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FCC set to back Internet traffic rules

The real target, or at least one of them speaks out over this horrible display of unAmerican government from within.





j-mac


Rush doesn't seem to understand at all what net neutrality is.

I mean literally no ****ing idea what he's talking about.

Rush is literally arguing in favor of censorship, and he doesn't even know it.
 
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Moderator's Warning:
This thread is not about Amy Goodman. Stick to the topic of this thread.

Thank you!

I'm trying to learn something here. It's hard enough trying to weed through the details of the OP itself. It's worse when BS posts start to hijack the thread.

Thanks for brining the topic back around! Much appreciated... :mrgreen:

The real issue here should be where does the FCC get the authority to regulate or make Internet policy. Sure you can point to the Telecomm Act 1996 where Congress invested the Commission with authority, but a tool such as the Internet is outside the realms of even the Federal government.

Have you looked at the bottom of your modem? Router? Your cable converter box? How about the coaxial cable or the cabling from your modem/router that plugs into your wall jack? Notice the "FCC" label on your modem, router, cable box or the package your cables came in?

Internet access is made via telephone and/or cable lines or radio signals (wireless services or satelite) which the FCC regulates. The World Wide Web/Internet may be an "open" information source, but you still have to gain access to it via traditional "wired" telecommunications services or radio telecommunications frequencies both of which are managed (regulated) by the FCC.

'Nuff said on that front. Now, back to this net-neutrality issue...

From what I'm learning on this net neutrality issue, it looks like it's more of a win for ISPs and a loss for consumers. (Do I atleast have the aspect right?)

Zyphlin, you once again have the floor. :mrgreen:
 
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From what I'm learning on this net neutrality issue, it looks like it's more of a win for ISPs and a loss for consumers. (Do I atleast have the aspect right?)

Zyphlin, you once again have the floor. :mrgreen:

Absolutely correct. It lets telcoms plant toll booths on the internet wherever they want. They can charge you an additional fee for getting 10GB of data from Netflix instead of 10GB from their own video service. They can charge you an additional fee for going to foxnews.com instead of msnbc.com. They can charge you an additional fee for going to walmart.com instead of bestbuy.com.

With net neutrality in place, 10GB of data is 10GB of data, regardless of where it comes from, so they can only charge you for 10GB of data. (if you pay for unlimited data, you get unlimited data)

Net neutrality does not guarantee that "the little minorities get equally heard," despite what Limbaugh says. He's an idiot who thinks radio and the internet are somehow comparable in this situation.
 
Source? Not sure what you are referring to here.

PolitiFact | Cass Sunstein once considered a "Fairness Doctrine" of sorts for the Internet, but then thought better of it

Cass Sunstein, Obama's Regulatory Czar wanted a "Fairness Doctrine" for the internet where he suggested the idea of the government requiring sites to link to opposing views. He later pulled this from his re-work of the book because it would be "too difficult to regulate" and "almost certainly unconstitutional". Almost certainly? How about most definitely. I could go on and on about Cass Sunstein, but that's for a different thread.

Sure, he no longer feels this way, or does he? I am a huge supporter of repealing the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution. I realize that in all likelihood it will never happen, but my belief in what our founders wanted and how the 17th Amendment goes vehemently against that hasn't and will never change. I'm not going to stop supporting the repeal because it would be "too difficult to accomplish". The fact that Sunstein stated openly that he believed government should require sites to link to opposing views should trouble everyone.
 
Great. More government intervention on behalf of the big corporations and at the expense of the People. I suppose it is no surprise in the end; but at some point I think government shouldn't work so much just for the corporations and aristocracy it protects; but rather on a general principle of what it was allowed to do and regulate.
 
PolitiFact | Cass Sunstein once considered a "Fairness Doctrine" of sorts for the Internet, but then thought better of it

Cass Sunstein, Obama's Regulatory Czar wanted a "Fairness Doctrine" for the internet where he suggested the idea of the government requiring sites to link to opposing views. He later pulled this from his re-work of the book because it would be "too difficult to regulate" and "almost certainly unconstitutional". Almost certainly? How about most definitely. I could go on and on about Cass Sunstein, but that's for a different thread.

Sure, he no longer feels this way, or does he? I am a huge supporter of repealing the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution. I realize that in all likelihood it will never happen, but my belief in what our founders wanted and how the 17th Amendment goes vehemently against that hasn't and will never change. I'm not going to stop supporting the repeal because it would be "too difficult to accomplish". The fact that Sunstein stated openly that he believed government should require sites to link to opposing views should trouble everyone.

The fairness doctrine is not net neutrality, despite what Limbaugh will tell you, so this is getting off on a tangent.
The only people in favor of this ruling are telcoms.

edit: Also, why are you in favor of taking power away from the people?
 
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The fairness doctrine is not net neutrality, despite what Limbaugh will tell you, so this is getting off on a tangent.
The only people in favor of this ruling are telcoms.

edit: Also, why are you in favor of taking power away from the people?

Deuce, Redress and I are having a conversation and I don't listen to Limbaugh. Any time the federal government decides to "regulate" something, it is taking power away from the people. Maybe you should let the adults converse while you go play in the backyard with the other little boys and girls.
 
PolitiFact | Cass Sunstein once considered a "Fairness Doctrine" of sorts for the Internet, but then thought better of it

Cass Sunstein, Obama's Regulatory Czar wanted a "Fairness Doctrine" for the internet where he suggested the idea of the government requiring sites to link to opposing views. He later pulled this from his re-work of the book because it would be "too difficult to regulate" and "almost certainly unconstitutional". Almost certainly? How about most definitely. I could go on and on about Cass Sunstein, but that's for a different thread.

Sure, he no longer feels this way, or does he? I am a huge supporter of repealing the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution. I realize that in all likelihood it will never happen, but my belief in what our founders wanted and how the 17th Amendment goes vehemently against that hasn't and will never change. I'm not going to stop supporting the repeal because it would be "too difficult to accomplish". The fact that Sunstein stated openly that he believed government should require sites to link to opposing views should trouble everyone.

I would absolutely oppose any kind of "fairness doctrine" internet or not. It is to my mind absolutely unconstitutional.
 
PolitiFact | Cass Sunstein once considered a "Fairness Doctrine" of sorts for the Internet, but then thought better of it

Cass Sunstein, Obama's Regulatory Czar wanted a "Fairness Doctrine" for the internet where he suggested the idea of the government requiring sites to link to opposing views. He later pulled this from his re-work of the book because it would be "too difficult to regulate" and "almost certainly unconstitutional". Almost certainly? How about most definitely. I could go on and on about Cass Sunstein, but that's for a different thread.

Sure, he no longer feels this way, or does he? I am a huge supporter of repealing the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution. I realize that in all likelihood it will never happen, but my belief in what our founders wanted and how the 17th Amendment goes vehemently against that hasn't and will never change. I'm not going to stop supporting the repeal because it would be "too difficult to accomplish". The fact that Sunstein stated openly that he believed government should require sites to link to opposing views should trouble everyone.

This man is not to be trusted when it comes to freedom of speech.
Heading to Oxford Univ. for Forum on “Child Protection, Free Speech and the Internet”

argues that unrestrained individual choice is dangerous and must be checked or countered in the interests of “citizenship” and “democracy.” In his own words: “A system of limitless individual choices, with respect to communications, is not necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government.
Sunstein’s argument is highly elitist. To Sunstein, the Internet is apparently guilty of the unspeakable crime of offering citizens and consumers too much of exactly what they want! But, according to his logic, the masses just don’t know what’s good for them so they must be aggressively encouraged (and potentially forced) to listen to things that others — namely, Sunstein — want them to hear.
 
Deuce, Redress and I are having a conversation and I don't listen to Limbaugh. Any time the federal government decides to "regulate" something, it is taking power away from the people. Maybe you should let the adults converse while you go play in the backyard with the other little boys and girls.

The issue however with this...which Deuce is right, is nothing like the fairness doctrine...is that its the government taking power away from the people which created, in part, the scenario we have now. The government did a half-ass job with regards to telecoms, which leaves us in a position where the telecoms have a pseudo-monopoly granted by the government. So the only two options is remove that pseudo-monopoly protection or actually regulate to some point the monoploy's you've created. Sadly, if we're dealing with reality...which, since you point out "adults" are talking, is what adults need to actuall deal with...the reality is its highly unlikely that they're going to break up the telecom's monopolies anytime soon. Which leaves us with either the choice of the monopolies screwing us (which they've given indication they very much want to) or giving the government FURTHER regulatory power that may screw us (as history tells us).

For me, I'll take the chance over the near guarantee.

i think the best bet would be very, very simple net neutrality rules stating that the speed one accesses data may be tiered and decided as a broad package, however that access to various sites or services must all be charged equally and given connection speeds. Essentially, as was stated above, that 1 MB of data is 1 MB of a data regardless of where it comes from and can not be treated differently...be it due to speed, or due to price...based on what that 1 MB is.

The only similarity really between the fairness doctrine and the topic of this thread is the fact they both are references to regulation of communication. Beyond that though there is little if any true similarities between the two.
 
i think the best bet would be very, very simple net neutrality rules stating that the speed one accesses data may be tiered and decided as a broad package, however that access to various sites or services must all be charged equally and given connection speeds. Essentially, as was stated above, that 1 MB of data is 1 MB of a data regardless of where it comes from and can not be treated differently...be it due to speed, or due to price...based on what that 1 MB is.
It seems the likely outcome of such a regulation is a slower internet and/or higher costs for everybody.

No longer are companies able to block access to P2P connections or restrict the rates of streaming media -- which is what constitutes the vast majority of internet traffic now, and will only eat greater shares of traffic in the future. Removing stopgaps will most certainly increase the demand for bandwidth -- if my file sharing and streaming is fast, I'm going to use it more.

Thus, we've got much greater demand for bandwidth, which to an evil service provider like Comcast, means slower service. No doubt people will complain when they're consistently receiving only a fraction of the 12MBps service they've paid for -- which means Comcast will need to pay for more "pipes" (and pass the cost to the consumer) or increase the costs of their tiers.
 
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Hey, here's an idea -- simply switch to some "pay as you go" model like you have on cell phones. The first XX Megabytes are free, susequent usage becomes more and more expensive. P2P becomes quite costly. So does streaming.

Hmm... suddenly Netflix and Amazon aren't too threatening anymore.
 
Wait...Amazon is one of the big bandwidth hogs now?

Learn something new every day. Is it because of Kindle?
 
Hey, here's an idea -- simply switch to some "pay as you go" model like you have on cell phones. The first XX Megabytes are free, susequent usage becomes more and more expensive. P2P becomes quite costly. So does streaming.

Hmm... suddenly Netflix and Amazon aren't too threatening anymore.

Couple problems with this:
-The market quickly decided that pay-as-you-go was incredibly unpopular. Once companies started offering unlimited services, people flocked to that.
-Also, the web is now incredibly different than it used to be. People don't have an easy method of knowing or projecting how much bandwidth they're going to use. Websites have tons of content on them now, you even see advertisements with small videos embedded in websites now. People aren't going to like being charged extra to watch advertisements.
-Volume of data transfer is less important than rate of transfer, as far as infrastructure goes.

Wait...Amazon is one of the big bandwidth hogs now?

Learn something new every day. Is it because of Kindle?

Amazon does video on demand services.
 
It seems the likely outcome of such a regulation is a slower internet and/or higher costs for everybody.

Quite possibly. Or more companies do what Verizon is doing and actually fulfilling their end of the bargain for using the pipes that WE pretty much paid for, and that was investing in next gen connection technology allowing for better bandwidth.

No longer are companies able to block access to P2P connections or restrict the rates of streaming media -- which is what constitutes the vast majority of internet traffic now, and will only eat greater shares of traffic in the future. Removing stopgaps will most certainly increase the demand for bandwidth -- if my file sharing and streaming is fast, I'm going to use it more.

As you should. Why the hell would I want to pay for 25 MBps speed if all I'm doing is browsing a text based forum or checking email. I'm paying for the higher speeds so I can play games, watch videos, and download items.

Thus, we've got much greater demand for bandwidth, which to an evil service provider like Comcast, means slower service. No doubt people will complain when they're consistently receiving only a fraction of the 12MBps service they've paid for -- which means Comcast will need to pay for more "pipes" (and pass the cost to the consumer) or increase the costs of their tiers.

Which is sadly still better than the alternative, and is a situation coming about because Comcast and others like them have taken the "pipes" that WE largely helped subsidize for granted, raking in higher and higher profits without reinvesting into next gen technology and better "pipes".

Or, what's more likely...other companies will realize the success Verizon has had going to fiber and possibly actually finally start investing their money to follow suit.

Those pipes aren't theirs, not solely, and they're easily as largely responsible for the congestion as individual users are for never taking the time, energy, and resources to reinvest into better pipes. If not for regulation we, the consumers, would get screwed anyways because they ****ed up and wouldn't have to deal with their ****up
 
I admit, I'm worried. I was just listening to Fox's straight news. (no mention of Glenn Beck) they were talking about how 300 congressmen were against this They also mentioned George Soros, Bill Moyers, McChesney, Free Press
The talked about how the internet is not broke and they don't know how or why the FCC was able to push this thing forward. And that it will take 2 yrs now to take it to the SCOTUS and get it overturned.
I then found this where Glenn Beck was warning us of this back in April. He also talks about McChesney, and quotes from this guy are pretty scary.


'Glenn Beck': Net Neutrality Pits Free Speech Against Free Press - Glenn Beck - FOXNews.com

Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean the Marxist isn't after my internet.
 
I'm waiting for the information to come out that shows this to be nothing but backdoor censorship of the internet. It's only a matter of time.
 
I admit, I'm worried. I was just listening to Fox's straight news. (no mention of Glenn Beck) they were talking about how 300 congressmen were against this They also mentioned George Soros, Bill Moyers, McChesney, Free Press
The talked about how the internet is not broke and they don't know how or why the FCC was able to push this thing forward. And that it will take 2 yrs now to take it to the SCOTUS and get it overturned.
I then found this where Glenn Beck was warning us of this back in April. He also talks about McChesney, and quotes from this guy are pretty scary.


'Glenn Beck': Net Neutrality Pits Free Speech Against Free Press - Glenn Beck - FOXNews.com

Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean the Marxist isn't after my internet.

I've often laughed at, derided, and despised Beck fans, but this is the first time that I've actually pitied them. He's waving his arms about how they are trying to steal your puppy, but while you're watching him do that his corporate sponsors are actually walking away with your puppy.

This FCC ruling isn't creating Net Neutrality, it's destroying it. Net Neutrality is EXACTLY what you want if your goal is real freedom of speech and real freedom of the press. Imagine this scenario, because it's literally a legal possibility after this ruling:

Your internet provider as part of its basic package gives you the normal high-speed connection to specific websites. Websites that have paid them off sufficiently. Foxnews.com, however, hasn't worked out this deal with your provider, so you can only access their website at 56k speeds. Not to fret, Barbbtx, you can access msnbc.com at full speed as part of the package! For a mere $5/month extra, you can access our deluxe news package, which gives you CNN, Fox News, AP, HuffPo, the Washington Times, and the NYT, all at full speed! Like netflix? For only $10/month, you can get your netflix streaming uncapped so that you can actually watch their content. Hey, our video streaming service is only $5/month! Wouldn't you rather subscribe to that?

This ruling isn't government taking power over the internet, it's the government handing that power over to ISPs who have a near-monopoly on services. Using infrastructure, by the way, that you the taxpayer paid for. Net neutrality isn't talked about much because you essentially have it right now. This thing that isn't broken? That's net neutrality. That's being taken away from you under the guise of protecting it.

You're letting your hatred for socialists cloud your judgment. A socialist said he's for it, therefore it must be bad. That may usually work for you, but this time the socialist is literally arguing in favor of free speech, but you've sided against him because he's a socialist.
 
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I've often laughed at, derided, and despised Beck fans, but this is the first time that I've actually pitied them. He's waving his arms about how they are trying to steal your puppy, but while you're watching him do that his corporate sponsors are actually walking away with your puppy.

This FCC ruling isn't creating Net Neutrality, it's destroying it. Net Neutrality is EXACTLY what you want if your goal is real freedom of speech and real freedom of the press. Imagine this scenario, because it's literally a legal possibility after this ruling:

Your internet provider as part of its basic package gives you the normal high-speed connection to specific websites. Websites that have paid them off sufficiently. Foxnews.com, however, hasn't worked out this deal with your provider, so you can only access their website at 56k speeds. Not to fret, Barbbtx, you can access msnbc.com at full speed as part of the package! For a mere $5/month extra, you can access our deluxe news package, which gives you CNN, Fox News, AP, HuffPo, the Washington Times, and the NYT, all at full speed! Like netflix? For only $10/month, you can get your netflix streaming uncapped so that you can actually watch their content. Hey, our video streaming service is only $5/month! Wouldn't you rather subscribe to that?

This ruling isn't government taking power over the internet, it's the government handing that power over to ISPs who have a near-monopoly on services. Using infrastructure, by the way, that you the taxpayer paid for. Net neutrality isn't talked about much because you essentially have it right now. This thing that isn't broken? That's net neutrality. That's being taken away from you under the guise of protecting it.

You're letting your hatred for socialists cloud your judgment. A socialist said he's for it, therefore it must be bad. That may usually work for you, but this time the socialist is literally arguing in favor of free speech, but you've sided against him because he's a socialist.


This is nearly a 180 degrees separated from what two FCC commissioners said.

Nothing is broken that needs fixing, however. The Internet has been open and freedom-enhancing since it was spun off from a government research project in the early 1990s. Its nature as a diffuse and dynamic global network of networks defies top-down authority. Ample laws to protect consumers already exist. Furthermore, the Obama Justice Department and the European Commission both decided this year that net-neutrality regulation was unnecessary and might deter investment in next-generation Internet technology and infrastructure.

Analysts and broadband companies of all sizes have told the FCC that new rules are likely to have the perverse effect of inhibiting capital investment, deterring innovation, raising operating costs, and ultimately increasing consumer prices. Others maintain that the new rules will kill jobs. By moving forward with Internet rules anyway, the FCC is not living up to its promise of being "data driven" in its pursuit of mandates—i.e., listening to the needs of the market.


It wasn't long ago that bipartisan and international consensus centered on insulating the Internet from regulation. This policy was a bright hallmark of the Clinton administration, which oversaw the Internet's privatization. Over time, however, the call for more Internet regulation became imbedded into a 2008 presidential campaign promise by then-Sen. Barack Obama. So here we are.

Robert M. McDowell: The FCC's Threat to Internet Freedom - WSJ.com

BRIAN SULLIVAN, GUEST HOST: Republican lawmakers vowing to fight what they are calling a job killer today. In a partisan vote, right along party lines, the Federal Communications Commission approving new Internet regulations. My next guest one of the two commissioners who voted against the move, fearing what it might bring next.

Robert McDowell with the FCC joining us now.

Mr. McDowell, thank you very much for joining us.

There is a concern that this new rule will allow service providers, Comcast, Verizon, whoever it might be, to charge what they want. Do you believe that Internet bills are going to go up?

ROBERT MCDOWELL, COMMISSIONER, FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION: nbsp; Well, what this does, actually, for the first time ever, it injects the government into these types of decision. It injects the government into Internet regulation.

And the perverse effect could be higher rates for consumers. It could be less investment. It could be less innovation in the Internet space. There is nothing broken in the Internet space. The government doesn’t need to be doing this.

And the unintended consequences and costs are really at risk here.

SULLIVAN: So, why is the FCC getting involved at all? And you clearly view it as an overstepping of FCC authority. Tell us more on why.

MCDOWELL: Right. Commissioner Baker and I both dissented. First of all, the FCC is defying a court and defying a large bipartisan majority of Congress. When was the last time you heard those words strung together, where there was a large bipartisan majority of Congress agreeing on something?

And the FCC is also defying a court order from April, this past April 6, at the D.C. Court of Appeals here, the federal court in Washington, D.C.

So, this is going to put the FCC on a collision course with Congress and the courts. And it’s going to cause years of litigation and create a lot of uncertainty in the broadband market and the Internet market in general, where there was no uncertainty before.

SULLIVAN: Some say, though, there are positives, right, that you cannot now block access, that there is equal Web access, and that it is basically an extension of free speech even more on the Internet. Are their upsides to this rule?

MCDOWELL: Actually, there really aren’t.

First of all, the Internet is open and freedom-enhancing, has been since it was privatized in 1994. And it’s become that way under current law, under the current bipartisan and international consensus that governments should keep their hands off of the Internet -- current until today, that is. So, that’s number one.

Number two; there are ample laws on the books that protect consumers, antitrust laws, consumer protection laws, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice. Both are really quite well-equipped to protect consumers, should a broadband provider act in an anti-competitive way.

So, there’s nothing to broken to be fixed. This is unnecessary. Laws already are on the books that protect consumers. And there are going to be really some adverse unintended consequences here.

FCC Approves Plan to Regulate Internet - FoxNews.com

this is little more than a naked power grab that was struck down by the courts 8 months ago, and will be again.


j-mac
 
This is nearly a 180 degrees separated from what two FCC commissioners said.

You highlight a large bipartisan majority and then go around talking about how liberals support this.

Net Neutrality: Good for business, good for free speech, good for the consumer
This ruling: Good for certain telcoms, bad for free speech, bad for the consumer.




this is little more than a naked power grab that was struck down by the courts 8 months ago, and will be again.


j-mac

I should ****ing hope so.

It's a money grab by certain ISPs, not a power grab by SCARY GOVERNMENT.
 
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You highlight a large bipartisan majority and then go around talking about how liberals support this.

Net Neutrality: Good for business, good for free speech, good for the consumer
This ruling: Good for certain telcoms, bad for free speech, bad for the consumer.






I should ****ing hope so.

It's a money grab by certain ISPs, not a power grab by SCARY GOVERNMENT.


Sorry, but the FCC doesn't make law, and I don't want them to. I am for smaller government, you on the other hand clearly are not.


j-mac
 
Sorry, but the FCC doesn't make law, and I don't want them to. I am for smaller government, you on the other hand clearly are not.


j-mac

So we're just ignoring the part where I said I hope the ruling gets overturned, then. How does one argue against a position that somehow manages to perceive the opposite of reality?

Net neutrality protects your freedom of choice and freedom of speech. Period. If that's your idea of "big government," then I suppose I favor big government.
 
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