> Reddit, Tumblr, Etsy and other sites have put up Red Alert banners as part of a day of action to drive petitions in support of the resolution.
This is being seriously mismanaged, and that may actually cause long term harm to the chances of saving (or restoring) net neutrality.
The big mistake being made is not explaining where the Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach fits into the bigger picture. There are several places along the timeline of net neutrality repeal where it in theory could be saved. The Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach is just one of them.
The CRA approach has almost no chance of actually passing both houses (it has a pretty good chance in the Senate, but because of the way the House is structured it would take a miracle there).
When you consider it in the context of the bigger picture, that's not a problem. Its role in the overall effort is to get members of Congress on the record, which might be useful later in campaigns for office. The public is broadly in favor of net neutrality and this support is very high even among Republicans.
That's probably not enough to get Republican voters to vote Democrat, because it is not high on the list of important issues for them, but it could be enough to get them to vote for more moderate Republicans in the Republican primaries or caucuses.
In sports terms, this is not a play to score a goal. It is an attempt to get better position to set up a later scoring play. But the people running these campaigns treat everything like it is a scoring attempt...and then when it doesn't score the people who participated feel like they failed.
That can discourage them, making them less likely to respond to later calls to action. Then they might not be there when it is time to actually go for a goal (e.g., get out and vote).
How do you convince network giants like IBM, Intel, Cisco, Nokia, Qualcomm, Broadcom, Juniper, D-Link, among others, that net neutrality regulations are a bad idea? They currently support what Ajit Pai is doing. They have even have gone as far as crediting his repeals for greater investment into their network infrastructure.
You probably don't because net neutrality isn't an automatic win for everyone. Some companies clearly benefit from the repeal. They do have incentive to invest in their networks when they can monetize it every which way, it's now a feature they can charge for...
Except maybe for a PR tidal wave so huge that anyone who opposes net neutrality is driven out of business, I don't see how you convince companies to go against their own interests.
You don't - you can only change the rules of the game so their interests are set in line with public opinion, or environmental standards, or safety practices, or whatever else.
^^ Right answer. Board members will be upset if companies don't do every thing they can to increase profits, including "persuading" members of Congress and swaying public opinion. Our job, as "civilians," is to set the rules of the game the way we want them. The companies won't- unless there is accidental alignment between the company's goals and ours (in this case, small companies may align for example).
In what sport do you hold back from scoring a goal in order to set yourself up to score a goal later though?
That is to say, what you're saying is true, but typically (as long as the net is in sight) the best way to set yourself up to score a goal later is to try to score a goal now.
The approach is prone to local maxima, but I'm not convinced there can be another approach here. If you're not trying to win it all, then you're setting yourself up to lose.
Pretty much every sport? You don't go all out every opportunity you have the instant you have priority. Nearly every sport has some concept of setting up plays: American football, soccer, basketball, boxing, MMA.
They can't even score a goal now. The purpose of this within the US legal system is a pure intermediate play. And the when net neutrality doesn't get overturned as a result of this instance people will feel demoralized and hopeless.
It was Alinsky who instructed people on how to personalize politics. It is thus a tactic of the left. If conservatives are finally fighting back, that is to their credit.
People have been personalizing politics since before there was even a word for politics. You merely fall prey to the same logical fallacy (ad hominem) you appear to rail against.
> Reddit, Tumblr, Etsy and other sites have put up Red Alert banners as part of a day of action to drive petitions in support of the resolution.
I get the feeling that these sites are just 'preaching to the choir' (i.e. their customers already support these things, and most likely have let their 'representative' know).
Is anyone doing anything to give the 50 senators who are against this a taste of what is to come? I recall cloudflare or someome along those lines threatenning to throttle traffic from government IPs, or maybe that just happened in my dream..
Those sites are a huge portion of overall internet traffic. While on e.g. Reddit, people may subscribe to tech subreddits, there are many people who don't and are unaware of anything to do with net neutrality. If they can convince a nonzero amount of people to contact their representatives, that's worth the hour or two of some intern's time to put up a banner. Who knows, some of those people might be in states represented by those 50 senators.
It would be amazing if someone could figure out a way to measure constituent opinion that didn't involve people showing up at or calling in to an office.
Well, that's kind of the thing. Everyone's willing to kill and die for their beliefs on the internet; a lot fewer will actually campaign and canvas and march and vote for their beliefs. The inconvenience of calling or mailing your politician tells them that you have passed a rock bottom threshold of willingness to act, and might conceivably have an effect on their vote totals next election.
The fact that those members have guns might also have something to do with it. 'Do this or else we will sick our gun carrying members on you' even if they do nothing at all is a more powerful signal than 'Do this or a bunch of people will show up to protest'.
> 'Do this or else we will sick our gun carrying members on you' even if they do nothing at all is a more powerful signal than 'Do this or a bunch of people will show up to protest'.
That threat is entirely without teeth for two reasons:
One: Disorganized militias fail against a well-regulated military force. Especially since this militia would be a minority group, composed of the subset of gun owners who are outright crazy/stupid enough to go up against their own government.
Two: It would destroy the NRA in the public sphere. They'd go from being a normal political group to truly being Yall-Qaeda, the armed paramilitary force of reactionary idiots no normal person can support. The NRA can put on a normal face right now, and get practically everything it wants through politics, but if it tries to force the issue through armed insurrection, it gets crushed like an insect. A small insect.
Maybe they can crowdfund ? If I read the news and see the prices to get "insights", it may be doable.
Then again I find it troubling how easy politicians are getting bought these days while in essence it's not that hard to govern with all the people in mind instead of them self. But I may be very naive in this regards.
In the sense of 'government regulation'. They are the ones who can arbitrarily enforce rules, pick and choose winners, and complicate the barrier to entry so much to discourage competition ...all within the law mind you.
> ...ISPs, who are driven by profits and literally nothing else
They live by the profits, and die by them too. That's how free market works.
This is an almost meaningless bill, only going to a vote so various politicians can claim to support net neutrality on the campaign trail.
Not only is it unlikely to pass both chambers and be signed by the president, passing the bill doesn't change the broader status of net neutrality. Currently, the legality of the FCC enforcing net neutrality is unclear, with the matter destined to be decided in the courts either way.
A law explicitly giving the FCC control has been necessary for over a decade, but both parties have refused to pass one or even consider passing a future one.
I find it funny that some people still see Net Neutrality as 'government controlling the internet'. They should take a look at FOSTA if they want to know what government controlling the internet really looks like.
It is government controlling the internet. It's the extent and who that is different. In this case, it's only forcing a fair playing field. Kinda like highways being public vs. toll instead of telling you what cars you are and are not allowed to drive. I'd like a "free" internet, but I still have to admit it's going to cost someone else's "freedom".
No, that implies companies have the same rights as individual people. They do not and should not as they don’t have the same legal constraints as people. There’s no human equivalent to many of the abilities enjoyed by corporations and corporations don’t die and cannot be imprisoned. They’re also able to raise funds in ways humans may not. The list goes on from there.
What I said doesn't imply this at all. I'm just stating that there's a trade-off between the freedom of corporations and the freedom of the people (but different kind of freedoms, ofc)
You're contradicting everything the pro net neutrality people have said for years, namely that without it the ISPs will control the Internet. Part of the premise is that the ISPs do in fact have control over the Internet by acting as the monopoly access point, and that they can do various terrible things accordingly. If you control the ISPs - ie how almost all Americans access the Internet - you inherently do control the Internet.
> They should take a look at FOSTA if they want to know what government controlling the internet really looks like.
Unfortunately, that's not a winning argument from a rhetorical perspective. Almost every single person in both the House and the Senate, of both parties, voted for FOSTA/SESTA.
FOSTA and SESTA are truly abominable bills. They're arguably the most anti-gay bills passed at the federal level since DOMA in 1996. But telling people "net neutrality isn't about controlling the Internet, because it's not as bad as these other bills that received near-unanimous, bipartisan support" isn't going to win over any allies who weren't already in your camp on both issues in the first place.
I made no mention of it 'not being as bad' as other bills. I stand by my statement. Net Neutrality is government regulating ISPs. ISPs are not the internet.
And I think it could convert those in the anti camp. Some are against Net Neutrality because they see it as government control of the internet (it is not). They need to recognize that FOSTA is directly what they perceive Net Neutrality to be (at least in terms of results).
> And I think it could convert those in the anti camp. Some are against Net Neutrality because they see it as government control of the internet (it is not). They need to recognize that FOSTA is directly what they perceive Net Neutrality to be (at least in terms of results).
As someone who's fairly active around both issues, trust me when I say that all this will do is solidify their opposition to net neutrality, and in the worst case, strengthen their support of FOSTA/SESTA.
No, it's not consistent. But it's also not a line of reasoning that will work with opponents of net neutrality. Politics isn't always cut and dry the way we might wish.
In my experience in discussing these issues with people who were pro-FOSTA, this argument has helped them realize that it is violating the first amendment, and an example of government controlling the internet. So I have to respectfully disagree with your conclusion.
> Net Neutrality is government regulating ISPs. ISPs are not the internet.
I've been doing some research on the prelude to Russian revolution and what I discovered is that Communist party of USSR did not start or create the concept of a brutal 'Secret Police'. The Tsar of Russia created the secret police and they had no concept of civil liberties to begin it.
When Communist party took over, they merely used this concept (and bolstered it), in addition to all the other terrible things they did.
Similarly, China didn't end up with a brutal communist party, they had a brutal Emperor, and Chinese communist party just step into that place (preceded briefly by Republic of China).
My point is, generally a tyrannical control of things begins with a more nobler or palpable reason, which eventually is taken over by bad people.
Take for instance, France has ban burqas in public places. You would think that the American right would consider this to be a noble thing and would wanna advocate it, but they won't because this gives the govt power, and eventually this power could and would be used against them.
Today you're claiming that net neutrality is govt controlling ISPs, not the Internet. But can a radical religious govt ban blasphemy on the internet by forcing the ISPs? FOSTA-SESTA were terrible things which passed, without any anti-NN side opposing them, and now nearly everyone in this thread is saying "Oh if you have a problem with NN how come you don't say anything to FOSTA-SESTA".
I still can't believe that the movement to kill net neutrality was (is?) called "restoring internet freedom". I guess it's a shortening of "restoring internet service providers' freedom"? But the longer form isn't as catchy.
Well, it is about "restoring internet freedom". It's just that, except in a few large cities, Americans have very little choice about ISP. So there's no way for ISPs to compete for users who care about net neutrality.
Edit: Actually, we'd have even more freedom with an Internet version of the FERC rule for open access to electrical transmission lines.[0]
> The legal and policy cornerstone of these rules is to remedy undue discrimination in access to the monopoly owned transmission wires that control whether and to whom electricity can be transported in interstate commerce.
Net neutrality is literally constraint on how data passing through networks can be routed and shaped. It’s exactly “constraining the Internet”. It’s not “freedom” in any shape or matter. Freedom is never constraint on others. It’s a popular constraint, and people just happen to confuse and conflate “things I like/feel positivity about” and “freedom”.
It’s controversial to say here but I don’t think it gets discussed enough: Net neutrality only really helps established players. That is not to say it hurts others, but it certainly helps established players.
That’s why they all love it. Facebook, Hulu, Netflix, GitHub, Tumblr, Microsoft. Unestablished unpopular players are not the ones getting throttled. It’s the ones already using tons of bandwidth getting throttled and odds are good most new players bandwidth usage is hardly even noticeable to the ISP. They wouldn’t be touting the joys of something that had the potential to displace them.
The one who would be getting throttled is primarily Netflix, who literally uses over half of the bandwidth of the Internet. Literally slows everything else on the Internet down. Netflix doesn’t want to be throttled, so of course they love net neutrality.
I’m not saying net neutrality is inherently bad, I just don’t think it’s as innately good as a lot of the cheerleaders attest.
This doesn't make sense. Why would the ISP's want to throttle the websites that their customers are using? Even with the lack of ISP competition, pissing off your users that much seems like a bad strategy. And they can already throttle users based on bandwidth used, how would eliminating net neutrality help them achieve this goal.
I predict the ISP's selling a default throttled connection to everything, and then for $10 more you can unthrottle Netflix or YouTube. Competitors would need to convince ISPs to allow unthrottled access to even have a chance.
Your prediction is exactly what you said doesn't make sense. Your prediction also doesn't match history. In 2014 Netflix was the one that had to pay Comcast to end its throttling.
Of course it is, you have to constrain the powerful so they cannot take freedom away from the dispossessed.
You have to restrict the freedom of Southern plantation owners to own slaves to ensure the freedom of slaves. You have to restrict the freedom of corporations to merge into a giant conglomerate so you can protect the freedom of choice of consumers. You have to restrict the freedom of corporations to charge for the origin of internet traffic so you can protect the freedom of internet users to visit any site they wish.
Freedom in society is always an exchange and a compromise. Your freedom to swing your fist ends five centimetres away from my nose.
What about my freedom to choose an ISP? If this is really about freedom and not just another cash grab, why doesn't Pai regulate that monopoly rules are illegal?
It’s not as clear cut as “it helps users”. There are positives and negatives for users as there are in all things in life; nothing is black and white.
Firstly I would hardly call demanding the end of free services on moral grounds “helping users”. As far as the end user cares, forcing them to pay for all services equally when they could previously get one for free is a net harm.
The bigger problem however is that internet has been running largely at full bandwidth capacity since mid 2015, particularly the backbone. Bandwidth is being devoured faster than it is being added. Not being able to limit major hogs, namely streaming services, in favor of other smaller and potentially more important connections actually harms users with slower overall response time for the internet at large.
I personally think things like medical/government services and online banking traffic getting priority over entertainment is not that controversial - but not allowed under net neutrality.
Average connection speed has been steadily increasing for over a decade. I dont like the idea of a risky solution to a non problem. I spend most of my time on the internet & I have one provider to "choose" from in my area.
> Net neutrality is literally constraint on how data passing through networks can be routed and shaped.
That's arguing that opposition to putting a dam in a river to alter its natural course is a constraint, because it constrains the placement of dams.
> Net neutrality only really helps established players.
Good for them. For once they're on the right side of an argument.
> Unestablished unpopular players are not the ones getting throttled.
How is that an argument in favour of anyone getting throttled at the whim of the ISPs?
> The one who would be getting throttled is primarily Netflix, who literally uses over half of the bandwidth of the Internet.
Once again: good for them. On the provider side: if bandwidth is a scarcity, data plan prices should reflect that. No need to give them the power to ghettoise the Internet.
It’s a very 1984 way of doing things where the ones in power blatantly say the opposite of what their intent is, to twist the truth and the meaning of the words entirely.
Wishful thinking, the president would not sign the bill and there's not a supermajority in the Senate and the house to overrule him. This is going nowhere.
To Trump's credit, I believe he would sign the bill. He mostly cares about winning and looking good. Also, he gives people what they want. If both houses pass the bill; "You wanted net neutrality? We now have the best net neutrality in the history of the internet. We rolled back Obama's sick and dying internet, Obama killed the internet did you know that folks?, and now we have the best most free internet EVER. Period."
We may actually have the opposite problem; Trump may not veto anything that comes across his desk.
What? He is literally the person who appointed the guy who made this happen. While Trump is erratic, so no one can rule out a complete 180 at any moment, to say that is "to his credit" is ridiculous.
I get your point, but he is also the guy to fire multiple people in his cabinet for arbitrary/popularity reasons, so don't put it past him to throw ajit under the bus because it would make him 'look good'
Exactly. He is fine with seeing if ideas or people will float or sink; it's his modus operandi.
Plus, Trump is a master at walking stuff back and saving face with his party and base. Net neutrality comes back? Well it's Trump net neutrality now, way better than broken Obama net neutrality. Obama job numbers fake, Trump job numbers great. Trump economy(which has basically not deviated from the Obama economy trajectory) doing great, Obama economy was broken. Etc, etc. All that matters is if it floats, and he can brand it Trump.
Without it, ISPs can stop offering internet access and start offering YouTube access. Here's an example of a plan in a country with weak net neutrality.
Just to be 100% clear with the packages shown, they offer the benefit that those apps don't count towards your mobile data, rather than just being available.
Still not great though, since it just increases the moat for existing companies. Also companies in the states have tried exactly the same thing before with their video streaming service not counting towards you data cap.
I don't think the FDA has turned healthcare into a boondoggle, especially since incidents like Thalidomide have revealed why the pharma industry must follow a compliance framework for R&D.
I don't think the USDA has turned agriculture or consumer food into a boondoggle. The Jungle is still a gripping read today, because the conditions of unregulated meatpacking factories were unbelievably grotesque, beyond the absolute worst of contemporary hidden camera food industry scandals.
I don't think the EPA has turned the environment into a boondoggle. Acid rain was an incredibly serious problem in the 1980s that's pretty much behind us today, because regulation of sulfur dioxide emissions in the clean air act incenticized companies to lower their emissions.[0]
Other commenters have accurately pointed out the more directly disagreeable parts of your post, but you have absolutely not provided an accurate representation of the government's historical role in regulated markets. I believe it is more possible to vote in a competent government if you are willing to accept the challenge that it is possible for one to exist.
If you want to see what pharmaceuticals would look like without the FDA, look at the "dietary supplements" industry, which is a drug industry that the FDA is explicitly prohibited from regulating, except in the most narrow truth-in-advertising and product-safety areas. The companies can't be bothered to actually put their claimed active ingredients in their products.
Also, your friend chose to live in that house, along with all the regulations that came with it. Spare us the sob story.
You clearly don't understand why NN was put in place. All the telcos were prioritizing content, taking advantage of their monopoly power. Starting a telco is serious work, and that isn't simply due to government regulation.
It's cheap because it's "ok" to let animals die. If an operation is > $5000, most people just don't do it.
Try applying the same logic to people. It's fine in a Randian utopia but for people who aren't delusional, dying because you need your appendix out kind of sucks ass.
Call us when veterinary care becomes the model for Healthcare anywhere in the world. Your statement is so ridiculous and ignorant that it's self-criticizing.
I don't know, man. You cherry-pick some examples of government inefficiency, but our society benefits greatly from all the rules that the government enforces in order to benefit citizens (e.g. the FDA approving new food products).
First of all, the government has its hands in almost everything, so any list small enough to fit into a hacker news comment is necessarily going to be "cherry picked".
I'm not one of those people who thinks we don't need any regulations. I think they need to be a last-resort when everything else has been tried.
Everything else has not been tried here.
I mean, 5G and the SpaceX satellite internet plan are right around the corner.
It's pretty easy to cherry-pick areas of business which are pretty much a big mess and a boondoggle as well. Especially large businesses. Bureaucracy is inevitable with size. United States high speed is actually dominated by businesses that very accurately could be described as "big messes" and "boondoggles" (check the consumer ratings of big cable companies for instance).
From what I see with these corporations, they are quite happy creating "regulations" of their own that benefit them and do not benefit their competitors. So I'm not getting this reaction, personally, which seems reflexively anti-government because bureaucracy. In a regulatory vacuum, eventually, someone's eventually going to step in with their own "regulations". And these rules will most likely benefit themselves... not the public.
I'm mainly okay with net neutrality because high speed broadband is a quasi monopoly in the United States. If this changes (which includes eliminating any regulations that stifle competition among US high speed Internet), net neutrality is probably not necessary.
> I think they need to be a last-resort when everything else has been tried.
Problem is you can always always cry that not everything has been tried and perpetually put off regulation until we try this or that or this again (it might work because things are slightly different now). It's also easy to argue that existing regulations were put in place by morons who had no reason to regulate anything, and ignore all the history and precedent how civilians, businesses and even government entities can't be trusted to operate above board without a gun to their head.
Even if you're naive enough you can see the utopia with limited regulation where everyone acts responsibly and for the greatest goof, plenty of people don't really want to be subjected to the reality of that perpetual experiment. We've had generations, centuries even where people had an opportunity to do the right thing sans regulation and the minute it costs more than $0 those ideals go out the window, if they ever existed.
And certainly seems like some of the nicest places to live are fairly heavily regulated in many aspects. And places that have very little regulation tend to be hellholes of pollution and varying degrees of human suffering and environmental damage.
So where is utopia of meager regulation that can be used as a shining example?
Lasik eye surgery. Veterinary care. Cell phone service (as opposed to landlines). Consumer electronics. Computer software.
I can already hear your objections..."But there's some regulation in all of those!"
Yes, but it's much less than in other fields. The fact that the government is so pervasive that it's very hard to find an example of a truly free market is not an argument against a free market.
I'm so tired of my bits coming into my house all fuzzy and distorted. Once my ISP replaces their wires with oxygen-free gold-plated fibre, my spotify playlists will sound way more pristine.
I don't believe that anyone here, without looking it up, could explain what exactly "net neutrality" means, without falling back on talking points and vague aspirational language, rather than what actually is written in the regulations.
For starters, the FCC did an end run around Congress because they couldn't get Congress to pass it, so they had to take previous regulations intended for telephone service and cram a square peg into a round hole with all kinds of promises not to enforce certain parts, etc.
I'll bet 90% of the people reading this comment don't even know what that means.
I think most folks here (and who care elsewhere) get the gist and impact of net neutrality. There's quite a few discussions that seem to illustrate their knowledge pretty clearly. You just have to read them. I mean can you honestly recite the regulations? Would that disqualify your opposition to it?
The gist of your position seems to be the supporters are dumb and you generally don't like government regulation .... and the rest honestly seem like handed out talking points about things like "couldn't get it through congress" in an article about congressional action.
I appreciate your posts -- and the few others that voice their ideas that are astray of whatever the current YC-manipulated ethos is.
For one, I have little fucking clue what any of those statements mean. However, from the understanding I have gleaned, I've found to be more close to the metal, than what either, heavily-lobbied side, can offer.
Back to lurking. No place is safe from manipulation. Not [0-9(a-z){0,3}]chan, neither HackerNews. Meritocracy of ideas is dying, etc. etc. ad captandum vulgus.
The problem isn't the idea of "net neutrality". The problem is special interest groups and lobbyists, but those are the same problems we've always had. Nothing's changed.
Admittedly, it could get worse, but the need for "drawing the line" (in this case, deciding what gets regulated) has to be done somewhere, and it seems most of us here think it's a good idea to draw it at what would likely be a critical bottleneck. Perhaps the regulations themselves aren't needed but the high likelihood that they might be made law might encourage ISPs to stay on the friendlier side, so promoting net neutrality is still good.
> "Net Neutrality" is nothing more than an Orwellian named, amorphous and vague idea that nobody really knows what it means.
What are you talking about? Net Neutrality isn't complicated at all, it's just saying that Internet providers need to deliver Internet connections without prioritizing or blocking certain sites/connections.
The only complication is that telcos and businesses have different ideas about how far it should go (ie should zero-rating content be included). This is like arguing that because we have disagreements about the extent of free speech that the entire concept of free speech is just poorly defined government propaganda.
This is nothing like GDPR, this not a government created oligopoly, you're thinking about this completely backwards. Net neutrality decreases government control over the Internet; it enshrines that businesses, states, and governments aren't allowed to control access or play favorites in a freely competitive online market.
There are valid reasons why someone might oppose legislated net neutrality, but "the government taking over" isn't one of them. You lose a lot of credibility when you use words like 'Orwellian' to describe a policy that explicitly makes it harder to censor things.
> Unintended consequences will prevent new technologies from forming (Look at what the GDPR laws are doing to blockchain...must be able to delete your data, you say? And the ink isn't even DRY!)
Preventing new technologies which have undesired consequences (whether intended or not) is an intended consequence of regulation.
> "Net Neutrality" is nothing more than an Orwellian named, amorphous and vague idea that nobody really knows what it means.
The 2015 Open Internet order's rules take up all of 8 pages. You could know what it means if you actually wanted to and were willing to put in a little effort.
(This is a response to a response to my comment by @ppf. That comment is dead, so I cannot reply directly to it)
Sure. Take that document you linked to, and take out the hundreds of pages that are summaries of the rules, recounts of the history of net neutrality regulation, explanations of why we need net neutrality, analysis of the legal authority for the rules, discussion of past court cases on net neutrality, the Commissioner's comments, and all the other extra things in there that are not the rules, and you'll be left with 8 pages that are the actual rules.
To save you some time, the authors of that document have already done that for you, and put the results in APPENDIX A -- FINAL RULES, which starts at page 283 of that particular version [1] of the document.
[1] I've seen other versions that are the same content, but are paginated differently.
Some government regulations are stupid, certainly. Something should probably be done about those. When you start saying that regulation as a whole is stupid--that being allowed to use cheap windows is more important than, say, keeping thalidomide out of the US--is where you lose me.
The U.K.'s (government / regulators) stance on net neutrality) is that as long as there is competition in the market and there are services you can sign up for that “neutral” then there is no need to step in yet.
The competition in the U.S. isn’t as great as it can be in here in the U.K. where many will only have a single choice for their ISP (or have restricted cell/sat isp or have a service that we wouldn’t even consider as broadband as it’s speed is so low).
It’s strange how people from different parts from the world may require different rules that govern them.
The USA is big. Like, really fucking big. As a result running an ISP, wired or cellular, has an extremely high cost to entry. As a result of that, most people’s choices for internet provider is precisely limited to one choice, the local telco monopoly. No net neutrality means that ISP ca. Do whatever they want and get away with it because what are you going to do? Send a sternly written letter?
So? Most of that is empty space nobody is trying to serve. The key metric is population density, which is comparable between urban areas in Europe and the US. The size of the US has nothing to do with lack of ISP choice, as evidenced by the fact that the same problem doesn't occur in countries with lower population densities than the US (33.8 people per km²) such as Sweden (21.5), Finland (16.2), Norway (13.4) or Australia (3.1).
It does not consolidate monopolies because, by law, ISPs are required to add all apps from a category (chat, video, etc) to zero-rating. i.e. if you add Netflix you are required to add YouTube, etc.
All I see about NN is a lot of manipulation from both sides. And what's especially frustrating is that some people insist that NN is anti-customer. No thanks, I'll keep my zero-rating.
Three offers Deezer and Apple Music but not Spotify zero-rated. This puts Deezer and Apple Music at an advantage, no matter if they're technically better or worse
Three also does this for social media and video services. (Part of why I'm leaving them when my contract is up)
We long had zero-rating in the form of toll free telephone numbers while most long distance calling required per-minute fees. That system worked okay because it just transferred costs from one party (the caller) to another (the callee) and was available to any provider who wanted to subscribe to the model. Zero rating that works like that would be okay.
What people are worried about is when the ISP's get to play kingmaker about which services will get deals and which will not. The cable TV providers are among the most hated companies in the US for a reason, and those are the only broadband ISP's available to most Americans.
Zero-rating as we fear it is just another way to let them impose arbitrary and capricious costs on their customers.
Truth be told, I distrust the part of government that supports “net neutrality” and I distrust the part of government that is against it. Make no mistake, the government is itching to dictate content and tax data transfer.
And the ISP isn't itching to dictate content? I get it, you're a libertarian. But, isn't lawful net neutrality better than the alternative for the consumer?
This is being seriously mismanaged, and that may actually cause long term harm to the chances of saving (or restoring) net neutrality.
The big mistake being made is not explaining where the Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach fits into the bigger picture. There are several places along the timeline of net neutrality repeal where it in theory could be saved. The Congressional Review Act (CRA) approach is just one of them.
The CRA approach has almost no chance of actually passing both houses (it has a pretty good chance in the Senate, but because of the way the House is structured it would take a miracle there).
When you consider it in the context of the bigger picture, that's not a problem. Its role in the overall effort is to get members of Congress on the record, which might be useful later in campaigns for office. The public is broadly in favor of net neutrality and this support is very high even among Republicans.
That's probably not enough to get Republican voters to vote Democrat, because it is not high on the list of important issues for them, but it could be enough to get them to vote for more moderate Republicans in the Republican primaries or caucuses.
In sports terms, this is not a play to score a goal. It is an attempt to get better position to set up a later scoring play. But the people running these campaigns treat everything like it is a scoring attempt...and then when it doesn't score the people who participated feel like they failed.
That can discourage them, making them less likely to respond to later calls to action. Then they might not be there when it is time to actually go for a goal (e.g., get out and vote).