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Grandalf, Thanks for this. I completely disagree with your conclusions, but this discussion is one of many public policy discussions where it's not a clear-cut

Grandalf, Thanks for this. I completely disagree with your conclusions, but this discussion is one of many public policy discussions where it's not a clear-cut thing. Having good arguments on both sides is the only way voters can stay educated and able to deal with proposed changes. I'm not going to go into a rebuttal in-depth. In general I feel there are many areas where regulation is not needed -- but market/product definition is. It's far too easy for companies to create such a complex market that buyers don't know exactly what they're purchasing -- and don't have time to research all of it. Insurance is like this. We don't need ISPs heading down this same route. It's not in the interests of a free and open market. Good stuff, though. Thanks.

grandalf 10y ago
Thanks! I think the Internet is one thing that has thrived in the absence of regulation, largely because of the absence of top-down control. I'd be curious what unwanted scenarios you view as the most likely to occur in the absence of net neutrality. In thinking about it a bit more, it would seem that unless VPN access were banned, users could work around nearly any port/protocol oriented non-neutrality simply by using a VPN. But this also creates problems, because an ISP that prioritized all VPN traffic equal to known low-latency traffic would need much more bandwidth headroom to prevent degradation of service. I think net neutrality is a very interesting issue, and argue against it largely to play devil's advocate, but also because this is a case where many of us have concrete experience and detailed knowledge of the thing being regulated, and so it is fun to attempt to argue against it based on technical points. It would seem that if we're truly interested in a neutral internet we would also require upstream providers to purchase some percentage of extra "headroom" bandwidth, just as we require banks and insurance companies to hold reserve/underwriting capital.

grandalf 10y ago

Thanks! I think the Internet is one thing that has thrived in the absence of regulation, largely because of the absence of top-down control. I'd be curious what unwanted scenarios you view as the most likely to occur in the absence of net neutrality. In thinking about it a bit more, it would seem that unless VPN access were banned, users could work around nearly any port/protocol oriented non-neutrality simply by using a VPN. But this also creates problems, because an ISP that prioritized all VPN traffic equal to known low-latency traffic would need much more bandwidth headroom to prevent degradation of service. I think net neutrality is a very interesting issue, and argue against it largely to play devil's advocate, but also because this is a case where many of us have concrete experience and detailed knowledge of the thing being regulated, and so it is fun to attempt to argue against it based on technical points. It would seem that if we're truly interested in a neutral internet we would also require upstream providers to purchase some percentage of extra "headroom" bandwidth, just as we require banks and insurance companies to hold reserve/underwriting capital.