13 ms·

If net neutrality falls, what happens next?

• chx 12y ago
  You need to realize packet filtering is not without costs. Nor is negotiating with most companies. Finally, you can't get blood out of stone. Altogether meaning -- the ISPs will go after the largest of traffic producers with a threat of pay or be throttled. Some evidence, beyond what Netflix says for eg. https://twitter.com/msonnabaum/status/504073659124703232 https://twitter.com/msonnabaum/status/504073659124703232 suggests something like this is already happening. But I can't see Verizon putting up an online shop saying "Buy X TB of VIP traffic for your domain". In the long run -- perhaps even that will happen. And then? And the you will pay...
• Qantourisc 12y ago
  I think it will need to get rather bad, before people will act. Before that any tools made would be used.
  • byuu 12y ago
    I'm somewhat interested in the tools, to see how the internet would route around the problem. One idea would be to make a browser that can 'leech' off sites that paid for fast lanes. Say, you store your data onto Google Drive, Facebook, etc and the browser will load the actual content off of these services and present it as if it were its own unique web site, stripping off all of the host site's branding. I won't say that's necessarily ethical, but it does feel like an inevitable consequence if things ever got really bad. You'd probably gain web hosts that advertise having peering deals for all of their hosted sites, so you just pay more money to host on them and your users "magically" get faster service. VPNs would likely play in a lot. I'm not sure how businesses would tolerate their required secure connections being throttled in the extreme. I wonder if a VPN service provider could pay for a fast connection to your ISP, giving you a link around it? Perhaps instead of Netflix at 100% speed, $tinywebsite at 20% speed, this could give you 70% speed across the board by connecting you with a neutral backbone.
• justinmk 12y ago
  It would be nice if NN advocates focused on improving competition in the ISP space instead of using this as a reason to give the FCC control over yet another communication medium. Mesh networks and more ISP choice would "enforce" net neutrality via consumer signals instead of the "just make it happen" solution being proposed.
  • themartorana 12y ago
    This sounds nice but is illogical. Actually creating alternative competitor networks are insanely prohibitively expensive, and will likely back up against a backbone served by one of the few capable ISPs anyway. Besides that, competition is artificially stifled by government sponsored monopolies - but competing ISPs like it that way. It makes new markets difficult but on the up side, makes price collusion easy (and the threat of competition non-existent). Like it or not, the fight is on the beaches of the FCC, and we don't get to move the front lines willy-nilly in this fight.
    • rakoo 12y ago
      Is it really _that_ expensive, though ? As far as I can see the lack of competition happens mainly in the last mile part. There are myriads of community-run ISPs that specifically target this area around the world; the best example I know is the FFDN (http://www.ffdn.org/ http://www.ffdn.org/). I've listened to many conf made by Benjamin Bayart, ex-president of the association that started this movement. The key idea behind running your own ISP (at least in France) are: - It's easy. A few forms to fill and you're official. - It's cheap. Expect less than 100 euros - All it really requires is involvement. People wanting to commit to it for more than the next 6 months. Technically they absolutely depend on big names' network for transiting data. But the end point is their own; there can be competition if you want to. Plus, the big names would like to create differentiation on the end points, but they actually don't care as much about that when you're your own ISP and peer/transit through them.
      • maxsilver 12y ago
        Assuming your talking about the US with your question (since the article is), than in the US it really is _that_ expensive. The main reason it's "easy" in France (and UK, and other places) is that the big name's network are required by law to let you use the end point. That exists in the US on the phone lines (legacy telephone regulations). But not on anything else (no cable or fiber). So unless you want to pour all of your time and energy into offering flaky, slow, unreliable internet over 100-year-old copper lines, with speeds below 6mb and minor outages daily, your out of luck re-using any lines in the US. That difference alone suddenly makes it not remotely easy or cheap. To deploy internet at a reasonable price, you have to start an entire fiber construction company, and local political lobbying firm, simultaneously, just to get a single customer. We're talking a barrier to entry of at least 1 to 2 million dollars, to wire a neighborhood, just to get your first customer signed up. Customers who've been conditioned to pay no more than $80/month for internet access. That cost is actually not expensive compared to typical municipal projects. But it's way more than you'll ever get funding for, to chase, unless you are already extremely wealthy from some other business / family history / etc. Venture firms would rather fund one thousand new Instagrams than pour money into anything remotely resembling a utility business. The main way around that cost barrier is to deploy "bad" technology, like wireless. That can be done on a shoestring budget. It works really well in places where there is zero density (rural, exurbs). But it's not the future, it's legacy deployment, with legacy problems and legacy speeds. The nicest microwave radios you can buy only barely match the speeds and reliability of the cheapest fiber deployment. So, if your in any sort of reasonably-sized city, you'd be stupid to not roll out fiber from the start. And to do that, your looking at millions of dollars of cost. No one will ever fund that. (I've tried -- countless times). Typically, only selfie-sharing iPhone apps can generate investment like that. This is why most people in the US are pushing for "common carrier". Because no one here believes a honest business will ever deploy a modern network on any large scale, so the best we can hope for is an upgrade from 100-year-old phone lines, to 40-year-old cable lines.
• freakonom 12y ago
  Companies will gradually start selling services piecemeal at what will be promoted as a "discount", where you buy a tiered package of sites. "Obviously, you only need Facebook, Google, and Buzzfeed. Why are you paying for that shitty internet you don't need?" Public praises the lower bills, talk shows argue incessantly, and nobody grasps either the tech or the economics: the price of the discount is that large tech/infra companies no longer have to worry about competition, and can levy arbitrary entry fees. Gradually the big companies open up walled app stores that let you run your internet applications within their parameters, rules, and fees. Since this is the only way to reach anyone, smaller upstarts/devlopers grudgingly accept the new way of things, until the whole shenanigan is disrupted by a little guy meeting an unmet, undervalued need out of left field. And the cycle repeats.
  • namenotrequired 12y ago
    > "Obviously, you only need Facebook, Google, and Buzzfeed. Why are you paying for that shitty internet you don't need?" For me, the value in Google, and partly in Facebook, is primarily in other sites they link to. Am I an exception? Or is the point, you might need those others occasionally, but you only need the main few to be fast?
  • joesmo 12y ago
    > Since this is the only way to reach anyone, smaller upstarts/devlopers grudgingly accept the new way of things, until the whole shenanigan is disrupted by alittle guy meeting an unmet, undervalued need. If, as a startup, I can't reach any customers anymore, why even take that risk and start a company? Why, as a VC / angel, would I want to invest in companies that are more or less destined to lose out (Internet based businesses). I think it'll have a huge negative impact on businesses, especially new Internet based businesses and this will lead to less innovation and less startups. It all depends how severe things get, but since there's really nothing to stop ISPs from charging businesses and customers whatever they want, I wouldn't be surprised if the current tech/Internet boom slowly fades away as company after company finds that it's just not worth trying to compete.
  • deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
• msoad 12y ago
  Right now most of non-neutral networks exist specially outside of the US in cellular networks. They allow Spotify or other media streaming services deliver content to the user without charging user's data plan. Most of the companies competing in media streaming space, specially those with paid subscribers are big enough to pay the ISP for the fast lane (Beats, Netflix, Rdio etc). One exception is the fast lane (or maybe VIP lane in this case) for Facebook in developing countries. I've seen Facebook let users with no data plan whatsoever use the service in Türkie. You can see how this makes it hard for other social networks to catch up. I don't think US cable companies make a tier system for websites. It doesn't make sense. All the non-media traffic isn't much that worth the discrimination. Most of the un-neutrality will be in cellular networks and media delivery.
  • bsimpson 12y ago
    Are you/were you Amish? I've never seen Turkey spelled with "ie", and Google seems to think that's the Penn. Dutch spelling.
    • lucb1e 12y ago
      In Dutch it's Turkije - there's a j in between ("ij" makes a single sound, and the "e" is another sound). "Turkie" would sound weird in Dutch too and it's not Dutch spelling, though I guess it looks like it.
      • ardacinar 12y ago
        Türkie might be a misspelling of Türkei (German) or Türkiye ( Turkish).
      • bsimpson 12y ago
        According to Wikipedia, the Pennsylvania Dutch are actually from southern Germany, and have no connection to Holland or Dutch.
        • lucb1e 12y ago
• sspies 12y ago
  Could it be a business case to open up the routing system to users?
• brandonmenc 12y ago
  Nothing. Quality of service will remain, at worst, as it currently is, and no one will notice a difference. Netflix et al. will continue to host cache devices with ISPs, torrents will still work, video chat will still work, and chances are no startup will ever be forced to pay ISPs to deliver their packets. No one will ever be presented with the option to purchase a "Social Media/Streaming/whatever Internet Package," but maybe they'll be offered the option to upgrade to a more explicit SLA with bandwidth/latency guarantees. Maybe some kids will DDoS an ISP or two, but the effect will be nil. That's my prediction.
  • zobzu 12y ago
    you dont seem to have noticed how the capitalist world works.
  • spindritf 12y ago
    Nothing. Exactly. Where there's competition, ISPs won't be able to keep their market share with a restricted service. And in areas without competition, they will gouge you one way or another regardless.
• eloisant 12y ago
  We actually have an example of "non neutrality" in France. One of the major ISP (Free) is throttling Youtube because it considers Google should pay them for the traffic to their users. Consequently, Youtube is pretty slow on this ISP.
  • brandonmenc 12y ago
    Really? > France's telecoms watchdog has cleared one of the country's largest ISPs of throttling YouTube. http://www.zdnet.com/isp-free-cleared-of-throttling-youtube-in-france-7000018367/ http://www.zdnet.com/isp-free-cleared-of-throttling-youtube-...
    • zobzu 12y ago
      yes really. i have free (the ISP). youtube barely streams 240p (with hiccups) sometimes it doesnt even display the page. same for downloading on google play. you rarely even get push notifications. some other sites are slow as well albeit its not as bad as google sites, such as facebook and apple (incl. app store, software updates etc.) Its been gradually worse and worse over the years, and now im switching away from that ISP in a month. its unbearable.
      • addandsubtract 12y ago
        Does this include Googles CDN servers? Fonts, JS files, etc.?
        • zobzu 12y ago
          yes, anything that goes through their peering which is what they throttle. and the cdn servers go through the peering for some reason.
• coldcode 12y ago
  You won't ever find out because no information will come to you not intended by someone else.
• bowlofpetunias 12y ago
  Americans have swallowed second rate telecommunications services, extortionate prices and lack of competition for ages and will continue to do so, because the alternative is evil socialist government regulation.
  • adventured 12y ago
    You're wrong on that. The problem with the US telecom industry is really bad regulation, not lack of regulation. The US already has so-called evil socialist government regulation, to an extreme. The US economy, including the telecom sector, is among the most regulated on earth. Per dollar of GDP, nobody passes more economic regulations each decade than the US Government. The US Government has been in control of the telecom infrastructure when it comes to regulating it, for decades. Their incompetence at setting up a functional environment is a huge part of the problem. They've been screwing it up when it comes to ISPs for 20 years. 'Evil socialist government regulation' isn't helping Canada or Australia either. And exactly like in those instances the problem is really bad regulation, not lack of regulation. The US has faster average internet speeds than: France, UK, China, Italy, Australia, Canada, Brazil, India, Norway, Russia, Taiwan, Germany, Finland, Israel, Austria, and so on. In fact, there are no large countries by population above the US in speeds other than Japan and South Korea (both of which are generally far beyond everyone else). Most of the fast countries are tiny in population: Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Hong Kong, etc. - and even then, the US isn't drastically behind them.
    • dvanduzer 12y ago
      The problem with US Politics is that nobody cares what words mean. Keep your laws off my body when the telephone is in the bedroom.
  • goldfeld 12y ago
    I read your comment in an extremely parodying tone and so I upvoted you.
  • iterative 12y ago
    No, we already have evil socialist government regulation, which is the only way that incumbents in any industry can restrict competition and thereby charge extortionate pricing. Unfortunately, for true believers in the one try faith of government intervention, the solution to problems caused by government regulation is always more government regulation.
• dvanduzer 12y ago
  Is this a question about Internet Neutrality or internet neutrality? e.g. ISPs like CBS or AOL?
• transfire 12y ago
  At first nothing. Most of the change will be behind the scenes where ISPs will start charging content provides more and more to deliver their content. They'll leave the little guys alone, and on the slow lanes, for now. But if your site gets popular plan to pay the piper! After a while, say 5 to 10 years the ISPs will lick their lips and start offering competing services. They will keep these services at arms length so it doesn't look so much like a competing service, e.g. NBC (which is Comcast). They'll squeeze the various third party players and buy some of them up in the end. So the future looks a lot like the past: ABC, CBS and NBC with a smattering of a few others, e.g. Google.
• vonklaus 12y ago
  America would be seen as less competitive. There would eventually be a brain drain in the mid-term as developers either did not emigrate, or did immigrate out of the country as other markets offer better value. Developers will start creating programs so that all traffic is masked and can not be differentiated, things like usenet will proliferate. Hardware entrepreneurs will created localized meshnets in major cities. Also, people could actually flip out. It is the dumbest thing to do from a political standpoint. Ancient Rome placated the people with panem and circus. Poverty is already pretty widespread so many people live for entertainment. If you knock this out people will wake up a bit when they have to pay a fuckton of money (that they don't have working minimum wage) for netflix. It will likely lead to a massive decline in American supremecy.
  • joeclark77 12y ago
    Your theory is that we will be seen as more competitive if we give government bureaucrats more power to regulate and arbitrarily rule over the free market?
    • vonklaus 12y ago
      No. The question was "If net-neutrality fails...". This is my prediction for a world with failed neutrality.
• MyDogHasFleas 12y ago
  Let's parse the premise. "If net neutrality fails" -- "net neutrality" -- you probably mean the currently popular version of this, which is "don't let ISPs create fast and slow lanes, and charge for the fast lanes." Or, even less precisely, "Don't let ISPs slow down the Internet." The problem with this is, the FCC is actually not proposing to let ISPs create "slow lanes". It is proposing to allow ISPs to charge fees for better quality of service, not to degrade the service that's already provided. In fact the proposals quite specifically forbid this. -- "if ... fails" The problem with this is, net neutrality is not in effect now. And has not been at all in history, except for a brief period before the courts shot it down (because the FCC was overstepping its authority). And, nothing like the "fast/slow lanes" version of the predicted net-neutrality-copalypse has happened. So to say "what if net neutrality fails" has it exactly backwards. We already know what the no-net-neutrality world looks like, we are in it now. The real question is, what if it succeeds? What will happen then?
  • lisper 12y ago
    > the proposals quite specifically forbid this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_for_our_time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_for_our_time
  • maxsilver 12y ago
    > The FCC is actually not proposing to let ISPs create "slow lanes". It is proposing to allow ISPs to charge fees for better quality of service, not to degrade the service that's already provided. In fact the proposals quite specifically forbid this. That is a meaningless distinction. There is absolutely no difference between "creating a slow lane" and "charging for better quality of service, not to degrade the service already provided". Therefore, it doesn't matter if the FCC "specifically forbids this." If "fast lanes" are allowed at all, all lanes will be "slow lanes" by default. It doesn't matter if the FCC "forbids" slow lanes, since every lane is a slow lane already, so technically the FCC's rule wasn't broken. This is how it works today. Every lane is a slow lane on Comcast, by default, unless you pay them for a "fast lane". > "Fast/slow lanes hasn't happened yet" Yes, it has. Are you in the US? Have you ever attempted to load Netflix or YouTube on a Comcast or Verizon connection in the past year? There's slow lanes everywhere. The only difference is the prediction -- we predicted Comcast would make us pick between slow and fast lanes, like cable packages. (like http://aattp.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/neutrality.jpg http://aattp.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/neutrality.jpg). Turns out they instead went to individual websites and CDN's and made them pick the slow/fast lanes. But it's the same problem. There's no coincidence Netflix suddenly works after paying an extortion fee to Comcast. Thats the number 1 example of the "fast lane" scenario playing out already. http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/04/after-netflix-pays-comcast-speeds-improve-65/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/04/after-...
• biren34 12y ago
  As someone who ran a wireless ISP for 3 years, there is the possibility of new competition. Wired networks are crazy expensive, but we were able to build a profitable infrastructure by renting rooftop space on tall buildings and doing directv style installations. Consumers weren't willing to pay much, so we ended up focusing on business customers. If enough people are willing to pay for neutral pipes, it might reinvigorate competition in the space--at least in dense urban areas. Our big fear at the time was fiber rollouts. Neutral nets would be a competitive advantage against big players we didn't have back then.
• evan_kastl 12y ago
  We create collective ISP's. WISPs are more and more viable and advances in RF technology will make backbone cheaper and more distributed.
• AznHisoka 12y ago
  What happens next: Sea levels rise to enormous levels, anarchy, and human beings become extinct. Don't sweat the small stuff.
• hatingcable 12y ago
  Net neutrality is already "failed", thanks to binopolies in service areas such as Comcast/Verizon and Verizon/At&T. What happens next? You really don't know? America has the slowest internet speeds, slowest download speeds and is the most expensive in the world. You can thank the FCC and our corrupt, corporations-over-people government. What to do? cut off cable service - it is the only thing that will hurt them, and hurt them we must because reason and fairness mean nothing to corporations - they are bottomless pits of greed and will never stop squeezing until we squeeze back.