OT: Net Neutrality maybe in Jeopardy

[Lord_Zedd]

As bad as it is in the US, if this passes, Robellus will be licking their chops for this to happen in Canada....

We already have a subtle history of this happening recently
- Telus censoring several websites from its customers regarding their union strike
- Rogers history of throttling content
- Bell wanting to censor every site that resembles piracy

Just like the FCC, the current CRTC head is a former Telus executive

[dagger]

I am as big a capitalist as any of you, but on this issue, I am concerned that the end of net neutrality will reinforce poverty and discourage social mobility. If you grow up poor, and don't have reasonably fast internet service, or a car in many smaller cities and towns, you're screwed. People who have to work nights often spend inordinate amount of time on crappy night buses, taking two hours to get home. Politicians want to build subways to get votes - but almost never seem to build them in parts of cities with the greatest need/dependence on transit (a pox on the Scarborough stubway and on John Tory and the Ford brothers). I consider the internet a vital tool for all that should be available to all without class discrimination. Mark Cuban hates net neutrality, and says it would be advantageous to society if the internet had fast lanes that would cost a lot more - well, that's like making sure the poor and middle classes can never go to schools like Harvard or Yale that reinforce class distinctions and lack of upward social mobility that lift people out of poverty, or at least let their children escape it.

[mrdressup]

The streams that reach Canadians from Europe land in NJ where they can be throttled at will on the questionable basis that they are deemed illegal by a Mega Corp. There aren't going to be any lawyers standing next to the fiber optic to look after the interests of Canadians. In many ways there is just one internet and the US has placed itself as its gatekeeper years ago. This a decision that has global reach.

[simmons21]

Different data plan options tailored to different lifestyles for $4.99 per month? Sign me up to end net neutrality! Wait. What?

This really isn't what net neutrality is largely about to be honest. Net neutrality is more about the telecom companies who own the internet infrastructure making use of the foresight they had in investing into the internet infrastructure decades ago by exerting control over third party companies and doing things like allowing video from their own platforms not to count at all against data plans as a way to entice new consumers. This idea and others like it outrages the companies who would be faced to compete against that now and into the future.

The whole net neutrality "movement" is basically the dot com companies, and the smaller telecoms who don't own a ton of other interests, arguing that the largest telecoms who do will exert their influence to offer free services in their other interests that don't count as data the same way other services would. In other words, they're concerned that Time Warner could create a Netflix like streaming site for example with all of Time Warner's media properties and make that available to AT&T users (which Time Warner owns) and have it be so that any subscribers who also have AT&T plans could access that service on their phones at no additional charge (or a reduced data plan charge) in order to drive more sales to their properties. Or that same company could buy Twitter and then tell all their users that Twitter won't count as data if you get your phone from them. Basically, Net neutrality is about the smaller companies pre-preemptively making the case that the largest ones with investments in internet infrastructure and telecommunications have unfair competition advantages to launch their own competing products and streaming sites by making the data count differently for some than for others.

However, this same coalition of smaller companies knows that to get the public on their side it can't just be about their desire to make it impossible for the larger ones to offer similar service offerings and make their own cheaper. It has to seem more about policing the internet and the possibility that these companies will somehow block Twitter from use entirely and force their own equivalent that can be used for free without data. Net neutrality has morphed into this disingenuous "We are the 99%" type of movement in order to make the average citizen think they're out to shape the internet and ensure freedom of speech and limit policing and reduce privacy concerns. In reality it's a coalition of a bunch of billion dollar businesses influencing grass roots so that they will be able to more easily maintain their market position against a smaller group of trillion dollar businesses who would otherwise enjoy what they perceive as an unfair competitive advantage based on their ability to control the flow of data and its price point. This advantage, of course, was acquired as a result of foresight and earlier purchases in internet infrastructure and telecommunications internet infrastructure over data, combined with their other business interests but the internet and the business opportunities on it are unlike anything ever seen before in the history of mankind so this is heated. There's probably no great comparison to this. The best I can think of might be 5 companies purchasing up all of the oil land in America in the 1700s, and then making cars, and creating gas stations where the gas you could buy would be cheaper if it was also going into one of the cars they built but only cheaper in one of the cars they built.

Big telecoms aren't the victim here. I don't want to live in the world were Rogers, Shaw, and Bell etc. can legally throttle services like Netflix to force people onto using their garbage services like Shomi/Crave. There's no alternatives to Telecoms in most places in North America, in my area for example I can only exclusively use Rogers or it's third party resellers. I would'nt have a choice.

This has real potential to destroy competition and innovation, NOT encourage it. This is not giving telecoms the "rightful" leg up that they've earned, it's giving them the farm.

[LLJ]

I'm trying to help with petition but man you gotta give out so much personal data in order to sign lol

The irony

[mrdressup]

I am as big a capitalist as any of you, but on this issue, I am concerned that the end of net neutrality will reinforce poverty and discourage social mobility. If you grow up poor, and don't have reasonably faster internet service, or a car in many smaller cities and towns, you're screwed. People who have to work nights often spend inordinate amount of time on crappy night buses. Politicians want to build subways to get votes - but almost never seem to build them in parts of cities with the greatest need/dependence on transit. I consider the internet a vital tool for all that should be available to all without class discrimination. Mark Cuban hates net neutrality, and says it would be advantageous to society if the internet had fast lanes that would cost a lot more - well, that's like making sure the poor and middle classes can never go to schools like Harvard or Yale that reinforce class distinctions and lack of upward social mobility that lift people out of poverty, or at least let their children escape it.

No one should consider themselves blind lovers of capitalism. It is good and it is bad all at once like anything else. It can be more or less of the other at any given time. Capitalism does not concern itself with offering you all options. You can be offered a choice between what is profitable and what is most profitable. In that instance pick your choice. If providers don't want to provide net neutrality then there is no capitalist option left to you. It's either going to be caving or taking the regulatory position that the net will have this property. If you like that then you are not a capitalist. Many aren't capitalists on all issues. I know I am not willing to defer to capitalism all of our choices. That would be insanity.

[OAKLEY_2]

We should ask ourselves how does America come to own the Internet? What other nations provide server service? In a digital world if IT can be outsourced to India F-F-S why can't we get neutral Internet from there or a boat in the Pacific or a private Satelite. Why do we have to pony up to the American digital mafia? That is what Comcast is. Dinosaurs trying to throw back the meteor. No doubt Rogers and Bell would love to have the Canadian market sewn up to be these kinds of service charge train robbers. They gave us complete cable crap for decades and now Big Comms America want to double down on internet because they simply pimped cable for far too long and fed up. If I have to do what Portugal does with pay as you play I would take my iPad, iPhone and anything else Rogers and Bell associated and put it in the dumpster. F the digital crooks.

[mrdressup]

We should ask ourselves how does America come to own the Internet? What other nations provide server service? In a digital world if IT can be outsourced to India F-F-S why can't we get neutral Internet from there or a boat in the Pacific or a private Satelite. Why do we have to pony up to the American digital mafia? That is what Comcast is. Dinosaurs trying to throw back the meteor. No doubt Rogers and Bell would love to have the Canadian market sewn up to be these kinds of service charge train robbers. They gave us complete cable crap for decades and now Big Comms America want to double down on internet because they simply pimped cable for far too long and fed up. If I have to do what Portugal does with pay as you play I would take my iPad, iPhone and anything else Rogers and Bell associated and put it in the dumpster. F the digital crooks.

There's actually a series of legal decisions that the US imposed on the global community that would make it the de facto owner of the internet. In "The Matrix" individuals illegally navigating the data streams were alluded to by the metaphor of the ship being targeted by the swimming algorithms that sought them out. The way the internet exists in the real world is that you can't really access it illegally. It is owned and it will be controlled. It's late in the game now to start demanding that the ownership rights of a rich class be held back. The level of concentration of wealth and power existing now is simply unparalleled. The owners feel they can have all they want, and you as a serf will pay his sharecropper's share to live in the shadow of the Lord's information manor. That is what we have set ourselves up for by blindly cheering on capitalists.

[Raptors_Won]

I already quit Cable, if the powers to be want to screw around more and mess up the accessibility of contents on the net, then I will quit the internet too. Please don't **** around with the internet! We like it as it is.

[Anatomize]

America is going down the tubes. It's unbelievable this issue is coming up yet again after the vast majority of Americans already rallied against it years ago.

In my opinion the internet backbone should either be nationalized, or treated like a private utility. These are the roads of the digital economy, and should be under tight control/oversight by the public. They're too important to leave unregulated. Let private entities compete over bringing service from the backbone to the population - the so-called last mile, or last few miles.

What better way to suppress a revolution than control the internet. Just ask China.

[Jef]

Will there be a test on this?

[DukeNukem3d]

You have to be pretty deluded to think that the giant power structures globally care about "predators" on the internet and not controlling the single biggest medium for expression for among other reasons, commerce.

Different data plan options tailored to different lifestyles for $4.99 per month? Sign me up to end net neutrality! Wait. What?

This really isn't what net neutrality is largely about to be honest. Net neutrality is more about the telecom companies who own the internet infrastructure making use of the foresight they had in investing into the internet infrastructure decades ago by exerting control over third party companies and doing things like allowing video from their own platforms not to count at all against data plans as a way to entice new consumers. This idea and others like it outrages the companies who would be faced to compete against that now and into the future.

The whole net neutrality "movement" is basically the dot com companies, and the smaller telecoms who don't own a ton of other interests, arguing that the largest telecoms who do will exert their influence to offer free services in their other interests that don't count as data the same way other services would. In other words, they're concerned that Time Warner could create a Netflix like streaming site for example with all of Time Warner's media properties and make that available to AT&T users (which Time Warner owns) and have it be so that any subscribers who also have AT&T plans could access that service on their phones at no additional charge (or a reduced data plan charge) in order to drive more sales to their properties. Or that same company could buy Twitter and then tell all their users that Twitter won't count as data if you get your phone from them. Basically, Net neutrality is about the smaller companies pre-preemptively making the case that the largest ones with investments in internet infrastructure and telecommunications have unfair competition advantages to launch their own competing products and streaming sites by making the data count differently for some than for others.

However, this same coalition of smaller companies knows that to get the public on their side it can't just be about their desire to make it impossible for the larger ones to offer similar service offerings and make their own cheaper. It has to seem more about policing the internet so Net neutrality has morphed into this disingenuous "We are the 99%" type of movement in order to make the average citizen think they're out to shape the internet and ensure freedom of speech and limit policing and reduce privacy concerns. In reality it's a coalition of a bunch of billion dollar businesses creating a grass roots movement to better compete against a smaller group of trillion dollar businesses who will enjoy an unfair competitive advantage based on their ability to control the flow of data as a result of their earlier purchases in internet infrastructure and telecommunications internet infrastructure over data combined with their other business interests.

i don't think you quite understand the ramifications of net neutrality as much as you think you do.

providers give you access to data. 1mb of data is 1mb of data, it doesn't matter what that source of data is and that's the way it should be, forever.

I understand it fully. I'm pointing out the one aspect of this that's been undersold to the public, which is that the movement is largely a consortium of billion dollar tech companies fighting over the competitive advantage of a smaller consortium of trillion dollar tech companies, and sold to the public as you versus them with a lot of fear mongering.

In a truly free tech market, particularly one where things will move more and more away from the costly start-up infrastructure of wired home connections and more to satellites, air and towers, new providers would beat the status quo with superior offerings. If the issue is price fixing then investigate and improve that. If the issue is that there's not enough providers then issue new licenses and implement new restrictions on mergers and acquisitions.

The problem I have with the gigantic eraser that the net neutrality community wants to wield on all of the internet is that in order to appease the Facebooks and Twitters of the world governments will create rules that will inadvertently create sweeping changes that will invite a new wave of net-driven crime impossible for future law enforcement agencies and intelligence communities to keep up with. They'll be neutered in the future if the pendulum swings too far the other way. You're scared about rising internet costs? What about sweeping changes worked into the fine print that make it harder to catch, monitor, or police against a growing movement of pedophiles who meet through the internet and decide to work together as organized crime, hiring lawyers well-versed in these new net neutrality laws who claim the evidence gathered against them is not admissible as a result of net neutrality issues that lead to it being obtained in the first place. Imagine a future society where terror groups are airing their beheadings and rapes and tortures livestreamed or on ads and internet service providers aren't allowed to block that because of net neutrality that went too far the other way. Imagine a murder of someone you care about fully plotted out online and the internet service provider being unable to access that potential evidence in any way, or make it available to police because of some sweeping net neutrality laws.

There's been plenty said about trivial fears related to rising costs and our ability to watch TV shows but what about real, life-changing harm that could be headed our way if in our pursuit of a totally free internet we simply empower predators of all kind to organize and systematically target in ways we currently can't imagine, all the while making it harder than ever before to convict. People are going to exist more and more online. We need more restrictions and policing similar to that which exists in the real world to protect the most vulnerable among us. Not a Wild West "Screw it! Anything goes! Let the strongest among us survive!" approach. That's what I see heading our way if the pendulum on privacy swings too far the other way and that's a far more justifiable fear for the future of society than anything closely related to big brother or 1984. I'm more scared of the people who'd seek to hurt us through any number of acts gaining a massive advantage in recruitment, organization, propaganda, and in combatting legal action against them then I am of Canada becoming China. I have faith in our democratic pillars and our ability to fight possible over-reach if it happens when it happens. I don't have faith that the worst among us in society have made use of the internet to enact pain anywhere near what they'll be able to do in future years so I think it's very important that we do not swing the pendulum too far the other way and completely neuter our ability to police serious crime and evidence online. The day the first organized pedophile crime ring years from now has their lawyer successfully argue in front of the victims' parents that the evidence against them is inadmissible because it violated their clients privacy rights under sweeping net neutrality laws is a day I hope never occurs.

[RIP Kobe]

I’m expecting anonymous to speak out at some point.

[elmer_yuck]

"Net neutrality" has only been in effect for a couple years. So the end of "net neutrality" won't be some huge change.
The internet did fine before government meddling.
It will continue to do fine after the government stops meddling.

[Dennis 37]

Just talked to my daughter (she's 30) about this and she said, "Swear word the United States they are swear word swear words!"

Think of the kittens!

[Dennis 37]

I’m expecting anonymous to speak out at some point.

We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.

[Inevitable]

Now y’all know why Elliot teamed up with the Dark Army.

[makeready]

"Net neutrality" has only been in effect for a couple years. So the end of "net neutrality" won't be some huge change.
The internet did fine before government meddling.
It will continue to do fine after the government stops meddling.

net neutrality was the de facto law of the internet before it was codified during obama... so no.

government "meddling" - actually just the enforcement of current norms - is far preferable to corporate interference in our modern mode of communication. remember, anticompetitive practices are hardly ever punished in america.

and this isn't just to fatten corporate profits. tiered services will be set up in such a way so as to funnel poor (and angry) people away from venues where they might organize resistance to the political and economic structures that prop up the ISPs.

[Double Helix]

You have to be pretty deluded to think that the giant power structures globally care about "predators" on the internet and not controlling the single biggest medium for expression for among other reasons, commerce.

i don't think you quite understand the ramifications of net neutrality as much as you think you do.

providers give you access to data. 1mb of data is 1mb of data, it doesn't matter what that source of data is and that's the way it should be, forever.

I understand it fully. I'm pointing out the one aspect of this that's been undersold to the public, which is that the movement is largely a consortium of billion dollar tech companies fighting over the competitive advantage of a smaller consortium of trillion dollar tech companies, and sold to the public as you versus them with a lot of fear mongering.

In a truly free tech market, particularly one where things will move more and more away from the costly start-up infrastructure of wired home connections and more to satellites, air and towers, new providers would beat the status quo with superior offerings. If the issue is price fixing then investigate and improve that. If the issue is that there's not enough providers then issue new licenses and implement new restrictions on mergers and acquisitions.

The problem I have with the gigantic eraser that the net neutrality community wants to wield on all of the internet is that in order to appease the Facebooks and Twitters of the world governments will create rules that will inadvertently create sweeping changes that will invite a new wave of net-driven crime impossible for future law enforcement agencies and intelligence communities to keep up with. They'll be neutered in the future if the pendulum swings too far the other way. You're scared about rising internet costs? What about sweeping changes worked into the fine print that make it harder to catch, monitor, or police against a growing movement of pedophiles who meet through the internet and decide to work together as organized crime, hiring lawyers well-versed in these new net neutrality laws who claim the evidence gathered against them is not admissible as a result of net neutrality issues that lead to it being obtained in the first place. Imagine a future society where terror groups are airing their beheadings and rapes and tortures livestreamed or on ads and internet service providers aren't allowed to block that because of net neutrality that went too far the other way. Imagine a murder of someone you care about fully plotted out online and the internet service provider being unable to access that potential evidence in any way, or make it available to police because of some sweeping net neutrality laws.

There's been plenty said about trivial fears related to rising costs and our ability to watch TV shows but what about real, life-changing harm that could be headed our way if in our pursuit of a totally free internet we simply empower predators of all kind to organize and systematically target in ways we currently can't imagine, all the while making it harder than ever before to convict. People are going to exist more and more online. We need more restrictions and policing similar to that which exists in the real world to protect the most vulnerable among us. Not a Wild West "Screw it! Anything goes! Let the strongest among us survive!" approach. That's what I see heading our way if the pendulum on privacy swings too far the other way and that's a far more justifiable fear for the future of society than anything closely related to big brother or 1984. I'm more scared of the people who'd seek to hurt us through any number of acts gaining a massive advantage in recruitment, organization, propaganda, and in combatting legal action against them then I am of Canada becoming China. I have faith in our democratic pillars and our ability to fight possible over-reach if it happens when it happens. I don't have faith that the worst among us in society have made use of the internet to enact pain anywhere near what they'll be able to do in future years so I think it's very important that we do not swing the pendulum too far the other way and completely neuter our ability to police serious crime and evidence online. The day the first organized pedophile crime ring years from now has their lawyer successfully argue in front of the victims' parents that the evidence against them is inadmissible because it violated their clients privacy rights under sweeping net neutrality laws is a day I hope never occurs.

My point is that because people seem to care more about being able to stream a TV show that they want then they do about updating and improving law enforcement's abilities to keep up with online crimes occurring and those yet to occur that likely will become worse if left unchecked, something like net neutrality,and all of the motivations many of you have for supporting it related to money, will get morphed and ear marked into privacy protections that will ultimately make it harder in the future for us as society to stay ahead of the worst among us targeting the most vulnerable among us. People care more about being able to stream something for free then they do about a future society that they signed off on where law enforcement and the intelligence communities are ill equipped to handle or prosecute increased organized crime online against minors, rape, terror recruitment, terror planning, etc because people want to turn every battle between business coalitions and the internet into an opportunity to limit control over all aspects of the internet. Thus making it the wild west and a place where predators, organized crime, and their legal defence teams will have more abilities in the future and victims, their families, and the prosecution will have less admissible evidence to connect organizations, prove beyond a reasonable doubt that something was intended, or secure a guilty verdict for those who are guilty and may hurt others again. "I know my internet rights! You got nothing!"

We are entering uncharted waters with every new precedent set that we are comfortable deregulating and limiting control of all kinds on the internet in the name of lower internet bills or out of privacy fear. 1984-style explorations on the dangers of big brother, and horrible countries with weaker democracies than ours which do exploit and overreach, have occupied our minds and fears longer than the similarly dystopian online criminal wastelands we'll be unwittingly enabling in their place if we aren't careful but they aren't any less scary and, IMO, are more likely to impact us, our children and their children than the alternative. Especially as life in general moves more and more online and becomes more virtual and our homes become smarter and more connected. When television for example was first created it was immediately and wisely seen as a game-changing form of connectivity and education and propaganda and fraud weapon. It was immediately regulated for the public. Not anybody could just create their own station and hop on the air and explain to teens that they were needed in a coming war and give them instructions on how to build bombs. Peds couldn't just acquire child exploitation video by flipping through the channels because that kind of content wasn't legal and purchasing it was rightfully illegal too. Organized crime, gang rapists, and terror cells couldn't just purchase ads and tell people where to come find them. We knew not to allow those things to happen. Heck, even news had rules. Channels had to originally air an even amount of political propaganda from one party as they did they other. You couldn't out-buy the other side. For 50 years we worked through issues like this and tried to balance fairness, reason, and free speech from hate speech, and the impact of sex and violence on children with the public's desire to have more access to sex and violence. We should have been more ready for the internet and used that knowledge to shape it collectively and work through new challenges and develop checks and balances.

In our pursuit of the ideal free and uncontrolled internet we may be creating an environment akin to the very beginnings of our species. We're better than that and fear from both extremes is necessary in order for us to find actual balance between oversight and control and overreach and manipulation. The privacy side shouts louder, has the hacking community, the terror communities, the pedophile community, organized crime, and more on their side and they want every grassroots movement related to the internet to scale back control. I'm just trying to be the guy in a room that's outnumbered asking the unpopular question of "What happens if we go too far the other way?" And it is an unpopular question to ask but I feel it needs to be asked and by more people.

[makeready]

the internet was researched and invented by tax dollars and rightfully belongs to the people.

if you feel that ISPs deserve more money than they've already made for laying all the fibre, because the public sector didn't anticipate the importance of the internet, that's fine. when the infrastructure is nationalized the government can compensate AT&T for their trouble.