FCC to Enforce Net Neutrality

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Here’s a bit of good news out of Washington for a change, the Federal Communications Commission has pledged to support net neutrality and crack down on companies that try to violate those principles.

“One thing I would say so that there is no confusion out there is that this FCC will support net neutrality and will enforce any violation of net neutrality principles,” Genachowski said when asked what he could do in his position to keep the Internet fair, free and open to all Americans.
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Pretty funny stuff considering the FCC voted only to censure Comcast without imposing any fines. I can see the RIAA/MPAA trying to sue the FCC next for encouraging Torrent usage.
 
Another step in the cybersecurity tyrannical power grab. I can't wait for the day of the 100% regulated internet where we get put on lists for accessing opposing political sites and being denied access to sites deemed unreasonable by a bureaucrat. Everyone's getting duped to believe it's in support of the end user's rights.. LOL. The tech blogs all fell for it.
 
w1retap said:
Another step in the cybersecurity tyrannical power grab. I can't wait for the day of the 100% regulated internet where we get put on lists for accessing opposing political sites and being denied access to sites deemed unreasonable by a bureaucrat. Everyone's getting duped to believe it's in support of the end user's rights.. LOL. The tech blogs all fell for it.
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You forgot to bring your tinfoil. ;)
 
While it would be nice to see throttling and such go away, and I never want to see any "pay or get your site throttled schemes", traffic shaping does serve a legit purpose when a particular node reaches near total saturation. I do not consider all packets equal. Voip, business, and government traffic, should come before grannies emails and little Jonny Warez's torrents.

Given the monopolies in most areas, we can't really trust the isp's to manage their traffic fairly, but anyone thinking the government can do better will have a rude awakening if the feds start exerting too much control. And they will, it is just a matter of time.
 
rflcptr said:
You forgot to bring your tinfoil. ;)
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He is just taking it to it's logical extreme, one at least partially supported by the US governments past actions when it comes to regulating industry and censorship..
 
GORANKAR said:
While it would be nice to see throttling and such go away, and I never want to see any "pay or get your site throttled schemes", traffic shaping does serve a legit purpose when a particular node reaches near total saturation.
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I use to work for Comcast, granted I was a low man on the totem poll. Let's face it, there were countless times where I was attempting to assist customers who were on a node that was beyond total saturation.

My supervisor at the time (still a good friend of mine) said that there were many ways to resolve this, for example upgrading the node or adding a new one and splitting the load in half for each node. Reality, this costs a lot of green and Comcast wasn't going to do a damn thing about this. Harsher reality, these were usually in middle to upper class areas, the ones where we received the least issues for late payment.

I don't like the government getting into the politics of the internet, because they still don't fundamentally understand it (let alone the other modern technologies). I also don't want to leave this up to companies like Comcast, who can afford to erect a 52 story e-peen in center city Philly while still pressing for higher rates with every franchised area they had.

I worked there for 2 years and there is many things I don't know about Comcast's procedures for handling these issues, because #1 They never got back to us on most of them and #2 Because the issues never went away.

One thing I can tell you though, despite the fact that Verizon isn't perfect either, they were sure afraid of FIOS.
 
rflcptr said:
You forgot to bring your tinfoil. ;)
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GORANKAR said:
He is just taking it to it's logical extreme, one at least partially supported by the US governments past actions when it comes to regulating industry and censorship..
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Too bad we've already seen the federal government take more steps in that direction, taking over private companies and legislating themselves more & more power. Have you guys been asleep? Conscious? It's amazing some people don't even care about how much power they give to the government over everything used in or directly related to their every day lives. Continue being a sheep and be fenced in when they get the last side of the fence built.
 
I'll wait until I learn how the FCC defines net neutrality before I determine if this is good news.
 
SockMan! said:
I'll wait until I learn how the FCC defines net neutrality before I determine if this is good news.
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You're going to read the 1000+ page document that gets voted on in the middle of the night with a 6 hour notice? :p
 
I find it amusing the same people complaining about this being an end run around private enterprise, and that it's going to lead toward some form of government censorship are also the same ones that have said in the past that the first amendment doesn't apply to the internet because it's all moderated by companies who have to right to censor what they want when they want, and that the Constitution doesn't apply to them.

So, essentially corporate fascism is fine, the prospect of any government control is BAAAD.

And in the end, none of it would have been an issue if there had not been companies acting like douchebags to begin with.
 
UrielDagda said:
I find it amusing the same people complaining about this being an end run around private enterprise, and that it's going to lead toward some form of government censorship are also the same ones that have said in the past that the first amendment doesn't apply to the internet because it's all moderated by companies who have to right to censor what they want when they want, and that the Constitution doesn't apply to them.

So, essentially corporate fascism is fine, the prospect of any government control is BAAAD.

And in the end, none of it would have been an issue if there had not been companies acting like douchebags to begin with.
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ah, classic. You don't have to subscribe to a service from someone if you don't want to. When you provide a service, you write the terms of service.

When the federal government steps in and makes it the law of the land, that's something entirely different. It's unfortunate you cannot even grasp that concept. They are saying directly in their wording that the FCC will directly dictate what the providers have to do in terms of their services provided. The ever growing hand of totalitarianism over private enterprise is more disturbing.
 
w1retap said:
Too bad we've already seen the federal government take more steps in that direction, taking over private companies and legislating themselves more & more power. Have you guys been asleep? Conscious? It's amazing some people don't even care about how much power they give to the government over everything used in or directly related to their every day lives. Continue being a sheep and be fenced in when they get the last side of the fence built.
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The government has been taking over private companies for decades...it's nothing new
 
last time i checked isnt the internet itself property of the us govt technically? i mean, ICANN is mostly US govt controlled and such...

plus im all for govt staying out of corporate business but internet is soon becoming a "utility" and like other utilities it will probably get regulated eventually...
 
You're right, we should let the people who buried the business in the first place retain control. All of these people bitching and moaning about how the government is going to screw up a company that is already screwed up crack me up. Fear mongering at its best.
 
Derfman said:
I use to work for Comcast, granted I was a low man on the totem poll. Let's face it, there were countless times where I was attempting to assist customers who were on a node that was beyond total saturation.

My supervisor at the time (still a good friend of mine) said that there were many ways to resolve this, for example upgrading the node or adding a new one and splitting the load in half for each node. Reality, this costs a lot of green and Comcast wasn't going to do a damn thing about this. Harsher reality, these were usually in middle to upper class areas, the ones where we received the least issues for late payment.

I don't like the government getting into the politics of the internet, because they still don't fundamentally understand it (let alone the other modern technologies). I also don't want to leave this up to companies like Comcast, who can afford to erect a 52 story e-peen in center city Philly while still pressing for higher rates with every franchised area they had.

I worked there for 2 years and there is many things I don't know about Comcast's procedures for handling these issues, because #1 They never got back to us on most of them and #2 Because the issues never went away.

One thing I can tell you though, despite the fact that Verizon isn't perfect either, they were sure afraid of FIOS.
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I blame most of it on the monopolies. In places where you have 2-3 or more high end companies offering service, the service is better, faster, cheaper, and tends to have far less shaping going on. I would welcome the feds breaking up the city, county, and state sanctioned and enforced monopolies. However, while there is some merit in parts of net neutrality, there are numerous dangers as well. I really do not want uncle Sam over regulating or outright controlling yet another industry if it can be helped. There are better ways of insuring fair access than some government mandate that is anything but simple or inexpensive to implement.
 
FLECOM said:
last time i checked isnt the internet itself property of the us govt technically? i mean, ICANN is mostly US govt controlled and such...
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LOL, umm, no. Yes, ICANN is a US entity, but it's entirely separate from the government and has been since 1998. And really the Internet is just a bunch of networks hooked together, with ICANN mediating everything so nobody stomps on each other. It's very decentralized, and all of the actual infrastructure is owned by private companies. About the only role the US government had, even 11 years ago, was orchestrating it all so it would work, they've never really 'owned' anything.

But yes, the fearmongering in this thread is staggering. Monopolies are never good for consumers, and this industry has shown very clearly that it intends to abuse them even further.
 
Just how do you suppose the government will enforce "neutrality" without censorship and where do you think the government will use as a gauge to define and determine what "neutral" looks like?

This is a dangerous move to our freedom and liberty on the government's part.
 
"So, essentially corporate fascism is fine, the prospect of any government control is BAAAD"

I think you need to look up the definition of fascism before you continue to make yourself look stupid.
 
"Monopolies are never good for consumers"

So you are for breaking up our largest monopoly ever imagined? No wait, that IS the federal government so I guess you'll have to live with your inconsistency.
 
in all reality the entire public utilities system in the US is totally jacked.... there is no competition and therefore the consumers lose out..... we cannot pick, except for a couple places, who we buy electricity from, water from or really internet.... i have 2 options; 1 comcast, 1 ATT.... 2 companies that reley on a lack of competition to make $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

i am not sure if adding another thing to the FCC plate is good either....

but for people that think the FCC regulating things and giving the
"fenced in" argument have to think.... when your child is watching TV while you are in the other room, do you want pornography to be easily accessable? do you want R rated commercials played durring children programing..... how about word usage on shows?

I understand limiting how much the gov is involved in your life is essential to a concervative (not Christian, since people often confuse the two) and that is fine, but having the FCC control whether or not Comcast can cut off your access when ever they want to or limit your bandwidth even when you are paying for $$ is not necessarily a bad thing...... it could be, but it doesnt have to be....


I am tired of all this "damn the government, they cannot be trusted and they are all bastards" it gets tiring......
 
jsmiddleton4 said:
Just how do you suppose the government will enforce "neutrality" without censorship and where do you think the government will use as a gauge to define and determine what "neutral" looks like?

This is a dangerous move to our freedom and liberty on the government's part.
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What the hell does neutrality have to do with censorship? All it means is that all data placed on the network is treated equally. The ISPs and the big scary government don't even have to look at it to determine whether they carrier is being neutral or not. Note that there are similar requirements already in place in the telephone system and they seem to be working fine.

I don't get where this fear mongering is coming from. If you're afraid of censorship, you should be totally for net neutrality. Without it, the ISPs are free to censor as they see fit. One of the purposes of neutrality legislation is to make sure that doesn't happen.

We'll see what the FCC's proposal looks like, but from what they've said to date, I don't see how there's anything to complain about from the consumer side of things, though I expect ISPs to gripe to no end.
 
w1retap said:
Too bad we've already seen the federal government take more steps in that direction, taking over private companies and legislating themselves more & more power. Have you guys been asleep? Conscious? It's amazing some people don't even care about how much power they give to the government over everything used in or directly related to their every day lives. Continue being a sheep and be fenced in when they get the last side of the fence built.
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So you're saying our choices are get screwed by the corporations or get screwed by the government?
 
keenan said:
LOL, umm, no. Yes, ICANN is a US entity, but it's entirely separate from the government and has been since 1998. And really the Internet is just a bunch of networks hooked together, with ICANN mediating everything so nobody stomps on each other. It's very decentralized, and all of the actual infrastructure is owned by private companies. About the only role the US government had, even 11 years ago, was orchestrating it all so it would work, they've never really 'owned' anything.

But yes, the fearmongering in this thread is staggering. Monopolies are never good for consumers, and this industry has shown very clearly that it intends to abuse them even further.
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1998 eh?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/01/bush_net_policy/
 
Adidas4275 said:
but for people that think the FCC regulating things and giving the "fenced in" argument have to think.... when your child is watching TV while you are in the other room, do you want pornography to be easily accessable? do you want R rated commercials played durring children programing..... how about word usage on shows?

I'm sure most of you will disagree with me on this.. but yes I would like for nudity and violence and "filthy" language to be accessible to my child if I had one. If you want to rant about how tiring it is to hear people complaining about the government, I'll rant about how tiring it is that people are TOO DAMN RESTRICTIVE. It's beyond agitating to hear the human body as "forbidden fruit".. and for people to be so damned uptight about how much skin they see. I don't want my child being hidden from the REAL world.. you can only hide a kid in a cocoon for so long before they experience the real world anyways, why spend so much time and effort trying to hide it?

I am tired of all this "damn the government, they cannot be trusted and they are all bastards" it gets tiring......
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Maybe if the government showed any initiative to actually do something that represents the common good of their constituents.. people wouldn't be complaining about it so often.:rolleyes:

We have our soldiers out on some crusade to "liberate" a third world country from tyranny.. and yet our own elected leaders do nothing to represent the general public; Talk about irony.. let's not forget how many billions of dollars we've funneled into this crusade while our country has only become further and further in debt. Imagine all the other places that money could have been spent.. such as schooling or public works, or maybe even to pay off our colossal debts :)eek: OMG, that's such a crazy idea, pay off our debts instead of spending billions to "liberate" a broke country!!).

Just think about it this way.. the average FAMILY (mother, father and two kids) doesn't make one billion in their LIFETIMES. Meanwhile we've spent how many billions on some joke of a crusade?
 
"I hate these filthy neutrals, Kif. With enemies you know where they stand but with neutrals, who knows?"
 
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