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Lawmakers are on high alert as the Federal Communications Commission prepares to vote on a plan to regulate the Internet despite warnings that it could choke industry investment and hurt the economy as a whole.

The move raises concern that the FCC could soon have its regulatory foot in the door of the wild West of the Internet -- with an eye toward eventually exerting tighter control over content at a time when sites like WikiLeaks openly snub the government.

The net-neutrality plan itself is far more limited, despite concerns about where it could lead. The proposal aims to prevent service providers from discriminating against websites and companies using their networks. In other words, it is meant to ensure companies like Verizon or Comcast can't block or slow access to certain websites while giving favorable treatment to others.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/12 ... -warnings/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Government regulation or private sector monopoly. Pick your poison.

Is comcast too big to fail?

Full Net Neutrality is a must.

Do you want ISP's picking and choosing what websites you can access?

Where's the Human Centipede option?!?! Gawddammit, I guess there is only one other logical option here.

dbackjon wrote:Full Net Neutrality is a must.

Do you want ISP's picking and choosing what websites you can access?

I'm not terribly up on this dbj but couldn't choose one that leaves it as a wild west atmosphere?

dbackjon wrote:Full Net Neutrality is a must.

Do you want ISP's picking and choosing what websites you can access?

Jon, you probably also believe in the tooth fairy, the Easter Bunny and the Fairness Doctrine.

I've only read smatterings on Net Neutrality over the past year or two but I'm still confused - what problem is being solved here by introducing this? What about the internet has not been working fine? By introducing this, what are we staving off? Serious questions.

GannonFan wrote:I've only read smatterings on Net Neutrality over the past year or two but I'm still confused - what problem is being solved here by introducing this? What about the internet has not been working fine? By introducing this, what are we staving off? Serious questions.

Without it internet use will become more structured and less "wild west" as providers gain the ability and desire to manipulate what content you see. A crude example would be AGS paying comcast a higher bid than cs.com to insure a higher user-end qualtiy.

And since a limited amount of companies provide the physical cables to your home and or your wireless contract is difficult to get out of, you're kinda stuck with what content they decide to push at the highest speed.

kalm wrote:

GannonFan wrote:I've only read smatterings on Net Neutrality over the past year or two but I'm still confused - what problem is being solved here by introducing this? What about the internet has not been working fine? By introducing this, what are we staving off? Serious questions.

Without it internet use will become more structured and less "wild west" as providers gain the ability and desire to manipulate what content you see. A crude example would be AGS paying comcast a higher bid than cs.com to insure a higher user-end qualtiy.

And since a limited amount of companies provide the physical cables to your home and or your wireless contract is difficult to get out of, you're kinda stuck with what content they decide to push at the highest speed.

Correct - say you get cable from a company bought by George Soros. Without Net Neutrality, he could decide to only carry liberal websites. No Fox News, etc - they would all be blocked by the company.

Nobody is stuck with Comcast. In 95% of the U.S. market, there are a multitude of legitimate ISP providers and diverse delivery methods.

native wrote:Nobody is stuck with Comcast. In 95% of the U.S. market, there are a multitude of legitimate ISP providers and diverse delivery methods.

Which show did you get that talking point from?

Honest Question.

kalm wrote:

GannonFan wrote:I've only read smatterings on Net Neutrality over the past year or two but I'm still confused - what problem is being solved here by introducing this? What about the internet has not been working fine? By introducing this, what are we staving off? Serious questions.

Without it internet use will become more structured and less "wild west" as providers gain the ability and desire to manipulate what content you see. A crude example would be AGS paying comcast a higher bid than cs.com to insure a higher user-end quality.

And since a limited amount of companies provide the physical cables to your home and or your wireless contract is difficult to get out of, you're kinda stuck with what content they decide to push at the highest speed.

I've got conflicts going on here with my philosophy on this. I agree with you on this stance and companies that fuck with my bandwidth or send me somewhere or give me limited choices would be out the door very fucking quickly.

The FCC is always reaching to control more of what we hear & see and I really think it is a piece of shit part of our government to a large extent.

I do not trust that the FCC would be more effective in this endeavor than the normal market would be at controlling it. I think that if this shit were to start then you quickly dump that ISP and move to one that does not do this. The corporate wind sock would stop blowing in that direction very quickly and there would probably be new ISP's getting a chance to jump in the market that were not doing this wouldn't they?

If a problem can be solved by the market without the government getting involved then it would save the taxpayers that money and be the preferable solution wouldn't it?

kalm wrote:

native wrote:Nobody is stuck with Comcast. In 95% of the U.S. market, there are a multitude of legitimate ISP providers and diverse delivery methods.

Which show did you get that talking point from?

Honest Question.

ISP examples you may not have considered:

HughesNet (ubiquitous availability)
WildBlue (ubiquitous availability)
Earthnet
ATT/U-Verse (widely available)

...cable, satellite, DSL in various versions, ISDN, dial-up ...

At least three different alternatives are available in any non-rural environment.

Doesn't Google do this already sort of anyway? I mean I use Google for most searches and I'm wondering how the ISP could over rule what I'm searching for on Google? I honestly don't know the aswer to what I'm asking kalm and maybe I'm still missing some of the picture but I can't see how Google would let some ISP fuck with their adsense stuff.

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote:

kalm wrote:
Without it internet use will become more structured and less "wild west" as providers gain the ability and desire to manipulate what content you see. A crude example would be AGS paying comcast a higher bid than cs.com to insure a higher user-end quality.

And since a limited amount of companies provide the physical cables to your home and or your wireless contract is difficult to get out of, you're kinda stuck with what content they decide to push at the highest speed.

I've got conflicts going on here with my philosophy on this. I agree with you on this stance and companies that **** with my bandwidth or send me somewhere or give me limited choices would be out the door very **** quickly.

The FCC is always reaching to control more of what we hear & see and I really think it is a piece of **** part of our government to a large extent.

I do not trust that the FCC would be more effective in this endeavor than the normal market would be at controlling it. I think that if this **** were to start then you quickly dump that ISP and move to one that does not do this. The corporate wind sock would stop blowing in that direction very quickly and there would probably be new ISP's getting a chance to jump in the market that were not doing this wouldn't they?

If a problem can be solved by the market without the government getting involved then it would save the taxpayers that money and be the preferable solution wouldn't it?

Agreed. But that hasn't exactly happened with the MSM in general has it? (Loose fact alert) but something like 9 companies control 90% of the consumed media nation wide. And while you might be more savvy than the average consumer, will that average consumer blame the website or the ISP for problems?

kalm wrote:

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote: I've got conflicts going on here with my philosophy on this. I agree with you on this stance and companies that **** with my bandwidth or send me somewhere or give me limited choices would be out the door very **** quickly.

The FCC is always reaching to control more of what we hear & see and I really think it is a piece of **** part of our government to a large extent.

I do not trust that the FCC would be more effective in this endeavor than the normal market would be at controlling it. I think that if this **** were to start then you quickly dump that ISP and move to one that does not do this. The corporate wind sock would stop blowing in that direction very quickly and there would probably be new ISP's getting a chance to jump in the market that were not doing this wouldn't they?

If a problem can be solved by the market without the government getting involved then it would save the taxpayers that money and be the preferable solution wouldn't it?

Agreed. But that hasn't exactly happened with the MSM in general has it? (Loose fact alert) but something like 9 companies control 90% of the consumed media nation wide. And while you might be more savvy than the average consumer, will that average consumer blame the website or the ISP for problems?

I don't know all of the details on this stuff kalm but I am interested to learn. Thanks to you I'm getting the details filled in for me here. Why is it that we need a government entity to keep consumers from finding the options that suit them best?

If we want more companies to jump into and divvy that pie up then having the FCC control this and tell them what they need to do would keep those 9 controlling 90% wouldn't it? Now if a new company comes along and says "hey we take your money and let you decide where you want to go" then we would be letting the market add more companies to the mix and break up that majority...or at least giving those companies the chance.

We need to stop baby sitting every fucking consumer choice and let people gain back a little or at least keep what they have of their ability to search out and buy from the best provider available.

Everybody & everything can not be babysat by a congressional fucking bill. Once the FCC gets involved don't you think that the scope is gonna widen on what they want to watch over?

Fuck man we need to stop acting and treating consumers like children. Let em' get fucked if they don't have the wherewithal to figure out that they are getting fucked. Thanks to you and dbj I'd be on a better alert status now.

I got no problem with the consumer being educated.

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote:I don't know all of the details on this stuff kalm but I am interested to learn. Thanks to you I'm getting the details filled in for me here. Why is it that we need a government entity to keep consumers from finding the options that suit them best?

Because of the threat of monopolies. Preventing monopolies and consolidation of power should be one of the key roles of government. I think, in this day and age, that monopolies pose as great a threat to liberty and choice as our government does.

I'll clarify a bit further. Right now I can get several ISP's in my neighborhood. I can get two cable tv providers (comcast and dish). If I want to watch or DVR EWU games, comcast is the only choice. What's different about the internet is that once I have a connection, I can access anything and theoretically at the same speed. Without net neutrality, there's a threat of internet access becoming more structured like cable tv is. I don't like that. Give me unfettered use of the internet and let the providers compete for the best price.

kalm wrote:

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote:I don't know all of the details on this stuff kalm but I am interested to learn. Thanks to you I'm getting the details filled in for me here. Why is it that we need a government entity to keep consumers from finding the options that suit them best?

Because of the threat of monopolies. Preventing monopolies and consolidation of power should be one of the key roles of government. I think, in this day and age, that monopolies pose as great a threat to liberty and choice as our government does.

How are we near monopoly on this? let's worry about "the threat" if it happens. We don't need to take more money out of the register on the threat at this point do we?

As I said if any of these companies start doing this then the advent of new choices in the market will push a monopoly even further away I would think.

if the FCC starts to regulate and control the ISP's then we will be paying for the regulation & control end and we will also be paying again on the other side with what we have to pay the ISP's to meet the regulations & controls. The corporations aren't paying that...we are...twice. To me, we would be the ultimate dumbasses again because we are so easily persuaded to let power be taken out of our hands.

I don't know why we're looking for a problem that isn't here and expecting the FCC to do the job the DOJ would do if the problem did arise which I'm pretty sure it won't arise.

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote: ...How are we near monopoly on this? let's worry about "the threat" if it happens. We don't need to take more money out of the register on the threat at this point do we? ...

You are correct and kalm is playing the role of Chicken Little. Unfortunately for kalm and his commie buddies, the sky is not even close to falling. Any but the most obscure rural market has at least three choices: cable, dsl, and satellite. The vast majority of markets have a dozen or more content delivery choices.

kalm wrote:I'll clarify a bit further. Right now I can get several ISP's in my neighborhood. I can get two cable tv providers (comcast and dish). If I want to watch or DVR EWU games, comcast is the only choice. What's different about the internet is that once I have a connection, I can access anything and theoretically at the same speed. Without net neutrality, there's a threat of internet access becoming more structured like cable tv is. I don't like that. Give me unfettered use of the internet and let the providers compete for the best price.

kalm, I totally agree with you on this. I just don't think the FCC is the way to do it. You can split off from Comcast to another ISP and still have your cable can't you?

I don't think Cable systems are looking to fuck with consumers a whole lot right now because Verizon FIOS is kicking them in the balls all over the country right now and I know our local cable system is going out of their way by giving us more bandwidth and trying to make sure that everything is real good with us here.

I don't know what it's like in Spokane but I can't imagine that they aren't worried about that there.

native wrote:

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote: ...How are we near monopoly on this? let's worry about "the threat" if it happens. We don't need to take more money out of the register on the threat at this point do we? ...

You are correct and kalm is playing the role of Chicken Little. Unfortunately for kalm and his commie buddies, the sky is not even close to falling. Any but the most obscure rural market has at least three choices: cable, dsl, and satellite. The vast majority of markets have a dozen or more choices.

Well to have any good exchange of ideas we gotta have at least two points of view so I'm glad he's teaching me something by making me argue with him.

kalm wrote:I'll clarify a bit further. Right now I can get several ISP's in my neighborhood. I can get two cable tv providers (comcast and dish). If I want to watch or DVR EWU games, comcast is the only choice. What's different about the internet is that once I have a connection, I can access anything and theoretically at the same speed. Without net neutrality, there's a threat of internet access becoming more structured like cable tv is. I don't like that. Give me unfettered use of the internet and let the providers compete for the best price.

What is your zip code? I guarantee you have access to more than two cable TV providers.

Here is a list of DSL providers in Spokane:
Internet Communications Inc.
LaunchNet
Speed Factory
i.web
TOAST.net Internet Service
Drizzle
Globalnet Telecom, Inc.
Purecom
Broadband.com
SureWire Internet
Sunset Net
Internet Central
Digital Endemic LLC.
Indra's Net, Inc.
BritSys Inc.
IPNS
Layer Four Solutions LLC
SBC Yahoo
Virtuallycheap Internet Services

Wait a fucking minute. Does Comcast have a deal in place with the local government that has barriers to entry for other business providing cable?

If that's the case then how fucking dumb are we to let that stand while asking for more to stop that company from fucking with the product?

Something is fishy here kalm.

Ursus A. Horribilis wrote:Wait a **** minute. Does Comcast have a deal in place with the local government that has barriers to entry for other business providing cable?

If that's the case then how **** dumb are we to let that stand while asking for more to stop that company from **** with the product?

Something is fishy here kalm.

Comcast built and/or acquired the cable infrastructure at the cost of $$$$millions.