
John Oliver pleads with viewers to revive net neutrality fight - Tomte
https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/8/15577800/john-oliver-net-neutrality-last-week-tonight-ajit-pai-title-ii-verizon
======
chroem-
This is definitely a cause worth fighting for, but something that I've noticed
is that nobody cares about these internet issues unless a major corporation's
profits are threatened. The media was largely silent about NSA spying and as a
result there was no organized movement against it. People said this was due to
privacy being too abstract of a concept for people to care, but I fail to see
how the issue of ISP's charging internet companies not to throttle them is any
less abstract for the average person. There's something else at play here.

~~~
rhino369
More people cared about NSA spying than net neutrality. But mass media and
major corporations have a strong vested interest in net neutrality. So they
amplify the people by covering it with news stories, engaging in "blackouts,"
etc. For Google, facebook, netflix etc. this isn't a philosophical or moral
issue. They don't want Verizon and comcast shaving their profit margin down.

It's a fight between two groups of companies, for the most part.

Practically, there is little chance ISPs actually turn the internet into a
walled garden. But they could skim off netflix and google.

Also, you might be in a "tech bubble." Net neutrality is a huge issue for
people involved in tech (by business or hobby). Most of my friends outside
that bubble don't really understand the issue at all.

~~~
dragonwriter
> But mass media and major corporations have a strong vested interest in net
> neutrality.

Major corporations like Comcast, and mass media like the NBCUniversal division
of Comcast certainly have a vested interest in the opposite direction.

------
5ilv3r
We grew up and are now tired, and the next generation was born into walled
gardens. We're not in a great place now.

------
leejoramo
How is the tech community responding to this this time? Are there plans for an
Internet blackout?

------
Beanus
The search on the FCC website he asked everyone to go to is broken. I emailed
them and they said they are working on it. We'll see if it gets fixed.

------
kluddy
Leave the title ll I Internet neutrality intact .

------
wonderwonder
Everyone who works in an industry that delivers content via the web should be
very concerned. This gives the larger established players the ability to crush
any upstarts simply by throwing money at the problem.

~~~
shmerl
_> Everyone who works in an industry that delivers content via the web should
be very concerned._

That's basically every site and service?

~~~
wonderwonder
Every site and service that doesn't have the financial resources to buy
preferential treatment and resources. So yes most of them.

------
Slackwise
Of course, Comcast is spending money to spin this:

[https://twitter.com/comcast/status/857357059196452865](https://twitter.com/comcast/status/857357059196452865)

(Saw this as an ad in the mobile app.)

Does that mean they're actually worried?

~~~
shmerl
It means they know they started to lose the obscurity advantage, and since now
they are exposed, they resort to misleading the public, to reduce the impact.

Second part of their tactic is to say that Net Neutrality should be protected
by the Congress, where they hope to have enough leverage to pass fake NN laws
that don't protect anything, while pretending they support NN.

So if that happens, public will have to put a lot of pressure on lawmakers to
prevent that outcome.

------
1337biz
Oh finally John Oliver has picked up a topic that is actually relevant to my
interest. I watched every episode of his show under Obama. But since he turned
his show into an endless Trump Hatefest it is just unbearable to stay through
all his negativity. Really unfortunate that he turned that great format into
one based on one-sided angry know-it-all rants.

~~~
soheil
Not sure why you're getting so many down votes, but I completely agree with
you. Some of his shows were incredible a few years back, two that come to
mind: Televangelists[1] and Debt Buyers[2].

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg)
[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxUAntt1z2c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxUAntt1z2c)

~~~
kbenson
Likely because it's tangential to the primary focus of the submission without
really providing relevance, is largely based on personal opinion, and touches
on incendiary political topics in a way that doesn't really further the
discussion.

It's also slightly ironic that the complaint was that John Oliver makes the
issue about Trump too much, and then the commenter introduces trump into this
discussion. "It's nice that he's not bashing Trump finally. Now let's take
this reprieve and specifically call that out so we can talk more about Trump."
While likely not the intention of the GP, that's what it ends up being in
practice if it's not curbed.

~~~
1337biz
Yes, that was a personal perception/comment. And I am not even arguing that he
is this time moving away from blaming it all on Trump. Just that it is this
one of the few occasions I agree with the problem premise and that this is a
welcome change from the rest of his feeding-the-hate stories.

