15 ms·

FCC forced by court to ask the public again for feedback on net neutrality

294 points by daegloe 7y ago

NikolaeVarius 7y ago
Recent interview with Ajit Pai covers some of his thoughts on net neutrality. I thought it was was worth a listen/read http://freakonomics.com/podcast/ajit-pai/ http://freakonomics.com/podcast/ajit-pai/ As for the article, I don't think it matters all that much except maybe possible slight embarassment?
- mlb_hn 7y ago
  I'm not sure I would agree that the article doesn't matter that much. It's an argument that while the FCC's going along with what the courts decided, they're not necessarily doing so in good faith because they tried to bury the announcement with fluff and didn't use a title that would be understandable to the average user.
- chance_state 7y ago
  Can you share some of the highlights that made it worth a listen? I don't really want to listen to that guy babel pro-ISP nonsense.
op00to 7y ago
Is my dead mother going to come back from the beyond again to give pro-isp propaganda?
- OrgNet 7y ago
  Do you have a better option for the crooks?
jasonlfunk 7y ago
It’s been over two years since Net Neutrality was repealed. I remember at the time there was a lot of talk about how the internet was going to be ruined by throttling, paid “fast lanes”, etc. Have any of these things happened? Or did that turn out to mostly be fear-mongering?
- superkuh 7y ago
  T-mobile has been throttling and creating paid fast lanes pretty heavily and I now pay as much in data overage fees to comcast per month as half my total bill.
  - Alupis 7y ago
    How much data are you using monthly? My comcast "cap" is 3TB monthly... which is a HUGE amount of data for a residential user. I've never even broken 1TB... If you're hosting something, might be worth upgrading to a business connection, which doesn't have data caps and comes with static ip's and a SLA. As an aside - I'm personally OK with data caps so long as they don't impact most users (80/20, 90/10 or something like that). ISP's pay for ingress traffic, so by setting a data cap that impacts only the egregious data hogs, it means they can charge normal users a smaller rate, rather than subsidize a few users by charging everyone more.
    - csours 7y ago
      I could be Ok with data caps per tier, if that actually led to lower costs for lower tiers. As it is, I pay a huge amount of money for low quality internet service. Also, 3TB is not huge for a family, especially in the age of 4K streams.
      - Alupis 7y ago
        Ya, 4k might be changing the math a bit, and ISP's might need to upgrade the caps, or offer different caps per tier like your idea. Either way, I don't want to subsidize the guy torrenting Blue-Rays and pushing 10TB a month when I'm only using 1TB.
        crooked-v 7y ago
        'Subsidize' isn't really accurate, though. For every major ISP, if everyone was using their connection at the maximum throughput allowed by their plan 24/7... everything would still work fine. The data caps exist solely so they can squeeze people for money beyond what they actually need to maintain the network.
Mountain_Skies 7y ago
Would introducing competition for internet access at the residential level help prevent the type of consumer abuse that was predicted to happen? If Comcast is my only choice for broadband and there is no net neutrality, they can set whatever terms they want. If I have a choice between Comcast, three LEO internet providers, and four fixed wireless providers, Comcast loses its leverage.
- SteveNuts 7y ago
  I wish my city, county, or state owned the actual coax cable leading to my house and ISPs had to bid against each other to service my internet. The fact that Comcast owns that cable means there's no real competition.
- snisarenko 7y ago
  Creating traditional competition in local infrastructure is difficult if not impossible for several reasons - Last mile sections of the city will always have winner takes most (customers) situation, making the lines built by the other providers redundant and wasteful - There are only so many communication lines you can put on poles, and underground, before the people start complaining about ugliness, and never ending construction. I think a good approach for local communication infrastructure is ownership by community/local-goverment and private contract bidding on construction, maintanance and support - Companies bid on building new infrastructure, - Companies bid on running & maintaining existing infrastructure (usually a 2-3 year bid contract that sets fixed rate for all customers for 2-3 years). At the end of each contract a new bid goes out, but the same company can "win" the bid - People in the community vote on the bids. The POLITICIANS don't get to pick the winning bid
  - thrtythreeforty 7y ago
    A lot of people agree that the problems that net neutrality regulations try to solve are caused by local, unimpeachable telecom monopolies. The economics of having a bunch of competing infrastructure make no sense. As much as I generally dislike regulation, I welcomed Title II classification because regulations are an effective answer answer to an abusive monopoly. However, I think another overall approach would be just as effective at achieving pro-consumer ISP behavior. The approach is simply this: via regulation, force local loop unbundling, and take no other action. Suddenly, anyone would be allowed to start an ISP and rent the existing infrastructure. This would reintroduce the free market and allow it to solve the underlying behavior problems. I think that when it came time to vote with their wallet, most people would select a pro-neutrality ISP, regardless of their political alignment. Competition generally works fine in places it's actually present. Incumbent ISPs would complain and scream, possibly louder than they have against Title II. I don't know what the legal approach would be for forcing unbundling, but I seem to recall it wasn't completely infeasible.
pmoriarty 7y ago
FYI: The deadline for comments is March 30, and the deadline for reply comments is April 29, (though it's not clear what the difference between comments and reply comments is). The FCC document (in all its legalistic glory) can be seen here: [1] And you can comment here: [2] [1] - https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-20-168A1.pdf https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-20-168A1.pdf [2] - https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/filings/express https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/filings/express
- intellijdd 7y ago
  I clicked on your second link and it took a while to load. Not wanting to seem like I'm putting on a tinfoil hat but what if the ISP's actually throttle the speeds to this specific site. Nah, they wouldn't do anything like that...
  - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
    Despite your “joke”... no, there are exceptionally few instances of ISPs selectively throttling. The best example was a small carrier that the FCC slapped with a fine - before Net Neutrality rules existed.
    - JustSomeNobody 7y ago
      Fast.com is an example where ISPs actively throttle it.
      - jsjddbbwj 7y ago
        What's your proof? It's most likely congestion in the routes that go to Netflix because of how many people use it.
        deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
        nitrogen 7y ago
brightball 7y ago
I must just live in a good area because I don’t understand why people still rally around this. In the past 10 years my home internet speed has gone from 15mb to 200mb with Charter/Spectrum without me paying another dime. They keep sending me free modem upgrades and there’s no fee attached. The service is good enough that I can stream 4 HD shows at the same time without an issue and internet based TV services are a viable option for people around the country. And I can do this without any noticeable drop off in work usage. What is the expected gain from Net Neutrality at this point?
- xkemp 7y ago
  None of that has anything to do with NN. NN is when you can't get to "Social Media Startup X" because they didn't pay your ISP. You are unlikely to even notice this, because only newcomers would be required to pay ransom. Blocking existing sites would lead to customer complaints and actual competition.
  - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
    > NN is when you can't get to "Social Media Startup X" because they didn't pay your ISP. That sounds bad! Any examples of that ever happening before or after NN?
    - Treblemaker 7y ago
      This is the case that first brought it to my attention: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/08/fcc-rules-against-comcast-bit-torrent-blocking https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/08/fcc-rules-against-comc....
      - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
        Ok, so YEARS before Net Neutrality and the FCC fined them for doing it. So, in no way supportive of the NN argument.
skizm 7y ago
Why won't the opponents of net neutrality do the same thing they did last time and just buy comments from ad-tech companies? Most comments last time (even the ones obviously programmatically added) were legit. Shell companies were created, those companies would buy "leads" from ad-tech companies. Those "leads" were names/emails of people who checked a box saying "I'm okay if you use my name and email to comment on the net neutrality issue." There is no real way to tell where these leads come from. Theoretically the ad-tech companies will place ads on publisher websites which contain a checkbox allowing a user to "opt-in". Once the leads make it back to the shell companies, they can add those leads to the comments section because the person willingly (in theory) gave them their info for this exact purpose. In reality the ad-tech industry is rife with grey-hat SEO techniques at best, and outright fraud at worst.
- nl 7y ago
  Why would adtech companies buy anti-net-neutrality comments? They are some of the biggest proponents of it because they don't want ISPs trying to charge them for transit to their users.
  - cowpig 7y ago
    I believe the parent comment was saying that AdTech companies were selling peoples' identities to use for fake comments on the FCC website (to, presumably, Comcast/Verizon/etc)
    - nl 7y ago
      Hmm maybe you are right. I'd like to see one of these checkboxes though.
travbrack 7y ago
Paid fast lanes are a bad idea, but I think 100% equality for all packets is just as bad or worse. Real time traffic should be prioritized over data transfers. Right now my video call gets clobbered when I download a file. It doesn’t have to be like that.
- skizm 7y ago
  Use quality of service controls in your router/modem. That's an end user problem, not a dumb wires problem.
  - travbrack 7y ago
    Without tagging packets over the internet, you can only throttle tcp streams and prioritize your upstream. I can prioritize the packets I send to my ISP, but I have no control over the order I get packets from them.
- gsich 7y ago
  How should your ISP know? Diffserv might help, but I doubt some shitty application will set them.
  - javagram 7y ago
    They can tell right now. T-Mobile gives free data usage for video and music streaming, for instance. You can either do traffic pattern analysis or just base it on what IPs they are connecting to.
    - rblatz 7y ago
      That works great today, but it stifles innovation. If I roll out a new real-time service my users suffer shitty delayed service, until I get big enough to force them to prioritize me.
    - gsich 7y ago
      That is not independent and not net neutral.
thayne 7y ago
> You are filing a document into an official FCC proceeding. All information submitted, including names and addresses, will be publicly available via the web. Why do they need my address at all? And worse, why do they need to make the email and physical address public?
Corrado 7y ago
I ran across an old article that might help you craft a comment. "How to write a meaningful FCC comment supporting net neutrality"[0]. I used several of the tips on there and I think my comment was pretty good. [0] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/07/saving-net-neutrality-tips-for-writing-persuasive-comments-to-the-fcc/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/07/saving-net-neutr...
dgzl 7y ago
Sometimes I feel like the only tech nerd who doesn't support NN.
- chriscappuccio 7y ago
  No brother, we are legion
- Treblemaker 7y ago
  Why do you not support it?
  - dgzl 7y ago
    It's been a while since I've looking into the subject, but from what I remember... the idea was that Telecom could sell slow-lane service at a discount. This would benefit people who would rather save money than purchase fast-lane service, which I imagine is more people than you'd think. If fast-lane public WiFi is available pretty much everywhere in town, and you're really trying to not spend money, then you might opt for slow-lane traffic at a discount at home and use public internet for you're more demanding transfers. Alternatively if you only want access to specific services and you can save money for doing so, then... same idea.
Proziam 7y ago
I just left my remarks. Here's what I wrote, just for the sake of public record (last time we played this game there was a lot of comments thrown out, unfairly). The internet is a critical part of both military and civilian infrastructure and should not be monitored, limited, or in any way restricted by any entity. Under the definition of arms understood at the time of the Constitution (as written by James Madison in Federalist 46), the internet and any digital tools which may be used in the defense of the nation are "arms" and therefore protected by the second amendment. Further, because the internet is ubiquitous in modern society as a means of communication, much more so than letters were at the time of the constitution, the government has no right whatsoever to restrict access or use of the internet. Even if there were a disagreement over this interpretation, there can be no doubt that the general public 'assembles' and 'petitions' using the internet. This petition itself is being written on the internet. All this ignores the simple truth that the internet is the most common means of distribution for the press worldwide. Finally, because the federal government has singularly supported, with enormous sums of taxpayer dollars, the internet infrastructure which is now (against the interest of the public, for which the federal government is a trustee) owned by private corporations, all internet infrastructure should be treated as public property, and ISP's should act only in a capacity of providing a utility service. In summary - there should be no privatization of internet infrastructure. There should be no government or corporation monitoring anyone's use of the internet (without a proper warrant, signed by a judge, on a case-by-case basis). A person's digital information should be treated as 'papers' and 'effects' as they are considered to be by the general public and by most experts in the subject. And lastly, there should be absolutely zero limits, restrictions, rationing, throttling, or other mitigation of any person's access to a completely free and open internet.
- cozos 7y ago
  > Under the definition of arms understood at the time of the Constitution (as written by James Madison in Federalist 46), the internet and any digital tools which may be used in the defense of the nation are "arms" and therefore protected by the second amendment. I'm not sure about this. What about shovels, nuclear bombs, or meth [0]? Do we have a right to bear nukes? [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_and_culture_of_substituted_amphetamines#Military_use https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_and_culture_of_subst...
propogandist 7y ago
Last time, Net Neutrality had clauses that would provide the government and corporations the ability to effectively establish a firewall that would Only Allow "Lawful internet traffic" and "Lawful applications, services or nom-harmful devices..." previous Net Neutrality text: > § 8.5 No blocking. A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices, subject to reasonable network management. > § 8.7 No throttling. A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of Internet content, application, or service, or use of a non-harmful device, subject to reasonable network management. - this is putting too much faith in the government (+corporations) and enables the lawful establishment of the Great American Firewall to manage what's "lawful"
- Treblemaker 7y ago
  It does no such thing. All ISPs and public wifi I have ever connected to have terms of service that prohibit illegal activities.
exabrial 7y ago
My opinion on this is really unpopular on HN, but I still hold it's the correct approach: Net Neutrality is a policy destined for continuous failure and we need to abandon it. * Creating competition is the only surefire path for improvement * State/Local governments should not subsidize players to avoid entrenching ISPs and creating local monopolies. * In areas with entrenched ISPs, the only way to break the cycle is to bring in new players (Google Fiber successfully proved this) The FTC should regulate ISPs, not the FCC: * An "internet service" provides internet access unfiltered subject to a well defined classes. Anything that is not an ISP is an "information service" provides a narrow walled garden and must be advertised as such. * ISPs should be regularly investigated for false claims on advertisement.
- wilc0 7y ago
  Google Fiber is essentially dead. It halted expansion in 2016 and has only supported its existing locations since then. Even for a company as rich as Google, it wasn't financially feasible for them. How are companies smaller than Google even supposed to compete?

294 points by daegloe 7y ago

Recent interview with Ajit Pai covers some of his thoughts on net neutrality. I thought it was was worth a listen/read http://freakonomics.com/podcast/ajit-pai/ http://freakonomics.com/podcast/ajit-pai/ As for the article, I don't think it matters all that much except maybe possible slight embarassment?

mlb_hn 7y ago
I'm not sure I would agree that the article doesn't matter that much. It's an argument that while the FCC's going along with what the courts decided, they're not necessarily doing so in good faith because they tried to bury the announcement with fluff and didn't use a title that would be understandable to the average user.
chance_state 7y ago
Can you share some of the highlights that made it worth a listen? I don't really want to listen to that guy babel pro-ISP nonsense.

op00to 7y ago

Is my dead mother going to come back from the beyond again to give pro-isp propaganda?

OrgNet 7y ago
Do you have a better option for the crooks?

jasonlfunk 7y ago

It’s been over two years since Net Neutrality was repealed. I remember at the time there was a lot of talk about how the internet was going to be ruined by throttling, paid “fast lanes”, etc. Have any of these things happened? Or did that turn out to mostly be fear-mongering?

superkuh 7y ago
T-mobile has been throttling and creating paid fast lanes pretty heavily and I now pay as much in data overage fees to comcast per month as half my total bill.
- Alupis 7y ago
  How much data are you using monthly? My comcast "cap" is 3TB monthly... which is a HUGE amount of data for a residential user. I've never even broken 1TB... If you're hosting something, might be worth upgrading to a business connection, which doesn't have data caps and comes with static ip's and a SLA. As an aside - I'm personally OK with data caps so long as they don't impact most users (80/20, 90/10 or something like that). ISP's pay for ingress traffic, so by setting a data cap that impacts only the egregious data hogs, it means they can charge normal users a smaller rate, rather than subsidize a few users by charging everyone more.
  - csours 7y ago
    I could be Ok with data caps per tier, if that actually led to lower costs for lower tiers. As it is, I pay a huge amount of money for low quality internet service. Also, 3TB is not huge for a family, especially in the age of 4K streams.
    - Alupis 7y ago
      Ya, 4k might be changing the math a bit, and ISP's might need to upgrade the caps, or offer different caps per tier like your idea. Either way, I don't want to subsidize the guy torrenting Blue-Rays and pushing 10TB a month when I'm only using 1TB.
      - crooked-v 7y ago
        'Subsidize' isn't really accurate, though. For every major ISP, if everyone was using their connection at the maximum throughput allowed by their plan 24/7... everything would still work fine. The data caps exist solely so they can squeeze people for money beyond what they actually need to maintain the network.

Mountain_Skies 7y ago

Would introducing competition for internet access at the residential level help prevent the type of consumer abuse that was predicted to happen? If Comcast is my only choice for broadband and there is no net neutrality, they can set whatever terms they want. If I have a choice between Comcast, three LEO internet providers, and four fixed wireless providers, Comcast loses its leverage.

SteveNuts 7y ago
I wish my city, county, or state owned the actual coax cable leading to my house and ISPs had to bid against each other to service my internet. The fact that Comcast owns that cable means there's no real competition.
snisarenko 7y ago
Creating traditional competition in local infrastructure is difficult if not impossible for several reasons - Last mile sections of the city will always have winner takes most (customers) situation, making the lines built by the other providers redundant and wasteful - There are only so many communication lines you can put on poles, and underground, before the people start complaining about ugliness, and never ending construction. I think a good approach for local communication infrastructure is ownership by community/local-goverment and private contract bidding on construction, maintanance and support - Companies bid on building new infrastructure, - Companies bid on running & maintaining existing infrastructure (usually a 2-3 year bid contract that sets fixed rate for all customers for 2-3 years). At the end of each contract a new bid goes out, but the same company can "win" the bid - People in the community vote on the bids. The POLITICIANS don't get to pick the winning bid
- thrtythreeforty 7y ago
  A lot of people agree that the problems that net neutrality regulations try to solve are caused by local, unimpeachable telecom monopolies. The economics of having a bunch of competing infrastructure make no sense. As much as I generally dislike regulation, I welcomed Title II classification because regulations are an effective answer answer to an abusive monopoly. However, I think another overall approach would be just as effective at achieving pro-consumer ISP behavior. The approach is simply this: via regulation, force local loop unbundling, and take no other action. Suddenly, anyone would be allowed to start an ISP and rent the existing infrastructure. This would reintroduce the free market and allow it to solve the underlying behavior problems. I think that when it came time to vote with their wallet, most people would select a pro-neutrality ISP, regardless of their political alignment. Competition generally works fine in places it's actually present. Incumbent ISPs would complain and scream, possibly louder than they have against Title II. I don't know what the legal approach would be for forcing unbundling, but I seem to recall it wasn't completely infeasible.

pmoriarty 7y ago

FYI: The deadline for comments is March 30, and the deadline for reply comments is April 29, (though it's not clear what the difference between comments and reply comments is). The FCC document (in all its legalistic glory) can be seen here: [1] And you can comment here: [2] [1] - https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-20-168A1.pdf https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-20-168A1.pdf [2] - https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/filings/express https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/filings/express

intellijdd 7y ago
I clicked on your second link and it took a while to load. Not wanting to seem like I'm putting on a tinfoil hat but what if the ISP's actually throttle the speeds to this specific site. Nah, they wouldn't do anything like that...
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  Despite your “joke”... no, there are exceptionally few instances of ISPs selectively throttling. The best example was a small carrier that the FCC slapped with a fine - before Net Neutrality rules existed.
  - JustSomeNobody 7y ago
    Fast.com is an example where ISPs actively throttle it.
    - jsjddbbwj 7y ago
      What's your proof? It's most likely congestion in the routes that go to Netflix because of how many people use it.
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
      - nitrogen 7y ago

brightball 7y ago

I must just live in a good area because I don’t understand why people still rally around this. In the past 10 years my home internet speed has gone from 15mb to 200mb with Charter/Spectrum without me paying another dime. They keep sending me free modem upgrades and there’s no fee attached. The service is good enough that I can stream 4 HD shows at the same time without an issue and internet based TV services are a viable option for people around the country. And I can do this without any noticeable drop off in work usage. What is the expected gain from Net Neutrality at this point?

xkemp 7y ago
None of that has anything to do with NN. NN is when you can't get to "Social Media Startup X" because they didn't pay your ISP. You are unlikely to even notice this, because only newcomers would be required to pay ransom. Blocking existing sites would lead to customer complaints and actual competition.
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  > NN is when you can't get to "Social Media Startup X" because they didn't pay your ISP. That sounds bad! Any examples of that ever happening before or after NN?
  - Treblemaker 7y ago
    This is the case that first brought it to my attention: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/08/fcc-rules-against-comcast-bit-torrent-blocking https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/08/fcc-rules-against-comc....
    - SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
      Ok, so YEARS before Net Neutrality and the FCC fined them for doing it. So, in no way supportive of the NN argument.

skizm 7y ago

Why won't the opponents of net neutrality do the same thing they did last time and just buy comments from ad-tech companies? Most comments last time (even the ones obviously programmatically added) were legit. Shell companies were created, those companies would buy "leads" from ad-tech companies. Those "leads" were names/emails of people who checked a box saying "I'm okay if you use my name and email to comment on the net neutrality issue." There is no real way to tell where these leads come from. Theoretically the ad-tech companies will place ads on publisher websites which contain a checkbox allowing a user to "opt-in". Once the leads make it back to the shell companies, they can add those leads to the comments section because the person willingly (in theory) gave them their info for this exact purpose. In reality the ad-tech industry is rife with grey-hat SEO techniques at best, and outright fraud at worst.

nl 7y ago
Why would adtech companies buy anti-net-neutrality comments? They are some of the biggest proponents of it because they don't want ISPs trying to charge them for transit to their users.
- cowpig 7y ago
  I believe the parent comment was saying that AdTech companies were selling peoples' identities to use for fake comments on the FCC website (to, presumably, Comcast/Verizon/etc)
  - nl 7y ago
    Hmm maybe you are right. I'd like to see one of these checkboxes though.

travbrack 7y ago

Paid fast lanes are a bad idea, but I think 100% equality for all packets is just as bad or worse. Real time traffic should be prioritized over data transfers. Right now my video call gets clobbered when I download a file. It doesn’t have to be like that.

skizm 7y ago
Use quality of service controls in your router/modem. That's an end user problem, not a dumb wires problem.
- travbrack 7y ago
  Without tagging packets over the internet, you can only throttle tcp streams and prioritize your upstream. I can prioritize the packets I send to my ISP, but I have no control over the order I get packets from them.
gsich 7y ago
How should your ISP know? Diffserv might help, but I doubt some shitty application will set them.
- javagram 7y ago
  They can tell right now. T-Mobile gives free data usage for video and music streaming, for instance. You can either do traffic pattern analysis or just base it on what IPs they are connecting to.
  - rblatz 7y ago
    That works great today, but it stifles innovation. If I roll out a new real-time service my users suffer shitty delayed service, until I get big enough to force them to prioritize me.
  - gsich 7y ago
    That is not independent and not net neutral.

thayne 7y ago

> You are filing a document into an official FCC proceeding. All information submitted, including names and addresses, will be publicly available via the web. Why do they need my address at all? And worse, why do they need to make the email and physical address public?

Corrado 7y ago

I ran across an old article that might help you craft a comment. "How to write a meaningful FCC comment supporting net neutrality"[0]. I used several of the tips on there and I think my comment was pretty good. [0] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/07/saving-net-neutrality-tips-for-writing-persuasive-comments-to-the-fcc/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/07/saving-net-neutr...

dgzl 7y ago

Sometimes I feel like the only tech nerd who doesn't support NN.

chriscappuccio 7y ago
No brother, we are legion
Treblemaker 7y ago
Why do you not support it?
- dgzl 7y ago
  It's been a while since I've looking into the subject, but from what I remember... the idea was that Telecom could sell slow-lane service at a discount. This would benefit people who would rather save money than purchase fast-lane service, which I imagine is more people than you'd think. If fast-lane public WiFi is available pretty much everywhere in town, and you're really trying to not spend money, then you might opt for slow-lane traffic at a discount at home and use public internet for you're more demanding transfers. Alternatively if you only want access to specific services and you can save money for doing so, then... same idea.

Proziam 7y ago

I just left my remarks. Here's what I wrote, just for the sake of public record (last time we played this game there was a lot of comments thrown out, unfairly). The internet is a critical part of both military and civilian infrastructure and should not be monitored, limited, or in any way restricted by any entity. Under the definition of arms understood at the time of the Constitution (as written by James Madison in Federalist 46), the internet and any digital tools which may be used in the defense of the nation are "arms" and therefore protected by the second amendment. Further, because the internet is ubiquitous in modern society as a means of communication, much more so than letters were at the time of the constitution, the government has no right whatsoever to restrict access or use of the internet. Even if there were a disagreement over this interpretation, there can be no doubt that the general public 'assembles' and 'petitions' using the internet. This petition itself is being written on the internet. All this ignores the simple truth that the internet is the most common means of distribution for the press worldwide. Finally, because the federal government has singularly supported, with enormous sums of taxpayer dollars, the internet infrastructure which is now (against the interest of the public, for which the federal government is a trustee) owned by private corporations, all internet infrastructure should be treated as public property, and ISP's should act only in a capacity of providing a utility service. In summary - there should be no privatization of internet infrastructure. There should be no government or corporation monitoring anyone's use of the internet (without a proper warrant, signed by a judge, on a case-by-case basis). A person's digital information should be treated as 'papers' and 'effects' as they are considered to be by the general public and by most experts in the subject. And lastly, there should be absolutely zero limits, restrictions, rationing, throttling, or other mitigation of any person's access to a completely free and open internet.

cozos 7y ago
> Under the definition of arms understood at the time of the Constitution (as written by James Madison in Federalist 46), the internet and any digital tools which may be used in the defense of the nation are "arms" and therefore protected by the second amendment. I'm not sure about this. What about shovels, nuclear bombs, or meth [0]? Do we have a right to bear nukes? [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_and_culture_of_substituted_amphetamines#Military_use https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_and_culture_of_subst...

propogandist 7y ago

Last time, Net Neutrality had clauses that would provide the government and corporations the ability to effectively establish a firewall that would Only Allow "Lawful internet traffic" and "Lawful applications, services or nom-harmful devices..." previous Net Neutrality text: > § 8.5 No blocking. A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices, subject to reasonable network management. > § 8.7 No throttling. A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of Internet content, application, or service, or use of a non-harmful device, subject to reasonable network management. - this is putting too much faith in the government (+corporations) and enables the lawful establishment of the Great American Firewall to manage what's "lawful"

Treblemaker 7y ago
It does no such thing. All ISPs and public wifi I have ever connected to have terms of service that prohibit illegal activities.

exabrial 7y ago

My opinion on this is really unpopular on HN, but I still hold it's the correct approach: Net Neutrality is a policy destined for continuous failure and we need to abandon it. * Creating competition is the only surefire path for improvement * State/Local governments should not subsidize players to avoid entrenching ISPs and creating local monopolies. * In areas with entrenched ISPs, the only way to break the cycle is to bring in new players (Google Fiber successfully proved this) The FTC should regulate ISPs, not the FCC: * An "internet service" provides internet access unfiltered subject to a well defined classes. Anything that is not an ISP is an "information service" provides a narrow walled garden and must be advertised as such. * ISPs should be regularly investigated for false claims on advertisement.

wilc0 7y ago
Google Fiber is essentially dead. It halted expansion in 2016 and has only supported its existing locations since then. Even for a company as rich as Google, it wasn't financially feasible for them. How are companies smaller than Google even supposed to compete?