FCC Loses Net Neutrality Case

[Fluribus]

Even when there is a choice of internet providers, they are often all horrible The cable co., the phone co., or the cellular co.

Google Fiber is supposed to be an effort to foster competition and push ISPs to improve. Unfortunately, I believe it will fail. A few limited test cases isn't going put sufficient pressure on the current players. Google should go big, or get stuffed. Of course, having Google become a major ISP might not be all sugary sweetness.

[fjtorres]

It used to be that broadcast networks were forbidden from owning the shows they transmitted. That changed with the arrival of cable and syndication when it was shown there was more than enough capacity and demand for free competition.

That is not the case with broadband so there is both logic and precedent for broadband providers being required to divest their content businesses or vice versa.

And in fact Time Warner has been considering getting rid of their cable business for a while and Charter just offered to buy it. It may be that the road to net neutrality can be forged through mandated divestiture instead of through leaky regulation.

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Do you really want the government to control the internet? I sure don't. If my internet provider does something I don't like, I can switch carriers. Switching governments takes a bit more work.

Even if it looks like you have options, most of those Internet service providers use infrastructure owned by a handful of companies. It turns out that the handful of companies are the very same companies that want to violate net neutrality in order to protect their media interests. So whatever those big companies do will trickle down to the independent players, whether those independent players like it or not.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Even if it looks like you have options, most of those Internet service providers use infrastructure owned by a handful of companies. It turns out that the handful of companies are the very same companies that want to violate net neutrality in order to protect their media interests. So whatever those big companies do will trickle down to the independent players, whether those independent players like it or not.

Agreed, Net Neutrality isn't the "government controlling the internet", it's the government using it's constitutionally-granted power of regulating interstate commerce to keep the internet from being controlled.

[ApK]

1. Regarding the quote from "Uncle_Erik" the lawyer earlier, I thought the SCOTUS only hears cases when lower federal courts disagree. That is, if the FCC loses every appeal, could it still go to the SCOTUS?
2. What would it take for broadband providers to be reclassified as common carriers? Surely the nature of Internet service has changed in the last 20 years and is now verging on being an essential public utility.
3. I agree with QuantumIguana. Under our current system, the government getting it's way in this case is the far better alternative than Comcast and Verizon that ilk getting their way.

ApK

[Cyberman tM]

Someone correct me if wrong - but this all boils down to the providers wanting to be paid thrice, instead of just twice, right?

Also, what about this:
http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20060909

Sounds reasonable to me, but I might be wrong.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by ApK

1. Regarding the quote from "Uncle_Erik" the lawyer earlier, I thought the SCOTUS only hears cases when lower federal courts disagree. That is, if the FCC loses every appeal, could it still go to the SCOTUS?

ApK

Yes.
Anybody can appeal all the way regardless of the case history.
The SCOTUS doesn't have to take the case but they can appeal.

[petrucci]

I have mixed feelings about this issue. On the one hand, if isps are allowed to discriminate based on sites, data, etc., the power is likely to be abused. On the other hand, networks have a finite capacity. Some users could monopolize the bandwidth at the expense of other users. It is my understanding that true net neutrality would prevent isps from penalizing the high usage customers.

One solution would be to prevent the isps from selling a service that cannot perform to specs. This would prevent them from overselling a network.

Another would grant isps the ability to discriminate traffic under very specific circumstances.

Either way, a proper solution would probably not come from a court. New laws are needed.

[pwalker8]

An awful lot of the concern seems to be along the lines of "but what if" rather than "they are doing this".

Yes, the basic backbone of the internet is controlled by a few companies, but those companies are not the ISP's, nor are they the companies that everyone seems to be worried about.

IMPO, any concern that a cable company is going to block or degenerate a specific destination, such as Netflix, iTunes, Amazon or any other large scale service is at best a short term worry. Cable TV companies are much like landline companies. They are still a cash cow and like landlines will be around for a while, but I don't think it will be that much longer before cable tv follows long distance service. (note, it really wasn't that long ago that Telephone companies considered Long Distance to be the new huge money maker for them. It didn't quite work out that way.)

On the flip side, government creating ISP monopolies and regulating how much people have to pay is the antithesis of the internet. I've got 100 MB to my house for less than I paid for sub 1 MB five years ago because I have five different providers who want my money - hardwired (u-verse and x-finity), wireless (AT&T, Verizon Wireless and a couple more) and Satellite.

I think that people are arguing for rules that ISPs must abide by. I doubt that anyone is arguing for ISP monopolies. While people are arguing that there ought to be regulations on what people are paying for, it seems as though very few people are arguing over what they are actually paying.

It is also worth considering that five competitors is not a very large pool. (They even have a word for it: oligopoly.) In many parts of the U.S., there are even fewer options because there isn't the population density to justify building out the infrastructure. In other words, competition doesn't work as well as we are led to believe. That is particularly true for industries that are difficult to enter into due to the infrastructure that must be constructed.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

In many parts of the U.S., there are even fewer options because there isn't the population density to justify building out the infrastructure. In other words, competition doesn't work as well as we are led to believe. That is particularly true for industries that are difficult to enter into due to the infrastructure that must be constructed.

The solution to that issue in the UK has been a law requiring the owners of the telephone network (British Telecom) to sell IP capacity on the telephone network to any ISP at the same price they sell it to their own ISP (BT Broadband). The result has been very healthy competition among ISPs to offer competitively-priced ADSL packages.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by HarryT

The solution to that issue in the UK has been a law requiring the owners of the telephone network (British Telecom) to sell IP capacity on the telephone network to any ISP at the same price they sell it to their own ISP (BT Broadband). The result has been very healthy competition among ISPs to offer competitively-priced ADSL packages.

That was also the rule for telephone companies here in the states.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

That was also the rule for telephone companies here in the states.

So why has it not resulted in competition, do you think? I notice that all the posts here have been talking about cable ISPs, not ADSL services. Is ADSL not popular in the US?

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by HarryT

So why has it not resulted in competition, do you think? I notice that all the posts here have been talking about cable ISPs, not ADSL services. Is ADSL not popular in the US?

It's slower than cable and it's top speeds are frequently not available in many areas. Of course, YMMV is always at play here.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

It's slower than cable and it's top speeds are frequently not available in many areas. Of course, YMMV is always at play here.

Yes, its speed depends on your distance from the telephone exchange, and you're right, it is generally slower than cable. I get about 15-16MBit/sec from my ADSL connection, and I really don't need more. 3MBit/sec is fine for streaming HD video, for example. However, it doesn't need the infrastructure investment that cable does, which is why I'm surprised to hear that there is no competition in the ISP market.