tech is going.
So how fast do you max out your mobile cap at supposed "terabyte" speeds? Or did you think that most mobile having a data cap really limits what you can do
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Re:Fast lanes is not against Net Neutrality (Score:4, Insightful)
All I see is so much hyperbole and chicken little "sky is falling" without any facts to back them up. Its all "What if" scenarios, for a bill that's only been in place for 2 years and didn't fix the monopoly issue.
Need I remind you that Comcast doing fuckery to the net is exactly why Net Neutrality was enacted and made into law? It's painfully obvious ISP's *WILL* engage in fuckery when the gloves are off. The hyperbole isn't. The sky is indeed falling, bro.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Sample list of things ISP's have done and are not just "what if" scenarios:
Madison River blocking Vonage
Comcast blocking p2p
AT&T/Apple blocking Skype/Google Voice
Windstream Communications hijacking search queries
MetroPCS tried to block streaming video
Cavalier, Cogent, Frontier, Fuse, DirecPC, RCN, and Wide Open West hijacking search queries
AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon blocking Google Wallet
Verizon blocking tethered connections
AT&T blocking FaceTime
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Unless you know of a company that has completely separate networks for their fast lanes, faster service comes at the expense of the rest. Note that faster is different from higher bandwidth.
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I'm 100% for the free flow of packets, but doing it via title 2 is potentially a VERY bad idea, and yet there's a hysterical reaction to all this that title 2 is the only way to save the internet (when in reality, it could be it's death knell). Tell the legislators to get off their lazy asses and make a title 3 especially for it, so the internet is not regulated by a law from 1934.
You are aware that it was the ISPs that forced themselves into being Title II right? Verizon in particular sued the FCC saying that it had no right to regulate them under Title I. The court agreed and said Verizon could be regulated under Title II. Thus that's what the FCC did. There is no Title III but do you want to rest your hopes on Congress passing something? This Congress?
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The summary is biased, and the story already has 8 different versions of it in the last 3 days (i.e. Pai is the devil incarnate). Enough is enough.
Also, Just for the record, reclassifying the internet as title 2 has other implications. The FCC gets the same power over it as radio. That means anything from forced "decency filters" to "providing equal time for opposite view points" (hello fairness doctrine).
I'm 100% for the free flow of packets, but doing it via title 2 is potentially a VERY bad idea, and yet there's a hysterical reaction to all this that title 2 is the only way to save the internet (when in reality, it could be it's death knell). Tell the legislators to get off their lazy asses and make a title 3 especially for it, so the internet is not regulated by a law from 1934.
Sigh. It's misinformation like this that propagates the need to repost the issue OVER AND OVER, cuz idiots like you just don't fucking get it.
The NN rules enacted in 2015, classifying ISP's as Title II common carrier had MANY MANY exemptions to Title II's so as to not apply stupid nonsense telecom rules to ISPs.
Title II is exactly the correct classification with the built-in exemptions. They are common carriers, and should be treated and behave as such.
If you're expecting new laws out of the Republicans,
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And whom might I pay for this faster internet speed? Spectrum and AT&T don't seem to want my money, or at least, provide it. I live 2 blocks from a major medical research facility and I have 25mb AT&T for $75 or 50mb Spectrum $99. Bundled. I stopped at 12 for $50 since I couldn't tell the difference in the two and I could only have the higher with Uverse. Which I don't want. My next option is business fiber: 12k to run it and $1600 a month for 100mbs. Is this a viable option?
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My fucking phone company doesn't get to charge me for the privilege of calling a certain area code
You mean like long-distance calling?
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You mean like long-distance calling?
And in the same vein, I get a "fast-lane" because I pay extra for "extended local area" calling. OMG, the telephone sky is falling!
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OK, 976.
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This has nothing to do with speech and everything to do with identifying and milking high-bandwidth users of their network.
Why shouldn't the high-bandwidth users pay more for their use? If 1% of the people are using 50% of the available bandwidth, why shouldn't they be charged a lot more than the 99% who split the other half? Yes, I deliberately put this in terms of the "1%-ers".
There are already tiers of access, so how is charging high-bandwidth users more changing anything? It isn't against net neutrality to charge more for more service.
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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"