FCC Approves New Net Neutrality Rules

[|Zach|]

FCC approves new net neutrality rules

The Federal Communications Commission voted Thursday to implement new net neutrality rules designed to make sure Internet service providers treat all legal content equally.

The historic vote on the proposal by FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler elicited hearty cheers from a wide array of technology companies and consumer groups while setting the table for further legal challenges from Internet service providers. The controversial proceedings that led up to the vote generated heated lobbying in Washington and public clamor on social media, all in efforts to steer the future direction of the rules that guide Internet traffic.

"No one ... should control free and open access to the Internet," Wheeler said to applause from the standing room-only crowd gathered before the FCC panel. "It's the most powerful and pervasive platform on the planet. The Internet is too important to allow broadband providers to make the rules."

Net neutrality, also called open Internet, is a principle that Internet networks are equally available to all types of legal content generators. Internet service providers (ISPs), mostly large cable or telephone companies, would be prohibited from discriminating against content by slowing transmission speeds or seeking payments in exchange for faster lanes of their Internet networks, a practice called "paid prioritization."

Implementing the principle at a time when Internet streaming technology is changing so rapidly proved challenging to Wheeler as he sought to balance the varying interests of influential content streamers, like Netflix, and large ISPs that have spent millions to fight the effort. The FCC was besieged with passionate comments from both sides of the debate, receiving about 4 million comments, a record. In the end, Wheeler, with a nudge from President Obama, delivered on his proposals, though not without a fight from his colleagues and Republican lawmakers who wanted to delay the vote.

Wheeler's proposal reclassifies ISPs as public utilities, like phone companies, that are subject to a set of regulations that ensure all consumers get fair access to their services. ISPs would be banned from paid prioritization deals, though they can set aside fast lanes for some exceptions, including public services, like remote heart monitoring.

The authority for the new rules comes from Title II of the Communications Act of 1934. The new rules also call for the regulators to "forbear" — or refrain — from some provisions of Title II, including pricing regulation and other parts that are less relevant to broadband services.

The regulations will be published in the Federal Register in a few weeks. They become effective 30 days after publication.

Pro-business advocates and ISPs, including wireless carriers, have denounced Wheeler's approach. The proposal's insistence on laying out the do's and don'ts of operating Internet networks would inhibit ISPs from introducing new services — say, connected refrigerators and smartphone-controlled windows and doors — and limit innovations in improving their networks, they say.

"What doesn't make sense, and has never made sense, is to take a regulatory framework developed for Ma Bell in the 1930s and make her great grandchildren, with technologies and options undreamed of eighty years ago, live under it," said Jim Cicconi, AT&T's senior executive vice president-external and legislative affairs, in a statement.

The five-member commission voted 3 to 2 to approve the proposal, as expected. Joining Wheeler in voting for his plan were Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel. Commissioners Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly, the two Republicans on the commission, voted against it.

"We cannot have a two-tiered Internet with fast lanes that speed the traffic of the privileged and leave the rest of us lagging behind," Rosenworcel said. "We cannot have gatekeepers who tell us what we can and cannot do and where we can and cannot go online."

The outcome is hardly surprising as all five commissioners had telegraphed their stances since Wheeler revealed the summary of his proposal earlier this month. President Obama came out strongly in support of the Title II option late last year.

Opponents sought to delay the vote until, citing a lack of transparency. On Monday, Pai and O'Rielly issued a joint statement criticizing Wheeler's refusal to reveal the entire 332-page plan and called for "the FCC leadership … to allow the American people a reasonable period of not less than 30 days to carefully study it" before the vote. The chairman made public only a summary before the vote.

O'Rielly reiterated his concern that Obama had inserted himself into the process. "I am just sick about what Chairman Wheeler was forced to go through during this process," O'Rielly said in a statement. "It was disgraceful to have the Administration overtake the Commission's rulemaking process and dictate an outcome for pure political purposes."

Several Republicans — Reps. Greg Walden, R-Ore. and Fred Upton, R-Mich., and Sen. John Thune, R-S.D. — helped create draft legislation in an effort to overrule the FCC's plans. Their legislation would ban paid prioritization, but falls short of reclassifying the Net as a utility.

"We will continue to seek a consensus solution, and hopefully bipartisan legislation, Cicconi said.

The FCC approved net neutrality rules since 2008. But Wheeler, a former tech industry executive and industry lobbyist, was forced to come up with a new proposal when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in early 2013 tossed out the earlier rules.

Anticipating Wheeler's proposals, ISPs have started to threaten lawsuits. "Instead of a clear set of rules moving forward, with a broad set of agreement behind them, we once again face the uncertainty of litigation," Cicconi said.

Some the key details of the proposal are still unclear. The FCC would have authority to enforce any "interconnection" agreements — deals struck between ISPs and content providers to transmit data more efficiently in the "back-end" of the Internet networks — that are "not just and reasonable."

But whether Netflix can continue to pay some ISPs to locate its servers closer to their networks' key distribution points to stream its movies without too much lag — as it does now — remains unclear.

In a lengthy speech before the crowd, Pai also questioned the FCC's ability to continue to refrain from the "forbearance" promises it made. The FCC also has agreed to not impose further tariffs or require ISPs to unbundle some services or file a burdensome amount of documents. But "the plan repeatedly states that it is only forbearing 'at this time,'" Pai said. "For other rules, the FCC will refrain 'for now.'"

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/...ules/24053057/

[Loneiguana]

Originally Posted by GloucesterChief

I am not saying that Verizon is an angel and Netflix isn't either. I am sure both used dirty tactics in negotiation. You know what though? They came to agreement without the government stepping in. That is what is supposed to happen. Not for one party to go running off the government to come down on their side.

Of course I believe Level3 for their study in Los Angeles but that blog post doesn't mention the M-Labs report linked in the blog post I posted.

We used extortion to increase revenue!

See, we got a deal done without the government!

[Loneiguana]

I can't take this 332 pages of regulation B.S. This talking point is a perfect example of how B.S. gets tossed around like fact.

From the mouth of the original idiot who said it:

The Republican commissioner acknowledged that the actual regulations take up just eight pages of the document.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/...-plan-20150210

And before you go, der, what else was in the document:

The rest of the document is a summary of public feedback and reasoning for the FCC's decision,

And again, here is everything you need to know about what was ruled on today:

http://media.npr.org/documents/2015/...eninternet.pdf

Fact Sheet: Chairman Wheeler Proposes New Rules for Protecting the Open Internet

Chairman Wheeler is proposing clear, sustainable, enforceable rules to preserve and protect the open Internet as a place for innovation and free expression. His common-sense proposal would replace, strengthen and supplement FCC rules struck down by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit more than one year ago. The draft Order supports these new rules with a firm legal foundation built to withstand future challenges. The Chairman’s comprehensive proposal will be voted on the FCC’s February 26 open meeting.

Consumers and Innovators Need an Open Internet

An open Internet allows consumers to access the legal content and applications that they choose online, without interference from their broadband network provider. It fosters innovation and competition by ensuring that new products and services developed by entrepreneurs aren’t blocked or throttled by Internet service providers putting their own profits above the public interest. An open Internet allows free expression to blossom without fear of an Internet provider acting as a gatekeeper. And it gives innovators predictable rules of the road to deliver new products and services online.

Legal Authority: Reclassifying Broadband Internet Access under Title II

The Chairman’s proposal provides the strongest legal foundation for the Open Internet rules by relying on multiple sources of authority: Title II of the Communications Act and Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. In doing so, the proposal provides the broad legal certainty required for rules guaranteeing an open Internet, while refraining (or “forbearing”) from enforcing provisions of Title II that are not relevant to modern broadband service. Together Title II and Section 706 support clear rules of the road, providing the certainty needed for innovators and investors, and the competitive choices and freedom demanded by consumers.
• First, the Chairman’s proposal would reclassify “broadband Internet access service”—that’s the retail broadband service Americans buy from cable, phone, and wireless providers—as a telecommunications service under Title II. We believe that this step addresses any limitations that past classification decisions placed on our ability to adopt strong Open Internet rules, as interpreted by the D.C. Circuit in the Verizon case last year. But just in case, we also make clear that if a court finds that it is necessary to classify the service that broadband providers make available to “edge providers,” it too is a Title II telecommunications service. (To be clear, this is not a “hybrid”— both the service to the end user and to the edge provider are classified under Title II.)
• Second, the proposal finds further grounding in Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Notably, the Verizon court held that Section 706 is an independent grant of authority to the Commission that supports adoption of Open Internet rules. Using it here—without the limitations of the common carriage prohibition that flowed from earlier classification decisions—bolsters the Commission’s authority.
• Third, provisions on mobile broadband also rest on Title III of the Communications Act. Among other things, the draft Order persuasively rebuts claims that Title III does not allow classification of mobile broadband as a telecommunications service.
• Finally, Title II’s “just and reasonable” standard and the Verizon court’s finding that Section 706 authorizes the FCC to protect the “virtuous circle” of network innovation and infrastructure development provide standards for the FCC to protect Internet openness against new tactics that would close the Internet.

New Rules to Protect an Open Internet

While the FCC’s 2010 open Internet rules had limited applicability to mobile broadband, the new rules – in their entirety – would apply to mobile broadband, recognizing advances in technology and the growing significance of wireless broadband access in recent years. Today, 55 percent of Internet traffic is carried over wireless networks. This proposal extends protection to consumers no matter how they access the Internet, whether they on their desktop computer or their mobile devices.

Bright Line Rules: The first three rules would ban practices that are known to harm the Open Internet:
• No Blocking: broadband providers may not block access to legal content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Paid Prioritization: broadband providers may not favor some lawful Internet traffic over other lawful traffic in exchange for consideration – in other words, no “fast lanes.” This rule also bans ISPs from prioritizing content and services of their affiliates.

A Standard for Future Conduct: Because the Internet is always growing and changing, there must be a known standard by which to determine whether new practices are appropriate or not. Thus, the proposal would create a general Open Internet conduct standard that ISPs cannot harm consumers or edge providers.

Greater Transparency: The rules described above would restore the tools necessary to address specific conduct by broadband providers that might harm the Open Internet. But the Chairman’s proposal also recognizes the critical role of transparency in a well-functioning broadband ecosystem. The proposal enhances existing transparency rules, which were not struck down by the court.

Reasonable Network Management: For the purposes of the rules, other than paid prioritization, an ISP may engage in reasonable network management. This recognizes the need of broadband providers to manage the technical and engineering aspects of their networks.
• In assessing reasonable network management, the Commission’s proposed standard would take account of the particular engineering attributes of the technology involved—whether it be fiber, DSL, cable, unlicensed wireless, mobile, or another network medium.
• However, the network practice must be primarily used for and tailored to achieving a legitimate network management—and not commercial—purpose. For example, a provider can’t cite reasonable network management to justify reneging on its promise to supply a customer with “unlimited” data.

Broad Protection

Some data services do not go over the public Internet, and therefore are not “broadband Internet access” services subject to Title II oversight (VoIP from a cable system is an example, as is a dedicated heartmonitoring service). The Chairman’s proposal will ensure these services do not undermine the effectiveness of the open Internet rules. Moreover, broadband providers’ transparency disclosures will continue to cover any offering of such non-Internet data services —ensuring that the public and the Commission can keep a close eye on any tactics that could undermine the Open Internet rules. 3

Interconnection: New Authority to Address Complaints About ISPs’ Practices

For the first time the Commission would have authority to hear complaints and take appropriate enforcement action if necessary, if it determines the interconnection activities of ISPs are not just and reasonable, thus allowing it to address issues that may arise in the exchange of traffic between massmarket broadband providers and edge providers.

Forbearance

Congress requires the FCC to refrain from enforcing – forbear from – provisions of the Communications Act that are not in the public interest. The proposed Order applies some key provisions of Title II, and forbears from most others. There is no need for any further proceedings before the forbearance is adopted. The proposed Order would apply fewer sections of Title II than have applied to mobile voice networks for over twenty years.

• Major Provisions of Title II that the Order WILL APPLY:
o The proposed Order applies “core” provisions of Title II: Sections 201 and 202 (e.g., no “unjust and unreasonable practices”
o Allows investigation of consumer complaints under section 208 and related enforcement provisions, specifically sections 206, 207, 209, 216 and 217
o Protects consumer privacy under Section 222 o Ensures fair access to poles and conduits under Section 224, which would boost the deployment of new broadband networks o Protects people with disabilities under Sections 225 and 255
o Bolsters universal service fund support for broadband service in the future through partial application of Section 254.

• Major Provisions Subject to Forbearance:
o Rate regulation: the Order makes clear that broadband providers shall not be subject to tariffs or other form of rate approval, unbundling, or other forms of utility regulation
o Universal Service Contributions: the Order DOES NOT require broadband providers to contribute to the Universal Service Fund under Section 254
o The Order will not impose, suggest or authorize any new taxes or fees – there will be no automatic Universal Service fees applied and the congressional moratorium on Internet taxation applies to broadband.

Fostering Investment and Competition All of this can be accomplished while encouraging investment in broadband networks. To preserve incentives for broadband operators to invest in their networks, Chairman Wheeler’s proposal will modernize Title II, tailoring it for the 21st century, encouraging Internet Service Providers to invest in the networks American increasingly rely on.

The proposed order does not include utility-style rate regulation
• No rate regulation or tariffs
• No last-mile unbundling
• No burdensome administrative filing requirements or accounting standards.

A Case Study: Investment in the Wireless Industry

For 21 years the wireless industry has been governed by Title II-based rules that forbear from traditional phone company regulation. The wireless industry has invested over $400 billion under similar rules, proving that modernized Title II regulation can support investment and competition. Fewer provisions will apply to ISPs than were applied to wireless carriers. When Title II was first applied to mobile, voice was the predominant mobile service. During the period between 1993 and 2009, carriers invested heavily, including more than $270 billion in building out their wireless networks, an increase of nearly 2,000%

There, now those melting down over it have no excuse when it comes to understanding what happened today.

[Dave Lane]

Originally Posted by KC native

And here's a guy from Level 3 that says they are full of shit

http://blog.level3.com/open-internet...tal-mea-culpa/

Level 3 used to be one of the very best organizations in the US for solid never oversold bandwidth.

[Dave Lane]

Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower

And that's good and well... if everyone migrates to cities or suburbs.

But I'm sure it'll be the ISP's fault when they refuse to upgrade from any copper lines to towns with fewer than 10,000 people for broadband because they can't justify the expense.

I've got Excede satellite and Verizon hot spot at my very remote observatory. Running them from in town tonight. It's not google fiber but it's internet without a pots line.

[cosmo20002]

Originally Posted by petegz28

Stand by what I said.....I never once said nor blamed Obama. As your girlfriend cosmo loves to remind us all, the "administration" is not Obama.

Wha?

You're having a really bad day, pete. Stop the lies and stop the insanity.

[Imon Yourside]

I'm only worried about what happens down the road, 300 pages for what? has anyone read all 300+? What can/can't be regulated in the future?

Bright Line Rules: The first three rules would ban practices that are known to harm the Open Internet:
• No Blocking: broadband providers may not block access to legal content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Paid Prioritization: broadband providers may not favor some lawful Internet traffic over other lawful traffic in exchange for consideration – in other words, no “fast lanes.” This rule also bans ISPs from prioritizing content and services of their affiliates.

Who decides what harms the open internet?

[jspchief]

Originally Posted by KILLER_CLOWN

I'm only worried about what happens down the road, 300 pages for what? has anyone read all 300+? What can/can't be regulated in the future?

Bright Line Rules: The first three rules would ban practices that are known to harm the Open Internet:
• No Blocking: broadband providers may not block access to legal content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
• No Paid Prioritization: broadband providers may not favor some lawful Internet traffic over other lawful traffic in exchange for consideration – in other words, no “fast lanes.” This rule also bans ISPs from prioritizing content and services of their affiliates.

Who decides what harms the open internet?

The FCC

[Lzen]

By Jeffrey Tucker from Beautiful Anarchy link Feb 26, 2015


A triumph of “free expression and democratic principles”? How stupid do they think we are?


It’s been painful to watch the gradual tightening of government control in the name of net neutrality. The Federal Communications Commission’s decision to rewrite the rules and declare the Internet as a public utility seals the deal. It cartelizes the industry and turns a “Wild West” into a planned system of public management — or at least intends to.



All the rest is a veneer to cover what is actually a power grab.



This whole plot has had all the usual elements. It has a good name and its supporters say it is about stopping private and public control. It’s had the backing of all the top names in content delivery, from Yahoo to Netflix to Amazon. It’s had the quiet support of the leading Internet service providers. The decision to impose the rule has been declared by a tiny group of unaccountable bureaucrats operating with the support of the executive lame duck.



The opposition, in contrast, has been represented by small players in the industry, hardware providers like Cisco, free-market think tanks and disinterested professors, and a small group of writers and pundits who know something about freedom and free-market economics. The public at large should have been rising up in opposition but people are largely ignorant of what’s going on.



Here’s what’s really going on. The incumbent rulers of the world’s most exciting technology have decided to lock down the prevailing market conditions to protect themselves against rising upstarts in a fast-changing market. To impose a new rule against throttling content or using the market price system to allocate bandwidth resources protects against innovations that would disrupt the status quo.



What’s being sold as economic fairness and a wonderful favor to consumers is actually a sop to industrial giants who are seeking untrammeled access to your wallet and an end to competitive threats to market power. One person I know compared the move to the creation of the Federal Reserve itself: the creation of an industrial cartel in the name of improving the macroeconomic environment. That’s a good comparison.



Let’s back up and grasp the position of the large content providers. Here we see the obvious special interests at work. Netflix, Amazon, and the rest don’t want ISPs to charge either them or their consumers for their high-bandwidth content. They would rather the ISPs themselves absorb the higher costs of such provision. It’s very clear how getting the government to make price discrimination illegal is in their interest. It means no threats to their business model.



By analogy, let’s imagine that a retailer furniture company were in a position to offload all their shipping costs to the trucking industry. By government decree, the truckers were not permitted to charge any more or less whether they were shipping one chair or a whole houseful of furniture. Would the furniture sellers favor such a deal? Absolutely. They could call this “furniture neutrality” and fob it off on the public as preventing control of furniture by the shipping industry.



But that leaves the question about why the opposition from the ISPs themselves (the truckers by analogy) would either be silent or quietly in favor of such a rule change. Here is where matters get complicated. After many years of experimentation in the provision of Internet services — times when we went from telephone dial-up to landlines to T1 connections to experimenting with 4G data coverage — the winner in the market (for now) has been the cable companies. Consumers prefer the speed and bandwidth over all existing options.



But what about the future? What kind of services are going to replace the cable services, which are by-and-large monopolies due to special privileges from states and localities? It’s hard to know for sure but there are some impressive ideas out there. Costs are falling for all kinds of wireless and even distributed systems.



If you are a dominant player in the market — an incumbent firm like Comcast and Verizon — you really face two threats to your business model. You have to keep your existing consumer base onboard and you have to protect against upstarts seeking to poach consumers from you. A rule like net neutrality can raise the costs of doing business but there is a wonderful upside to this: your future potential competitors face the same costs. As an established player in the market, you are in a much better position to absorb higher costs than those barking at your heels. This means that you can slow down development, cool it on your investments in fiber optics, and generally rest on your laurels more.



But how can you sell such a nefarious plan? You get in good with the regulators. You support the idea in general, with some reservations, while tweaking the legislation in your favor. You know full well that this raises the costs to new competitors. When it passes, call it a vote for the “open internet” that will “preserve the right to communicate freely online.”
But when you look closely at the effects, the reality is exactly the opposite. It closes down market competition by generally putting government and its corporate backers in charge of deciding who can and cannot play in the market. It erects massive new barriers to entry for upstart firms while hugely subsidizing the largest and most well-heeled content providers.



So what are the costs to the rest of us? It means absolutely no price reductions in internet service. It could mean the opposite. Watch your bills. I predict that it is not going to be pretty. It also means a slowing down in the pace of technological development due to the reduction in competition that will immediately follow the imposition of this rule. In other words, it will be like all government regulation: most of the costs will be unseen but the benefits will be concentrated in the hands of the ruling class.



There is an additional threat to how to the FCC has reclassified the internet as a public utility. It means a blank check for government control across the board. Think of the medical marketplace, which is now entirely owned by a non competitive cartel of industry insiders. This is the future of the internet under net neutrality.



If you look at how all this shakes out, this is really no different from how most every other sector in life has come to be regulated by the state, from food to money to medicine to education. It always shakes out this way, with a sleepy public believing the propaganda, an elite group of insiders manipulating the regulations for their own benefits, a left-wing intelligentsia that is naive enough to believe platitudes about fairness, and a right wing that is mostly ignorant and for sale to the highest bidder.



No, I don’t believe that this ruling means the end of times for the internet. But it does mean that progress going forward in the digital age will be slowed compared with what it would otherwise be. Future generations will laugh in bemusement: it was the dawn of a new age and yet they believed it could be controlled the same as all that came before. Fools.



http://tucker.liberty.me/2015/02/26/...7ca5-139723837

[petegz28]

Originally Posted by Lzen

By Jeffrey Tucker from Beautiful Anarchy link Feb 26, 2015


A triumph of “free expression and democratic principles”? How stupid do they think we are?


It’s been painful to watch the gradual tightening of government control in the name of net neutrality. The Federal Communications Commission’s decision to rewrite the rules and declare the Internet as a public utility seals the deal. It cartelizes the industry and turns a “Wild West” into a planned system of public management — or at least intends to.



All the rest is a veneer to cover what is actually a power grab.



This whole plot has had all the usual elements. It has a good name and its supporters say it is about stopping private and public control. It’s had the backing of all the top names in content delivery, from Yahoo to Netflix to Amazon. It’s had the quiet support of the leading Internet service providers. The decision to impose the rule has been declared by a tiny group of unaccountable bureaucrats operating with the support of the executive lame duck.



The opposition, in contrast, has been represented by small players in the industry, hardware providers like Cisco, free-market think tanks and disinterested professors, and a small group of writers and pundits who know something about freedom and free-market economics. The public at large should have been rising up in opposition but people are largely ignorant of what’s going on.



Here’s what’s really going on. The incumbent rulers of the world’s most exciting technology have decided to lock down the prevailing market conditions to protect themselves against rising upstarts in a fast-changing market. To impose a new rule against throttling content or using the market price system to allocate bandwidth resources protects against innovations that would disrupt the status quo.



What’s being sold as economic fairness and a wonderful favor to consumers is actually a sop to industrial giants who are seeking untrammeled access to your wallet and an end to competitive threats to market power. One person I know compared the move to the creation of the Federal Reserve itself: the creation of an industrial cartel in the name of improving the macroeconomic environment. That’s a good comparison.



Let’s back up and grasp the position of the large content providers. Here we see the obvious special interests at work. Netflix, Amazon, and the rest don’t want ISPs to charge either them or their consumers for their high-bandwidth content. They would rather the ISPs themselves absorb the higher costs of such provision. It’s very clear how getting the government to make price discrimination illegal is in their interest. It means no threats to their business model.



By analogy, let’s imagine that a retailer furniture company were in a position to offload all their shipping costs to the trucking industry. By government decree, the truckers were not permitted to charge any more or less whether they were shipping one chair or a whole houseful of furniture. Would the furniture sellers favor such a deal? Absolutely. They could call this “furniture neutrality” and fob it off on the public as preventing control of furniture by the shipping industry.



But that leaves the question about why the opposition from the ISPs themselves (the truckers by analogy) would either be silent or quietly in favor of such a rule change. Here is where matters get complicated. After many years of experimentation in the provision of Internet services — times when we went from telephone dial-up to landlines to T1 connections to experimenting with 4G data coverage — the winner in the market (for now) has been the cable companies. Consumers prefer the speed and bandwidth over all existing options.



But what about the future? What kind of services are going to replace the cable services, which are by-and-large monopolies due to special privileges from states and localities? It’s hard to know for sure but there are some impressive ideas out there. Costs are falling for all kinds of wireless and even distributed systems.



If you are a dominant player in the market — an incumbent firm like Comcast and Verizon — you really face two threats to your business model. You have to keep your existing consumer base onboard and you have to protect against upstarts seeking to poach consumers from you. A rule like net neutrality can raise the costs of doing business but there is a wonderful upside to this: your future potential competitors face the same costs. As an established player in the market, you are in a much better position to absorb higher costs than those barking at your heels. This means that you can slow down development, cool it on your investments in fiber optics, and generally rest on your laurels more.



But how can you sell such a nefarious plan? You get in good with the regulators. You support the idea in general, with some reservations, while tweaking the legislation in your favor. You know full well that this raises the costs to new competitors. When it passes, call it a vote for the “open internet” that will “preserve the right to communicate freely online.”
But when you look closely at the effects, the reality is exactly the opposite. It closes down market competition by generally putting government and its corporate backers in charge of deciding who can and cannot play in the market. It erects massive new barriers to entry for upstart firms while hugely subsidizing the largest and most well-heeled content providers.



So what are the costs to the rest of us? It means absolutely no price reductions in internet service. It could mean the opposite. Watch your bills. I predict that it is not going to be pretty. It also means a slowing down in the pace of technological development due to the reduction in competition that will immediately follow the imposition of this rule. In other words, it will be like all government regulation: most of the costs will be unseen but the benefits will be concentrated in the hands of the ruling class.



There is an additional threat to how to the FCC has reclassified the internet as a public utility. It means a blank check for government control across the board. Think of the medical marketplace, which is now entirely owned by a non competitive cartel of industry insiders. This is the future of the internet under net neutrality.



If you look at how all this shakes out, this is really no different from how most every other sector in life has come to be regulated by the state, from food to money to medicine to education. It always shakes out this way, with a sleepy public believing the propaganda, an elite group of insiders manipulating the regulations for their own benefits, a left-wing intelligentsia that is naive enough to believe platitudes about fairness, and a right wing that is mostly ignorant and for sale to the highest bidder.



No, I don’t believe that this ruling means the end of times for the internet. But it does mean that progress going forward in the digital age will be slowed compared with what it would otherwise be. Future generations will laugh in bemusement: it was the dawn of a new age and yet they believed it could be controlled the same as all that came before. Fools.



http://tucker.liberty.me/2015/02/26/...7ca5-139723837

[Bearcat]

The analogies in that article and saying the content providers want someone else to pay for "high costs" don't really hold up when the new ISP in town is offering the current basic service for free and a product that's 100 times faster for the same price as a standard cable/internet package. "forcing" the current ISPs to take their foot off the hose.

[Chiefshrink]

The Fed Govt has been licking it's chops now for almost 20 years to figure out how to get it's greedy tentacles to tax and regulate(squelch free speech)the Net and will be creatively innocent(wolves in sheep clothing) as possible to do it.

[Garcia Bronco]

"The opposition, in contrast, has been represented by small players in the industry, hardware providers like Cisco, free-market think tanks and disinterested professors, and a small group of writers and pundits who know something about freedom and free-market economics. The public at large should have been rising up in opposition but people are largely ignorant of what’s going on"


WTF? Cisco is not a "Small player" in the industry. Not even a little bit. They're a dogshit company, but not a small one.

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

No shit. Its to ensure the little guy or start up gets a fair shot at success and not crushed before they ever get going by a huge conglomerate.

This is good for entrepreneurs, small businesses. Why is Fox and the right wing not happy?

Maybe because all the talk from the right about supporting entrepreneurs and small-business is is just complete bullshit?

[ViperVisor]

What a load of a turd pretzel knot.

To impose a new rule against throttling content or using the market price system to allocate bandwidth resources protects against innovations that would disrupt the status quo.

Making things worse by turning your internet into something like the cable/satilite TV system is what is best because free market magic BS would happen.

That is what a reeruned ideologue came up with.

Content is king now online. The highway to my internet glory hole in the wall where I sell erotic Alex Smith fan fiction is the same quality as Amazon.com's.

I sink or swim based on the merit of what I offer online. The top dogs are not allowed any unfair advantage on the cyber highway.

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by mr. tegu

You wouldn't mind ISPs being able to favor certain content so that some is faster than others?

Gloucester Chief thinks crack should be legal. He's an extremist libertarian if not anarcho-capitalist. He doesn't think the govt should have a role in anything except protecting his property.