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The Senate has forced a vote to restore net neutrality
- WheelsAtLarge 8y agoWishful thinking, the president would not sign the bill and there's not a supermajority in the Senate and the house to overrule him. This is going nowhere.
- Rapzid 8y agoTo Trump's credit, I believe he would sign the bill. He mostly cares about winning and looking good. Also, he gives people what they want. If both houses pass the bill; "You wanted net neutrality? We now have the best net neutrality in the history of the internet. We rolled back Obama's sick and dying internet, Obama killed the internet did you know that folks?, and now we have the best most free internet EVER. Period." We may actually have the opposite problem; Trump may not veto anything that comes across his desk.
- kmkemp 8y agoWhat? He is literally the person who appointed the guy who made this happen. While Trump is erratic, so no one can rule out a complete 180 at any moment, to say that is "to his credit" is ridiculous.
- craftyguy 8y agoI get your point, but he is also the guy to fire multiple people in his cabinet for arbitrary/popularity reasons, so don't put it past him to throw ajit under the bus because it would make him 'look good'
- Rapzid 8y agoExactly. He is fine with seeing if ideas or people will float or sink; it's his modus operandi. Plus, Trump is a master at walking stuff back and saving face with his party and base. Net neutrality comes back? Well it's Trump net neutrality now, way better than broken Obama net neutrality. Obama job numbers fake, Trump job numbers great. Trump economy(which has basically not deviated from the Obama economy trajectory) doing great, Obama economy was broken. Etc, etc. All that matters is if it floats, and he can brand it Trump.
- craftyguy 8y ago> Reddit, Tumblr, Etsy and other sites have put up Red Alert banners as part of a day of action to drive petitions in support of the resolution. I get the feeling that these sites are just 'preaching to the choir' (i.e. their customers already support these things, and most likely have let their 'representative' know). Is anyone doing anything to give the 50 senators who are against this a taste of what is to come? I recall cloudflare or someome along those lines threatenning to throttle traffic from government IPs, or maybe that just happened in my dream..
- rhcom2 8y agoNot to introduce flame bait but one of the reasons the NRA is powerful is the ability to quickly motivate their very vocal members.
- mch82 8y agoIt would be amazing if someone could figure out a way to measure constituent opinion that didn't involve people showing up at or calling in to an office.
- PhasmaFelis 8y agoWell, that's kind of the thing. Everyone's willing to kill and die for their beliefs on the internet; a lot fewer will actually campaign and canvas and march and vote for their beliefs. The inconvenience of calling or mailing your politician tells them that you have passed a rock bottom threshold of willingness to act, and might conceivably have an effect on their vote totals next election.
- jacquesm 8y agoThe fact that those members have guns might also have something to do with it. 'Do this or else we will sick our gun carrying members on you' even if they do nothing at all is a more powerful signal than 'Do this or a bunch of people will show up to protest'.
- 8y ago
- FellowTraveler 8y agoWhat a scam. "Net Neutrality" is just a euphemism for "forcing all ISPs to submit to federal licensing to make it easier to coerce them into doing stuff".
- grawprog 8y agoLol I assumed there were less Ignorant redneck idiots here. People like you really just don't seem to understand how the internet actually fucking works or that the internet is not just an American fucking thing.
- jumelles 8y agoThis is dangerous misinformation.
- trentnix 8y agoIt’s also an inevitable consequence. Truth be told, I distrust the part of government that supports “net neutrality” and I distrust the part of government that is against it. Make no mistake, the government is itching to dictate content and tax data transfer.
- wslack 8y agoIt's really not. The US gov't can't require censorship like that.
- icebraining 8y ago"Seven dirty words" disagrees with that broad claim. Censorship on the media is already in effect.
- ppf 8y agoDo you think that the FCC's regulation of Cable TV content counts as "censorship"?
- greesil 8y ago
- jordigh 8y agoI still can't believe that the movement to kill net neutrality was (is?) called "restoring internet freedom". I guess it's a shortening of "restoring internet service providers' freedom"? But the longer form isn't as catchy.
- StaticRedux 8y agoBranding makes the world go round. Whether it's forward, or in this case, backward.
- mirimir 8y agoWell, it is about "restoring internet freedom". It's just that, except in a few large cities, Americans have very little choice about ISP. So there's no way for ISPs to compete for users who care about net neutrality. Edit: Actually, we'd have even more freedom with an Internet version of the FERC rule for open access to electrical transmission lines.[0] > The legal and policy cornerstone of these rules is to remedy undue discrimination in access to the monopoly owned transmission wires that control whether and to whom electricity can be transported in interstate commerce. 0) https://www.ferc.gov/legal/maj-ord-reg/land-docs/rm95-8-00w.txt https://www.ferc.gov/legal/maj-ord-reg/land-docs/rm95-8-00w....
- mch82 8y agoWhat's your definition of freedom?
- mirimir 8y agoBeing unconstrained.
- lawnchair_larry 8y agoSo you’d obviously want to ensure net neutrality then?
- 8y ago
- yosito 8y agoIf you live in Arkansas, Louisiana, or Ohio, call your senators and urge them to vote in favor of net neutrality!
- nateconq 8y ago"would need a bare majority in both the Senate and the House, as well as the president’s signature" "We don’t know how this is going to end...." They know very well how it will end. This is an effort to get ammo for the primaries.
- polotics 8y agoWell any representative that votes No puts themselves fair and square in the parliament of whores.
- pc86 8y agoIt's people like you that elected Donald Trump. You can't just disagree with someone, you need to attack them personally.
- ataturk 8y agoIt was Alinsky who instructed people on how to personalize politics. It is thus a tactic of the left. If conservatives are finally fighting back, that is to their credit.
- 24gttghh 8y agoPeople have been personalizing politics since before there was even a word for politics. You merely fall prey to the same logical fallacy (ad hominem) you appear to rail against.
- everdev 8y agoIt's cool to be passionate about a cause but name calling drags everyone down. Not the right site for a comment like this.
- dhimes 8y agoWait- that was a reference to political writer P.J. O'Rourke: https://www.amazon.com/Parliament-Whores-Humorist-Attempts-Government-ebook/dp/B008UX8K3S/ https://www.amazon.com/Parliament-Whores-Humorist-Attempts-G... It's an excellent read.
- jeremyt 8y agoI am firmly opposed to "Net Neutrality". Literally everything the government regulates becomes a mess and a boondoggle. Health care, housing, and pensions all the way down to city building codes (I have a friend who needs to replace her windows in San Francisco, and the city government has decreed that they can only use wooden frame windows because of the aesthetics, even though they are more than twice as expensive) I have been in and out of government, and I have met the people who will implement "net neutrality", and I wouldn't trust them to install my cable modem. And inevitably, big business had (and will continue to have) their lobbyists in the room, making sure that any regulations benefit them and prevent upstart competitors. Unintended consequences will prevent new technologies from forming (Look at what the GDPR laws are doing to blockchain...must be able to delete your data, you say? And the ink isn't even DRY!) "Net Neutrality" is nothing more than an Orwellian named, amorphous and vague idea that nobody really knows what it means. Give me a shitty natural monopoly that I can compete with every day and twice on Sundays over a government created sclerotic ologopoly.
- mustacheemperor 8y agoI don't think the FDA has turned healthcare into a boondoggle, especially since incidents like Thalidomide have revealed why the pharma industry must follow a compliance framework for R&D. I don't think the USDA has turned agriculture or consumer food into a boondoggle. The Jungle is still a gripping read today, because the conditions of unregulated meatpacking factories were unbelievably grotesque, beyond the absolute worst of contemporary hidden camera food industry scandals. I don't think the EPA has turned the environment into a boondoggle. Acid rain was an incredibly serious problem in the 1980s that's pretty much behind us today, because regulation of sulfur dioxide emissions in the clean air act incenticized companies to lower their emissions.[0] [0]https://www.edf.org/approach/markets/acid-rain https://www.edf.org/approach/markets/acid-rain Other commenters have accurately pointed out the more directly disagreeable parts of your post, but you have absolutely not provided an accurate representation of the government's historical role in regulated markets. I believe it is more possible to vote in a competent government if you are willing to accept the challenge that it is possible for one to exist.
- 8y ago
- ryanpcmcquen 8y agoI find it funny that some people still see Net Neutrality as 'government controlling the internet'. They should take a look at FOSTA if they want to know what government controlling the internet really looks like.
- nercht12 8y agoIt is government controlling the internet. It's the extent and who that is different. In this case, it's only forcing a fair playing field. Kinda like highways being public vs. toll instead of telling you what cars you are and are not allowed to drive. I'd like a "free" internet, but I still have to admit it's going to cost someone else's "freedom".
- cdancette 8y agoSo we can summarize saying it's customers freedom against ISP freedom.
- nercht12 8y agoYes
- ianai 8y agoNo, that implies companies have the same rights as individual people. They do not and should not as they don’t have the same legal constraints as people. There’s no human equivalent to many of the abilities enjoyed by corporations and corporations don’t die and cannot be imprisoned. They’re also able to raise funds in ways humans may not. The list goes on from there.
- icebraining 8y agoIf I ran an ISP without incorporating, should I be able to disregard net neutrality?
- cdancette 8y agoWhat I said doesn't imply this at all. I'm just stating that there's a trade-off between the freedom of corporations and the freedom of the people (but different kind of freedoms, ofc)
- boomboomsubban 8y agoThis is an almost meaningless bill, only going to a vote so various politicians can claim to support net neutrality on the campaign trail. Not only is it unlikely to pass both chambers and be signed by the president, passing the bill doesn't change the broader status of net neutrality. Currently, the legality of the FCC enforcing net neutrality is unclear, with the matter destined to be decided in the courts either way. A law explicitly giving the FCC control has been necessary for over a decade, but both parties have refused to pass one or even consider passing a future one.
- ghba66 8y agoWhy are people here so pro-net neutrality? I don't have NN in Europe and I'm happy: because of it, I enjoy zero-rated services at a fair price.
- Matterrr 8y agoZero-rating is a terrible thing that helps stifle the free market and consolidate monopolies. It is also of questionable legality.
- ghba66 8y agoIt does not consolidate monopolies because, by law, ISPs are required to add all apps from a category (chat, video, etc) to zero-rating. i.e. if you add Netflix you are required to add YouTube, etc. All I see about NN is a lot of manipulation from both sides. And what's especially frustrating is that some people insist that NN is anti-customer. No thanks, I'll keep my zero-rating.
- fourthark 8y agoThat sounds sort of like... zero-rating neutrality? Might be even harder to pass that kind of law over here. I agree about the manipulation from both sides though. There's an acceptance that we have to be so shrill and lie for our cause, because marketing.
- kennydude 8y agoThat's definitely not the case in the UK. Three offers Deezer and Apple Music but not Spotify zero-rated. This puts Deezer and Apple Music at an advantage, no matter if they're technically better or worse Three also does this for social media and video services. (Part of why I'm leaving them when my contract is up)
- Crosseye_Jack 8y agoThe U.K.'s (government / regulators) stance on net neutrality) is that as long as there is competition in the market and there are services you can sign up for that “neutral” then there is no need to step in yet. The competition in the U.S. isn’t as great as it can be in here in the U.K. where many will only have a single choice for their ISP (or have restricted cell/sat isp or have a service that we wouldn’t even consider as broadband as it’s speed is so low). It’s strange how people from different parts from the world may require different rules that govern them.
- tzs 8y ago> Reddit, Tumblr, Etsy and other sites have put up Red Alert banners as part of a day of action to drive petitions in support of the resolution. This is being seriously mismanaged, and that may actually cause long term harm to the chances of saving (or restoring) net neutrality. The big mistake being made is not explaining where the Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach fits into the bigger picture. There are several places along the timeline of net neutrality repeal where it in theory could be saved. The Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach is just one of them. The CRA approach has almost no chance of actually passing both houses (it has a pretty good chance in the Senate, but because of the way the House is structured it would take a miracle there). When you consider it in the context of the bigger picture, that's not a problem. Its role in the overall effort is to get members of Congress on the record, which might be useful later in campaigns for office. The public is broadly in favor of net neutrality and this support is very high even among Republicans. That's probably not enough to get Republican voters to vote Democrat, because it is not high on the list of important issues for them, but it could be enough to get them to vote for more moderate Republicans in the Republican primaries or caucuses. In sports terms, this is not a play to score a goal. It is an attempt to get better position to set up a later scoring play. But the people running these campaigns treat everything like it is a scoring attempt...and then when it doesn't score the people who participated feel like they failed. That can discourage them, making them less likely to respond to later calls to action. Then they might not be there when it is time to actually go for a goal (e.g., get out and vote).
- jiojfdsal3 8y agoHow do you convince network giants like IBM, Intel, Cisco, Nokia, Qualcomm, Broadcom, Juniper, D-Link, among others, that net neutrality regulations are a bad idea? They currently support what Ajit Pai is doing. They have even have gone as far as crediting his repeals for greater investment into their network infrastructure.
- Brockenstein 8y agoYou probably don't because net neutrality isn't an automatic win for everyone. Some companies clearly benefit from the repeal. They do have incentive to invest in their networks when they can monetize it every which way, it's now a feature they can charge for... Except maybe for a PR tidal wave so huge that anyone who opposes net neutrality is driven out of business, I don't see how you convince companies to go against their own interests.
- mnw21cam 8y agoThis is about the USA. Perhaps the title could be updated to say "The US Senate..."?
- enknamel 8y agoWhy do we need NN? I have yet to hear any valid argument for it. Everything that people complain about is already illegal under multiple laws.
- boomboomsubban 8y agoWithout it, ISPs can stop offering internet access and start offering YouTube access. Here's an example of a plan in a country with weak net neutrality. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Screenshot-2017-10-28_MEO_-_Televis%C3%A3o,_Internet,_Telefone_e_Telem%C3%B3vel.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Screenshot-2017-10-28_MEO... If you believe some other law already prohibits this, please tell me.
- Tyr42 8y agoJust to be 100% clear with the packages shown, they offer the benefit that those apps don't count towards your mobile data, rather than just being available. Still not great though, since it just increases the moat for existing companies. Also companies in the states have tried exactly the same thing before with their video streaming service not counting towards you data cap.