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http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20001825-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

The Federal Communications Commission does not have the legal authority to slap Net neutrality regulations on Internet providers, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

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FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

and you're happy about this because...?

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

The Neon Grue said:

woohoo!
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20001825-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

The Federal Communications Commission does not have the legal authority to slap Net neutrality regulations on Internet providers, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

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Um, you do realize that if you have Comcast, now they have the right to cancel any P2P sharing you do, right?

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

Also, they can decide what sites you have immediate access to and what might take a while - high priority, ad revenue sites are quick; places like here... maybe not so much.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

I was guessing he was being sarcastic. I'm hoping he will soon confirm this suspicion.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

Lying Bastard said:

Also, they can decide what sites you have immediate access to and what might take a while - high priority, ad revenue sites are quick; places like here... maybe not so much.

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Let's not forget that they could, if they wanted:
- Charge for gaming access. Want ping times lower than 500ms? Pay to have your gaming traffic put on priority or your multiplayer will be a lag-fest.
- Charge for any sort of home server usage. Want to stream from your PC / Pogo Plug / etc. to your laptop on the go? Pay up for streaming access or have your data blocked.
- Give preferential treatment to approved streaming video services. Hulu? It'll work fine if Hulu pays your ISP. Blip? Nah, videos from the Nostalgia Critic will take forever to load, if they do so at all, because Blip ain't one of their partners.
- Block/throttle VOIP communication unless you pay for their VOIP service. No more free Skype for you!

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

Combined with the Supreme Court decision allowing unfettered political advertising by corporations, this is really, really bad.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

figmentPez;366420][QUOTE=Lying Bastard said:

Also, they can decide what sites you have immediate access to and what might take a while - high priority, ad revenue sites are quick; places like here... maybe not so much.

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Let's not forget that they could, if they wanted:
- Charge for gaming access. Want ping times lower than 500ms? Pay to have your gaming traffic put on priority or your multiplayer will be a lag-fest.
- Charge for any sort of home server usage. Want to stream from your PC / Pogo Plug / etc. to your laptop on the go? Pay up for streaming access or have your data blocked.
- Give preferential treatment to approved streaming video services. Hulu? It'll work fine if Hulu pays your ISP. Blip? Nah, videos from the Nostalgia Critic will take forever to load, if they do so at all, because Blip ain't one of their partners.
- Block/throttle VOIP communication unless you pay for their VOIP service. No more free Skype for you![/QUOTE]

Don't forget that because major broadband services have parceled up the entire country, your local broadband provider is likely to only have 1-2 other competitors for your service who are often simply reselling the same data pipeline.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

If the cable lines were managed like power lines, in that you could see actually competition on them, I wouldn't have a problem with this. Comcast decides to be a dick, then I start using someone else. The problem is that the internet industry is effectively a monopoly, as the lines are privately owned which therefore makes competition a joke at best.

We'll see how this pans out. Personally I could give less of a fuck about p2p. From where I stand it is a blight on bandwidth so good riddance. Question is how much further they decide to take it, and the fact that there is nothing to control how far they take it....I dunno. Probably won't be good.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

my simplistic view is that the courts ruled that the FCC cannot dictate what is done on the internet.

However it looks like I may have had things backwards.. re-researching..looking for Kurtz's viewpoint...crud, I can't find it.. all I remember was a strip of Pvp with Harry Mudd enforcing his view on the internet (Captain Kirk).. and looks like I got it backwards. I'm sorry. I woohoo'd at the wrong moment.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

TeKeo said:

Don't forget that because major broadband services have parceled up the entire country, your local broadband provider is likely to only have 1-2 other competitors for your service who are often simply reselling the same data pipeline.

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Other competitors? We have one cable company and no DSL where I live. The only other broadband option is satellite, as far as I know, and that's not a good alternative.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

figmentPez;366434][QUOTE=TeKeo said:

Don't forget that because major broadband services have parceled up the entire country, your local broadband provider is likely to only have 1-2 other competitors for your service who are often simply reselling the same data pipeline.

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Other competitors? We have one cable company and no DSL where I live. The only other broadband option is satellite, as far as I know, and that's not a good alternative.[/QUOTE]

Satellite is a joke. My parents have it, and they even hit the 7 gig a month download limit. All they do is play farmville on facebook, check the weather, and look at farm auction sites.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

figmentPez;366434][QUOTE=TeKeo said:

Don't forget that because major broadband services have parceled up the entire country, your local broadband provider is likely to only have 1-2 other competitors for your service who are often simply reselling the same data pipeline.

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Other competitors? We have one cable company and no DSL where I live. The only other broadband option is satellite, as far as I know, and that's not a good alternative.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, that's pretty much what I meant.

Here it's Comcast or Verizon (or a Verizon re-seller, which amounts to the same thing).

Well... shit. There goes the internets.

Oh please...the internet failed as soon as they started letting those people in.

You know who I'm talking about.

Fun Size said:

Oh please...the internet failed as soon as they started letting those people in.

You know who I'm talking about.

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people with graphic browsers?

ISP want to be able to regulate the internet? Good.

That makes them responsible for EVERYTHING that goes through their servers and down their lines. Before they had it like phone companies (as long as they kept their lines "dumb" they could not be held responsible for conversations that take place through them) treat it like a dumb pipe and the responsibility lied with those at either end.

Covar said:

ISP want to be able to regulate the internet? Good.

That makes them responsible for EVERYTHING that goes through their servers and down their lines. Before they had it like phone companies (as long as they kept their lines "dumb" they could not be held responsible for conversations that take place through them) treat it like a dumb pipe and the responsibility lied with those at either end.

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...are you a fan of the ACTA? cause the idea of my isp watching every packet in and out disgusts me.

From the Techdirt Article I just finished reading:

"That doesn't mean that Comcast should get off free for its actions. It should still be punished -- but by the FTC, rather than the FCC -- for misleading its customers about what type of service they were getting, and what the limitations were on those services. As for the FCC, if it really wants a more neutral net, it should focus on making sure that there's real competition in the market, rather than just paying lip service to the idea in its broadband plan."

Frankly I agree in theory, but in principle I don't see the FTC doing diddly.

wana10;366602][QUOTE=Covar said:

ISP want to be able to regulate the internet? Good.

That makes them responsible for EVERYTHING that goes through their servers and down their lines. Before they had it like phone companies (as long as they kept their lines "dumb" they could not be held responsible for conversations that take place through them) treat it like a dumb pipe and the responsibility lied with those at either end.

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...are you a fan of the ACTA? cause the idea of my isp watching every packet in and out disgusts me.[/QUOTE]
I'm a fan of them getting slammed for child pornography distribution and other criminal acts, having their pants sued off for allowing their customers to access Copyrighted material, and generally having their business slammed to the point where they will beg for net neutrality.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

TeKeo said:

Yeah, that's pretty much what I meant.

Here it's Comcast or Verizon (or a Verizon re-seller, which amounts to the same thing).

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There aren't even resellers here as far as I know. It's led to really lousy customer service, because they know that there isn't any competition.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

figmentPez;366687][QUOTE=TeKeo said:

Yeah, that's pretty much what I meant.

Here it's Comcast or Verizon (or a Verizon re-seller, which amounts to the same thing).

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There aren't even resellers here as far as I know. It's led to really lousy customer service, because they know that there isn't any competition.[/QUOTE]

I'm lucky in that i have at least 3 options here in Ohio: Time Warner, Verizon, and AT&T. Time Warner is pretty good, for the price... especially as we have a land line still.

FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

Interesting read on the subject.

The scariest part of this for me?

#2 Say goodbye to Skype and VOIP

Are you enjoying all that free voice communication you’ve had with Skype? Did you enjoy calling your relatives back in the old country — and not having to spend a dime to take all the time with them you wanted?


Get ready to say goodbye. VOIP and cell phones having been killing the land-line business, but voice communication carriers love making money with all the little nickle-and-dime doodads they charge.


VOIP and Skype eliminated that. But if they can legally charge to carry Skype traffic (or just straight block it), ISPs stand to win and you will lose.

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FCC / Net Neutrality FAILS!

Dave said:

Interesting read on the subject.

The scariest part of this for me?

#2 Say goodbye to Skype and VOIP

Are you enjoying all that free voice communication you’ve had with Skype? Did you enjoy calling your relatives back in the old country — and not having to spend a dime to take all the time with them you wanted?


Get ready to say goodbye. VOIP and cell phones having been killing the land-line business, but voice communication carriers love making money with all the little nickle-and-dime doodads they charge.


VOIP and Skype eliminated that. But if they can legally charge to carry Skype traffic (or just straight block it), ISPs stand to win and you will lose.

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Farking shite.

.

It should be noted, however, that some companies (Time Warner for one) have tried to limit it's users in some test markets and it failed spectacularly, with large groups of subscribers switching to competitors who didn't limit them. This FCC ruling only allows them to block content, it doesn't mean that it will be economically viable for them to do so.

AshburnerX said:

It should be noted, however, that some companies (Time Warner for one) have tried to limit it's users in some test markets and it failed spectacularly, with large groups of subscribers switching to competitors who didn't limit them. This FCC ruling only allows them to block content, it doesn't mean that it will be economically viable for them to do so.

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So those of us in markets with no real competition are still screwed?

Currently where I live I only really have Comcast to choose from for my internet

I can choose between Comcast and extremely shitty DSL because we don't live near a waystation or wtf ever the DSL things are called.

figmentPez;367267][QUOTE=AshburnerX said:

It should be noted, however, that some companies (Time Warner for one) have tried to limit it's users in some test markets and it failed spectacularly, with large groups of subscribers switching to competitors who didn't limit them. This FCC ruling only allows them to block content, it doesn't mean that it will be economically viable for them to do so.

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So those of us in markets with no real competition are still screwed?[/QUOTE]


No competitors will move in and try for a piece of that consumer pie.

Chazwozel said:

No competitors will move in and try for a piece of that consumer pie.

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A few questions:

1. Why haven't they already? There are a lot of people who are already pissed about the service they're getting. We'd have switched if there were any other option. We regularly get stations where the color goes out, the picture gets staticky, closed captions are garbled or non-existent and Comcast has done nothing to fix this, insisting it's our television's fault. (It happens in every room in the house, without and without cable boxes. 5 different televisions with the same issues means the problem is not on our end.)
2. Is my understanding true, that competitors either need to get state/city approval to wire the area or they need to re-sell existing infastructure? If so, what's to keep Comcast, or whoever owns the cable, from forcing resellers to follow the same restrictions on P2P, VOIP, streaming video, gaming, etc.?

This isn't a case where just any competitor can lease a building and start selling their product. This is a utility, a part of city infrastructure. I'm not sure how it's regulated, but I'm sure it takes more than finding an empty building and signing a lease to set up shop providing a true alternative to existing internet services.

Wait, didn't the ruling just say that the FCC doesn't have authority over the internet, so basically they just need to expand it's authority or make a new agency for the net?! Aka NN is just belayed.

@Li3n said:

Wait, didn't the ruling just say that the FCC doesn't have authority over the internet, so basically they just need to expand it's authority or make a new agency for the net?! Aka NN is just belayed.

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Pretty much. Hopefully it actually gets done.

---------- Post added at 09:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:23 AM ----------

figmentPez said:

2. Is my understanding true, that competitors either need to get state/city approval to wire the area or they need to re-sell existing infastructure? If so, what's to keep Comcast, or whoever owns the cable, from forcing resellers to follow the same restrictions on P2P, VOIP, streaming video, gaming, etc.?

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Some companies have deals with cities saying they are the only company that can provide service in that area. Even if there aren't restrictions, it's insanely expensive and time consuming to get permits to dig peoples yards up and lay all that fiber or copper. The companies that already offer service don't need to do that. Cable is laid inside tubes so they can run new cable through it without as much digging.

I'm pretty sure most restrictions on reselling lines were removed. So even if they have to resell lines to another company they are most likely reselling it for close to, if not the same, price they sell to the customer. And yeah, Companies like AT&T could still filter traffic on their large internet backbones that everyone uses if they wanted.

Here's what a lot of the telco's are doing to smaller town's and areas with no competition. It's not that they can't afford it, it's just not in their best interest to upgrade if they don't have to.

Ugh. I hope comcast doesn't start pulling any crap. The local DSL provider blows. And the ONLY alternative in my major metropolitan area.