White House Urges FCC to Implement Stronger Net Neutrality Rules

xJ321x said:
I find it funny when people think they own what the government is in control of when the government is in control of them as they think it. Ironic. There is a reason I can't negotiate my tax rates with the government and it's because I'm their employee and not their boss.
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You work for the government?
 
DustMite said:
This latest push for "net neutrality" is nothing more than putting the federal government in charge of determining Internet pricing, terms of service, and what types of products and services can be delivered. This will lead to fewer choices, fewer opportunities, and higher prices for most consumers. You think internet is too expensive now and you think we're being fleeced by the ISPs, just wait till the government steps in to "help".

The proposed "net neutrality" rules are really about giving wealthy companies an edge. It will create fast lanes where companies can pay to have their content given priority. This will hurt the smaller, regional ISPs and drive them out of businesses in favor of a small handful of giant companies. That does not sound like net neutrality. Instead, that sounds like pay to play which is opposite of supposed "net neutrality."
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Can you tell us where a "fast lane" is created in the FCC's proposed rules? As a matter of fact the following is included in Wheeler's comments:

"With this Notice we are specifically asking for input on different approaches to accomplish the same goal: an Open Internet. The potential for there to be some kind of “fast lane” available to only a few has many people concerned. Personally, I don’t like the idea that the Internet could become divided into “haves” and “have nots.” I will work to see that does not happen. In this Item we specifically ask whether and how to prevent the kind of paid prioritization that could result in “fast lanes.” Two weeks ago I told the convention of America’s cable broadband providers something that is worth repeating here, “If someone acts to divide the Internet between ‘haves’ and ‘have nots,’” I told the cable industry, “we will use every power at our disposal to stop it.” I will take a backseat to no one that privileging some network users in a manner that squeezes out smaller voices is unacceptable. Today, we have proposed how to stop that from happening, including consideration of the applicability of Title II. There is only ONE Internet. It must be fast, robust and open. The speed and quality of the connection the consumer purchases must be unaffected by what content he or she is using. And there has to be a level playing field of opportunity for new ideas. Small companies and startups must be able to effectively reach consumers with innovative products and services and they must be protected against harmful conduct by broadband providers. The prospect of a gatekeeper choosing winners and losers on the Internet is unacceptable."
 
maverikv said:
You work for the government?
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Every single tax payer works for the US government, albeit partially. The US is a corporation and you're merely its employee. It takes almost half of your earnings in some form of taxation and it lets you do what you want on your free time.

Free range chattel, nothing more.
 
flashoverride said:
You compete with an entity that doesn't have to pay the bills you do and can order non-customers to pay for its growth.

Seriously, have you ever given any thought to why having the fucking government run shit might be a bad idea, especially where it competes with other entities?
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Yeah, you might have a point if we were talking about a bottling plant, or a textiles factory, or almost anything that wasn't absolutely essential to conducting business and daily life in the first world. But we are talking about essential telecommunications, and Title II was written precisely for this same situation with Ma Bell's phone lines.
Try running a business without the internet, it's about as possible as doing so without a phone or electricity.

We cannot allow our economic future to be held hostage by a couple of telecom giants that would like to extort every possible cent out of each private citizen and business in the country because they hold a protected monopoly over some wires in the ground providing essential services.

My thought process in favor of municipal broadband was:
Provides an essential utility service.
Not driven exclusively by a profit motive.
Not beholden to shareholders and stock price.
Is accountable to it's customers (residents).

It is not the responsibility of me, you, and every american not employed by VZW, ATT, and ComcasTWC, to ensure their continued record profitability at our expense. If they can find the will to trim their fat (profit margins) enough to offer competitive rates with (wasteful government run) municipal broadband, it's a victory for private industry. If they can't, it's still a victory for private industry [all the businesses that will be receiving better cheaper telecom service], just not VZW, ATT and ComcasTWC.
 
only anarchists believe there shouldn't be public roads, health care, or internet

they live in a delusional fantasy where mcdonalds should need to build the highway to mcdonalds

they believe businesses should be unregulated so they can merge into one single world-wide business (the most profitable state a business could assume) which then topples governments and exploits people to the maximum possible extent

it's a bunch of paranoid delusional hooey. either we prevent the internet from being exploited by its owners (the ISPs), or it will be exploited by its owners. then there will be no more internet as we know it. take your pick, cheese heads
 
Good to see that this trickster is not just backing Wall Street and futile wars at a safe distance from his own nation - but net neutrality as well.
 
Cali3350 said:
Whether I like the guy or not, thats what I wanted the President to say.
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but he was the one that put wheeler in the fcc as it's head figure.

im not sure how credible his stance on net neutrality is, considering he is backing a guy that a known anti net neutrality agent with ties to isps and lobbyists.

even wheelers remarks is one that translates that he will work extra hard to make everyone accept a dual lane internet highway by ironing out the legal issues to make it work. that doesnt sound like someone who is giving up on the poorman/richman internet highway now is it :rolleyes:
 
How about we get rid of government created monopolies and make it easier for actual competition. I've never seen more government fix problems that were created by the government to begin with. It is also a bad idea to give the FCC more control over the internet. Look at the censorship we have on the radio and TV. Do we really want that in charge of our internet as well? Do we really want a government entity that answers only to the president to have more power over the internet just because "fuck Comcast, those guys deserve it"?
 
Twisted Kidney said:
I wonder if people would be OK with the idea that you could only place calls to certain numbers that are friendly to the telco or they bury you in static?

Would those people think it's OK for your electric company to reduce the efficiency of any non-LG appliances you own?

Not that this is anything about the people, this is the same old same old for politicians the world over. Talk about doing something for the people and then do something to the people instead.
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Yeah, give them utility status and they can't directly block you, they can just charge you $10 a kb and you'll stop yourself.

I live in SE Michigan, the telcos charged at one time 25 cents to call across town while charging 5 cents to call across the country.

Ever since cell phones, most telcos lost interest in jacking their landline customers. You make ignorant comments about phone landline utilities like someone whose had a cell their entire teen/adult life.
 
bAMtan2 said:
only anarchists believe there shouldn't be public roads, health care, or internet

they live in a delusional fantasy where mcdonalds should need to build the highway to mcdonalds

they believe businesses should be unregulated so they can merge into one single world-wide business (the most profitable state a business could assume) which then topples governments and exploits people to the maximum possible extent

it's a bunch of paranoid delusional hooey. either we prevent the internet from being exploited by its owners (the ISPs), or it will be exploited by its owners. then there will be no more internet as we know it. take your pick, cheese heads
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Yup, this.

What they also fail to understand is that business craves stability (economic, social, national) and when businesses control the means of production in an unregulated manner, they effectively become the authority figures of society and ultimately create governance in order to instill the stability they need for continued operation. From anarchy, invariably emerges social and societal order in the form of government. The entire documented course of human history supports the idea that anarchy cannot and will never be more than a temporary state of disorder between more persistent ones. There'll always be someone who has fantasies and delusions about making anarchy a reality. It takes a very disconnected person who is really good at ignorning the real world to genuinely believe in something like that and most that do would be pretty upset about losing creature comforts so they never, ever attempt to create a place in which their baby can exist.
 
aardvark sandwich said:
Every single point in that post is wrong though.
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Sure, we can discuss it. First, take the central one, the idea that anarchy is can persist in perpetuity, and find a working example to refute that claim. Since governments and nations rise and fall, how about we set the easy critera of 50 years of functional anarchy.
 
xJ321x said:
Every single tax payer works for the US government, albeit partially. The US is a corporation and you're merely its employee. It takes almost half of your earnings in some form of taxation and it lets you do what you want on your free time.

Free range chattel, nothing more.
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Your tinfoil hat might be on a bit too tight
 
maverikv said:
Your tinfoil hat might be on a bit too tight
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You know the good ol days before civilization were invented were the best. Nomadic hunter gatherer lifestyle was true freedom. Except that you had to follow the socialist animals who mandated that you had to follow them just to eat. We just can't win can we?
 
bAMtan2 said:
only anarchists believe there shouldn't be public roads, health care, or internet

they live in a delusional fantasy where mcdonalds should need to build the highway to mcdonalds

they believe businesses should be unregulated so they can merge into one single world-wide business (the most profitable state a business could assume) which then topples governments and exploits people to the maximum possible extent

it's a bunch of paranoid delusional hooey. either we prevent the internet from being exploited by its owners (the ISPs), or it will be exploited by its owners. then there will be no more internet as we know it. take your pick, cheese heads
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This is the truth. I'm always amazed (though not surprised anymore) at the amount of people who will continue to argue against their own interests.

I would rather have the internet by owned by the government than by a business. A government has at least some responsibility to its people, a business has absolutely none. It's only beholden to the market, and the market is whatever they want it to be.
 
A government has at least some responsibility to its people
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Exactly! Like the FCC Chair who was elected by the people. Everyone likes him, and he's only doing what's in the interests of everyone right?


I'd rather vote where it really counts. With my wallet.
 
MisterClean said:
How about we get rid of government created monopolies and make it easier for actual competition.
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this is the kind of half-complete thought that tragically causes potential allies of reason to attack it. how do you create or allow competition when it costs a billion dollars to build out a fiber optic or cell tower network to every house?

the answer is: you take ownership of the network (highways, fiber, towers) and share it with ALL businesses. then there is unlimited competition in everything (except the impossible-to-compete-in billion-dollar infrastructure.) but neanderthals won't have this, because the businesses that stand to lose from such competition are among the biggest in the world, and they use their cash flow to brainwash innocent people into saying things like "GOVERNMENT TAKEOVER OF THE INTERNET!"

the only oligopoly/monopoly the government is creating here is the one that already exists because the government is doing nothing about the shitheads who paid for their election ads and tv interviews and opinion pieces and forum shills. said shitheads aren't regulated enough to allow any room for competition, or to prevent them from annihilating competition before it starts.

the anarchists want freedom but all they're doing is creating a monarchy of businesses. the kingdom of england was a business, pipe smokers
 
Dreaz said:
This is the truth. I'm always amazed (though not surprised anymore) at the amount of people who will continue to argue against their own interests.

I would rather have the internet by owned by the government than by a business. A government has at least some responsibility to its people, a business has absolutely none. It's only beholden to the market, and the market is whatever they want it to be.
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Politicians are beholden to voters at various intervals, with no long term interest at stake.
Businesses on the other hand have actual capital on the line. Skin in the game.

Your last line is absolutely hilarious.

Because the potential for an inadequate amount of competition (as perceived by you) could exist in a free market, lets have resellers sell a government-controlled product with a fixed price and call that 'open' and organic competition.

Thanks for the laugh.
 
aardvark sandwich said:
Politicians are beholden to voters at various intervals, with no long term interest at stake.
Businesses on the other hand have actual capital on the line. Skin in the game.

Your last line is absolutely hilarious.

Because the potential for an inadequate amount of competition (as perceived by you) could exist in a free market, lets have resellers sell a government-controlled product with a fixed price and call that 'open' and organic competition.

Thanks for the laugh.
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Yet you can't offer any example of functionality in what you're proposing instead. If anarchy were so amazing, the billions of people that have lived over the course of human history would have stumbled into a way to make it work AND, if it's so much better, it would have proven superior to existing systems.
 
Gotta wonder why Obama is advancing this issue, only after Republicans regained control of the U.S. Senate. Is it possible Harry Reid et al were the ones blocking advance of this issue?
 
Yup, only two choices y'all. Total anarchy or government controlled internet tv roads and healthcare. There are literally no other options.
 
The mistake everyone makes is the assumption of a zero sum game with anarchy.
It can't exist if there is also statism at the same time.
You're wanting to see it exhibited on some purist sense, absent everything else.

I reject that notion entirely.

I'm saying there can be pockets of activity; economic action, independent of coercive influence through simple apathy towards that coercion.

The united states government asserts it has ownership and control over an imaginary geographical boundary, and that outsiders have to go through an application process to be given the right to enter this area and participate in the labor force. But we all know that's bullshit, people routinely journey into this "controlled" geographical boundary with out so much as a "pretty please" from the Mexican border (the other imaginary geographical boundary. And good for them.

Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal immigration".

Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal" consumption of "controlled substances".

Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal" prostitution.

So you go ahead and write your cute little rules.

I don't give a shit.
 
Drawing attention away from a glaring hole in the thing you're advocating by screaming, "Look over there, illegal immigration! I agree with it!" won't really fix the hole. :p
 
maverikv said:
Your tinfoil hat might be on a bit too tight
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Yeah reality is so real some people can't handle it and believe what they want rather than what is.

I bit it's also crazy to think the government is listening in on all our phone calls.
 
MavericK96 said:
So if you don't like the one option you're given for internet in your area, you'd just opt to not have internet at all? I highly doubt that.
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It would be a lot easier without the government mandated monopolies that ruined any competition. I don't know why everyone is struggling with this. The government created this mess, why would the government be any better at getting us out of it? Remove the regulations that only help established players who are using the government to stifle competition, and competition will flourish and prices will fall.

You want an alternative between anarchy and total government control? How about an actual limited government? Surely that's not too hard for you to grasp. It's like some of you think the only way anything ever gets done is through the State.
 
aardvark sandwich said:
Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal immigration".

Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal" consumption of "controlled substances".

Show me a time when there has never been any "illegal" prostitution.

So you go ahead and write your cute little rules.

I don't give a shit.
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While I don't disagree with legalizing some of those, your argument quickly becomes illogical. Show me a time when there has never been "illegal" murder/rape/kidnapping; should we legalize it? There are potential public interests in making certain things illegal; it is where to draw the line.

I agree with you that those things should be legal, or much less illegal in certain controlled manners. But to simply say that because it's always been done, it should be legal, opens a whole host of areas that absolutely should not be legal.
 
I also think it's hilarious that people are arguing it's only governments that create monopolies. De Beers, Rockefeller, JP Morgan, Carnegie all operated in a time of "limited government".

Concentrated power, whether it's business or government, is bad. Right now it is concentrating in both, but with the corporate coffers capturing the government. We need some populist reform, using the government to rein in the worst, and the people to actually pay some fucking attention and use the checks and balances that are in place to actually make the government work for us.

It begins with cutting off the flood of bribes to legislators; good luck, the current GOP you just voted in is incredibly against any type of campaign finance reform.
 
Debeers and Carnegie used the government to stifle competition egregiously. Jp Morgan as well. You may want to do some more research on standard oil. Not only did they use government regulations to help build their monopoly, they still couldn't prevent competition.this competition lowered gas prices for everyone, and increased innovation, not only in fuels but in industry as well. On top of that, due to competition, they didn't maintain s monopoly status very long.by the time the government split them up, they only held 60% market share and was falling rapidly.

The government creates monopolies. The free market and competition destroys them.
 
TwistedAegis said:
While I don't disagree with legalizing some of those, your argument quickly becomes illogical. Show me a time when there has never been "illegal" murder/rape/kidnapping; should we legalize it? There are potential public interests in making certain things illegal; it is where to draw the line.

I agree with you that those things should be legal, or much less illegal in certain controlled manners. But to simply say that because it's always been done, it should be legal, opens a whole host of areas that absolutely should not be legal.
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You don't understand my argument.
I'm not endorsing anything simply because it has happened in the past. That is not my argument. It does however show that people are in fact able to operate outside "the law" in certain situations, which was my point. There is also no assumption on my part that nothing bad will ever happen. I do not, for example, endorse the cartels, but I realize they operate within two simultaneous 'controlled' geographical boundaries and have made an absolute mockery of the rules that purport to protect us.
 
MisterClean said:
The government creates monopolies. The free market and competition destroys them.
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Look, not even Adam Smith, the coiner of the phrases "the invisible hand" and the father of modern economics, believed that. A pretty good article from Fortune the other day about that:

http://fortune.com/2014/08/13/invisible-hand-american-economy/?xid=ob_rss

Adam Smith said:
“The interest of [businessmen] is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public ... The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order ... ought never to be adopted, till after having been long and carefully examined ... with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men ... who have generally an interest to deceive and even oppress the public”
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Adam Smith said:
People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty or justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies; much less to render them necessary.
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Your first quote is in direct support of my argument. Regulations serve to protect vested interests and stifle competition leading to government created monopolies.

The second quote reinforces that statement, that a company well try to abuse power to become a market leader.I say this is impossible without the force of the government and it's regulations. Only a government has a monopoly on "legitimized"force. They are the only ones who can literally hold a gun to your head and say you will only buy this product at this Price. Without that force, there ell always be competition.

Smith's example of tradesmen colluding on price doesn't work in the real world.all it takes is one figure tradesman undercutting the others price to gain market share.the others well be forced to follow suit, or lose profit. O r,I guess, the third option, which is use the government to cut the newcomers out.
 
Government is the reason we grow rice in fucking Sacramento.
Manipulated water prices.

I dont care who you are, that is fucking stupid.
 
Dreaz said:
Right. Classifying telephones and electricity drove those prices sky fucking high, didn't they? Shit, my water bill breaks me every month!

Wait. Can it be that what you're saying is horseshit?
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Actually, yes they are driving prices higher because they can. They have monopolies or near monopolies. There are exactly two real power generation companies in Oregon. And the Feds are tied in greatly to the big hydro plant in the state. I always enjoy hearing from the greenies who talk about solar or wind power and getting rid of fossil fuels. They tend to ignore that after being made "utilities", there is little reason or need to innovate new tech for power generation. And now many of those ecotopia types want to get rid of hydro here in the NW, which is rather cheap and plentiful for crappy wind farms and solar plants.

Why is my landline still $45+ a month after all the deregulation of the 80s which then turned back into big bells 20 years later? I may have had my issues with USWest then Quest but CenturyLink has just been raising rates since they took over here. It makes more sense these days for me to go to two cell phones as I will likely save money. That or find a bundle deal and get DSL for a secondary ISP option that would make my landline worth the expense.

About the only public utility that makes sense is water for urban/suburban areas.


Read here for a take on the tax and price complications:

http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=3368355
 
Ok then why is no one saying BREAK UP THE CURRENT ISP's into baby bells again.

I dont think that alone is the solution, I do think we need at least an acknowledgement that we do as ISP consumers have thr right to have a connection that the ISP is not data mining, throttleing, traffic shaping, selectivly dropping packets, and MITM my web site connections, blocking my Tor non-exit relay.

If you have a solution that at least protects those rights, and allows the government to not have to dictate from a Title 2 stand point then I am all ears. I dont think that solution exists, I do think we need an ISP consumers Bill of Rights, that the ISP's and the Govt cant violate without a warrent.

So far all I am hearing is that Title 2 is not an answer, I am waiting patiently for someone to tell me what is it, and I dont hear anything that solves my concerns, so until then I'll stand with the EFF, and just keep voring for small governement Freedomworks canidets.
 
No one, in any party, has the balls to break up the oligopolies. Cable, banking, healthcare, you name it...we've gotten into bigger is better, damn the rest.
 
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