FCC plans to repeal net neutrality this thursday

[Elibean Spaceman]

I know this was talked about a bit in the US politics thread, but I thought that this should have been a thread too.

So, Ajit Pai, the FCC chairman, plans to remove net neutrality on the 14th. I'm going to copy and paste from the letter from battleforthenet.com

Spoiler

I urge you to stop the FCC's plan to end net neutrality *before* the FCC's December 14th vote.

I don't want ISPs to have the power to block websites, slow them down, give some sites an advantage over others, split the Internet into "fast lanes" for companies that pay and "slow lanes" for the rest, or force me to buy special "tiers" to access the sites and services I choose. But that's exactly what the FCC plan would do. Please read it:

https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-347927A1.pdf

Blocking & throttling by ISPs is a serious problem. Comcast has throttled Netflix, AT&T blocked FaceTime, Time Warner Cable throttled the popular game League of Legends, and Verizon admitted it will introduce fast lanes for sites that pay-and slow lanes for everyone else-if the FCC lifts the rules. This hurts consumers and businesses large and small.

If some companies can pay ISPs to have their content load faster, startups and small businesses that can't pay those fees won't be able to compete. This will kill the open marketplace that has enabled millions of small businesses and created America’s 5 most valuable companies. Without strong net neutrality protections, Internet providers will effectively be able to impose a tax on every sector of the American economy.

Moreover, under Chairman Pai's plan, ISPs will be able to make it more difficult to access political speech that they don't like. They'll be able to charge fees for website delivery that would make it harder for blogs, nonprofits, artists, and others who can't pay up to have their voices heard.

If the FCC passes their current order, every Internet user and business in this country will be unprotected from abuse by Internet providers, and the consequences will be dire. Please publicly support net neutrality protections by denouncing the FCC's current plan. Do whatever you can to stop Chairman Pai, to ensure that businesses and Internet users remain protected.

Thank you!

If you live in the United States, then call your local congressperson to stop Ajit Pai from getting rid of net neutrality on the 14th. Government agencies have announced that they plan to police the internet after net neutrality is repealed. THIS IS SERIOUS BUSINESS, AGAIN IF YOU LIVE IN THE US PLEASE CALL YOUR CONGRESSPERSON!

Edited December 13, 2017 by Larverto

[SoulWeaver]

Has anyone actually bothered to figure out what definition of Net Neutrality is being used here? I have yet to see anyone attempting to either promote this or shut it down use anything remotely resembling a definition for Net Neutrality. Am I the only one who recognizes the issues of throwing terms around without even attempting to define them? What exactly are you guys assuming Net Neutrality means?

[dragonlordsd]

17 hours ago, SoulWeaver said:

Has anyone actually bothered to figure out what definition of Net Neutrality is being used here? I have yet to see anyone attempting to either promote this or shut it down use anything remotely resembling a definition for Net Neutrality. Am I the only one who recognizes the issues of throwing terms around without even attempting to define them? What exactly are you guys assuming Net Neutrality means?

Basically, Net Neutrality means that Internet Service Providers must provide equal access to all websites.

That's the simplest definition. Internet is treated like electricity: you pay your bill, and you get access. They can't specify what you do with that access.

If it gets repealed, Internet Service Providers will be allowed to either throttle (reduce access speed) or even simply turn off any website they don't like.

For example, if the repeal gets passed, Verizon can just disable access to Netflix for all of their customers. Not even "you have to pay more for access" just, boom. Gone. Shut off. And if this sounds ridiculous, it's not. This is actually something Verizon did 3 years ago, to force people to subscribe to their own streaming service. This case led to the initial implementation of Net Neutrality rules.

If you want to see how ridiculous things can get, check out the service in countries that don't have Net Neutrality. In some countries you have to pay for each individual website you want to have access to (like how cable TV works). $5 for Google,  $7 for Google and Facebook, etc.

[SoulWeaver]

2 hours ago, dragonlordsd said:

Basically, Net Neutrality means that Internet Service Providers must provide equal access to all websites.

That's the simplest definition. Internet is treated like electricity: you pay your bill, and you get access. They can't specify what you do with that access.

If it gets repealed, Internet Service Providers will be allowed to either throttle (reduce access speed) or even simply turn off any website they don't like.

For example, if the repeal gets passed, Verizon can just disable access to Netflix for all of their customers. Not even "you have to pay more for access" just, boom. Gone. Shut off. And if this sounds ridiculous, it's not. This is actually something Verizon did 3 years ago, to force people to subscribe to their own streaming service. This case led to the initial implementation of Net Neutrality rules.

If you want to see how ridiculous things can get, check out the service in countries that don't have Net Neutrality. In some countries you have to pay for each individual website you want to have access to (like how cable TV works). $5 for Google,  $7 for Google and Facebook, etc.

While that is the simplest definition, I think it's too complicated an issue for really simple definitions. At its truest, Net Neutrality is something no one actually wants, because the truest definition of Net Neutrality I've seen is that all data packets are given equal bandwidth priority across all channels of access. This means, among other things, that 911 calls placed over WiFi would have equal bandwidth priority to, say, one of us downloading a rom hack, or checking our email, when really such calls should have higher priority. Obviously, that's not the main method of sending a 911 call, but it does happen.

Also, if Verizon wants to say nobody can use Netflix, the obvious answer is to switch away from Verizon. I mean, I don't want to sound rude here, but duh. All a company has to do is wait for Net Neutrality to be repealed, then come out and make an official statement that they will be holding themselves to the rules of Net Neutrality of their own accord, they don't have to make any sort of major changes to the system they already had in place, they build goodwill with the people, they get all the business from the customers who are leaving their previous provider because their previous provider decided to be moronic, other companies see that and follow suit, and presto, the only real change that happened was the government deregulated itself. This is actually how Switzerland did this, seeing as how you're bringing up countries that don't have government-run Net Neutrality.

EDIT: …Sorry - I wasn't trying to start an argument or anything like that, I just really hate seeing people toss around terms with very simple, if any, definitions behind them. Thanks for at least having a definition you're using.

Edited December 14, 2017 by SoulWeaver

[NinjaMonkey]

28 minutes ago, SoulWeaver said:

Also, if Verizon wants to say nobody can use Netflix, the obvious answer is to switch away from Verizon.

That assumes that you live in an area with more than one internet supplier. Some parts of the US only have one internet supplier, and thus the people living there only have one option available to them in terms of who provides their internet access.

Edited December 14, 2017 by NinjaMonkey

[Lord Raven]

2 hours ago, SoulWeaver said:

Also, if Verizon wants to say nobody can use Netflix, the obvious answer is to switch away from Verizon. I mean, I don't want to sound rude here, but duh. All a company has to do is wait for Net Neutrality to be repealed, then come out and make an official statement that they will be holding themselves to the rules of Net Neutrality of their own accord, they don't have to make any sort of major changes to the system they already had in place, they build goodwill with the people, they get all the business from the customers who are leaving their previous provider because their previous provider decided to be moronic, other companies see that and follow suit, and presto, the only real change that happened was the government deregulated itself. This is actually how Switzerland did this, seeing as how you're bringing up countries that don't have government-run Net Neutrality.

Net Neutrality is meant to prevent collusion between ISPs too; collusion between them can lead to regional monopolies on broadband internet service (which obviously hasn't happened here). As far as political issues go, it's pretty black and white in the US. Net Neutrality is needed due to many regions having limited options, which gives individual ISPs more power to limit your internet.

The ideal capitalism that you're describing is pretty much required by legislation and regulation in the US due to vast differences between regions and having the third most populated country in the world.

[Tryhard]

Net neutrality may not be so needed in the US if there was more competition in corporate ISPs for especially rural areas but quite a lot of other countries have the benefit of being more densely populated and with more choices for ISP, while it's not uncommon for you to have almost no choice in the US. As it is, granting essentially a monopoly to companies like Comcast seems like a poor idea for average consumers. Even the majority of conservatives do not approve of repealing net neutrality, because a lot of them do see internet services should be treated as a utility like energy companies, at least in their current state. And Comcast were already the ones to come out and say they support net neutrality, while pretending they don't dump millions of dollars lobbying to get net neutrality repealed. They obviously are doing it for a reason. It's my opinion that even if you do normally believe in less regulation for businesses, this is an example of corporatism over capitalism because money is going directly into the pockets of people that are making political decisions to repeal net neutrality on behalf of the corporations that will benefit from it (and no-one else).

While I think you should protest this move, I think it's fairly obvious that it's going to pass.

Edited December 14, 2017 by Tryhard

[Anacybele]

I don't visit Serious Discussion much at all or even get into politics much (because it usually bores me), but I heard about this net neutrality appeal thing and...while at first getting rid of it didn't sound like a good idea to me, now after hearing more viewpoints about it and what other things getting rid of it might mean, I really have no idea what to believe.

I don't know if it's better for it to be gone or not. I just don't know enough. Even after reading through some of this thread, I'm not sure.

[Etrurian emperor]

So would the repeal of net neutrality affect people outside the US ?

[Wist]

2 hours ago, Etrurian emperor said:

So would the repeal of net neutrality affect people outside the US ?

Maybe. It could affect prices for some services. For example, imagine Netflix has to spend more to reach American consumers. They could raise prices in the US to make up the difference. Or, they could raise prices across the world, but by less because more subscribers are paying the difference. This kind of international cross subsidisation isn't uncommon. But even if they take this route, it might not affect prices in your country if the video streaming market where you live is sufficiently competitive.

[Thane]

Could someone explain to me how it's possible for a handful of non-elected people to do this, especially when it goes against the interests of the average American?

[Moblin Major General]

50 minutes ago, Thane said:

Could someone explain to me how it's possible for a handful of non-elected people to do this, especially when it goes against the interests of the average American?

The bureaucracy in the US is many times more powerful than in other countries, particularly Europe. This is for the sake of expediency, as voting on this issue in Congress would take away from more important legislation. It leads to some really stupid decisions like this sometimes, but the alternative is politicizing something that shouldn't even be considered as a partisan issue.

[dragonlordsd]

15 hours ago, SoulWeaver said:

While that is the simplest definition, I think it's too complicated an issue for really simple definitions. At its truest, Net Neutrality is something no one actually wants, because the truest definition of Net Neutrality I've seen is that all data packets are given equal bandwidth priority across all channels of access. This means, among other things, that 911 calls placed over WiFi would have equal bandwidth priority to, say, one of us downloading a rom hack, or checking our email, when really such calls should have higher priority. Obviously, that's not the main method of sending a 911 call, but it does happen.

Also, if Verizon wants to say nobody can use Netflix, the obvious answer is to switch away from Verizon. I mean, I don't want to sound rude here, but duh. All a company has to do is wait for Net Neutrality to be repealed, then come out and make an official statement that they will be holding themselves to the rules of Net Neutrality of their own accord, they don't have to make any sort of major changes to the system they already had in place, they build goodwill with the people, they get all the business from the customers who are leaving their previous provider because their previous provider decided to be moronic, other companies see that and follow suit, and presto, the only real change that happened was the government deregulated itself. This is actually how Switzerland did this, seeing as how you're bringing up countries that don't have government-run Net Neutrality.

EDIT: …Sorry - I wasn't trying to start an argument or anything like that, I just really hate seeing people toss around terms with very simple, if any, definitions behind them. Thanks for at least having a definition you're using.

No problem. Yeah, I also hate it when people just throw out buzzwords without actually explaining them.

That said, one minor correction: that's not how 911 systems work. They actual have a separate system for processing those that is created by an entirely different subset of service providers than those publicly available. This can be confusing, largely due to the fact that most of the providers are splinters of existing providers. Motorola Solutions, for example, is a completely different company from Motorola, even though they were once the same company, and have almost the same name.

[Lord Raven]

14 hours ago, Anacybele said:

I don't visit Serious Discussion much at all or even get into politics much (because it usually bores me), but I heard about this net neutrality appeal thing and...while at first getting rid of it didn't sound like a good idea to me, now after hearing more viewpoints about it and what other things getting rid of it might mean, I really have no idea what to believe.

I don't know if it's better for it to be gone or not. I just don't know enough. Even after reading through some of this thread, I'm not sure.

What have you heard in favor of NN? What about against it?

Because I've heard a lot of arguments against NN -- and none of them match up with reality.

[Anacybele]

6 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

What have you heard in favor of NN? What about against it?

Because I've heard a lot of arguments against NN -- and none of them match up with reality.

Well, I haven't explicitly heard anything in FAVOR of it, but my stepdad said what its removal could possibly mean. He isn't 100% sure himself though, so I don't take his words as the be all and end all.

But he said the removal of NN may not necessarily be a bad thing. He said to take shipping costs online for example. If NN was applied to those, every form of shipping on every online shop would cost the same. Like, fast shipping would cost the same all over. Without NN, there would be more competition between these online shops. Amazon could charge less for faster shipping than Target or Wayfair could charge less for fast shipping than Jet. Shipping costs would go down overall as a result due to all these online stores wanting to attract customers.

And this does make sense to me. But I'm still unsure about the possible negative effects NN could have on other sites I go to, like Deviantart, SF, Hulu, etc. What if Hulu wants to start charging more? Or image hosts get greedy like Photobucket and charge you to use them? And I doubt SF would do this, but as another example what if a site like SF wanted to charge me to use some of its features? Would the absence of NN make them decide to start doing that?

And then as you said, I heard a lot of arguments against NN too.

Edited December 14, 2017 by Anacybele

[Etrurian emperor]

Aaaaaaaaand its dead. Nice job America. 

It doesn't have much effect on me but its a shame for all those Americans. Its also a shame because people just oozing of bad faith ended up winning. 

[Lord Raven]

32 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

But he said the removal of NN may not necessarily be a bad thing. He said to take shipping costs online for example. If NN was applied to those, every form of shipping on every online shop would cost the same. Like, fast shipping would cost the same all over. Without NN, there would be more competition between these online shops. Amazon could charge less for faster shipping than Target or Wayfair could charge less for fast shipping than Jet. Shipping costs would go down overall as a result due to all these online stores wanting to attract customers.

This has absolutely nothing to do with net neutrality. Unless he's using an analogy; in which case, no, that's not an apt metaphor, because shipping and information do not follow the same rules. Shipping has a lot of logistics associated with flow of packages that require different pricing for different shipping methods; the only way to block information in NN is by actively seeking out websites and blocking them behind a paywall.

On top of that, shipping is not a utility, nor is shipping really relevant to the majority of people's lives. Internet is a utility and internet is much more central to work and living than package shipping, therefore it's a necessity to keep it neutral so people can access emails and job application websites (among other things like youtube and university websites -- there's a lot of youtube stuff involved in work after all), because the repeal of NN allows ISPs to charge you extra to visit certain websites.

It's also been shown that cost of internet will *not* go down, because the options just aren't there. If every region had 10 ISPs available then net neutrality would not be necessary, but many regions have as many as 1-3 ISPs available to choose from, so companies have very little incentive to lower prices in this case. Shipping costs are incentivized to be lowered due to competition across the internet and multiple agencies; the internet itself doesn't have much incentive to lower prices or raise quality due to lack of competition.

35 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

And this does make sense to me. But I'm still unsure about the possible negative effects NN could have on other sites I go to, like Deviantart, SF, Hulu, etc. What if Hulu wants to start charging more? Or image hosts get greedy like Photobucket and charge you to use them? And I doubt SF would do this, but as another example what if a site like SF wanted to charge me to use some of its features? Would the absence of NN make them decide to start doing that?

You can think of it like cable. One possible mechanism is that the ISP charges you extra if you want access to certain websites, or if you don't want throttling. I highly doubt SF (or DA) would be affected, but stuff like Hulu/Netflix/Youtube/Any email can be affected pretty easily because of how widely used they are. It's very restrictive because essentially your ISP chooses what you see unless you fork over a few extra dollars (which piles up over time -- think of microtransactions in gaming and apply it to the internet), whereas net neutrality both the government and ISPs were required to stay out of things like this.

[Anacybele]

1 minute ago, Lord Raven said:

This has absolutely nothing to do with net neutrality. Unless he's using an analogy; in which case, no, that's not an apt metaphor, because shipping and information do not follow the same rules. Shipping has a lot of logistics associated with flow of packages that require different pricing for different shipping methods; the only way to block information in NN is by actively seeking out websites and blocking them behind a paywall.

On top of that, shipping is not a utility, nor is shipping really relevant to the majority of people's lives. Internet is a utility and internet is much more central to work and living than package shipping, therefore it's a necessity to keep it neutral so people can access emails and job application websites (among other things like youtube and university websites -- there's a lot of youtube stuff involved in work after all), because the repeal of NN allows ISPs to charge you extra to visit certain websites.

It's also been shown that cost of internet will *not* go down, because the options just aren't there. If every region had 10 ISPs available then net neutrality would not be necessary, but many regions have as many as 1-3 ISPs available to choose from, so companies have very little incentive to lower prices in this case. Shipping costs are incentivized to be lowered due to competition across the internet and multiple agencies; the internet itself doesn't have much incentive to lower prices or raise quality due to lack of competition.

You can think of it like cable. One possible mechanism is that the ISP charges you extra if you want access to certain websites, or if you don't want throttling. I highly doubt SF (or DA) would be affected, but stuff like Hulu/Netflix/Youtube/Any email can be affected pretty easily because of how widely used they are. It's very restrictive because essentially your ISP chooses what you see unless you fork over a few extra dollars (which piles up over time -- think of microtransactions in gaming and apply it to the internet), whereas net neutrality both the government and ISPs were required to stay out of things like this.

He was using an analogy, sorry for not clarifying. But I pointed that out to him too, that shipping and such don't follow the same rules. That's when he said he's not 100% sure.

I think he used the cable analogy too though, because he also mentioned Verizon and stuff (Verizon has Fios for cable). And yeah, I feared Hulu, Netflix, Youtube, etc. would be affected. And I felt like our own internet service, which is Comcast Xfinity would charge us extra to visit certain places.

[NoirCore]

6 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

Aaaaaaaaand its dead. Nice job America. 

It doesn't have much effect on me but its a shame for all those Americans. Its also a shame because people just oozing of bad faith ended up winning. 

Not necessarily. The repeal still needs to go to the courts; that's how Net Neutrality was saved before twice, I believe.

[Michelaar]

While it doesn't affect me all that much, it is just baffling to see how scummy some people are.

[Lord Raven]

26 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

He was using an analogy, sorry for not clarifying. But I pointed that out to him too, that shipping and such don't follow the same rules. That's when he said he's not 100% sure.

I think he used the cable analogy too though, because he also mentioned Verizon and stuff (Verizon has Fios for cable). And yeah, I feared Hulu, Netflix, Youtube, etc. would be affected. And I felt like our own internet service, which is Comcast Xfinity would charge us extra to visit certain places.

I was not clear with my cable analogy. You have to buy internet in "packages" rather than having access to the whole thing there. Rather than keeping the internet unregulated, they allow the ISPs to regulate it.

A lot of authoritarian countries have governments or oligarchs dictating the internet; this is actually more comparable to that (it allows for a massive spread of propaganda, including companies paying ISPs to actively advertise them, for instance). It's a power grab by parts of our government through the ISPs -- or a powergrab from ISPs through our government. Either way, objectively not a good thing.

[Anacybele]

12 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

I was not clear with my cable analogy. You have to buy internet in "packages" rather than having access to the whole thing there. Rather than keeping the internet unregulated, they allow the ISPs to regulate it.

A lot of authoritarian countries have governments or oligarchs dictating the internet; this is actually more comparable to that (it allows for a massive spread of propaganda, including companies paying ISPs to actively advertise them, for instance). It's a power grab by parts of our government through the ISPs -- or a powergrab from ISPs through our government. Either way, objectively not a good thing.

Oh, so this is what we'd have without net neutrality? Then yeah, that does sound shitty...

[Lord Raven]

1 hour ago, Anacybele said:

Oh, so this is what we'd have without net neutrality? Then yeah, that does sound shitty...

Don't get me wrong; as it currently stands it is only a possibility, and it's based on the fact that Portugal/Spain have no net neutrality and require you to buy internet packages.

Also, of course, there's plenty of places where the state run the media and regulate the internet. Russia is a great example.

There was no net neutrality prior to the latter half of Obama's second term. The internet still wasn't fine, but it wasn't in as catastrophic a spot as people suspect we may see in the future. There have been many instances of companies that disobeyed net neutrality in concept prior to that, but it was not significant. I'm in a bit of a "wait and see" mode here to some extent, because due to Trump's election it was a matter of "when," not "if."

Edited December 14, 2017 by Lord Raven

[Anacybele]

15 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

Don't get me wrong; as it currently stands it is only a possibility, and it's based on the fact that Portugal/Spain have no net neutrality and require you to buy internet packages.

Also, of course, there's plenty of places where the state run the media and regulate the internet. Russia is a great example.

There was no net neutrality prior to the latter half of Obama's second term. The internet still wasn't fine, but it wasn't in as catastrophic a spot as people suspect we may see in the future. There have been many instances of companies that disobeyed net neutrality in concept prior to that, but it was not significant. I'm in a bit of a "wait and see" mode here to some extent, because due to Trump's election it was a matter of "when," not "if."

Yeah, fair enough. I've basically been in a "wait and see" mode too.

[Tryhard]

1 hour ago, Lord Raven said:

There was no net neutrality prior to the latter half of Obama's second term. The internet still wasn't fine, but it wasn't in as catastrophic a spot as people suspect we may see in the future. There have been many instances of companies that disobeyed net neutrality in concept prior to that, but it was not significant. I'm in a bit of a "wait and see" mode here to some extent, because due to Trump's election it was a matter of "when," not "if."

Even though there was no net neutrality prior to 2015, there were certain things that were enforced to stop ISPs from abusing their attempts to violate what would become known as net neutrality. It's also worth noting that the near-real time deep packet inspection required to throttle or filter traffic without performance issues that ISPs didn't want to do wasn't possible until relatively recently.

Violations like these: https://www.freepress.net/blog/2017/04/25/net-neutrality-violations-brief-history

As summarised by someone:

• In the early days of the Internet, ISPs treated all traffic the same.
• Companies begin to realize that they have the technology to filter traffic to block the use of competing services (Madison River) or slow down traffic on certain sites (Comcast).
• FCC tries to stop this using their existing regulatory power. In the first case, Madison River was classified as a Title II service (because it was a DSL provider) so their enforcement stuck. In the Comcast case, FCC was told by a federal court that they didn't have the authority to regulate Comcast because it wasn't classified as a Title II service
• In response, the Obama administration applied the Title II classification giving the FCC legal teeth to enforce net neutrality.