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FCC Chairman Ajit Pai accused of cherry-picking data to repeal net neutrality
- shmerl 9y agoI'd say he doesn't operate with data at all. His claims that deregulating the anti-competitive ISP market helps innovation is some toxic Kool Aid. And politicians who repeat it with glee while voting for Pai are simply disgusting.
- hsod 9y agoNet neutrality was dead the moment Trump won the election. Pai was specifically chosen in order to repeal it. Public comments and hearings and reports are all theater. If we wanted Net Neutrality to stick around, we shouldn't have elected a President who openly opposes it (https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/532608358508167168?lang=en https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/53260835850816716...).
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- shmerl 9y agoReally, this shouldn't be even decided by the President. It should be the matter of law. The problem is that Congress is completely dysfunctional in this regard, so we shouldn't expect any improvement here. It's a very perverted situation, when policy on anti-trust is drafted by the executive branch.
- dgllghr 9y agoWhile Pai and the FCC will do whatever they can to repeal Net Neutrality, the FCC operates with well defined stipulations. Once the FCC repeals Net Neutrality, it will be sued. And when it is sued, the burden will be on the FCC to prove that they had good reason to repeal Net Neutrality. That is why these public comments are so important, not because of Pai's actions, but because of the court case that will follow. If the prosecutors can show that the FCC did not act within the best interest of consumers, there is a very good chance that Net Neutrality will remain law. Congressman Don Beyer did a very helpful town hall on the subject along with former Chairman Wheeler and former FCC General Counsel Jon Sallet: https://www.facebook.com/RepDonBeyer/videos/1940174359562352/ https://www.facebook.com/RepDonBeyer/videos/1940174359562352... (the video is long but very informative).
- shmerl 9y agoPai and his ISP masters know that. That probably was their plan all along. Get sued, then ask the Congress to pass a "law" that would "put the debate to rest", while not actually preventing any anti-competitive abuse because of all the holes in that law. Given current situation in the Congress you should expect that. The same Congress just voted for Pai.
- r00fus 9y agoGOP needs a solid defeat in 2018 or the Internet will become a lot more "comcastic".
- EGreg 9y agoThat's what they said in 2016 but fewer people turned out to vote against Donald Trump than against Romney or McCain. And also GOP picked up a lot of senate seats.
- shmerl 9y agoI think the only way to really prevent that is strong and disruptive competition that will spook all the current slumbering monopolists. Google Fiber pretended to aim at that, but now it slowed to a crawl (it did cause some good ripple effects). Will Starlink from SpaceX fix it? Who knows, but I have little expectation from the Congress to do anything of value about it. When was the last time they did something good about technology polices? DMCA-1201 and CFAA aren't repealed. There is no meaningful copyright reform on the horizon, and so on. Net Neutrality will be another victim of this dysfunction.
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- sova 9y agoNet Neutrality is part of Freedom of Speech and I will not waive my right so thoughtlessly simply because a different human sits behind a respected desk.
- knodi 9y agoWe didn't he and the GOP cheated their way in.
- craftyguy 9y agoIf it's any consolation, donald frequently contradicts himself.
- davesque 9y agoHonestly, I feel that the repeal of net neutrality protections is basically a foregone conclusion at this point. It's fairly clear that Pai has known what he plans to do all along and is perfectly willing to ignore and/or fabricate evidence. Update: To be clear, I'm not saying people shouldn't comment. I did, in fact, submit a comment (perhaps even two) during the comment period to the FCC arguing in favor of net neutrality rules.
- dwringer 9y agoThat's definitely what those in favor of repealing the protections want you to think. Silencing dissenters by creating the illusion that their voice means nothing is one of the oldest tricks in the book.
- davesque 9y agoWhat's your suggestion then?
- convolvatron 9y ago..maybe their voice doesn't actually mean anything?
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- acomjean 9y agoChairman Pai was just approved to his 5 year term by the US senate this week sadly. It retroactive so he's got 4 years left. The party that holds the presidency chooses 3 of the five FCC members, but they still need to be approved. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/ajit-pai-gets-new-term-on-fcc-despite-protest-of-anti-net-neutrality-plan/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/ajit-pai-gets-ne...
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- tehwebguy 9y agoThis might be the worst thing he's done so far, but it's not even the stupidest thing he's done this week. Five days ago he put out a statement congratulating himself for demanding that Tim Cook turn on an imaginary iPhone radio to help the people of Puerto Rico.
- acdha 9y agoThat’s less far-fetched than it sounds when you know that the iPhone did have FM tuners in the hardware for every model prior to the iPhone 7, which removed the headphones used as an antenna, and groups like http://freeradioonmyphone.org/ http://freeradioonmyphone.org/ have been trying to get the FCC to mandate opening up hardware access for many years.
- tehwebguy 9y agoThat entire organization appears to be built on a misconception. This is the most detailed description I can find: > I’ve dug around, and what I’ve been told is that there is an FM radio chip in older iPhones, but it’s not connected, and there’s no antenna designed for FM radio. The chip is just part of a commodity component part, and Apple only connected the parts of the chip that the iPhones were designed to use. No iPhone was ever designed to be an FM radio, and there is no “switch” that can be “flipped” — nor software update that could be issued — that could turn them into one. It’s a complete technical misconception. https://daringfireball.net/linked/2017/09/28/fcc-fm-iphones https://daringfireball.net/linked/2017/09/28/fcc-fm-iphones
- acdha 9y agoYeah, I’m definitely not endorsing them, only noting that this isn’t a new issue Pai came up with recently. Gruber’s theory certainly sounds plausible and I’d assume that if this was doable in software one of the jail breaking teams would have done it by now since that community loves to find cases where they remove Apple’s limitations.
- betterunix2 9y agoThis is hardly news; I pointed out as much in the comment I submitted a few months back. The fact is that Ajit Pai had decided to repeal net neutrality and only accepted public comment because the law requires him to do so. His NPRM is riddled with half-truths and outright falsehoods; cherry-picked examples; and false dichotomies. The commentary he sought was a litany of leading questions meant to support his decision to end net neutrality (ironically, some of the questions did not even accomplish that despite clearly being intended to do so, likely because his decision making process never involved a serious effort to understand the technical details of the Internet).
- nnfy 9y agoAm I the only one bothered by the reclassification of ISPs as telecommunications companies? For this reason, net neutrality drastically expands the reach of the federal government, and opens up the internet to legal regulations drafted decades before the internet was even an idea.
- notfcctool 9y agoNope, you’re totally not the only idiot. Obviously, since Ajit Pai was reconfirmed.
- nnfy 9y agoWow, excuse me for trying to have an objective discussion and consider the possible downsides of this legislation. Perhaps you'd care to explain why you think my comment justifies being called an idiot? Edit: do you really want to give the Trump administration the power to decide what is and is not neutral content delivery? This is the kind of consequence I am attempting to discuss.
- jackmott 9y agohttps://i.redditmedia.com/eL7_BFQW3XfTroeyzv9KqX8CaaWStPn-xjKF44qqHxY.jpg?w=640&s=06730847a9dc89a85e76754f5ed8693a https://i.redditmedia.com/eL7_BFQW3XfTroeyzv9KqX8CaaWStPn-xj...
- nnfy 9y agoAre you familiar with the concept of regulatory capture and how expanding the laws of a government which has been captured destroys competition, creates artificial barriers to market entry, and enables dangerous abuse of power? Do you really want a guy like Pai to have his powers expanded? Why won't anyone actually answer any of my questions? Especially if the answers are so obvious. Try starting an ISP, or go read about how it is nearly impossible to enter the market and compete with the likes of Comcast et all because of regulations. These are companies with ~50% approval ratings, ripe for disruption, and we are stuck with them because of regulations. The principle of net neutrality makes sense, but I have yet to see anyone attempt to convince me that there isn't some danger to at least consider in this implementation.
- thewhitetulip 9y agoThis is one incidence where I feel proud that India is better than the US. FB tried bribing its way into India for their Free Basics which was kicked off by the TRAI. At least we have that level of institutions.
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