4 ms·

I don't know, the Internet got on fine without those rules for a lot longer than we've had those rules, I feel like the gloom-and-doom over this is highly overs

by cwyers 9y ago

I don't know, the Internet got on fine without those rules for a lot longer than we've had those rules, I feel like the gloom-and-doom over this is highly overstated.

MentallyRetired 9y ago
I mean... http://www.iflscience.com/technology/country-net-neutrality/ http://www.iflscience.com/technology/country-net-neutrality/
tclancy 9y ago
There wasn't money to be made for most of that time. Once there was and utilities discovered they wouldn't get much of it and started to mess about, rules were introduced.
- xienze 9y ago
  No money to be made in say, 2005-2015?
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    The FCC adopted the “Network Freedoms” principles and initiated it's first case-by-case action regarding neutrality (the Madison River case over blocking access to Vonage which was settled with a agreement to stop doing that and pay a fine) in 2004-2005. It continued case-by-case enforcement of the principles until the 2010 D.C. Circuit decision in Comcast v. FCC stopped that. The 2010 and 2015 Open Internet orders were a replacement for case-by-case enforcement.
mtgx 9y ago
It's not overrated. Comcast and Verizon were already caught drastically slowing down Netflix and Youtube the last time around, before the net neutrality rules passed, until those companies "paid up". Netflix and Youtube are probably safe from such actions now, but what about the much smaller services that try to compete with Youtube or Netflix, or podcast platforms, and so on? Also this recently happened in Portugal, where technically there are some net neutrality rules now, but the current Commission canceled the previous Commission/Neelie Kroes' proposal to ban zero-rating. And since that meant they were allowed to do this sort of stuff, they went right ahead and did it: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DNGlrABUIAAr9RO.jpg:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DNGlrABUIAAr9RO.jpg:large This is way more likely to happen in the U.S., where internet companies have local monopolies.
- Pilfer 9y ago
  >Comcast and Verizon were already caught drastically slowing down Netflix and Youtube Actually no, all three incidents you mentioned (Netflix being slow on Comcast, Netflix being slow on Verizon, Youtube being slow on Comcast) were caused by peering issues. These are not net neutrality issues, contrary to Netflix's massive PR campaign to convince you otherwise. The actual issue was Netflix opted not to peer with Comcast/Verizon, and instead funneled all their traffic through Cogent and Level 3.
  - cwyers 9y ago
    And Netflix refused to do peering the way everyone else has done peering on the Internet because they wanted to pressure ISPs into installing and maintaining OpenConnect boxes on their own dime. Netflix has been an incredibly poor actor in this whole saga.
- 0xfeba 9y ago
  That image is from a cell data provider, for paying a monthly fee for zero-rating those specific services. Not quite the same.
dragonwriter 9y ago
The rules (both the current ones and the prior effort that was struck down) were adopted in responses to changes of behavior by ISPs from their historical, basically neutral, behavior which the FCC first tried and failed to address by lighter-touch, case-by-case action. The Comcast BitTorrent-blocking case is perhaps the best known of the early cases.
make3 9y ago
the times were extremely different, and the rules can't hurt
- cwyers 9y ago
  The times were three years ago.
  - orthecreedence 9y ago
    The internet got on fine because there was a somewhat unspoken (but generally followed) rule that ISPs are neutral carriers. In the last 5 years or so, ISPs have started overstepping these bounds to attempt to squeeze profit out of their customers. Net Neutrality is a response to that overstepping. If the ISPs had just continued making ridiculous amounts of profit without upsetting the balance this never would have happened.
nafizh 9y ago
It's like saying why do we need Environment protection laws, the world survived for 13 billion years. Well, duh, 'things' have changed.
rsynnott 9y ago
Partially because ISPs were afraid that pushing their luck too much would result in rules like this coming in. Removing the rules gives a blessing for bad ISP behaviour in a way that mere absence of the rules did not.
0xfeba 9y ago
And it's been continuing just fine with them now, right?

by cwyers 9y ago

I don't know, the Internet got on fine without those rules for a lot longer than we've had those rules, I feel like the gloom-and-doom over this is highly overstated.

MentallyRetired 9y ago

I mean... http://www.iflscience.com/technology/country-net-neutrality/ http://www.iflscience.com/technology/country-net-neutrality/

tclancy 9y ago

There wasn't money to be made for most of that time. Once there was and utilities discovered they wouldn't get much of it and started to mess about, rules were introduced.

xienze 9y ago
No money to be made in say, 2005-2015?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  The FCC adopted the “Network Freedoms” principles and initiated it's first case-by-case action regarding neutrality (the Madison River case over blocking access to Vonage which was settled with a agreement to stop doing that and pay a fine) in 2004-2005. It continued case-by-case enforcement of the principles until the 2010 D.C. Circuit decision in Comcast v. FCC stopped that. The 2010 and 2015 Open Internet orders were a replacement for case-by-case enforcement.

mtgx 9y ago

It's not overrated. Comcast and Verizon were already caught drastically slowing down Netflix and Youtube the last time around, before the net neutrality rules passed, until those companies "paid up". Netflix and Youtube are probably safe from such actions now, but what about the much smaller services that try to compete with Youtube or Netflix, or podcast platforms, and so on? Also this recently happened in Portugal, where technically there are some net neutrality rules now, but the current Commission canceled the previous Commission/Neelie Kroes' proposal to ban zero-rating. And since that meant they were allowed to do this sort of stuff, they went right ahead and did it: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DNGlrABUIAAr9RO.jpg:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DNGlrABUIAAr9RO.jpg:large This is way more likely to happen in the U.S., where internet companies have local monopolies.

Pilfer 9y ago
>Comcast and Verizon were already caught drastically slowing down Netflix and Youtube Actually no, all three incidents you mentioned (Netflix being slow on Comcast, Netflix being slow on Verizon, Youtube being slow on Comcast) were caused by peering issues. These are not net neutrality issues, contrary to Netflix's massive PR campaign to convince you otherwise. The actual issue was Netflix opted not to peer with Comcast/Verizon, and instead funneled all their traffic through Cogent and Level 3.
- cwyers 9y ago
  And Netflix refused to do peering the way everyone else has done peering on the Internet because they wanted to pressure ISPs into installing and maintaining OpenConnect boxes on their own dime. Netflix has been an incredibly poor actor in this whole saga.
0xfeba 9y ago
That image is from a cell data provider, for paying a monthly fee for zero-rating those specific services. Not quite the same.

dragonwriter 9y ago

The rules (both the current ones and the prior effort that was struck down) were adopted in responses to changes of behavior by ISPs from their historical, basically neutral, behavior which the FCC first tried and failed to address by lighter-touch, case-by-case action. The Comcast BitTorrent-blocking case is perhaps the best known of the early cases.

make3 9y ago

the times were extremely different, and the rules can't hurt

cwyers 9y ago
The times were three years ago.
- orthecreedence 9y ago
  The internet got on fine because there was a somewhat unspoken (but generally followed) rule that ISPs are neutral carriers. In the last 5 years or so, ISPs have started overstepping these bounds to attempt to squeeze profit out of their customers. Net Neutrality is a response to that overstepping. If the ISPs had just continued making ridiculous amounts of profit without upsetting the balance this never would have happened.

nafizh 9y ago

It's like saying why do we need Environment protection laws, the world survived for 13 billion years. Well, duh, 'things' have changed.

rsynnott 9y ago

Partially because ISPs were afraid that pushing their luck too much would result in rules like this coming in. Removing the rules gives a blessing for bad ISP behaviour in a way that mere absence of the rules did not.

0xfeba 9y ago

And it's been continuing just fine with them now, right?