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>If the comments matter only because the law requires them, that's a very weak argument. If the law requires that they be considered in the process of creating
by ABCLAW 8y ago
>If the comments matter only because the law requires them, that's a very weak argument.
If the law requires that they be considered in the process of creating policy, then fraudulently spamming comments is a direct attempt to subvert the policy making function of the FCC.
We cavalierly assume the comments do not matter because of an underlying assumption; that FCC Chair Pai will not actually consider them regardless of their contents, and that he functionally controls the decision to enact or repeal NN regulations. Imagine if we had a different FCC chair - would the comments still not matter?
There are two problems preventing the comments from fulfilling their intended function, but the existence of a second problem (Pai's refusal to discharge the duties of his office honorably) does not negate the first (the fraudulent corruption of the public comments record).
- upofadown 8y ago>If the law requires that they be considered in the process of creating policy, ... The important distinction here is that they have to be considered as comments, not votes. For example, if a whole lot of comments say more or less the same thing, then that only counts as one comment. In this case the politics had already been decided so no comment could affect the general outcome. In a very real sense the comments did not matter in this case. In other situations they can matter. The pointless distraction related to the various attempts to spam the FCC comments in the end prevented actual politics that could of possibly retained net neutrality.