The US Government now Controls the Internet

Post Reply New Topic

The FCC department of the US Government has now seized control of the Internet.
Someday you'll say you remember the Internet as it once was, lawless like the Old West.
(I do hope the Anonymous group will retaliate.)

http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/26/technol ... index.html

Finally!

Actually the U.S. government created the internet and still owns a stake in it.

Net Neutrality is targeted regulation at the ISPs, who have been regularly screwing everyone else over regarding the internet and the plans you have.

You the consumer will benefit, because your ISP won't be able to throttle websites and data streams as long as you are within your data cap.

It also means you will finally get the full speeds you pay for, instead of the lower speeds you normally wind up getting.

Lastly this means websites such as Netflix, YouTube, Gaming will no longer have to pay ISPs to prevent blockage and throttling of their users.

Oh this regulation only applies to all internet traffic and connections in U.S. territories.
The EU has similar regulation for its members too.

Say goodbye to innovation. There was never yet a Golden Goose which the State didn't try to kill.

This is from some years ago, but still applicable:

https://www.theobjectivestandard.com/is ... eutrality/

Actually, you don't have a clue!! !
This means internet FREEDOM!! ! *
Basically, ISPs ect cannot censor the internet!! !! !! !! !! !
The government regulates THEM ( not you) .
By stopping the corporations from censuring the internet we have free expression in the only place ( the internet) that can make a difference. We can still get information from sites that are anti-ATT, Exxon..etc.
* freedom facilitates innovation. That was why it was created, so scientists could share information more easily.
Unfortunately, those that hate freedom tried to straight jacket the internet. They wanted ATT ( or whatever company) to have the right to prevent you from seeing an anti-ATT site, or only play chess at yahoo rather than chess.com.
Luckily those that have some sympathy for some libertarian views prevailed and now we can celebrate that the internet is at least temporarily safe.

The government and big corporations are a different thing?

How do you know there is enough bandwidth available?

Bandwidth can be scaled up indefinitely as long as you have the infrastructure.
You can also scale it down to match the traffic for very little, by idling the parts you don't need at the moment.

Right now the ISPs and their shareholders do not want to build new infrastructure and build it out to the smaller cities.

The major ISPs which are Comcast, AT&T, Charter, Verizon, and Time Warner Cable control the market forcing out smaller companies and controlling the major lines.
Their network capacity hasn't been upgrade since the late 1990s in most places.
Expansion of their broadband networks have been slow or have stopped all together due to the "costs" which would lower profit in the short term.

They are refusing to upgrade their networks due to the costs and shareholder revolts.
The ISPs are asking the U.S. government to fund the upgrade and expansion, when they themselves can afford to it.

A literal example of this is the following near me:

I pay ~$40 for my 3MB DSL through AT&T, to get actual broadband from charter would cost me $70+ depending on speeds, since you cannot buy it alone (I am 45mins North of Detroit!)
My Aunt lives 5 miles away in the next town over, they cannot get anything above DSL because the ISPs won't run the lines out there claiming "costs" and "not enough profit".
The town is a high middle class town.
The town on the East side of me doesn't even have DSL and actual cable service due to it being too small for service even though the residents want it.
The township is banned from implementing any local service due to state regulations.

My dad pays ~$60 for 2MB internet, which I think is DSL or "broadband" through the cable company and this was the cheapest price.
His city is 6 miles North of Detroit.

AT&T's CEO regretted letting the iPhone on the network because of how much it costs them to upgrade their network to handle smartphones.
He also feared Apple because they had the power to do as they please, like releasing iMessage which bypasses the carriers texting systems when messaging another iMessage user.
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/news/c ... s-imessage


The carriers make $.003 (yes that is three thousandth of a cent) to handle each text message.

Yet they charge us a massive price hike to send and receive each message.

Also Cities and Towns cannot currently build their own broadband/cable infrastructure because most states have made it illegal to prevent them from competing against the big 5 ISPs.

The big 6 ISPs want you to go over the data cap they force on you, so they can charge you huge costs for going over.
Comcast and AT&T charge you $10 for every 50GBs you go over.
Time Warner Cable (TWC) has no data caps in many areas
Verizon also has no data caps in many areas.
Charter cuts you off once you hit it.
Other smaller ISPs don't have caps or throttling either.
https://gigaom.com/2012/10/01/data-caps-chart/

The link also explains how Internet bandwidth is unlimited and why data caps and throttling are implemented.


How did this all come to be?

The big 6 consolidated the industry through buying and blocking competition.
In most cities and states only have a choice between 2-4 ISPs, which are normally part of the big 6 ISPs.

They have an oligopoly which allows them to control the market as they fit.

Competition does not exist in the ISP business in the U.S., in part due to regulation.

And how will the new rules change this situation?

This arcticle is a good example of the "private industry is good, government is bad" manichean libertarian mindset.

It will eventually allow those places to build their own broadband networks, placing much needed competition and incentive on the current ISPs.

Chattanooga, TN and Wilson, NC are the first two cities freed from the state regulations.
Soon all the states bans and restrictions on municipal broadband will be gone.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/02 ... mpetition/

With municipal broadband networks now allowed to expand outside of their own cities and towns, this will place much needed pressure on the big 6 ISPs.

Why would want to sign up to a municipal broadband network?
It's regulated as a utility as it is governed by the same body that regulates water and power.
You get better speeds at a much cheaper price with no caps than you would with the big 6 ISPs.

Chattanooga's public internet offers speeds of up to 1000 Megabits per second, or 1 gigabit, for just $70 a month. A cheaper 100 Megabit plan costs $58 per month
http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/20/technol ... -internet/

Comcast Chattanooga's prices are $69.99 internet bundle (you cannot buy broadband separately) with speeds up to 25Mbps.
AT&T Chattanooga's price for up to 3Mbps for $29.99 (first year), full price is $39.99.
Time Warner Cable Chattanooga's price for up to 15Mbps is $34.99, $44.99 for up to 20MBs.

Why buy 15Mbps for $34.99 from the big publicly traded ISP, when you can buy 100Mbps for $58 from the publicly regulated utility?

Wilson NC's public broadband is 40Mbps for $34.95.
http://www.greenlightnc.com/about/internet/

It goes up from there.

I seriously wish I had a municipal broadband network where I live, so I could get these cheap prices.
With this all said, Verizon led the other ISPs against the original Net Neutrality rules (which were much weaker than the new ones) and won at the U.S. Court of Appeals!
The ruling judge told the FCC what they had to do to make Net Neutrality stick and the FCC did that today.
The ISPs have only themselves to blame for this outcome.

This new ruling will encourage municipalities to go it their own instead of relying on the big 6 ISPs for internet, phone and cable!!

So, they've actually removed restrictions on competition? Sounds good to me if that's the case.

Only on municipalities.
state regulation on private ISPs is still enforce.

Then I'm against it.

The idea that our current culture and society needs more regulations at the federal level has long been problematic for me and now I feel that I get an almost instinctively skeptical reaction when anyone says that what we do is not regulated enough by the feds. Maybe that's just me though.

Actually, since the author is an Objectivist rather than a libertarian, he would be all in favor of government when it acts to defend individual rights rather than to violate them. The Objective Standard is not a place where you'll find any sympathy for anarchism.

If you want a simple Manichaean dualism, it's free trade for mutual benefit = good, coercion = bad. Supporters of this measure think that some good can be accomplished by unelected bureaucrats issuing arbitrary edicts backed by guns. I'm not convinced.

I've been around long enough to know that nothing good comes from government control.
It's always the camel's nose under the tent scenario.