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> Zero-rating is free shipping. I don’t know of anyone that considers free shipping anti-competitive, though one could make the same argument. That's a bad ana

> Zero-rating is free shipping. I don’t know of anyone that considers free shipping anti-competitive, though one could make the same argument. That's a bad analogy. A better analogy would be USPS[0] providing certain shippers with free shipping, and not others[1]. Imagine the disastrous effects this would have on small sellers, who would certainly not have the means to negotiate these rates with USPS, whereas a larger company would. So it's not a slippery slope, because the anti-competitive impact is direct and immediate. USPS has to charge everyone the same price for the same service, and for good reason. [0] Like broadband ISPs, USPS has an effective monopoly on shipping in parts of the country, as private carriers (UPS/FedEx) will simply "offload" certain deliveries to them, as USPS is required to ship to all locations. [1] USPS does offer, for example, "Media mail" discounts, but this is available to all shippers, and represents a different service (slower delivery, no guaranteed dates - in the olden days, it represented surface shipping, though I'm not sure that is the case anymore).

colechristensen 12y ago
It seems more akin to USPS providing discounted rates for books in Media Mail and Library Mail (the T-Mobile way of discounting any streaming service without charge, at least) As long as traffic priorities are applied to _classes_ of traffic which don't directly benefit a provider's service over competitors, I don't have a problem with it and don't think it violates the spirit of what network neutrality is supposed to be about. It's also important that it's a positive benefit, not a restriction.
jschwartzi 12y ago
UPS does actually do something like this. If you buy a UPS label online without an account, you pay what's called "list price," which is the full advertised price for shipping. However, if you're a shipper with an account, UPS will discount your shipping below list price if you do a lot of business with them. I've seen up to a 20% discount for parcels shipped UPS Ground on a small company's account. I don't have any data on this, but I suspect that some combination of the list price discount and some special contractual arrangements are what allow Amazon to offer services such as Prime for such a low price. List price for a 1 lb next day air shipment were on the order of $50.00 last time I shipped anything.

colechristensen 12y ago

It seems more akin to USPS providing discounted rates for books in Media Mail and Library Mail (the T-Mobile way of discounting any streaming service without charge, at least) As long as traffic priorities are applied to _classes_ of traffic which don't directly benefit a provider's service over competitors, I don't have a problem with it and don't think it violates the spirit of what network neutrality is supposed to be about. It's also important that it's a positive benefit, not a restriction.

jschwartzi 12y ago

UPS does actually do something like this. If you buy a UPS label online without an account, you pay what's called "list price," which is the full advertised price for shipping. However, if you're a shipper with an account, UPS will discount your shipping below list price if you do a lot of business with them. I've seen up to a 20% discount for parcels shipped UPS Ground on a small company's account. I don't have any data on this, but I suspect that some combination of the list price discount and some special contractual arrangements are what allow Amazon to offer services such as Prime for such a low price. List price for a 1 lb next day air shipment were on the order of $50.00 last time I shipped anything.