6 ms·

This has to be one of the most useless campaigns. Yet another slactivist 'don't really do anything but damnit feel like you did.' It doesn't 'raise awareness'

• rdl 12y ago
  I agree CISPA/PIPA were better, but that's because it was a much more clear message, and a more clear threat to all big companies. The sad truth is ending net neutrality actually helps enough big companies (access networks for sure; large content sites who can pay, to reduce the threat from smaller sites...) that it's not going to face the same kind of opposition from tech.
  • mhurron 12y ago
    A lot of the same companies that would win with anti net neutrality legislation being passed also supported SOPA/PIPA so I don't see the big tech divided don't do anything angle being applicable. No one is willing to do anything that would give up ad revenue or clicks. Shit like this makes donating to the EFF feel like a giant waste of money. "September 10: The day like every other day we won't inconvenience you, please click our ads."
• untog 12y ago
  "People have heard of Net Neutrality." "People" have, but most of the internet-using population haven't. Not saying this is the best method, but don't be fooled into thinking that everyone is aware of what's going on.
  • mhurron 12y ago
    If they weren't, after this they're still won't.
    • wuliwong 12y ago
      Why? Are you saying the actual popup doesn't communicate the proper information? I said in another comment, my website is for finding and discussing new music. My users certainly don't have to be technical people. It would seem, seeing this message might very well give them some information they've never seen before.
      • mhurron 12y ago
        First - When was the last time you read a popup? Hell, who doesn't have a popup blocker now? Second - This is not information - "Cable companies could make this page so slow, it would still be loading..." How? Why? What is this about? There is no information there. On top of that, many ISP's already are (people are familiar with throttling regarding their mobile data plan) so this doesn't even say that anything is changing.
        • untog 12y ago
          Hell, who doesn't have a popup blocker now? Again: the vast majority of people. Taking things that techies do and extrapolating to the internet population at large never ends well.
          • mhurron 12y ago
            Most browsers ship with popup blockers, and they're on by default.
            • nitrogen 12y ago
              Popup blockers typically don't block pop-overs (in-page HTML elements).
• Zikes 12y ago
  I can't tell you how many posts I saw exactly like yours regarding the Ice Bucket Challenge. "What good does a glorified wet t-shirt contest do?" "It's just a bunch of celebrities trying to participate in a pointless meme." "You're all just a bunch of mindless lemmings. You'll do anything for the attention." The Ice Bucket Challenge raised $111.1m as of August 19th, according to alsa.org.
  • Dirlewanger 12y ago
    You're thinking too broad. Think about what this is: a blog post from a CDN company. Who's the main audience? Tech-savvy people. Tech-savvy people will put this on their site that's most likely for tech-savvy people (who in turn have heard of Net Neutrality and hopefully have contacted their Congressperson about it). Any people who work for companies who have substantial traffic from non-tech-savvy people most likely would not be in a position to implement this near-worthless popup. Face it, unless Google puts something up on their homepage (they won't), nothing's changing.
    • wuliwong 12y ago
      Your assumption that the audience for Cloudflare's post is "tech-savvy people" is accurate but your follow-up assumption that the websites that these tech-savvy people make are "most likely" for tech-savvy people is obviously incorrect. The website I built for music. Certainly, my users need not be tech savvy to use my site. So if I installed this popup, there is a good chance of showing it to some non-tech people. I would assume that a lot of people that read HN have built products for non-tech people.
    • Zikes 12y ago
      So you're saying there's nothing we can do and we should just keep our heads down and pretend nothing's wrong because there's no way we can compete with big companies and lobbying groups. Good plan, let me know how that works out.
      • icebraining 12y ago
        Saying "this is not useful" is not the same as saying "nothing is useful".
• mrfusion 12y ago
  Why is the reddit box so small? I'm pretty disappointed.
• epi16 12y ago
  I say the same thing every time I read a "slacktivism" post, but here we go again: if this is useless, what do I actually do to help? Seriously, I'm not posing this as rhetoric. I've already filed a fairly long, unique comment to the FCC, but I've heard that the FCC ignores most comments unless they come from well-known players. I donate money monthly to the EFF. I've signed the letter to the lawmakers on Battle for the Net. I don't have a personal website, so I can't put up a banner ad. So, given that I've heard comments on this site and in person that all of the above counts as slacktivism, just makes me feel better, and doesn't contribute to an actual solution, what do I do to influence this issue? Ignoring the possibility of coming into large sums of money and buying myself a congressman of my very own?
  • davidw 12y ago
    Calling or writing letters (not emails!) to congressional representatives is another thing you can do. FWIW, I think that donating money is pretty real.
    • epi16 12y ago
      Are letters taken more seriously than emails? That's good to know, thanks.
      • davidw 12y ago
        I don't know if they consider it consciously, but it's about the costs to the sender: emails are cheap and easy to fire off. Phone calls and letters a bit less so.
      • at-fates-hands 12y ago
        I've spoken to several reps and they say yes. This is mainly because they get inundated with email. Letters and snail mail? Not so much. You actually have a captive audience to a degree when you send a letter.
  • mhurron 12y ago
    As an individual US citizen, that is probably all you can do, though I would call "signed the letter to the lawmakers on Battle for the Net" slacktivism. Slacktivism is - " "feel-good" measures, in support of an issue or social cause, that have little or no practical effect other than to make the person doing it take satisfaction from the feeling they have contributed" Donating money to the EFF, well you would hope it goes to paying the lawyers fighting these things in the court, so you are directly contributing to a practical effect. Comments to the FCC are actually part of the FCC's process, so while they may ignore them, that is the actual way to get your input to the FCC. Even more so when you send a personally written comment instead of filling in a form letter. On the other hand, click to sign a petition, throw up a banner add, put a little black box on the web page, send a tweet, change your avatar, these do nothing. However because you feel like you did something because you had to change some html or upload some image somewhere people do these instead of anything that would require any real thought.
• DennisP 12y ago
  Oh I don't know, the anti-SOPA campaign worked out pretty well.
• BashiBazouk 12y ago
  Worse than that. The idea that if we don't have net neutrality the internet will suddenly run at dial up speeds is pure hyperbole. Yes, net neutrality is a good thing. Yes, without it will have a certain set of problems associated with it. But simulating a problem that is highly unlikely and annoying is unlikely to get my sympathy and only grudging support. Reminds me of Critical Mass bicycle protest in San Francisco. As a life long cyclist and general lover of all things bicycle I should support the idea but they are so annoying I find myself pushed in the opposite direction...
  • jessaustin 12y ago
    Is Critical Mass a protest? I never noticed it being that. I thought it was just a bunch of folks riding? Maybe you just don't like them personally?
    • bcoates 12y ago
      As far as I can tell Critical Mass is propaganda of the deed against pedestrians.
      • jessaustin 12y ago
        Well that's not cool. I don't support that either. In my experience (limited to places I've lived), Critical Mass is more about bicycles in the street with the autos than about bicycles in the sidewalk or crosswalk with pedestrians.
    • BashiBazouk 12y ago
      Originally in the 90's it was a protest of "cyclists reclaiming the streets". It may have morphed into something else. Still, causing traffic jams and blocking people from getting home on a Friday evening seems a bit selfish and more annoying than a way of garnering support...
  • cbd1984 12y ago
    The worst part about Critical Mass is that they can block people who are trying to save a life. People who are on-call, like doctors and CRNAs and so on, don't get lights and sirens. They just drive normal cars, but if they don't get to the hospital within a certain short amount of time, someone is likely to die. Critical Mass cyclists have no way of knowing who's on-call and coming in to a hospital. Even if they do make a path for all obvious emergency vehicles, that isn't enough.
• Istof 12y ago
  While that might be true that it won't have much effect on most people, why don't you focus your energy into doing something that you think will make things change instead? Also I don't think most people know what net neutrality is at all at this point.