Obama: ‘I’m a Big Believer in Net Neutrality’
by Capitol ConfidentialJust a few weeks ago, the ongoing debate over proposed net neutrality rules under consideration by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) appeared to have taken a turn for the worse. At least as far as net neutrality proponents were concerned. But, with President Obama’s left flank increasingly uneasy with the direction he is taking as the midterm election approaches, observers say he may be aiming to shore up his base by tilting leftwards on the issue, one that flies below the radar of most Americans.
Specifically, as Obama seeks to strike a more centrist tone on items like the deficit, taxes and education, tech and telecoms policy observers say he appears to be going out of his way to curry favor with the online left— which political experts say has been in a state of near-revolt for months now—by reaffirming his strong commitment to net neutrality. One tech policy expert that Big Government consulted described the proposed policy as “one of the top items on the American Left’s wish-list,” and one of those guaranteed to “fire up” the online left like the Iraq War did in years past—with the fringe benefit for Obama that most Americans have no idea what net neutrality means, either in theory or in practice.
In an interview filmed after last week’s the State of the Union address, a clip of which is currently being promoted by hard-left media reform group Free Press, Obama is captured on camera underlining that both he and FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski are major supporters of net neutrality:
This is despite the policy recently having become the target of pointed questions, scrutiny and criticism from minority and civil rights groups, as well as a broader array of groups typically seen to align closely with Democrats and progressives—including one prominent union. In addition, the proposed policy has attracted criticism from conservatives, Internet Service Providers and others.
Many of the minority and civil rights groups remain concerned about the prospect of net neutrality widening the “digital divide”—and having a disproportionately negative effect on minorities, and African-Americans in particular.
Meanwhile, some tech and telecoms policy experts suggest that the FCC’s record with regard to issues of importance to minorities (for example, saving African-American radio stations) of late has been weak in the round, which has resulted in the agency being perceived as undeserving of the trust its Chairman might hope to engender.
Net neutrality advocates, including Free Press (which recently became involved in a dust-up over whether the group could properly be labeled “radical” and “neo-Marxist,” descriptions that an adviser to the Arts + Labs coalition used in an op-ed and which some tech and telecoms policy advisers regard as fair), continue to assert that government regulation of the type advocated by Genachowski is necessary in order to preserve the open character of the internet. Currently, the group is running a campaign to garner 2 million signatures on its pro-net neutrality petition—which is set to run until the current comment period ends on March 5.
Those wishing to comment on the FCC’s proposed rulemaking regarding net neutrality other than via Save The Internet can do so at the FCC website.
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156 Comments
You note that "most Americans have no idea what net neutrality means, either in theory or in practice" and yet in your article, you provide no working definition or link to discussion of what the idea might mean.
Of course… NObama will take control of the internet to shut down sites like BigGovernment, censor sites like FoxNews, etc… How else do you think he'll be able to stop all the bad press about him? How else will he be able to stop us from talking and organizing?
Maybe he's just driving the point home, no?
Anything that obama supports or believes in is going to cost us one way or another.
Regardless of definition of and details of the Obamunism take over of the Internet, we need to be scared to the bone of these Radical Progressives taking control of our Internet. You all know very well that the plan is to change and regulate content, and tax every aspect of delivery as a further revenue stream to feed there hunger for power and control. We must fight any intervention by this Revolutionary Obamunism.
Well, you'd think that if the issue was important enough, and he reconized a deficit in the knowlege of the people, he'd seek to inform rather than write such an 'inside-ish' article.
I suspect he is slobbering when he thinks of ways to tax the web.
i agree. i am one who does not know the workings of net neutrality but as the other reply states it does drive the point home. i was looking for something in the article in order to read up on the topic and was surprised when there was nothing.
it does have shades of Venezuela
How can we get a petition going against Net neutrality? I looked on the save the internet site and they are already up to 1.7 million signatures. I think we all need an article that explains clearly what net neutralilty means so we can forward it to all of our email friends. Darlene
As I recall, the Left got the fedgov to kill off all the ethnic and neighborhood radio stations so they could be replaced with NPR and PBS.
Don't need it driven home.
Need information.
All I know is that Net Neutrality means private businesses are not allowed to fully administrate their own networks, and the Fed has no business micro managing private businesses.
Also, I thank God every day that Obama is failing.
De Ja Vu ……… Jimmy Carter and the bringing back of Fairness Doctrine. Again, Jimmy was the worst US President in history!
I read the article on BigJournalism "Obama, Pelosi, Rangel, Geithner, Holder on Judicial Watch 2009 Most Corrupt List; MSM Silent" http://www.judicialwatch.org/news/2009/dec/judici...
If each and every one of us sent this article to our local papers, printed up flyers and put up on bulletin boards at grocery stores and left them at other public places like workroom lunchrooms etc…..we can start in a very small way to expose these hoodlums. It's imperative to make this article go viral in more ways than one.
Remember how the "joker" poster went national? This man needs to go back wherever he came from. I hear it's very hot there.
Net Neutrality = The Fairness Doctrine on Steroids!! I will not only affect media, it will put strict controls on freedom of speech.
You need a link? No prob.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa507.pdf
IT"S called husseins i bes ownen ameriKa. i think hussein is weak as a man, but strong as i'm pissed at my mommy and daddy for having me……
Net neutrality means one thing plan and simple. If the Gov't thinks a broadcast, news print, blog is not neutral in nature as in critisism of the current administation, the perpertrators of such information maybe fined or maybe even shut down. If it gets that far and comes to pass the very next step would be to control the entire media in this country. Study Van Jones and his comments about media and Venezuela and how he loved what Chavez was doing. Take the blinders off America. By his own Words Obama wants to fundamentaly change America. His words, not mine. "And to all my progressive friends we will get what we want. We will reform america". How many times does he have to say it?
Bingo. Who is the only entity that can take away control of assets from its owner? Government. Now, government can act as agent, through the courts, to address matters of debt, and compel transfer of property from one owner to another. Of course, this is not what net neutrality will do. In net neutrality, government will take control of assets from its owners, and keep that control for itself. Think that control will remain "neutral?" How fair was the "Fairness" Doctrine?
i have done a little research and although i am defiantly not an obummer fan it appears and i say again appears
that he may be correct on this.
from what i have quickly read over it looks as though the companies (google, bing etc) want to charge for services.
net neutrality appears to say that all info on the internet should be available to anyone who seeks it.
i need to do some more research and if anyone can shed more light on this please do.
here is one link i looked at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality
And will Americans be sheep like the people of Venezuela, I think a lot on the left will.
I agree, Net Neutrality is still too vague and unknown at this point — that's why I don't like it …
I understand so far that the government seeks control of internet through Trojan Horse of "neutrality of fees charged by network providers" and to charge fees on networks, the "evil corporations".
But regulations would be intrusive and require all networks be registered with the government, including private networks large and small, and networks would have to provide information on all the IP addresses of it's users and subscribers, which opens the door so surveillance and monitoring — can you say Big Brother?
This gives government control of internet and makes private companies pay for it. Also opens the doors for taxing internet transactions and use.
Obama is jealous of Chinese and Iranian internet "progress".
.
Keep your marxist hands off the Net Barry!
just like he wants us to believe that he is fiscally restrained.
He has been surpassed!
.
Net Neutrality is Trojan Horse for government takeover of the internet.
Net Neutrality means networks large and small will have to register all their users, and themselves, with the government.
Opens the door to monitoring, surveillance, limiting free speech, and internet taxes. It is control of the internet by the government and will force private networks to monitor usage and provide access for the government at their own expense (classic fascism). This would eventually include all small private networks, e.g., even 10 users in small businesses.
It all comes under the guise that government wants to "neutralize" pricing of bandwidth by network providers.
.
The bottom line on net neutrality is that the GOVERNMENT decides, not private individuals or companies.
Having been an engineer for a telecom company, I speak with some authority when I say that net neutrality would be an utter disaster. Instead of allowing companies to control their networks and groom bandwidth according to the demands of their customers and the services they provide, the government would dictate how those networks would be managed. Google wants net neutrality so that they can push their high-bandwidth products through the force of government, despite that it would slow the network for all other services like internet, email, etc. Right now, most internet aps prioritize data according to a hierarchy, depending upon how latency-sensitive the data happens to be. This will cause networks to slow down and every website or ap that you have would likely slow to a snail's pace. Instead of the telecom cos. doing this, the government would dictate how it would be done. This would be an utter disaster!
It's so simple. If Barry is for it; it's very bad for us.
Obama seems intent on ensuring that we catch up to the disaster that Venezuela has become — at breakneck speed!
See point proven, here is someone who doesn't understand net neutrality.
Here is the best way to think about the topic because this is truly the issue at hand. Imagine your water company, which you pay for on a monthly basis based off of the consumption says to you, I want to charge you based off of how you use your water. Tiered water instead of how large the connection is to your house (think bandwidth). They may say we believe the water you use to cook and shower with should cost you more than the water you use to flush the toilet. Or you sell the vegetables in your garden that our water grew and you should be charged extra for that. These are the ideas that ISPs and telephone companies are tossing around right now they want to charge your Internet access as a tiered service based off of the sites you go to. Net neutrality would prevent them from tiered services and force them to be in the water business where it's the size of the pipe coming to your house plus the consumption that results in how much you pay.
Which do you think is more fair? Should you pay for water based on how you use it or how much you used it? Giving these regulation rights does not force anyone to register, even ISPs, it just subjects to these fair use policies.
"….government regulation of the type advocated by Genachowski is necessary in order to preserve the open character of the internet…"
B.S. (and I don't mean Barbara Streisand) Where are the folks on the left who were crying about ISPs giving personal information to the govt. under the Patriot Act (which still exists, BTW)? Where are the leftists who used PeerGuardian or Ethereal who complained every time a govt. agency hit their networks? Come on, people! They don't just want to get into our networks, they want to CONTROL them! (regulation?… taxes coming soon….)
Make no mistake, this is akin to the fairness doctrine. The govt. has NO business dictating to private businesses this way (that's fascism) and they have no business burdening everyone with bureaucratic policing and network shaping.
But here are some informed POVs: http://techliberation.com/2009/09/25/how-governme...
and http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/net_neutra...
Must we become mini-China?
if dear leader is for it, I'm against it….he is a progressive with a progressive agenda and silencing any opposing opinion is necessary for him to further his and the progressive agenda…this is all about control…funny I don't see this in the enumerated powers that "limits" government….
This sounds like a straw man here. If we havnt had any problems so far, why is it all of a sudden an issue? I have been reading about "net neutrality" and from what i gather, their worse case scenario hasnt come to light. In fact, unless im reading things wrong, the problems they are "worried" might happen, wouldnt make good business sense. I.E. yahoo accounts not receiving email from google accounts, or google searching book stores wil only bring up book giants like barns and noble, and never show smaller book stores like joe snuffies books. If search engines started to do things like that, they would lose business, to other search engines who had a better variety. Kinda like no one i know pays any attention to Wiki because of its slanted vision of america
I'm in favor of Net Neutrality because my phone company opposes it, and they are the only entity in the universe that is trying harder than the government to $crew me over and steal my money lol.
Again with this?
Dammit, these people are still trying to change the definition of words. Orwell's Ministry Of Truth would be proud.
<h2>Net Neutrality </h2> is defined here:
Leo Laporte on Net Neutrality
and here:
<a href"http://www.savetheinternet.com/">Save The Internet
But basically, the definition is simple:
<h1>Bits are bits and all data packets should be treated equally.</h1> In other words, internet service providers and other internet "gatekeepers" can't slow down or block content that they don't like.
For example AT&T can't block Skype or other VOIP applications for their subscribers because they want you to use their land lines and cell service, AOL can't block you from getting Yahoo mail, Verizon can't block access to Hulu because they want you to watch their cable service, etc.
Again with this?
Dammit, these people are still trying to change the definition of words. Orwell's Ministry Of Truth would be proud.
<h2>Net Neutrality </h2> is defined here:
Leo Laporte on Net Neutrality
and here:
<a href"http://www.savetheinternet.com/">Save The Internet
But basically, the definition is simple:
<h1>Bits are bits and all data packets should be treated equally.</h1> In other words, internet service providers and other internet "gatekeepers" can't slow down or block content that they don't like.
For example AT&T can't block Skype or other VOIP applications for their subscribers because they want you to use their land lines and cell service, AOL can't block you from getting Yahoo mail, Verizon can't block access to Hulu because they want you to watch their cable service, etc.
I don't think it is fair to characterize the Venezuelan people as sheep. A friend of our family is from Venezuela and she sends us information about what is going on.
When Chávez first took over literally millions took the street protesting. Then he got the backing of the military. Protesting gets more difficult when someone put their gun where your mouth is. The problem is that it's one thing to scream about something and another to be shot for it. And nobody wants to go first. But it is a powder keg over there and if he keeps pushing, there may be volunteers.
America !! It is time to stand up. It is starting to sound more and more like China. Everyone better start getting their Carrier Pigeons together. This administration is going to force this through The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) “Chief Diversity Officer,” communications attorney Mark Lloyd.
But Doctor of Jurisprudence Lloyd is far more than merely a communications attorney. He was at one time a Senior Fellow at the uber-liberal Center for American Progress (CAP), for whom he co-wrote a June 2007 report entitled “The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio.”
Which rails against the fact that the American people overwhelmingly prefer to listen to conservative (and Christian) talk radio rather than the liberal alternative, and suggests ways the federal government can remedy this free-market created “problem.”
* Restore local and national caps on the ownership of commercial radio stations.
* Ensure greater local accountability over radio licensing.
* Require commercial owners who fail to abide by enforceable public interest obligations to pay a fee to support public broadcasting.
These last two get perilously close to the use of “localism” to silence conservative (and Christian) radio stations, about which we have been warning for quite some time.
Well, that and the fact that this all runs on infrastructure and technology designed by DARPA and paid for with my Tax dollars, which I'm not going to allow to be used to give MSNBC preferental treatment over breitbart just becasue they can afford to pay my ISP more.
I dont think you are correct at all. This has nothing to do with bandwith,
Just another example of Progressive intellectuals thinking " We are intellectuals, we know what is best for the people, all we need is the power to enforce our agenda ". Yeah, it has worked out well for the citizens in Cuba, Venezula, Columbia, Iran, China, N.Korea, etc. But the Progressives then say coulda, shoulda, woulda if only we had more power. It's an endles game that they play with WE THE PEOPLE and it always ends badly.
Neecie is right. Let's have a little more respect for those who live under the boot heel of leftism.
Unfortunately it does. This is exactly what it has to do with, I am in this business. Sites like Google and Hulu make money hand over foot and what ISPs are interested in doing is charging them extra fees to provide access to their network because they make so much money. They also want to charge users who visit these "high tiered" sites extra to access them. Think HBO, Showtime but it's not soley related to video content just Internet content in general. They also want to charge people who use services such as Vonage or other VoIP technologies that aren't theirs more. Net neutrality specifically deals with these issues. These are the main issues.
Gee, a luminary of "Fairness" Doctrine sophistry, in kind, if not in name, is also an exponent of net "neutrality?"
What are the odds?
You know ,Gun owners of America and the Christian Coalition are in favor of Net Neutrality, Hardly a bunch of radical progressives. Some people might want to read the articles on Wikipedia about the topic a bit more before making a quick judgment. My Enemy's Enemy is not necessarily my friend.. Just Say'n
It is precisely that kind of silly reasoning that got us a Marxist in the White House. Just because you think things are bad doesn't mean it can't become much, much worse. Just ask any citizen of Venezuela!
You might adjust your moniker from "painless" to "painful". It would probably be more appropriate, because that philosophy will bring great pain — to ALL of us!
Do ya hear that? The clock is ticking and we're going take back the country and stop this insanity and corruption. BHO our national embarrassment!
You got that right. He came from a wacky family…a radical mom who handed him over to his radical grandparents, his grandparents handed him over to a black Commie pedophile, his father and stepfather deserted him. If the pedophile instructed him by example, then Obie might have reason to resent his white grandparents and his white mom. His associations with a black radical – ahem – minister who found slave pimping profitable and who lives in a mansion in a gated community of Chicago; with the Daley machine, who own Chicago; slumlord Rezsko – who got him his own mansion; slumlord Jarrett, who acts as his advisor; cop killers Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn and on and on and on. Let's not forget George Soros and Andy Stern, who are in charge of this sinking ship. Obamacare is a payoff to Stern and his unions because they're going broke and need to be propped up like a Ponzi scheme – that's what Obamascare is designed to do. Judge Obie by his friends and cronies.
Gun owners of America and the Christian Coalition are in favor of Net Neutrality
Although it is admirable that you respect the judgment of these organizations so much that you appear to think they can't err, the leadership is only human, and can make mistakes.
I'm not going to bother to check if this is true or not, because it doesn't matter. I'm not going to resign my lifetime membership to GOA just because someone in its leadership was misled on a deliberately obfuscated issue.
i understand that but as i said this is what i have "quickly" read over
if you have any sources which are NOT political and can give a good definition
i would appreciate it
Here's a working definition of net neutrality: an Internet Service Provider cannot prioritize some "bits" over others. In other words, it doesn't matter if you're moving text from the NY Times, video from Hulu, or audio from Rush 24/7. ISPs must treat all those bits the same way. They can't, for example, throttle down the speed at which you are able to download video from a certain source, just because that source is a business competitor.
A real-world example? Comcast is buying NBC. Let's say you get your Internet service from Comcast. There's nothing in current rules to stop Comcast from prioritizing video from NBC programs, and throttling (slowing down) the video you receive from CBS.com or ABC.com. If Comcast lets me buy a certain amount of bandwidth at a certain download speed, it should be required to deliver that, regardless of what "types" of bits I'm downloading — even if those bits are video, and allow me to drop my Comcast cable.
This is a bigger issue in parts of the country (in my area, for example) where consumers really only have 1 option for high-speed Internet service.
I'm a conservative, so I have big concerns about letting the government have control over the Internet. But I don't think this is so cut-and-dried as "Obama is for it, so I'm against it." I know a lot of people in the tech sector who have level heads, but are in favor of net neutrality.
then that would make us as bad as the lefties
i keep seeing those saying " if he is for it , i am against it"
come on…
that definatly makes it sound like the party of no
True 'net neutrality' would be the government taking a neutral position and butting out.
This is kind of like HealthScare and the Porkulus with friendly sounding names. It's about regulatory control, nothing more. The left wants this government (public) control which will kill innovation (like HealthScare) and force all of us to live and work with LESS than the status quo. Forget about looking to the future. Forget about Internet2.
If Net Neutrality had been in place in 1996 we would all still be using dial-up and the content we could access would be extremely limited
Sorry, but I just wanted to drive that point home. The govt. makes problems it cannot fix and breaks what it tries to.
I'm not sure something as politically charged as so-called net "neutrality" can be addressed in a non-political fashion, but here is info from a non-partisan source:
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa507.pdf
I'm not sure something as politically charged as so-called net "neutrality" can be addressed in a non-political fashion, but here is info from a non-partisan source:
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa507.pdf
These are tricky dicky talking points that are highlighted while the entirety of truth is ignored.
How about "Government Neutrality". Where gubment get's the hell out of our lives and our wallets.
Well, Chavez has been in power for 11 years and plans to stay for 11 more. Obie has already told us he plans on being president for a long time. Longer than 8 years? Hopefully, no longer than 4, but it would be nice if he overplays his hand and becomes either a lame duck or is urged to resign.
"You make more money so we are going to charge you more per unit."?
Got that right. Never say "It cannot get worse", because it darn sure can.
Quite true, plus people seem to fail to relize that the internet they are on now is "Net Neutral" it's just Defacto neutrality at the moment and hasn't been put into law. Overturning Net Neutrality is what would cause radical change.
Obama is a Anti-Christ and when this system will be destroyed I will forget his name and live a very happy life without this loon!
Why should I fear him or what his politic tries to do?
He is human, right?
Humans are imperfect and they will make errors. The time will come when the human governments will make a terrible error in their calculation. Then nobody will be able to fix it.
Amen to that!
What really has me nervous is how many times what a bill is called is the opposite of what the law does.
And there's been times when what people thought was going to be the bill was amended into something different at the last minute, or changed between the vote and being published.
I still do not have a firm grasp on this issue because it seems that everyone talking about it doesn't seem to have a firm grasp. Some say it's about bandwidth and commerce, and other say it's about content–I guess I would have to see specifically what is being proposed.
My gut instinct is to be against it. No, not just because Obama is for it; but it seems that going to the feds to save freedom contradicts reality. The problem is that any time your create a new bureaucracy to solve a problem, it inevitably morphs into something whose sole purpose becomes growing and expanding rather than solving the problem for which it was created.
Thank you. Too many people are falling for leftist talking points and think this is completely harmless. The more information, the better. I don't want the entire nation and the world to learn a hard lesson and suffer from another mistake. ObaMao's bad enough and too much damage has already been done.
Look at it this way…if Big Brother forces this net neutrality farce by tricking the masses into thinking it's harmless and all about 'fairness', you will likely be stuck with a single option for HSI as possible competitors will be unable to handle the burden of investing in new infrastructure, especially in an already burdensome area.
Funny how just because Obama supports it then it just can't be good. I'm anti-government and I know net neutrality is good. Is the first amendment bad because it's enforced by the government? That's what net neutrality regulation does, it guarantees everyone on the Internet has equal access to the Internet. It is exactly the opposite of China's Internet where you get China's version of the Internet. This is designed to prevent ISPs and other players of the Internet from presenting you only their version and paying more for less restricted versions.
I have to agree with you. I've learned a little bit but there are so many pros and cons that I just get more confused. Everyone I talk to knows little or nothing about it. The links on here give a person some insight, but again…too many pros and cons.
First amendment isn't enforced by the government. It's what the government can not take away.
I'm not up on the net-neutrality thing, but what you posted doesn't make sense. What is "equal access to the internet"? Why does the FCC need to enforce this policy? Is everyone forced to own a computer w/ net access, and paid for by tax money? Would the FCC then decide equality?
Indeed, after all, a stopped clock is right twice a day.
Come to think of it, a stopped clock's judgment fairs rather favorably, in comparison…
I think what the people that are for Net Neutrality are missing the overall picture. If you look at everything this administration has done one piece at a time a lot of it may seem reasonable. It's when you stand far enough back that you can see the whole big picture that it gets scary. All of Maobama's policies are designed to get the government camel's nose under the tent flap of a particular industry. He knows he and his minions ( word chosen purposely ) can't take over the U.S. all at once or in a hurry so they will do it one insidious piece at a time. The people that just look at each individual piece are going to be in for a rude awakening someday soon. But by then it will probably be too late. Viva La Revolution!!
I'd put Wilson above Jimmy….Creating the Fed and the IRS has done far more damage then peanuthead…
Please allow me to direct you to the excellent posts by "ellie" and "sbenard" below:
Sorry, but this is not about allowing everyone equal access. I was for it, at first, because I thought it sounded good. Then I started looking around. The devil is in the details, of which most are fully unaware. We sued SBC (now AT&T) back when they were throttling bandwidth in violation of their original agreement. They reversed this practice but other ISPs i.e. Cox Cable have as part of their TOS that users are to expect throttling due to shaping, based on the tier of service they pay for. In the end it comes down to the infrastructure they have in place. It's unreasonable to force every ISP to lay fibre and bulk up their server farm (passing the costs on to us) just to comply with a government mandate. Now on to the other end of the spectrum (see ellie's post) every small business or home with more than one computer connected to the internet is considered a network which can be subject to government regulation. We're looking at restrictions being placed on US by the government. All of us and not just the evil big corporations.
Good question. Equal access to the Internet means that if you pay for access to the Internet through an ISP you shouldn't have to pay an additional charge to access specific sites. ISPs are interested in charging you extra based on where you intend to go on the Internet. Net neutrality wants to guarantee that if you purchase access to the Internet you have unfettered, unrestricted access to that Internet access you purchased.
ISPs already offer different bandwidth connections, which is exactly the same thing as how much water can enter your house at once based off of the water line size coming into your house. There is nothing wrong about that. But based off of how you use this connection they want to charge you extra. This creates the opportunity for large ISPs (imagine NBC one day being owning an ISP) to say with this basic Internet access you can go to sites like hulu.com and msnbc.com for only $10 a month but if you want to go to more conservative websites such as foxnews.com or biggovernment.com you'll need to purchase our silver Internet access package at $20 a month. These fees could be in addition to or replace our current Internet access fees but I doubt they'd replace them. This wouldn't be an issue if the Internet was a free market but it clearly is not. Our access to the Internet is maintained through public lines with a very small amount of service providers. There is no real/true ISP competition within local areas. In Jersey I can choose from Verizon or Comcast in my area that's it. So we can't use the argument that a bad business model will lose out in the end because the Internet market just doesn't allow for multiple businesses. These are the facts.
Yes. And, might I add: "an article that explains clearly and in a non-partisan manner".
I'm a BIG Believer of getting this Bsssss..er out of OFFICE
I do understand and my heart does go out to them. I take it they never had the right to bear arms like we do here though?
He is a big believer in far left propaganda. The first president in our history who thinks our nation needs to be torn down and recreated. He hates this country. The country is beginning to return the favor.
oBumber, you are a real slow learner!
And you link to the leftist savetheinternet to bolster your argument?
The easiest way to describe it is ' not getting charged any more for the internet than anyone else, even if you're online 24/7 wif an ifone shoved up the rump dowloading 1 stolen movie after another in between ripping off musical artists.
Why shouldn't an ISP be allowed to deny access to a website? If you were forced to not read biggovernment.com 10 times a day so that you could post your half-truths, would you not change ISP? Or, are do you want to have your cake and eat it to?
Every law they pass is just a piece of the puzzle. When this puzzle finally gets assembled, our vote will mean nothing, and when ballots no longer work, we'll resort to bullets. The next revolution will make the one the French had look like a sunday school picnic.
I was trying to answer the question of what Net Neutrality means. The original and accurate definition is what I posted.
I didn't realize that "SaveTheInternet" was a lefty organization.
Now, does this mean that the Obama administration won't try to hijack it for their own agenda? I don't know.
I don't see how making ISP s treat all data packets the same is overreaching government regulation.
One final note before I go to work (network engineer). This is why we republicans get labeled as pro big business. Here is a clear example of a regulation that is specifically designed to protect the people of America. Our rejection of this act only benefits the large ISPs that exist right now. It holds back technology and our access to information in the future. Net neutrality would not require anyone to register anything, it would not require information over networks to be recorded (your ISPs already do this anyway), and it would not require anything of the FCC. What it would do is if a company let's say Optimum wants to charge you extra for your Internet connection because you visit youtube.com a lot then the FCC could step in and say that type of business is not allowed.
This keeps businesses honest. ISPs are ISPs they provide access to the Internet and should not regulate what sites you are going to. Water companies are water companies and should not be regulating which sites you go to.
Some people say this is going to be the government regulating Americans. It's not it's a law that prevents ISPs from regulating your access to the Internet. Wake up.
May be why he refused to release his academic record, and turned to Bill Ayers for ghost writing help.
This has got to be STOPPED!!!!
Leave our fucking net ALONE!!!!
DAMN IT!!!! NO MORE GOV INTERFERENCE!!!
Even though the title of the bill sounds good "Net Neutrality" it does not mean that!
It means that he wants too monitor the net and destroy our freedom of speech…
This guy hates everything AMERICAN!!! He hates our Constitution and our Bill of RIGHTS!!!
And how do they ensure that all packets are treated equally without monitoring, auditing, inspecting…..?
They can inspect my SSL – PGP encrypted packets all they want but having ISP 'monitors' seems like a costly nightmare scenario to me.
I wish it was that simple. We shall see. I still want to know how they can ensure all packets are treated equal without some sort of auditing or inspection. I'm sorry, my ISP doesn't limit anything now. I don't want the government forcing a slowdown from, say YouTube just so I can retrieve mail from my POP server while running my FTP server. I balance that myself.
Funny. That's the way a lot of folks think, though.
I'm open to being convinced. But nobody's really explained to me how requiring ISPs to treat all "bits" as equal is going to lead to more government control over content.
Companies like Comcast would love nothing more than to make it difficult for you to watch online video, if your only other option is to buy a Comcast cable package. Net neutrality would stop them from saying, "Yes, you paid for a 2 megabit-per-second connection, which is plenty fast enough to stream video. But we're going to throttle the speed of video from Hulu and CBS.com, because we prefer you didn't download those kinds of bits."
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness"
…just wanted to say that I heard Libs wanting to tax the net before the '90s bubble burst. Taxes would've crippled and killed right away. Sadly, unless we change course, they're coming.
sorry I don't understand what you are trying to say.
As with all things Obama, "net neutrality" is a trojan horse.
The real intent of progressives with this move is to take advantage of public ignorance of the telecom networks and seize control not only of those networks, but ACCESS to them. I am a career telecom engineer, both in designing local telecom networks and wide area networks.
Few people realize that the same network that carries your internet traffic also carries your home telephone calls and wireless calls. (Wireless calls are only wireless from your handset to the nearest cell phone tower.) Over the past 20 years, all telecom networks have been digitized and groomed into a single network.
By forcing private cos. to carry all data, including your home phone calls, with the same priority, progressives know that it will create a bottleneck, overwhelm the network and bring the telecom networks to a grinding halt, and thus create a public outcry for more government intervention and control. Progressives will then step in and declare that "for the good of the collective", government just HAS TO not only fund all telecom networks, but CONTROL them as well — for the good of the collective, of course. Once that happens, it won't matter how much good content is available from BigGovernment.com or any other web site, because their real objective is complete control over ACCESS to the network. If you attempt to view biggovernment.com or breitbart.com and ten minutes later the web page still hasn't downloaded to your PC, then it doesn't matter how good the content is. It simply isn't AVAILABLE!
Do you really want government to control not only your internet, but your HOME voice telephone traffic? Since there are always limited resources, even with government control, the government could have to decide, "Oh, sorry. There isn't enough bandwidth for you to use the telephone any more." Or, "Oh, sorry, but the network was too busy when you attempted to call 911 for an ambulance." The real end goal for progressives in taking over control of private telecom networks isn't to equalize data or "net neutrality". The real purpose is to control access of the American People to ALL forms of COMMUNICATION and INFORMATION. It's real objective is power and control. It's ultimate objective … is tyranny!
"…By NOT monitoring, auditing and inspecting…." huh????? You really think that's what they want?
As to your other points I'll do some more research. I'm against blocking anything and haven't noticed such with my ISP.
I'm not buying it. The ISP's do not pay for each site a user might visit, unlike cable/satellite TV. If they want to charge for each site, they could only do so if they PAY EACH site they provide.
Net Neutrality is about censoring and controlling the internet. Otherwise, there's no reason to do it. Shouldn't people who use giant amounts of data or pipe, or whatever you want to call it, get volume discounts? Shouldn't business be able to negotiate that themselves? Government wants to control the internet. In the radio world, this is called the Fairness Doctrine. Basically it's the same thing, dressed up differently. Just as the Fairness Doctrine exists to make everything decidedly less fair, net neutrality exists to make everything less neutral. Some will just be more neutral than others. I'll let you all decide who those are. Exactly.
That is a huge obstacle that the Progressives have to deal with here.
True !! In either money or freedom !!
It looks like Comcast was a problem and has backed off a bit. Here are some interesting pros and cons about NN:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/31/the-net-neut...
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/172...
I'd opt for taking on ISPs rather than handing control like this to the government.
It looks like Comcast is still a problem. I found some interesting pros and cons:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/31/the-net-neut...
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/172...
I'd still rather opt for taking on ISPs rather than handing the government this kind of power.
Look, I agree with you. The Federal Gov. has a sort of reverse Midas Touch, whatever they touch turns to crap.
I DON'T want the Feds screwing up the web, but if the ISPs start blocking access to services or sites THEY don't like….then the gov. SHOULD tell them to cut that s**t out and leave the web alone.
But, yeah….as soon as the government starts meddling with something it usually gets worse.
It's cool
Well I look at it this way. Nobody is forced to have a computer. I think the market would keep them from charging us more as some companies would offer there service without the extra charge. So it would force others to follow suit or lose business.I have a problem with the Feds getting any more power over the Internet for any reason. I think it is a step toward control of the Internet to shut down sites that criticize Obama. Maybe if it were not Obama I would not be so suspicious. But I put nothing past this Marxist. And since you seem to have to add this to your post I am also a (Network Engineer) over 20 years…
I understand Net Neutrality and am against it.
However, even if I knew nothing about it, just the fact the Obama is FOR it would make me against it!
As with most topics which have even a tinge of politics (and net "neutrality" has a tanker semi of it), Wikipedia is not a very reliable source.
"…the online left— which political experts say has been in a state of near-revolt for months now…"
I've found them utterly revolting for far longer than that.
You are exactly correct – but that's the argument *for* net neutrality. You do understand that they cannot possibly do an equitable job of paying each site in proportion to their overall traffic ? Also, it's a start down a slippery slope that allows the government (state or federal) to begin to tax the ISP's earnings which is a start to the government taxing the internet usage based on which sites are frequented.
You are exactly right that the ISPs do not pay for each site a user might visit – that's not the point and it's not the visit to the site they are wanting to charge you more for.
The only thing they *can* charge you for is the use of their 'local-loop' and transm ission lines. This is the wire(s) from the telephone pole outside your house to the box on the side of your house or the cable line from the TV-distribution box in your neighborhood to the TV cable box on the outside of your house. In both cases, the wires inside your house belong to you, but all your internet traffic must flow through your cable-modem or (if ADSL) your telephone-line that belongs to them (the ISP).
It is this use of their wires to carry your internet traffic that the ISPs feel they can use to make more money *FOR THEIR OWN COFFERS* by charging you (not the sites you visit) more based on where you go and what kind of internet access you use. They have no intention of paying the sites you visit – the extra money is strictly intended to go into their pockets because (in their mind), you 'owe them more' for some types of internet traffic than others (example, file transfers would cost you more than web browsing – watching internet movies would cost more than reading web sites, YouTube would cost more than MSNBC.com – even to the point of political discrimination – progressive sites like MMfA or TheDailyKOS would cost more than FoxNation.com, etc.
What Jim and I are saying is Net Neutrality (which has always been the status quo) would (should) be made law to prevent the ISPs from charging you more than your neighbor for any internet purpose other than if you use *more* internet bandwidth (internet traffic) than your neighbor – where you go or what you do is none of their business and they should not be allowed to set price differentials based on that information.
Hope that helps….
Thank you!!!!! And add to that any home with more than one computer connected to the internet is a network and thus, regulated, controlled, monitored….by Big Brother.
The ISPs (yours among them) are – at some point – limiting your traffic – all networks do so to some extent as part of network management.
The issue of Net Neutrality arises when the ISP gets so blatant that they actually start *blocking* your traffic based on protocol or destination or time-of-day and when such blocking violates their own terms-of-service while they continue to charge you full price with no refund or even notification that they are doing this.
The technical term for this practice is "Traffic Shaping".
The methods the ISPs use are based on abusing the TCP/IP protocol in various ways. For example, on protocols they want to slow down, they can throw away packets periodically – this causes the TCP/IP connection to slow down and use less bandwidth because it thinks the network has slow pipes and that the missing packets are due to network 'overflow' (TCP/IP was designed to be self-correcting and self-adjusting in order to work over both fast and slow networks so it does not 'die', but just 'slows down'). By throwing away every nth packet, they cause an individual connection to think it's running on -say- a 9600bps phone line when it's really coming over your 4MB cable connection – but being 'throttled' to reduce bandwidth so the ISP can give that bandwidth for some other purpose or customer.
The issue is that (with Net Neutrality) the ISPs would be required to treat all packets as equal. What they want is to be able to slow down some packets in order to provide more space on their (deliberately over-sold) network 'main pipes' for packets they like – either packets of a more 'friendly' protocol (such as POP (port 110) or HTTP (port 80) or HTTPS (port 443)). 'Unfriendly' protocols might be port 20 (FTP data as opposed to port 21 that is the FTP control connection), or anything from the IP addresses belonging to YouTube.com or Google.
ComCast was actually caught discriminating against certain protocols – service was apparently OK until their customers tried a file download for instance. Their defense was that their network could not handle the full bandwidth that their users had been sold, so they were secretly 'throttling' 'bad' packets (based on port (protocol) or based on IP address) in order to prevent their users from using the full bandwidth that was in the user's service-contract that ComCast salespeople had sold them.
Once this came to light, it was found that many other ISPs (Verizon for instance) had plans in various stages of implementation to do exactly the same thing for exactly the same reasons.
By outlawing this practice ('Net Neutrality'), the ISPs would be required to increase their 'central pipes' to accomodate the service rates they advertise in their service agreements rather than restrict their users to the existing capability of their (outdated) networks while not having to provide the bandwidth that their users are already being charged for and that they are contracted to provide.
Yes – it's all about greed.
Then as a Network Engineer (me too), you know that a given domicile only (maybe) a choice of two monopolies to choose from if they're lucky – a phone line where ADSL is usually sold at speeds between 384Kb and somewhere around 1 Mbps (dedicated speed) or cable service around 2-4 Mbps using shared media.
In no way does a household have an option to 'shop around' for that 'local-loop' that physically connects to the house.
Because the cable company and/or the telco have a monopoly on the physical wire that connects the home to the outside world, they should absolutely be prevented from holding their customers hostage to their (monopoly) decisions about what internet traffic their customers are or are not allowed to receive and what price the customer must pay for that access.
This argument is incorrect. ISPs cannot be forced to lay extra fiber. What net neutrality would do is say you can't sell Uncle Joe 3Mbps Internet connection and then on top of it charge him based on the sites he plans on visiting. If the ISP cannot provide 3Mbps then they should revise the name of the product they're selling. I cannot believe that you are arguing for the monthly fleecing that goes on to all Americans who purchase Internet access through an ISP. If there is anyone who thinks your cable and Internet bills are inexpensive then yes you should be anti-net neutrality. If this doesn't pass there is a clear argument that your water usage should also be tiered based on how you plan on using it. Bandwidth is consumable and provided through public "pipes."
Comcast and the other ISP players know there is no real laws to prevent them from forcing their phone service to have the best access and Vonage or other VoIP companies from having weaker service unless you pay extra. They are slowly tiptoeing to this point. They would never do that quickly not now because then net neutrality would have the reason to finally pass.
Step back from your hatred of government and look at the facts. If I'm talking to someone who believes government has no role anywhere anytime and provides no good at all then this argument can never be won and I'm sorry for wasting my time. There is a time for government protection and this that time. This has nothing to do with what is on the Internet but the connection that you purchase from the handful of ISPs that exist.
You're dead wrong here WeWeed.
Net Neutrality has been the situation from day one of the internet.
The ISPs (without government enforcement) are attempting to change that.
I cannot believe I'd ever say this, but I think O'bama may have one right here.
I cannot speak for any strings that the FCC or congress may have put on the Net Neutrality bill…
Great info in your posts. I did some looking around and saw how Comcast was screwing customers. Just happened to notice a reply and thought I'd reply back as I'm hyped right now that the media aren't covering a HUGE story:
http://biggovernment.com/fgaffney/2010/02/03/shar...
You're engaging in political double-talk here. Net Neutrality means that the 'so-called private businesses' (publicly traded ISPs) are not allowed to administer their networks in such a way that they restrict access to the internet they purport to provide access to while still charging their customers top dollar for that access.
Get real – for the ISPs – there are two networks one network (the 'public' one) *IS* their business – without this public network, they have no reason to exist since this is the network service and internet access they sell to their customers. They have a 2nd network (the 'private' one) that is used to maintain their business (think email, file servers, possible voice mail, etc)
No one is restricting what the ISPs do on their private networks. The Net Neutrality principle is attempting to insure that their public network is not run in a discriminatory manner.
I cannot speak for or to any other strings that Obama may be attempting to enforce on the ISPs in addition to the requirement to treat all network packets in a 'neutral' manner. It is possible that the Net Neutrality bill also contains onerous government reporting requirements – I just don't know.
ok thanks
i read the article and i think i have a better understanding.
appearances can be decieving.
Bob – do some research dude – your re-definition of 'Net-Neutrality' makes no sense.
Please do some research – then come back when you understand the topic.
I also read the article and agree that appearances can be deceiving. The report states that no evidence of ISP partisanship has been found so far. This is untrue – Comcast has been caught discriminating against file-sharing protocols (specifically bit-torrent) and has admitted as much. Verizon (until about 5 years ago) discriminated against all other ISPs by charging exhorbitant prices for the use of their 'access lines', but only $5 per month for their internet service resulting in a bill that was $45 for access+$$ for a different internet provider or $50 for Verizon internet with sub-standard service limited to Windows-only machines (no home networks) and only about 2/3 of the bandwidth stated on the contract and advertised by Verizon.
I wonder whether this report was commissioned by one ISP or another because it contains all the talking points and 'spun' facts that the ISPs use in their debates.
Please do not pity the 'poor ISPs'. They chose to get into the internet service business. Their greed is trying to keep legislation from passing that would provide a 'baseline' against which they can be held responsible to their customers whenever the ISPs attempt to take unfair advantage of individual customers.
That's BS ellie.
What kind of troll are you ?
Net Neutrality means no such thing unless you are saying that the proposed legislation that is wrapped around (and seperate from) Net Neutrality says those things.
If that's what you are saying, then Net Neutrality is not to blame – the legislators are.
Either the trolls are taking over this site, or it's time for me to start agitating an recommending AGAINST the Tea Party and BigGovernment.com.
There are way too many fools here (hippieconservative is the notable exception) that assume that if Obama's for it, then it must be (by definition) bad for America.
This is a technical issue – those that do not understand the internet are destined to destroy it and he who can destroy a thing – controls a thing.
With 'friends' like on this board, the internet is doomed in America and the rest of the world will have that much more of an advantage against us.
And how do they ensure that all packets are treated equally without monitoring, auditing, inspecting.
By NOT monitoring, auditing and inspecting. An ISP can charge me for volume (more bandwidth) but not block or slow down my access to anything on the web.
Just so you know ALL ISPs have Carnivore Boxes installed since the late 90's so the Gov is already inspecting pretty much everything.
I just don't want my ISP to be able to block o if I want to watch an episode of some TV show from three weeks ago because they don't want me to use "those websites" but their own.
I don't know if the comparison is apt but it would be like your phone company blocking access to the 1-800 numbers of conservative talk shows.
Not a straw man at all.
The scenarios have happened:
Comcast filtering & blocking bit-torrent traffic (preventing downloads of Linux CDs, on-line movies, other .iso files) and Verizon charging a $50 / month fee for Verizon internet service or $45 / month for another company to access the Verizon wires that carry internet to customer homes.
Your example of search engines giving biased results is exactly what happened with MS Search – that's why Microsoft had to cancel their MSNetwork and now has 'bing'. (From what I can see, Bing primarily finds sites that are Microsoft-friendly or have paid Microsoft for good results, but I have no direct proof of that yet – I just know that a google search vs a Microsoft Bing search produce two wildly different results).
You just think 'we' have not had problems so far because the instances of discriminatory service have not been widely reported upon to date. 'I' have personal experience with Verizon that contradicts your straw-man argument that there is no problem here.
Let me suggest http://www.groklaw.net as another source.
Net Neutrality was covered in great detail some time ago (years ago when it was first brought up).
I'm sure there's still stuff in their archives about this topic.
Groklaw comes from Robert Heinlein's 'grok' meaning 'to understand' and 'law': 'to understand the law'.
It's a great resource for pretty much any topic having to do where the internet or open-source software intersects the law.
Pam (the site owner) is an ex-paralegal-turned-journalist that got started covering the SCO vs IBM lawsuit where The SCO Group claimed they owned Linux and sued IBM for $5Mil with a stated intent to charge every company that uses Linux $699/processor for the Intellectual Property that SCO may (or may not) have had in Linux. (Hint: it turned out that SCO had no Intellectual Property in Linux other than what they gave away for free years earlier).
The site has extensive archives of topics covered in the past and I specifically remember that Net Neutrality was covered in great detail several years ago when it was first brought up.
Comcast bites. I still don't see how they can enforce 'bit' equality without individual packet and IP destination inspection and that's what bothers me the most, along with stifling innovation and passing on higher costs. If Comcast is doing garbage like this then, maybe……something. I'm going to research this more but I'll never trust the government to control much less fix things…. especially Health Care.
Zander – you're raving.
Take two vallium and chill, dude.
Net Neutrality is all about the ISPs being required to leave our net alone.
The ISPs have gone to the FCC to get permission from the FCC to charge different rates for different services or premium rates for some services or sites.
To counter the pull that the ISPs have with the FCC, the Net Neutrality concept was brought out by Google & other network sites. The ISPs are trying to spin this as 'government control over the ISP networks'.
That's BS – this is technical people trying to keep the internet free (you are not helping here) from ISP interference and knowing that the ISPs have more pull (read bribes and influence) than individuals – hence the attempt to get a law passed that will force the FCC not to rule in the ISP favor.
All the so-called 'scare' scenarios have already occurred – Comcast has been caught filtering traffic it does not like. Verizon has been caught setting prices such that competitors cannot compete.
The government is not interfering with the internet – Net Neutrality is attempting to keep it that way by preventing the ISPs from interfering with our access to the internet.
Do not let your hatred of Obama to destroy your common sense. Check out http://www.groklaw.net's archives. Net Neutrality was covered in tremendous detail on that site several years ago.
I suspect this is Obama attempting to launch a distraction – a decoy intended to deflect attention from his ratings and his healthcare issues.
Remember that whenever Clinton needed a respite from Lowinski, he dropped a few bombs on Iraq as a distraction….
It is merely another way for the Government vis a vis Goggle to control what information we can obtain and disseminate. And I'm with a few of you that stated – if Obama is for it, I against it. (with one caveat – I'm for the Saints in the Super Bowl.)
The good news is that everything Obama is for so far has failed. (I'm even willing for the Saints to lose in order to maintain Mr. Obama's 100% loser record). I may be a fair weather fan, but my country is at stake here.
Nice try, but no.
1. 911 service is never blocked by voice network providers – it's illegal for them to do so for safety reasons. Cell phones donated to abused-spouse organizations are valuable specifically because even cell phones with no active contracts can still call 911.
2. Telcos are required to 911-map all phones to a location in order to be able to vector police, fire & other rescue units based on 911 calls even if the user is unable to speak.
3. Voice and Data (even when carried on the same infrastructure) are always treated as separate entities with voice getting preference due to voice data's extreme sensitivity to latency.
4. Inside a home, voice communication is an analog signal that gets clipped on the high and low frequency ends outside the range of human hearing. It is *outside* the bandwidth that humans can hear that the data stream(s) are carried. This is the purpose of the filters that are provided with ADSL service – they filter the data frequencies out of the signal to prevent interference with phone equipment or side effects that may be caused by the data frequencies.
5. The exception to this is ISDN traffic where all voice is digitized at the handset and travels the network in digital form. All other voice traffic is only digitized AFTER it enters the telco switches. The claim that voice data is treated as data when covered under Net Neutrality is bogus unless you mean only within the sphere of ISDN.
6. Net Neutrality only applies to internet *data* traffic – possibly including Voice-Over-IP (such as Vonage) or 'magic-jack' calls.
7. Net Neutrality is not about government control – it's about getting congress to pass a law that makes it illegal for ISPs to pressure or bribe the FCC into ruling that ISPs are allowed to discriminate based on the type of internet traffic or destination. This has already occurred (investigate ComCast and Verizon and AT&T in the southeast.
8. The Government is already able to get phone taps to monitor your home phones – Net Neutrality does not change that in any way.
Tyranny is when company spin is picked up without examination or questioning and foisted on those that actually understand the technology because of fear on the part of the unknowing led by the incompetent.
Please stop leading.
Words of wisdom spoken to the unknowing by the terminally stupid and intentionally ignorant.
Rants like yours really tick me off because I've been bitten by many of the same ISPs that are fighting Net Neutrality and publishing all sorts of bogus, misleading white papers as well as commissioning reports that show their points of view (such reports can come from anywhere – even otherwise respectable sources like the Cato Institute). It appears that the Cato Institute is not above 'finding' in favor of he-who-pays-for-the-report-and-research.
Kinda like the validity of the science behind global warming…
Thanks, I did understand it as you and Jim explained. It would an easy NO for me. I don't mind paying for better service, like more speed and bandwidth. If the providers prices gets too high because of higher profit margin, new yetechnology will emerge, like a protal webpage or a different medium, etc. The market will dictate that.
I remember when cell phones were expensive and exclusive. I remember ONTV and Select TV. I remember Pong and $1000 BetaMax too.
WRONG; that's not what "net neutrality" is! rather it is akin to the "FAIRNESS DOCTRINE" in radio was/is……………….a way to censor and shut up those right of center !
You don't know what you're talking about.
Go away troll……….you're a shill and trying to make us believe that balck is white and white is black, by claiming to be an "expert", but when others don't buy what you're selling, you showed your true colors.
"Net Neutrality" is the same crapola as the "FAIRNESS DOCTRINE"; a way to shut up sites such as this one !
You didn't even bother to actually join this site, so why should anyone believe you; especially since there have been real experts writing articles about this for more than a year, all of whom refute your claims.
You're so full of it, your eyes must be brown and your breathe smells like a cesspool.
"Net Neutrality" is just like the damned "FAIRNESS DOCTRINE", which I bet you were/are all for, as well.
Okay, now get all bent out of shape because yes, I did hurl insults at you and talked down to you as well. But the truth is on my side and you're lying.
Sorry for the 2nd reply. We have the same concerns. I don't want the Feds to have any control over the internet either. That's why I'm in favor of keeping the internet free (in favor of Net Neutrality – the current status quo).
Unfortunately, the internet is mandatory for many reaons – one of which is that I no longer trust television or radio news, I no longer read newspapers (too little info, too late, too filtered – if covered at all).
I use the internet to shop, bank, and search for solutions to problems at work as well as a carrier for my VPN link so I can work from home.
I *DO NOT* want my ISP interfering with my internet connection (and my life).
The market cannot sort this out because of the monopoly that the ISPs have over the 'local-loop' to customer houses that they charge other ISPs to have access to.
I lived in Pittsburgh, PA for a while (Verizon country). Verizon ADSL was either a 50$ / month for 768Kbps service that actually provided 600Kbps (measured) or $45 access charge to Verizon (for the use of the physical Verizon line into my house) + $40 to another ISP to provide me decent internet service.
Eventually my ISP sued Verizon, won the court case and my access charge dropped to $5-to-$10 per month + my ISP's bill. There's no way I could have afforded the lawyer fees to file my own lawsuit.
The people who support net neutrality largely fall into too camps. Those who are fellow travelers right from it's conceptual beginnings, and consumers who have butted heads with their ISPs. I sympathize with the latter group, but the solution is not to put in place regulatory framework. The best solution, as is almost always the case, is more competition and innovation. Regulation stifles both. Regulation increases price, causes scarcity, or both.
I have watched as a host of places of public accommodation (restaurants, bookstores, hotels, etc.) have transitioned from a pay-to-play to no fee Wi-Fi service. This transition has taken place while net neutrality is still just the fevered dream of cyber-commies like Richard Stallman. The ability to have the internet on your PC, your laptop, on your cell phone, and in your ears all come from the success of one of the most unfettered free markets we have left.
Key word…"WAS" the worst…NOBAMA IS NOW the WORST
WATCH YOUR SEARCH: GOOGLE TEAMS WITH NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY
That came from Drudge Report
You don't know what you're talking about.
I am a big believer in all Cable New Shows boycotting Obama until he issues a public apology for telling Democrats not to watch cable news shows.
This communist/marxist freak is stepping waaay out of his bounds. When he screws with the FREEDOM of the American people, he is asking for a huge push-back. And he will get it.
To clarify my previous statement, a boycott of Obama by Cable News Shows would mean that they would refuse to broadcast any of Obama's endless speeches or give him any more air time until he gets down on his knees and begs their forgiveness.
All i can do is hope to remind the left that Obama will be a one term pres (assuming he isnt impeached) and the next pres will almost certainly be a conservative. If i were elected I would immediately appoint Dick Cheney to monitor the internet for 'fairness'. In other words, what the left dishes out will come back to haunt them.
"If the Gov't thinks a broadcast, news print, blog is not neutral in nature as in critisism of the current administation, the perpertrators of such information maybe fined or maybe even shut down."
You are very misinformed. For those who are confused about the definition of net neutrality….
Net neutrality does NOT mean that government would control content available on the internet. Instead, it means that government would keep the internet open and equal for everyone by PREVENTING service providers from blocking or slowing down certain content, such as peer-to-peer file sharing, and/or preventing service providers from imposing fees for higher levels of internet access.
It has absolutely nothing to do with the political neutrality of internet content!
Yes, but how would they enforce this without setting up a way to monitor all internet traffic?
If it ain't broke then don't fix it. What the hell is wrong with this president?
net neutrality- everyone will equal access to the net, some people's access will be *more* equal than others
It's nice sounding, like sustainable development, living wage, and unilateral disarmament. To quote 'Southpark" Q: "Isn't that Fascism?" A:"No it isn't" Q:"Why not?" A:" Because we don't call it that!"
[...] Capitol Confidential noted the other day, net neutrality is an issue that that is dear to the left, but has flown under the radar of most [...]
[...] Capitol Confidential noted the other day, net neutrality is an issue that that is dear to the left, but has flown under the radar of most [...]
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