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European Parliament passes net neutrality law

541 points by xmpir 13y ago

deleted 13y ago
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contulluipeste 13y ago
It never stops to amaze me - what does have Europe that other places don't? ...anyway, I'm just glad and thankful to be born in Europe!
thomasahle 13y ago
> Providers of internet access to end-users shall not discriminate between functionally equivalent services and applications. This means they can still throttle torrents, right?
- Bulk70 13y ago
  Well, based on that quote they can throttle what they want - but they have to do it equally across all similar applications. So for example they can't throttle Youtube and not throttle Netflix - they have to throttle both (or neither).
  - akie 13y ago
    Well, that depends on your interpretation of "functionally equivalent". Is Youtube functionally equivalent with Netflix?
    - bayesianhorse 13y ago
      Spam-Emails, DDOS attacks and Http Traffic aren't functionally equivalent, which is probably the point. I think the definition will also include the question of competition between the traffic streams. Youtube and Netflix are competitors, whereas an E-Mail Service and a Gaming Service isn't. Net Neutrality should not mean we have to build the infrastructure that can faithfully execute DDOS attacks. Now, if we want to build the infrastructure to let all internet users stream 4K Video 24/7, is a whole other question...
- belorn 13y ago
  If its: a) Reasonable, b) transparent, c) non-discriminatory of that traffic type, d) there is temporary and exceptional network congestion, e) measure is not be maintained longer than necessary. If all those are true they may throttle torrents. A key word here is transparent, since few ISP even admit that they throttle traffic.
Morgawr 13y ago
These are great news, I am a big supporter for net neutrality, however I am a bit concerned about one small detail: >“Net neutrality” means the principle according to which all internet traffic is treated equally, without discrimination, restriction or interference, independently of its sender, recipient, type, content, device, service or application. I wonder how this will work in case of malicious attacks, ddos, disruptive requests and packets/connections with the sole purpose of disrupting the normal usage of the net. Blocking these at isp level is not a bad idea, but how deep does this rabbit hole go?
- MatthewWilkes 13y ago
  This doesn't extend to protecting illegal acts from interference.
  - higherpurpose 13y ago
    By that logic ISPs could throttle or block torrenting or Bitcoin if they are "illegal" in some country.
    - kaoD 13y ago
      Sure, what's the problem? If it's illegal, it's illegal. The blame is on the people if they let their governments ban BT.
    - rvschuilenburg 13y ago
      That is correct. In The Netherlands we already have net neutrality, but this hasn't stopped the Pirate Bay from being blocked. However, try to prove to a judge the entire protocol is illegal and should be blocked.
      - ErikHuisman 13y ago
        Initially the court decided that blocking all subscribers went too far but BREIN wasn’t satisfied and took the case to a full trial, which they won. Both Ziggo and XS4ALL filed subsequent appeals, arguing that the blockade was ineffective and denied subscribers’ free access to information. Today the Court of The Hague released its verdict which sides with the Internet providers. In its ruling the Court states that the Pirate Bay blockade is disproportionate and ineffective, citing TNO research and the Baywatch report of the University of Amsterdam. As a result, the blockade was found to hinder the Internet providers’ entrepreneurial freedoms. jan 2014
timthorn 13y ago
From first reading, this makes it look as if ISPs will be unable to offer eg elevated weighting to specific VoIP traffic unless that's offered by the ISP themselves. I want my VoIP trunks to my exchange to have better QoS than my Skype chats. I'm not convinced this is a good thing.
- icebraining 13y ago
  I want my VoIP trunks to my exchange to have better QoS than my Skype chats. Then configure your router to do so?
  - timthorn 13y ago
    That works for my link from the PoP to my router, but not beyond the PoP.
- dspillett 13y ago
  I think it is more like "unable to offer eg elevated weighting to specific VoIP traffic unless that is specifically requested by their users" - which means they can't discriminate between services for their financial benefit rather than because that is what their users want (favouring skype over google's hangout unless Google pay them a wodge of cash, or vice versa, for instance). They would be able to give weighting to VoIP traffic generally by my understanding, assuming that they can correctly identify the traffic of course, so they can still perform good QoS practise to stop large bulk data transfer (P2P sharing, huge HTTP transfers) causing massively inflated latency for more interactive traffic (VoIP, small HTTP(S) transfers, ...) where that matters.
- belorn 13y ago
  In addition, there is demand on the part of content, applications and services providers, for the provision of transmission services based on flexible quality parameters, including lower levels of priority for traffic which is not time- sensitive. The possibility for content, applications and service providers to negotiate such flexible quality of service levels with providers of electronic communications may also be necessary for the provision of certain services such as machine-to-machine (M2M) communications. Providers of content, applications and services and providers of electronic communications should therefore continue to be free to conclude specialised services agreements on defined levels of quality of service as long as such agreements do not impair the quality of internet access service. -http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+AMD+A7-2014-0190+237-244+DOC+PDF+V0//EN http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//...
bayesianhorse 13y ago
I think the EU is getting an amazing amount of work done, if you consider that it consists of 28 nation states which went to war with each other regularly for centuries up to a couple of decades ago...
- bananas 13y ago
  We're probably not done yet in that case!
- Systemic33 13y ago
  And some of them are still culturally at war ;) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark%E2%80%93Sweden_relations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark%E2%80%93Sweden_relation...
  - mercurial 13y ago
    I don't know. Danish news always go "X is bad in Denmark. Meanwhile, X is really good in Sweden."
    - baq 13y ago
      there's a lot of 'grass is greener on the other side' in all of europe, this is probably the case here.
      - mercurial 13y ago
        True enough. Though in this specific case, grass is more likely to be covered by more now on the other side :)
      - mcv 13y ago
        And it used to be that we tried to take their grass by conquest. Now we just go there on vacation.
    - Svip 13y ago
      There used to be two ways to argue for a law proposal in Folketinget (Danish parliament): "According to science, ..." and "in Sweden, they have..."
LambdaAlmighty 13y ago
This will end in tragedy for consumers (and profit in the right pockets), as do all attempts by governments to regulate. "Introduced by socialists, green and left blocs" -- an immediate huge red flag. The days of EU internet freedom are coming to an end, once these people start meddling in.
NicoJuicy 13y ago
It was a close call... Neelie Kroes didn't want this. But against expectations, democracy won.. That doesn't happen much in the world (Eg. What Karel De Gucht tried / did ). All with all, i'm very glad this happened! It gave me some faith again in Europe as a regulator (i'm from Belgium ). (still dissappointed in Neelie Kroes though, she has some very good ideas... Opposing net neutrality was definetly a bad idea)
- NicoJuicy 13y ago
  PS. Some examples of good ideas: - Transforming libraries in hackerspaces (this is one of the best ideas i ever came accross) - Removing roaming (expensive cell phone calls in foreign countries, but in Europe, we are all different countries. 9000 € for checking your mail and etc... was not an exception). Some people who regulary stay in foreign countries (work, business, long vacation, .. get a mobile subscription in that country, so they would have 2 phone numbers). But this should be fixed in 2016 (still a long time though) - PRO net neutrality (some years ago, currently she changed her opinion for an unknown reason : http://ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/kroes/en/blog/netneutrality http://ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/kroes/en/blog/netne... )
  - shdon 13y ago
    On the whole, I think she does good work. I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt that she genuinely thought the text as proposed would sufficiently protect net neutrality or at least underestimated the holes it left. But even if she didn't, it is good to see that parliament did its job and corrected the mistakes made by the legislators.
    - mcv 13y ago
      She's the only Eurocommissioner that I constantly see fighting for all sorts of good causes. The others barely register or seem to be a net negative. I like Kroes a lot, but every once in a while, she suddenly supports something that seems quite the opposite of her usual position. Weirdly out of character. And I often find myself wondering if maybe there's something else at play in the background.
deleted 13y ago
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mercurial 13y ago
> mobile carrier industry body the GSMA said it “recognises the efforts of Rapporteur Pilar del Castillo to develop a constructive response to the Commission’s Connected Continent proposals but believes that the overall package fails to address the key challenge of stimulating growth and investment.” I'll take that as a ringing endorsement and a strong sign that the net neutrality law is good for consumers. Good job on writing these amendments and getting them to pass, left-wing MEPs!
- timthorn 13y ago
  I think that's more a response to the ban on intraEU roaming charges than net neutrality...
  - mercurial 13y ago
    > “Network operators must be able to develop services that meet the needs of consumers and charge different prices for differentiated products,” GSMA director general Anne Bouverot exclaimed. This bit makes me say that Net Neutrality isn't exactly what they were lobbying for.
  - lclarkmichalek 13y ago
    If they're still bitter about that, then they need to grow up. The writing has been on the wall for a _long_ time about the death of EU roaming charges. Some companies were already bragging about not charging any well prior to the ban
kzrdude 13y ago
I'm so happy how Andersdotter/@teirdes has arrived in Brussels. She is already "e-communications" spokesperson for the Greens/EFA group in the EP: http://www.greens-efa.eu/electronic-communications-12163.html http://www.greens-efa.eu/electronic-communications-12163.htm... and I believe that they have a very powerful collaboration on privacy and other pirate issues
- mercurial 13y ago
  I actually met her last year at a conference. Very intelligent and well-spoken.
  - kzrdude 13y ago
    Yeah, it's wonderful, a young person talking about internet issues I care about, just listen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiNH3MCFkBg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiNH3MCFkBg Right now I'm of course nervous for the election, and I hope that she will keep her mandate. She's clearly got a visionary mind, and uses every opportunity to stress the need for evidence-based policy.
    - mercurial 13y ago
      I'd be happy to give her my vote, but I'm in the wrong country.
hendrik-xdest 13y ago
I wouldn't give too much on this just yet. From the information in the article I can't tell if the word "strong" is correct for what was passed today. If anything, an indicator that Neelie Kroes is happy with the result might point to a weak law that won't help net neutrality at all. We might not have the "Specialised services" part in there anymore. Yet, let's wait until the dust settles and some people have read the complete text before we celebrate. Also, as we speak, the text that didn't make it might already have been inserted in the US-EU trade agreement that is discussed behind closed doors at the moment. Wouldn't be the first time that the same words were dismissed first and than added in a different law. ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) was dismissed and then added to a treaty between the EU and Canada.
- mercurial 13y ago
  > If anything, an indicator that Neelie Kroes is happy with the result might point to a weak law that won't help net neutrality at all. At this point she has no choice. She can't lament the passing of a law she initiated herself. I wouldn't put too much stock into it. > Also, as we speak, the text that didn't make it might already have been inserted in the US-EU trade agreement that is discussed behind closed doors at the moment. Obviously, the industry is not going to give up without a fight. The price of net neutrality is eternal vigilance and all that.
- Silhouette 13y ago
  Would you elaborate on your final paragraph, please? I wasn't aware of either a closed-door US-EU trade agreement in the works, or any back room ACTA-style deal in a Canada-EU treaty.
  - mcintyre1994 13y ago
    The US-EU trade agreement may refer to TTIP, whose contents do seem to be secret at the moment. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/ http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/
vixen99 13y ago
Roaming charges: I predict the telecomms will be increasing their general charges to make good losses on roaming. "Infrastructure and spectrum are expensive, and these costs need to be recouped somehow. Right now, the mobile operators are a bit stuck into low domestic data prices. So the money has to be clawed back from roaming customers instead". The reversal of this policy will mean that the non-traveling public will subsidize travelers. Great for those voting and attending the EU Parliament among others. Not so hot for the rest.
- sveme 13y ago
  Possible, but I would say it will rather create a much fiercer competition: Differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As a German, the only viable option if I am spending most my time within Germany was to go with a German carrier. Now with the removal of roaming charges, the EU becomes the domestic market and in principle I could shop around other EU countries to find the best deal. Austria for example has some really good deals, so maybe I will go with a carrier from there. And with SEPA even billing should not be an issue. The other (intended) thing this will spur is further consolidation of the EU Telecoms market as there will suddenly be a much larger number of competing players on the market. As I said, in principle Austrian Telecoms are now for the first time directly competing for customers with Spanish Telecoms in Germany, so I guess we'll see a lot more mergers in the close future. Which might turn out to be anticompetitive in the long run, mind.
  - M2Ys4U 13y ago
    I'm pretty sure that higher prices for international calls have not been abolished, though, which puts a dent in the idea of shopping around for the best deal. Though, I suppose you could buy multiple SIMs and switch them around as needed now.
    - sveme 13y ago
      To my understanding calls from your own country to another EU country are also covered by this: http://ec.europa.eu/news/science/130916_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/news/science/130916_en.htm The quote: >International call charges would be capped at the price of a long-distance domestic call and intra-EU mobile calls at €0.19 per minute (plus VAT).
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lmedinas 13y ago
"This vote is the EU delivering for citizens. This is what the EU is all about – getting rid of barriers to make life easier and less expensive.” At least something positive made from our Parlament! If we want a strong Europe we have to unite and share more between countries. EDIT: Citing the source from the other post. PS: I hope i didn't sound too patriotic :)
higherpurpose 13y ago
They're still allowed to have premium channels for their TV service and such. Isn't that not very "net neutrality"-like?
- pjc50 13y ago
  TV is not internet. You can run TV over internet, but that's a service being provided over the internet. TV has never been a universal access medium.
johansch 13y ago
Here's a kind of sickening statement: '"Europe's telecoms operators are facing decreasing revenues ... compared with operators in the U.S. and Asia," said the GSM Association, an industry group for mobile phone companies. In a statement signed by director Anne Bouverot, the group said European laws are "impairing their ability to invest in the infrastructure required to put Europe back on the path to growth and jobs."' http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/european-parliament-adopts-net-neutrality-law-23172382 http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/european-parliame... One example of these "poor companies": TeliaSonera: 1.69 billion euros in profit out of a 2.99 billion euro revenue (2013) Edit: Sorry, yearly revenue was about 11.6 billion euro.
- Nux 13y ago
  Yeah, someone seriously needs to whip their greedy arses. I guess we need even more competition to drive these dinosaurs a bit out of business. It's the USA and ASIA that should follow Europe, not the other way around.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- danielweber 13y ago
  TeliaSonera: 1.69 billion euros in profit out of a 2.99 billion euro revenue (2013) I'm having trouble believing those numbers. I found a source that agrees with you [1] but Bloomberg charts show only a ~10% profit margin. [2] I wonder if the reporter in [1] confused annual revenue with quarterly revenue from this Bloomberg article. [3] EDIT: The reporter in [1] isn't wrong, but people misreading the first paragraph is probably the source of the confusion spreading across the Internet. Read down a few paragraphs and they compare 4th quarter net profit to 4th quarter revenue, which is roughly 10%. Also, here is the profit & loss statement from 2013. [4] Annual revenue is about 104 billion kronor, net income is about 15 billion kronor. [1] http://www.thelocal.se/20140130/beleaguered-teliasonera-took-profit-tumble-in-2013 http://www.thelocal.se/20140130/beleaguered-teliasonera-took... [2] http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/TLSN:SS http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/TLSN:SS [3] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/teliasonera-profit-misses-estimates-on-falling-broadband-mobile.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/teliasonera-profit-... [4] http://markets.ft.com/research/Markets/Tearsheets/Financials?s=TLSN:STO&subview=IncomeStatement http://markets.ft.com/research/Markets/Tearsheets/Financials...
mschuster91 13y ago
Well then, finally a point to prove to anti-EU activists (UK: UKIP, DE: AfD, etc.) why having the European Union actually is important and the European Parliament isn't just a paper tiger regulating the population to death. (Granted, most European laws ARE regulation to death, but this is a good starting point...)
bpeel 13y ago
I wonder if we could interpret this to mean that it would be illegal for ISPs not to provide IPv6. It is just internet traffic after all.
jcfrei 13y ago
Roaming charges will effectively be dropped on the 15th December 2015. Src: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/content/20140331IPR41232/html/Ensure-open-access-for-internet-service-suppliers-and-ban-roaming-fees-say-MEPs http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/content/2014...
- thisiswrong 13y ago
  So much is changing in the tech world. I hope that by dec 2015 we have incentivised mesh networks, thus making centralized telcos obsolete.
netcan 13y ago
If we didn't already have such a shoddy history with national telecoms (and other infrastructure company), I would be in favor of them. It's so unsatisfying to think that this ugly government in bed with big oligopolies, regulators, lobbying and nonsense could be the optimal solution. yuck.
abvdasker 13y ago
I think this can also be taken as good news in the US. Passing these laws makes Europe a very attractive place to put an internet service. It may be wishful thinking, but my hope is that this form of international competition motivates US legislators to pass similar net-neutrality laws to keep from losing start-ups and tech companies to Europe.
barking 13y ago
A couple of popular acts emanating from the EU parliament just recently. Couldn't be anything to do with the European parliament elections coming up this summer could it? Our local MEP was on radio claiming credit for the smartphone recharger harmonization measure just recently. When queried about loopholes in the act that effectively allow manufacturers to sidestep the issue she revealed herself to be clueless.
stcredzero 13y ago
Are European laws a bellwether for US laws? I hope so.
_asciiker_ 13y ago
Why do I get the feeling that most of these comments are basically pointing out faults in EU instead of the news itself which is of great relevancy to all of us. I understand the audience here is mostly American but shouldn't we really by cheering this achievement and try to convince US senators to follow the lead? US is the one who is behind right now. Neutrally speaking.

541 points by xmpir 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

It never stops to amaze me - what does have Europe that other places don't? ...anyway, I'm just glad and thankful to be born in Europe!

thomasahle 13y ago

> Providers of internet access to end-users shall not discriminate between functionally equivalent services and applications. This means they can still throttle torrents, right?

Bulk70 13y ago
Well, based on that quote they can throttle what they want - but they have to do it equally across all similar applications. So for example they can't throttle Youtube and not throttle Netflix - they have to throttle both (or neither).
- akie 13y ago
  Well, that depends on your interpretation of "functionally equivalent". Is Youtube functionally equivalent with Netflix?
  - bayesianhorse 13y ago
    Spam-Emails, DDOS attacks and Http Traffic aren't functionally equivalent, which is probably the point. I think the definition will also include the question of competition between the traffic streams. Youtube and Netflix are competitors, whereas an E-Mail Service and a Gaming Service isn't. Net Neutrality should not mean we have to build the infrastructure that can faithfully execute DDOS attacks. Now, if we want to build the infrastructure to let all internet users stream 4K Video 24/7, is a whole other question...
belorn 13y ago
If its: a) Reasonable, b) transparent, c) non-discriminatory of that traffic type, d) there is temporary and exceptional network congestion, e) measure is not be maintained longer than necessary. If all those are true they may throttle torrents. A key word here is transparent, since few ISP even admit that they throttle traffic.

Morgawr 13y ago

These are great news, I am a big supporter for net neutrality, however I am a bit concerned about one small detail: >“Net neutrality” means the principle according to which all internet traffic is treated equally, without discrimination, restriction or interference, independently of its sender, recipient, type, content, device, service or application. I wonder how this will work in case of malicious attacks, ddos, disruptive requests and packets/connections with the sole purpose of disrupting the normal usage of the net. Blocking these at isp level is not a bad idea, but how deep does this rabbit hole go?

MatthewWilkes 13y ago
This doesn't extend to protecting illegal acts from interference.
- higherpurpose 13y ago
  By that logic ISPs could throttle or block torrenting or Bitcoin if they are "illegal" in some country.
  - kaoD 13y ago
    Sure, what's the problem? If it's illegal, it's illegal. The blame is on the people if they let their governments ban BT.
  - rvschuilenburg 13y ago
    That is correct. In The Netherlands we already have net neutrality, but this hasn't stopped the Pirate Bay from being blocked. However, try to prove to a judge the entire protocol is illegal and should be blocked.
    - ErikHuisman 13y ago
      Initially the court decided that blocking all subscribers went too far but BREIN wasn’t satisfied and took the case to a full trial, which they won. Both Ziggo and XS4ALL filed subsequent appeals, arguing that the blockade was ineffective and denied subscribers’ free access to information. Today the Court of The Hague released its verdict which sides with the Internet providers. In its ruling the Court states that the Pirate Bay blockade is disproportionate and ineffective, citing TNO research and the Baywatch report of the University of Amsterdam. As a result, the blockade was found to hinder the Internet providers’ entrepreneurial freedoms. jan 2014

timthorn 13y ago

From first reading, this makes it look as if ISPs will be unable to offer eg elevated weighting to specific VoIP traffic unless that's offered by the ISP themselves. I want my VoIP trunks to my exchange to have better QoS than my Skype chats. I'm not convinced this is a good thing.

icebraining 13y ago
I want my VoIP trunks to my exchange to have better QoS than my Skype chats. Then configure your router to do so?
- timthorn 13y ago
  That works for my link from the PoP to my router, but not beyond the PoP.
dspillett 13y ago
I think it is more like "unable to offer eg elevated weighting to specific VoIP traffic unless that is specifically requested by their users" - which means they can't discriminate between services for their financial benefit rather than because that is what their users want (favouring skype over google's hangout unless Google pay them a wodge of cash, or vice versa, for instance). They would be able to give weighting to VoIP traffic generally by my understanding, assuming that they can correctly identify the traffic of course, so they can still perform good QoS practise to stop large bulk data transfer (P2P sharing, huge HTTP transfers) causing massively inflated latency for more interactive traffic (VoIP, small HTTP(S) transfers, ...) where that matters.
belorn 13y ago
In addition, there is demand on the part of content, applications and services providers, for the provision of transmission services based on flexible quality parameters, including lower levels of priority for traffic which is not time- sensitive. The possibility for content, applications and service providers to negotiate such flexible quality of service levels with providers of electronic communications may also be necessary for the provision of certain services such as machine-to-machine (M2M) communications. Providers of content, applications and services and providers of electronic communications should therefore continue to be free to conclude specialised services agreements on defined levels of quality of service as long as such agreements do not impair the quality of internet access service. -http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+AMD+A7-2014-0190+237-244+DOC+PDF+V0//EN http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//...

bayesianhorse 13y ago

I think the EU is getting an amazing amount of work done, if you consider that it consists of 28 nation states which went to war with each other regularly for centuries up to a couple of decades ago...

bananas 13y ago
We're probably not done yet in that case!
Systemic33 13y ago
And some of them are still culturally at war ;) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark%E2%80%93Sweden_relations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark%E2%80%93Sweden_relation...
- mercurial 13y ago
  I don't know. Danish news always go "X is bad in Denmark. Meanwhile, X is really good in Sweden."
  - baq 13y ago
    there's a lot of 'grass is greener on the other side' in all of europe, this is probably the case here.
    - mercurial 13y ago
      True enough. Though in this specific case, grass is more likely to be covered by more now on the other side :)
    - mcv 13y ago
      And it used to be that we tried to take their grass by conquest. Now we just go there on vacation.
  - Svip 13y ago
    There used to be two ways to argue for a law proposal in Folketinget (Danish parliament): "According to science, ..." and "in Sweden, they have..."

LambdaAlmighty 13y ago

This will end in tragedy for consumers (and profit in the right pockets), as do all attempts by governments to regulate. "Introduced by socialists, green and left blocs" -- an immediate huge red flag. The days of EU internet freedom are coming to an end, once these people start meddling in.

NicoJuicy 13y ago

It was a close call... Neelie Kroes didn't want this. But against expectations, democracy won.. That doesn't happen much in the world (Eg. What Karel De Gucht tried / did ). All with all, i'm very glad this happened! It gave me some faith again in Europe as a regulator (i'm from Belgium ). (still dissappointed in Neelie Kroes though, she has some very good ideas... Opposing net neutrality was definetly a bad idea)

NicoJuicy 13y ago
PS. Some examples of good ideas: - Transforming libraries in hackerspaces (this is one of the best ideas i ever came accross) - Removing roaming (expensive cell phone calls in foreign countries, but in Europe, we are all different countries. 9000 € for checking your mail and etc... was not an exception). Some people who regulary stay in foreign countries (work, business, long vacation, .. get a mobile subscription in that country, so they would have 2 phone numbers). But this should be fixed in 2016 (still a long time though) - PRO net neutrality (some years ago, currently she changed her opinion for an unknown reason : http://ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/kroes/en/blog/netneutrality http://ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/kroes/en/blog/netne... )
- shdon 13y ago
  On the whole, I think she does good work. I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt that she genuinely thought the text as proposed would sufficiently protect net neutrality or at least underestimated the holes it left. But even if she didn't, it is good to see that parliament did its job and corrected the mistakes made by the legislators.
  - mcv 13y ago
    She's the only Eurocommissioner that I constantly see fighting for all sorts of good causes. The others barely register or seem to be a net negative. I like Kroes a lot, but every once in a while, she suddenly supports something that seems quite the opposite of her usual position. Weirdly out of character. And I often find myself wondering if maybe there's something else at play in the background.

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mercurial 13y ago

> mobile carrier industry body the GSMA said it “recognises the efforts of Rapporteur Pilar del Castillo to develop a constructive response to the Commission’s Connected Continent proposals but believes that the overall package fails to address the key challenge of stimulating growth and investment.” I'll take that as a ringing endorsement and a strong sign that the net neutrality law is good for consumers. Good job on writing these amendments and getting them to pass, left-wing MEPs!

timthorn 13y ago
I think that's more a response to the ban on intraEU roaming charges than net neutrality...
- mercurial 13y ago
  > “Network operators must be able to develop services that meet the needs of consumers and charge different prices for differentiated products,” GSMA director general Anne Bouverot exclaimed. This bit makes me say that Net Neutrality isn't exactly what they were lobbying for.
- lclarkmichalek 13y ago
  If they're still bitter about that, then they need to grow up. The writing has been on the wall for a _long_ time about the death of EU roaming charges. Some companies were already bragging about not charging any well prior to the ban

kzrdude 13y ago

I'm so happy how Andersdotter/@teirdes has arrived in Brussels. She is already "e-communications" spokesperson for the Greens/EFA group in the EP: http://www.greens-efa.eu/electronic-communications-12163.html http://www.greens-efa.eu/electronic-communications-12163.htm... and I believe that they have a very powerful collaboration on privacy and other pirate issues

mercurial 13y ago
I actually met her last year at a conference. Very intelligent and well-spoken.
- kzrdude 13y ago
  Yeah, it's wonderful, a young person talking about internet issues I care about, just listen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiNH3MCFkBg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiNH3MCFkBg Right now I'm of course nervous for the election, and I hope that she will keep her mandate. She's clearly got a visionary mind, and uses every opportunity to stress the need for evidence-based policy.
  - mercurial 13y ago
    I'd be happy to give her my vote, but I'm in the wrong country.

hendrik-xdest 13y ago

I wouldn't give too much on this just yet. From the information in the article I can't tell if the word "strong" is correct for what was passed today. If anything, an indicator that Neelie Kroes is happy with the result might point to a weak law that won't help net neutrality at all. We might not have the "Specialised services" part in there anymore. Yet, let's wait until the dust settles and some people have read the complete text before we celebrate. Also, as we speak, the text that didn't make it might already have been inserted in the US-EU trade agreement that is discussed behind closed doors at the moment. Wouldn't be the first time that the same words were dismissed first and than added in a different law. ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) was dismissed and then added to a treaty between the EU and Canada.

mercurial 13y ago
> If anything, an indicator that Neelie Kroes is happy with the result might point to a weak law that won't help net neutrality at all. At this point she has no choice. She can't lament the passing of a law she initiated herself. I wouldn't put too much stock into it. > Also, as we speak, the text that didn't make it might already have been inserted in the US-EU trade agreement that is discussed behind closed doors at the moment. Obviously, the industry is not going to give up without a fight. The price of net neutrality is eternal vigilance and all that.
Silhouette 13y ago
Would you elaborate on your final paragraph, please? I wasn't aware of either a closed-door US-EU trade agreement in the works, or any back room ACTA-style deal in a Canada-EU treaty.
- mcintyre1994 13y ago
  The US-EU trade agreement may refer to TTIP, whose contents do seem to be secret at the moment. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/ http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/

vixen99 13y ago

Roaming charges: I predict the telecomms will be increasing their general charges to make good losses on roaming. "Infrastructure and spectrum are expensive, and these costs need to be recouped somehow. Right now, the mobile operators are a bit stuck into low domestic data prices. So the money has to be clawed back from roaming customers instead". The reversal of this policy will mean that the non-traveling public will subsidize travelers. Great for those voting and attending the EU Parliament among others. Not so hot for the rest.

sveme 13y ago
Possible, but I would say it will rather create a much fiercer competition: Differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As a German, the only viable option if I am spending most my time within Germany was to go with a German carrier. Now with the removal of roaming charges, the EU becomes the domestic market and in principle I could shop around other EU countries to find the best deal. Austria for example has some really good deals, so maybe I will go with a carrier from there. And with SEPA even billing should not be an issue. The other (intended) thing this will spur is further consolidation of the EU Telecoms market as there will suddenly be a much larger number of competing players on the market. As I said, in principle Austrian Telecoms are now for the first time directly competing for customers with Spanish Telecoms in Germany, so I guess we'll see a lot more mergers in the close future. Which might turn out to be anticompetitive in the long run, mind.
- M2Ys4U 13y ago
  I'm pretty sure that higher prices for international calls have not been abolished, though, which puts a dent in the idea of shopping around for the best deal. Though, I suppose you could buy multiple SIMs and switch them around as needed now.
  - sveme 13y ago
    To my understanding calls from your own country to another EU country are also covered by this: http://ec.europa.eu/news/science/130916_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/news/science/130916_en.htm The quote: >International call charges would be capped at the price of a long-distance domestic call and intra-EU mobile calls at €0.19 per minute (plus VAT).

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lmedinas 13y ago

"This vote is the EU delivering for citizens. This is what the EU is all about – getting rid of barriers to make life easier and less expensive.” At least something positive made from our Parlament! If we want a strong Europe we have to unite and share more between countries. EDIT: Citing the source from the other post. PS: I hope i didn't sound too patriotic :)

higherpurpose 13y ago

They're still allowed to have premium channels for their TV service and such. Isn't that not very "net neutrality"-like?

pjc50 13y ago
TV is not internet. You can run TV over internet, but that's a service being provided over the internet. TV has never been a universal access medium.

johansch 13y ago

Here's a kind of sickening statement: '"Europe's telecoms operators are facing decreasing revenues ... compared with operators in the U.S. and Asia," said the GSM Association, an industry group for mobile phone companies. In a statement signed by director Anne Bouverot, the group said European laws are "impairing their ability to invest in the infrastructure required to put Europe back on the path to growth and jobs."' http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/european-parliament-adopts-net-neutrality-law-23172382 http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/european-parliame... One example of these "poor companies": TeliaSonera: 1.69 billion euros in profit out of a 2.99 billion euro revenue (2013) Edit: Sorry, yearly revenue was about 11.6 billion euro.

Nux 13y ago
Yeah, someone seriously needs to whip their greedy arses. I guess we need even more competition to drive these dinosaurs a bit out of business. It's the USA and ASIA that should follow Europe, not the other way around.
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danielweber 13y ago
TeliaSonera: 1.69 billion euros in profit out of a 2.99 billion euro revenue (2013) I'm having trouble believing those numbers. I found a source that agrees with you [1] but Bloomberg charts show only a ~10% profit margin. [2] I wonder if the reporter in [1] confused annual revenue with quarterly revenue from this Bloomberg article. [3] EDIT: The reporter in [1] isn't wrong, but people misreading the first paragraph is probably the source of the confusion spreading across the Internet. Read down a few paragraphs and they compare 4th quarter net profit to 4th quarter revenue, which is roughly 10%. Also, here is the profit & loss statement from 2013. [4] Annual revenue is about 104 billion kronor, net income is about 15 billion kronor. [1] http://www.thelocal.se/20140130/beleaguered-teliasonera-took-profit-tumble-in-2013 http://www.thelocal.se/20140130/beleaguered-teliasonera-took... [2] http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/TLSN:SS http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/TLSN:SS [3] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/teliasonera-profit-misses-estimates-on-falling-broadband-mobile.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/teliasonera-profit-... [4] http://markets.ft.com/research/Markets/Tearsheets/Financials?s=TLSN:STO&subview=IncomeStatement http://markets.ft.com/research/Markets/Tearsheets/Financials...

mschuster91 13y ago

Well then, finally a point to prove to anti-EU activists (UK: UKIP, DE: AfD, etc.) why having the European Union actually is important and the European Parliament isn't just a paper tiger regulating the population to death. (Granted, most European laws ARE regulation to death, but this is a good starting point...)

bpeel 13y ago

I wonder if we could interpret this to mean that it would be illegal for ISPs not to provide IPv6. It is just internet traffic after all.

jcfrei 13y ago

Roaming charges will effectively be dropped on the 15th December 2015. Src: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/content/20140331IPR41232/html/Ensure-open-access-for-internet-service-suppliers-and-ban-roaming-fees-say-MEPs http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/content/2014...

thisiswrong 13y ago
So much is changing in the tech world. I hope that by dec 2015 we have incentivised mesh networks, thus making centralized telcos obsolete.

netcan 13y ago

If we didn't already have such a shoddy history with national telecoms (and other infrastructure company), I would be in favor of them. It's so unsatisfying to think that this ugly government in bed with big oligopolies, regulators, lobbying and nonsense could be the optimal solution. yuck.

abvdasker 13y ago

I think this can also be taken as good news in the US. Passing these laws makes Europe a very attractive place to put an internet service. It may be wishful thinking, but my hope is that this form of international competition motivates US legislators to pass similar net-neutrality laws to keep from losing start-ups and tech companies to Europe.

barking 13y ago

A couple of popular acts emanating from the EU parliament just recently. Couldn't be anything to do with the European parliament elections coming up this summer could it? Our local MEP was on radio claiming credit for the smartphone recharger harmonization measure just recently. When queried about loopholes in the act that effectively allow manufacturers to sidestep the issue she revealed herself to be clueless.

stcredzero 13y ago

Are European laws a bellwether for US laws? I hope so.

_asciiker_ 13y ago

Why do I get the feeling that most of these comments are basically pointing out faults in EU instead of the news itself which is of great relevancy to all of us. I understand the audience here is mostly American but shouldn't we really by cheering this achievement and try to convince US senators to follow the lead? US is the one who is behind right now. Neutrally speaking.