can anyone steelman the argument against net neutrality for me? The only one i've ever heard was that its "government intervention". Which doesn't quite add up for me.
I think it has pros and cons but in the end, I'm slightly opposed to net neutrality and I'll share my reasons. I think the internet is more complicated than water and electricity and writing regulations that actually regulate just the bad stuff away and keep the good stuff is overly optimistic to me. Regulation tends to freeze an industry in place. I'm not convinced that the internet today is the final word on what it should look like in 20 years. I also find most of the anti-net neutrality arguments to be pretty fictional and depend on companies having such a safe monopoly that there will be no recourse for just cutting out companies if they don't pay up. With the possibility of cell phones, cable, DSL, microwave, satelite, or even mesh networks, I just don't see a complete monopoly where they could just cut off Google searching for example. You add in VPN services, and worst case is you are talking about inconveniences, not a stranglehold. In my experience, even a mediocre market is usually better than what congress usually passes. So, yeah, maybe some perfect regulatory framework exists, but I doubt we know what it is, and even if we did, I doubt that is the one they would actually pass. I'm aware there is some natural monopoly elements to internet, but I would rather focus on increasing competition by getting rid of exclusive geographical agreements or even municipal broadband rather than net neutrality.
Lol. Yes, BGP/CDNs/QoS and constant deployment of new protocols like TLS 1.3 or QUIC is incredibly simple. If you don't know how something works, that doesn't mean it's simple.
There are a number of reasons against it given by the FCC chairman. It's fairly technical regarding many legal bits but the gist is that the legislation is 1) poorly done and 2) does not solve a problem that needed to be solved and 3) will probably reduce investment in broadband infrastructure which is bad because an actual problem people face is access to broadband.
1) The laws are complicated and somewhat vague which creates an onerous and costly legal burden for ISPs. Smaller ISPs would probably have a steeper obstacle to overcome as a result which would be bad for competition. One example of this is the General Conduct Rule the FCC adopted in 2015 which didn't specifically state what was or was not expected. None of the FCC's regulations apply to 'edge providers' either e.g. Facebook or Google. So Internet users would have to understand the difference between ISPs and edge providers which is not straightforward to understand the law.
2) It was said that prior to 2015 when the FCC adopted Net Neutrality that ISP censorship was not a problem and they had invested in providing broadband access to people i.e. the system worked. So Net Neutrality solved a problem no one had: ISPs censoring people. The same could be said for ISPs charging premium rates to reach certain content. As far as creating a two-tier system for packets, Net Neutrality opponents argue this would be a good thing because it creates a better, faster, more reliable service.
3) A problem people did have was getting access to the internet. If Net Neutrality reduced investment in broadband infrastructure, solving this problem was less likely.
The primary impact of net neutrality, is that it prevents ISPs from charging tech companies like Google and Netflix for data usage.[1] Google (especially YouTube) and Netflix together take up about 75% of all bandwidth usage in the United States, so this is really about charging these two companies, and these two companies alone, for the amount of network buildout that's required to support their increasing demands. Any bandwidth costs anyone else faced due to this sort of thing would be inconsequential in comparison, if the ISPs bothered to bill anyone else at all.
Google and Netflix do not like this, of course, and have created or funded dozens of grassroots efforts to "save the Internet" by ensuring ISPs are legally prohibited from billing them. My personal view is that when you are on the "majority of the data usage on the Internet" scale, ISPs should have every right to negotiate with you, and that preventing that process ensures that Google and Netflix's economies of scale permanently win out as monopolists in the space.
[1]Insert rhetoric from supporters about double charging here, don't bother commenting to claim it. I've heard the argument before. And I was answering the parent's question, not trying to start an argument with the opposing position.
The primary impact of net neutrality is to regulate the internet as a utility in order to prevent an oligopoly of two ISPs deciding who is allowed to access what information online. What if all of the electricity in the United States was generated by two unregulated companies? They would have sole discretion over who got electricity, what time of day electricity was available to them, and whether they were able to access electricity at an affordable price. They could turn off an elderly person's air conditioning on a hot day because of "peak traffic" on the grid if the retired person on a fixed-income couldn't afford the surge pricing.
Of course that would be an unacceptable outcome. So why should we permit the same with the internet access?
A college student writing a paper on the FCC might only have access to academic articles opposing net neutrality because they can't afford the articles that express an alternate view and Comcast doesn't want her to see them.
The internet is about access to information. Net neutrality is about profiteering from that access.
Not when it is happening in coordinated fashion, which crucially cuts off payment and revenue streams. NN would only guarantee a tiny fraction of neutrality, which has never been an issue anyway (i.e. ISPs have never cut off someone for political speech except when it's illegal)
Payments are a totally separate problem and basically irrelevant to a conversation about NN other than an ISP's technical ability to block access to a particular payment system (e.g. "we only support PayPal, go find another ISP if you want to use Venmo"). Net neutrality is about the Internet and the role ISPs and AS's play in providing Internet service; whatever other problems you are worried about can be solved separately.
Again, net neutrality is about the network and not the policies of edge services that happen to use the network. Unless you are claiming that an ISP is blocking traffic to appease a payment processor you are talking about something that is completely irrelevant and serves only to distract from the actual issue here.
Since you need this explained: when I said that in a world of net neutrality you can set up your own edge service, I was talking about the technical ability to do so and not whether or not some other problem would stop you. Maybe no payment processors are willing to work with you and you cannot afford to pay for the kind of connection your service demands. Equally possible is that you simply lack the technical skills needed to set up an edge service and cannot find or afford to pay someone to do it for you. Maybe you are just too busy. None of the above is relevant to the debate over net neutrality because net neutrality only concerns the operation of the network itself and not the endless other factors that might impact your ability to run whatever applications you intend to run.
That makes no sense and it's precisely because of double charging. Consumers are paying for the bandwidth and access. It does not matter if they decide to spend their bandwidth on Netflix and Google.
It's a counterpoint to "charging these two companies ... for the amount of network buildout that's required to support their increasing demands" - given that said traffic is produced by ISP customers who have already paid for their respective Internet connections, it's clear that this is not what they're charging for.
This is all the bullshit talking like of Google and YouTube and Netflix are sending forcefully traffic to everyone that doesn't even want it.
Internet Service Provider as name suggests is a company that provides access to the internet. Net Neutrality goal is to make sure that's all they are doing. What you can access supposed to be all up to you, the user, not the ISP.
Someone also mentioned here mentioned that they are vary of placing regulation that would stifle innovation. This is wrong assumption for two reasons: 1) internet was this way until 2014[1], FCC was enforcing it, but after Verizon won lawsuit things changed 2) we had major acquisitions of media companies by ISPs, Comcast and AT&T, things are changing and the goal is to turn internet service into interactive cable. I don't live in Comcast region, but AT&T is doing this by offering capped internet (I'm taking about residential access) then zero rating services that are their own (HBO and Cinemax). At the same time they pulled these channels from Dish (they asked them to pay for more subscribers than they have) and jacked prices on DirecTV (also owned by them). They essentially want to turn HBO into a streaming service.
This is not technology innovation, this is flexing monopoly's muscles to generate more money.
[1] this is actually more complicated. The internet from beginning was under Title II intently because it was offered through telcos which operated under that regulation. In 2003 it was reclassified to Title I from telecommunication service to information service. This is where all started. The ISPs started using their position to throttle traffic, and in certain instances outright block it (reneger issues with VoIP?). FCC though acted in it and penalized ISPs which reverted their practices. After that happened to Verizon, they sued FCC and the court ruled that under Title I FCC has no control over Internet unless it reclassify it. At that point car was out of the bag. To get control back FCC reclassified Internet back to Title II. That was until 2017 when FCC reverted that change. We are now in untested waters where ISP can do pretty much anything and the only thing they have to worry about is being sued.
No, it should not, because as long as we have net neutrality anyone can start a new "platform" is no other "platform" will let them speak. The problem is that ISPs are gatekeepers and typically enjoy local monopolies; there is no such problem with edge services.
what about payment services like patreon, paypal etc? (my personal theory is that google etc love the stronghold they keep in online media and do not want ISPs to mess with it, hence why they are so supportive of NN regulation)
As for Google et al., I do not understand the connection. A neutral Internet is one in which a small startup competitor faces one less barrier to entry, so how does NN help Google maintain this so-called "stronghold" in online media? Net neutrality is the reason Google does not have "partnerships" with ISPs to be the sole provider of web search to the ISP's customers, or Facebook being the only social network you can access, etc.
It is not that hard if you actually understand the history of the rules. The article forgets to mention that there were much stronger regulations in place during the 90s -- like DSL services being required to share their physical infrastructure with competitors. It forgets to mention the episode where Comcast tried to charge residential customers an extra fee just for the privilege of using VPN applications. It also focuses more on edge services than on the larger issue of net neutrality: deploying new protocols and Internet applications without having to negotiate with ISPs for permission to do so.
That’s an interesting part in there about how only one company in history really did something that NN would have prevented, and the FCC quickly fixed that anyhow. The other often sited examples like Comcast temporarily limiting torrent traffic for network management reasons - is a valid reason to do so even under 2015’s NN ruling (really, even under NN an ISP can throttle for network management reasons).
So the question I have is why did FAANG, Reddit, and all of tech media jump so heavily into panic mode regarding NN repeal? It seems very unlikely their priorities sync up with mine.
ESP when you consider that FAANG has been in censorship mode of content with little concern for obviousness since 2015, expanding their data mining, and swinging their weight into would-be competitors. Your article makes good points, and it makes me think my skepticism of the corperate directed outrage against NN repeal is justified.
FAANG companies have a very obvious interest in a net neutrality resolution. The ubiquity of the coverage of this particular bit of regulation is the FAANG companies flexing their PR muscle.
Carriers like T-Mobile currently zero-rate streaming, presumably because it's easier[1] to deliver static content. Strictly speaking, this isn't net neutrality.
It's a moral argument. Any form of coercion that prevents the free lawful use of private property is an attack on individual freedom. No act can be considered lawful if it comes from an unlawful act. No individual or group of individuals may dispose of another individual's property without violating his rights, whether this property is a refrigerator or communications infrastructure. People in the United States asking for more socialism, regulations and abuses against private property should know that the Berlin Wall no longer exists.
It is an economic argument as well. Oligopolies based on regulations and government protectionism are always bad and monopolies arising from competition are always good because they offer what the demand demands and favor social cooperation. It must be understood that competition lies in the free entry and exit of markets and not in a utopian perfect competition from the neoclassical point of view. If there is only one ISP in your state or city, you should ask yourself if the government has given it the monopoly concession of the service through prior regulation. Regulations and interventions always require more regulations and subsequent interventions giving more rights to politicians and prebendary monopolists at the cost of taking freedom from the rest of the people, people who pay the benefits of these groups without getting anything in return.
Just think of all the regulations against free-speech that certain groups want to impose throughout the Internet. Which companies would be favored if these regulations on social networks were carried out? Of course they would favor big companies over small ones because you are artificially raising the competitive cost without improving the service. Cost that not all companies can afford. The moral argument in this case is self-explanatory.
