Timeline for Net Neutrality and Stack Overflow / Stack Exchange
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
108 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Aug 15, 2018 at 19:22 | comment | added | Shog9 | That's awesome, @Ben - thanks! | |
| Aug 15, 2018 at 19:08 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Shog9 For 100G, both options I know of are good to go. Links: unlimitedville.com ("unlimited for normal usage" - e.g., "unlimited") and unlimitedleasing.com (true unlimited, afaict). Either should be fine for 100G ballpark. I have friends in my area who use these and are very happy with them. | |
| Aug 15, 2018 at 18:39 | comment | added | Shog9 | Unlimited, or "unlimited" @Ben? I'd love to have the option of switching my 100GB+/mo usage to wireless without having to worry about getting downgraded or disconnected. Link 'em if you got 'em! | |
| Aug 15, 2018 at 18:26 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Shog9 not to completely re-open the topic, but on the particular topic of wireless providers: within the year since this post, I discovered 2 or 3 unlimited wireless broadband providers that have excellent coverage all over the country. Pricey, but real alternatives. | |
| Nov 30, 2017 at 19:25 | comment | added | cr0 | "Protecting an open society" does not sound like censorship at all. Prohibiting media companies from silencing political viewpoints could be censorship, but it seems plainly anti-censorship, as in, I don't want Verizon capable of silencing political viewpoints. "Safeguarding the political process" is a little ambiguous but it is easier to see where it comes from (eg. FB not accepting Russian ads for US politics) than where it becomes censorship of media companies. | |
| Nov 30, 2017 at 19:22 | comment | added | cr0 | Thanks for explaining all this. One thought I can't follow: "The coiner of the term Net Neutrality also "argued in congressional testimony that the FCC should be charged with "protecting an open society," "safeguarding the political process," and prohibiting media companies from silencing political viewpoints." Another way to put that is: tell media companies (which would include Stack Overflow) what they are and are not allowed to publish on their distribution networks." How did you conclude the second sentence based on the first? | |
| Jul 14, 2017 at 0:47 | comment | added | Zarepheth |
I realize that if there are 2 or more providers offering the same service, that a monopoly does not technically exist. However, if you have only a small number of powerful providers for a great number of customers you end up with an oligarchy. The economic and political consequences of oligarchies are the same as with monopolies, although less severe. Break up the large oligarchic businesses into lots of small, directly competing businesses and government intervention would not be needed.
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| Jul 13, 2017 at 20:59 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @iheanyi I appreciate that you're at least willing to let stuff roll over in your mind over time ;-) The FAQ points this out about the data: "Based on the data available, this graphic displays the number of wired broadband providers that the population of the given area can access. This includes providers of DSL, cable, copper, or fiber." I take this to mean that DSL services capable of 25Mb or more are what's included, rather than all DSL. | |
| Jul 13, 2017 at 20:54 | comment | added | iheanyi | Wireline includes dialup service. The FCC definition of broadband is now 25Mbit/s down. If you filter for just access to broadband, those graphs don't look as great. Now, there's certainly arguments to be had about what level of service should "count", but having access to 4 dialup providers is quite different than having access to 4 providers capable of >25Mbit/s service. That said, on my second read of your answer, a few weeks after my first, I'm softening more to your point of view. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:53 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @YLearn also, to be complete: the funding for this data collection comes from the NTIA (an executive branch agency). | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:52 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @YLearn, I think you are incorrect. If you'll click through to the FAQ document, you'll find this a few pages down: "The definition of a substantially complete data set has a four‐part test, with each part intended to counterbalance the others. The definition requires the provision of data for the following: a) 70 percent of broadband service providers in a state; b) to 80 percent of households in a state; c) to 90 percent of households in rural areas of the state; and d) to 95 percent of public Community Anchor Institutions." Households are part of the criteria for complete data reports. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:42 | comment | added | YLearn | The data was never meant to represent the individual. Rather it is meant to represent the service available to communities through their public resources. The two are not the same. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:39 | comment | added | YLearn | @BenCollins, "The data is aggregated from the census block or road segment level data and was provided to NTIA by each state grantee." What data do these grantees collect? "Community Anchor Institutions include schools, libraries, medical and healthcare providers, public safety entities, community colleges and other institutions of higher education, and other community support organizations and entities. SBDD grantees have collected data about the broadband plans to which these organizations subscribe." And finally where did the funding come from? www2.ntia.doc.gov/sbdd | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:33 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @YLearn Of course, I'm open to criticism of the data. But here's what the SBI says about it: "Since accurate data is critical for broadband planning, another purpose of the SBI program is to assist states in gathering data twice a year on the availability, speed, and location of broadband services, as well as the broadband services that community institutions, such as schools, libraries and hospitals, use." That sounds to me like they are collecting data about general broadband availability, not just from community institutions. More importantly: it's the best data we have (afaik). | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 23:28 | comment | added | YLearn | @BenCollins, the National Broadband Map had a number of issues. Primarily that it's data is based from education, public safety, healthcare, or community (libraries, local government, etc) sources. These types of organizations often do not access the internet in the same manner as a consumer and as such their options are typically different from those presented to consumers. It isn't a representation of an individual/consumer access to broadband. Trying to say these charts show consumers have access to some number of ISP's is simply false. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 18:28 | comment | added | ɥʇǝS | Meanwhile I'm at the complete mercy of Comcast because no one else services my address. But, I'd show up under the chart as having at least 2 options. Why? Because CenturyLink at least promises me 1.5mbps. Such competition. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 17:20 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @MarkKCowan interestingly, the US also has LLUB, but it only applies to telephone companies with monopolies in local markets (ILECs). I don't know the ins-and-outs of it, so I don't know exactly when it would apply and when it wouldn't. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 17:15 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @traggatmot I believe you've misread the charts. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 17:14 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @spacetyper: simple - there are two providers competing. They offer products that have tradeoffs. Consumers can choose between them. That's called competition. Whether or not you think those are good options are immaterial to whether or not competition exists. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 16:35 | comment | added | spacetyper | There are two ISPs I have available to me (in a top-ten US metro area). One is century link, one is cox. Century link cannot in good faith be called high speed internet--it is DSL only where I am (I used to have it, and you can't get more than 25Mbps--but in reality it was consistently ~5Mbps). Cox just implemented a 1TB/month data cap. How is this not uncompetitive? | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 15:36 | comment | added | discodane | "My view is that the prior regime of antitrust enforcement coupled with letting free markets figure things out is the superior approach." IS BRILLIANT. Net neutrality fixes a problem that doesn't exist (yet), but if it did ( and government stayed out of the way ), the market would put those who used the bad practice out of business. Fix the government involvement that allows for monopoly like companies to exist, and net neutrality will fix itself, or rather you, the consumer, will fix it. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 14:19 | comment | added | traggatmot | 'It looks to me like there are actually very few people who have fewer than 4 providers available to them.' Over 75% of the US has 3 or less wireline providers. Now, over 85% have 4 or more wireless providers. But, do those tables tell us anything about the overlap to determine the total broadband providers available to the US? I don't think they do. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 12:33 | comment | added | Mark K Cowan | @BenCollins: I just checked — it isn't just at UK-level, it's a requirement across the entire European Union (as is net neutrality although UK mobile carriers seem to be able to cheat it with mobile tethering restrictions). | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 12:26 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @MarkKCowan I actually want to pursue something like that here in the US at the local level. The term "local loop unbundling" has a nice ring to it. | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 12:12 | comment | added | Mark K Cowan | In the UK, we can choose almost any internet company regardless of which one installed our lines - I don't know exactly how it works, but it's called "local loop unbundling", is a consequency of regulation, and (combined with other legislation such as CCR) promotes competition. The government's forcing of ISPs to engage in spying and censorship on the other hand though......... | |
| Jul 12, 2017 at 9:20 | comment | added | Chill2Macht | "It looks to me like there are actually very few people who have fewer than 4 providers available to them. " -- literally, according to your own charts, the vast majority of people do not have access to 4 or more wireline providers. At the current point in time, given how unreliable, expensive, and low-quality wireless internet access is at this time, the competitive state of the wireless internet market is not relevant. Only the state of the wireline internet market is relevant. And even according to your own information, that market is extremely oligopolistic. | |
| Jul 3, 2017 at 9:34 | comment | added | Benjol | Also, who has the deepest pockets to influence and lock down government regulations in their favour? It's one thing to have a high financial barrier to enter a market, it's another to have regulatory barriers to your potential innovation. | |
| Jul 1, 2017 at 2:49 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 ummm, I don't believe in complete control, but I do believe in regulation. Clean air, non rotten meat, child labor, all regulation. I'm not sure what point you think you're making with DMCA. All regulation is introduced by government. It's disingenuous to pretend they're all for the benefit of consumers when clearly, you've heard of lobbying. | |
| Jul 1, 2017 at 2:10 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi Also, DMCA and patents are government intervention, so you just made my case that government tends to make a mess of everything. | |
| Jul 1, 2017 at 2:09 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi You seem to have this impression that if we could just control everything enough, we could somehow make it perfect or pretty close to it. But over the history of mankind, we've already seen that it doesn't work and that the market makes much better decisions in the long run. Most consumers don't care about repairing their own devices, so it isn't surprising if the market doesn't care. You're never going to have a system that creates your ideal world, so you have to ask the question, "What are the trade offs?" You're trading a ton of other people's money for what? | |
| Jul 1, 2017 at 1:41 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 but ISPs do compete. Today, it's in the form of media, tomorrow who knows. The fact is, if we allow anticompetitive behavior in one area of the internet, rationalizing it away as it only hurts Netflix, Hulu, or anyone else who'd ever innovate in that arena, but won't go any further, we leave in a legal framework that makes it hard to fix problems when it expands later. Look at the issues the DMCA is now creating for security research or consumer repair of their own devices. Look at the patent reform issues we're having now. It is shortsighted to ignore problem we can actually forecast | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 23:00 | comment | added | Alexander O'Mara | @jpmc26 "ISPs don't even compete with BitTorrent" Do you know who companies like Comcast and Time Warner are? They are companies that make money selling media. The kind of people who might get upset if they though people were using BitTorrent to download the stuff they sell. The kind of people who might try to indiscriminately ruin torrent traffic (and with it, my ability to legitimately download some of my favorite Linux distros), just to make a buck. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:52 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi I already understand; I've been saying this stuff the whole time. What's the "anti-competitive behavior" here? The ISPs haven't shown they're doing this with any kind of regularity. We have two instances: Netflix and BitTorrent. Both of those are a source of high traffic that impose a significant burden on their infrastructure. There doesn't seem to be sufficient evidence that this was some kind of anti-competitive behavior; ISPs don't even compete with BitTorrent. So how does regulating their network usage even solve any problems? | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:38 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 Yes, compliance costs necessarily increase with regulation. However, we expect that given the nature of ISPs (you necessarily need significant funding to enter the market as an ISP), there's significantly less competition than in other industries and more market capture. So here, regulation also has the effect of ensuring the already anti-competitive nature of ISP business doesn't also transfer that property to the users of the service they're providing. Now you're approaching understanding of the Title II classification issue. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:34 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi It's not flawed. Regulation categorically costs extra to comply with. By the way, know what the ISPs are gonna do to cover those costs? Hike up rates. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:32 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 You're correct, regulation won't decrease the cost of entry. However, it stabilizes or removes one potential source of cost inflation. Your taxi service example however is flawed - that's a perfect example of how giveaways to an industry lead to cost increases - it's the same problem with how dealerships crafted laws to favor their business - taxi medallion owners pushed for laws that helped ensure the increasing value of licenses to deliberately make it harder for competitors to enter the market and/or guarantee profits despite a lack of innovation in their core business. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:28 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi Right, and regulation isn't going to decrease the cost of entry, now is it? It'll make it higher, maybe to the point New York's taxi services at at, where the cost of even getting "approved" will be prohibitive, let alone the cost of any infrastructure you need. I'm not suggesting that ISPs are saints, but the government isn't some kind of altruistic savior, either. They have their own agendas and goals, which run contrary to the consumer's at least as often as the actual businesses. And the government is far less likely to suffer consequences of making bad decisions. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:25 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 As price increases, the rewards increase (not always, but I'll concede to make my point) - but so does the cost of entry. Which means the only competitors you can attract are those with significant funding. The history of innovation so far has shown things are best (as in actual competition) when the cost of entry is low. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:25 | comment | added | Shog9 | As I said, wireless internet as it exists on the market today has vastly inferior capability to even fairly limited wireline services, @Ben - 10x less data or more. With the demise of Clearwire, I'm not even aware of anyone in the wireless space actively trying to compete with wireline providers nation-wide (happy to be corrected on that); what's left is a spotty patchwork of local fixed-point ISPs, with major carriers directing their focus on emergency / semi-mobile hotspot usage. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:24 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 If it's simple supply and demand, the monthly rental cost of a cable modem should be decreasing not increasing. If it's simple supply and demand, it shouldn't cost me extra when I supply my own cable modem and wifi AP versus renting the one provided by the ISP. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:22 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi That isn't random. It's simple supply and demand. Demand for internet services has increased drastically as more types of content have become feasible. I don't especially like price increases, but I'm willing to wait while the market sorts it out rather than screw everything up for a short term fix that will probably make things worse in the long run. As prices increase, so do the rewards for getting in the market, which will attract more competitors (supply). It'll balance out eventually. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:20 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 ISPs aren't randomly jacking up fees? Please! ISPs are well known jack up monthly costs randomly with "cost recovery fees" and other such BS. The cost to rent the same exact cable modem fluctuates year after year. Some are already looking to charge users extra to opt out of targeted advertising based on deep packet analysis. I see no reason to extend them the benefit of the doubt where it comes to net neutrality. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:20 | comment | added | Shog9 | What's your argument there, @jpmc26? "The wolf isn't currently at our door, so let's unbar it and go to bed with bloody steaks hung round our necks?" | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:20 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Shog9 the chart shows only 12% have only 1 (or none) available option. Also, I don't see why wireless providers shouldn't be considered a part of the competitive mix. They are valid alternatives for lots of people. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:19 | comment | added | Alexander O'Mara | @jpmc26 Ultimately, voters should hold the whole system accountable. Remove the regulations, are they are accountable to nobody. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:19 | comment | added | Shog9 | Throttling is all but necessary, @jpmc26, particularly when you're oversubscribed (which most ISPs will be for practical reasons, particularly consumer ISPs). Throttling based on content type as a QoS technique to resolve congestion is also practical. Throttling based on content type when there's no congestion because you can't be bothered to manage congestion is just lazy. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:15 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @AlexanderO'Mara Who holds the FCC accountable, then? Congress? The president? Voters? Don't make me laugh. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:14 | comment | added | Alexander O'Mara | @jmpc26 It's not about trust. It's about accountability. Net neutrality regulations ensure that ISPs are held accountable, because ISPs certainly won't hold themselves accountable. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:14 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @Shog9 BitTorrent and Netflix aren't throttled anymore, so you're left asking, "Where's the insurmountable problem that warrants the threat of violence?" I also repeat what I said before: some government pencil pusher is never going to suffer the consequences of their bad decisions. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:14 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @Shog9 "naive attempts to avoid real network management" I agree that throttling is probably a less than ideal solution. But for an ISP, what is the alternative and what's the cost of that alternative? I do want people to strive to do their best. On the other hand, doing your best costs time and money, and sometimes those resources are best put elsewhere. SO makes those kinds of trade offs constantly; there's a lot I could criticize as being well less than ideal. Regulations don't make those just disappear; it just shuffles them around. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:05 | comment | added | Shog9 | Thanks for spending the time to dig up data on this, Ben - vastly improves your post. I gotta quibble a bit with the charts you posted: much as I'm looking forward to the day when it isn't true, I cannot seriously consider wireless a competitor to wireline at this time: most providers have either extremely limited geographic coverage, extremely limited data caps, or both. Focusing solely on wireline, over half the country has <=2 providers; that's not a healthy competitive market. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:04 | comment | added | Shog9 | @jpmc26, you're making a lot of assumptions. I literally have a job that periodically involves using BitTorrent to transfer fairly large datasets, something my ISP was actively throttling just a few years ago. I don't know what KRyan does, but the notion that someone could be affected by these sorts of naive attempts to avoid real network management doesn't strike me as either implausible or even unlikely. If you've never had to deal with this sort of thing, great! | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 22:04 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi But that is the point. ISPs aren't just randomly shutting down whoever. The only case we have of ISPs doing this kind of limiting is in a single case where the amount of traffic was absolutely massive, enough that it plausibly affected their ability to maintain their systems. ISPs have a vested interest in serving as much traffic as they can to attract as many customers as possible, so unless the traffic is big enough to cause a problem or big enough they think they're losing money to a competitor, they don't have any reason to block it. So why would they block you if you're not big? | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:55 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @KRyan I don't trust anyone that much, but if you think people in government are more honest than at Comcast, you're kidding yourself. If Comcast doesn't provide some level of service, anyone who does will beat the crap out of them. Comcast has a vested interest in keeping their systems going. Some government pencil pusher won't have any incentive to care about the impact of their decisions. I find it much more bizarre that you think government officials are that altruistic. It's also possible that Comcast was taking a long view and sunk that money into infrastructure, too. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:49 | comment | added | KRyan | @jpmc26 That is a bizarre level of trust you have there in Comcast. Myself, more Comcast employees have lied to me than haven’t, so I do not share your trust. I do not trust Comcast to use such an ability wisely. I don’t trust them when they say they used it against Netflix wisely. I don’t trust them when they try to frame it as a function of ability, since after all as soon as Netflix threw more money at them all of a sudden the problem disappeared. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:46 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 So, there are a few problems, here's a couple: 1. You need more capital to launch a new business, because you must plan for higher interconnect costs. 2. There is a lot more risk, because interconnect costs are less controlled and you can't predict your cost simply by looking at similar businesses. When the cost/risk to enter the market increases, it necessarily reduces the number of players who enter. That's one problem that net neutrality advocates want to minimize. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:43 | comment | added | iheanyi | @jpmc26 I don't have the level of traffic of Netflix. I think you're missing the point. Let's say the cost is proportional to user base. So the price increase scales with users. For Netflix, their margin could be large enough that they'd still do well even with that incremental increase, without a need to pass those costs on to customers. For a small startup with very little margin, that could be enough to go out of business or force you to pass along that incremental cost which may cost you customers then go out of business. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:34 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @iheanyi How could you have the level of traffic of Netflix without the user base of Netflix? That doesn't make a whole lot of sense... | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:31 | comment | added | iheanyi | "I don't know of many cases of this actually happening. There is the one famous instance between Netflix and Comcast (which they resolved without the help of regulators)." You seem to imply that this was resolved with no ramification to consumers. What if it was resolved by Netfix raising their rates? That's a way to resolve things w/o regulators. What if instead of Netfix, I'm the one who has the conflict? Unlike Netflix, I don't have a user base that would stay loyal to me should I raise rates. So, I go out of business. In the same breath as you bring up a compelling argument, you dismiss it | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:27 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @KRyan I don't see any evidence that Comcast or any other ISP "targets" anyone who isn't responsible for a massive amount of traffic. So unless you're sending across traffic comparable to Netflix, you have no reason to be concerned. On the contrary, Netflix hogging their networks probably makes getting the bandwidth you need for your job harder. That you don't get the bandwidth you desire (and while yes, you pay for it, as I recall, Comcast's terms pretty clearly state a maximum, not any minimum) is a separate problem and would only be exacerbated by the regulation you're supporting. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 21:13 | comment | added | KRyan | @jpmc I rely on my internet connection—and a certain amount of bandwidth—for my livelihood. Comcast hasn't targeted me, my employer, or our clients yet—and I have the incentive of my ability to provide for my family as incentive to insure they never will. Because I know I will never be able to protect myself—even as it is, the service I receive is often vastly inferior to what I paid for, and Comcast has forced me to burn vacation days because they did not deliver what I paid them to and I could not do my job. So no, it's not just personal entertainment. And I find your strawman immoral. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 20:57 | comment | added | jpmc26 | @KRyan Let's be honest here. You're talking about movies and shows you watch for your personal entertainment. Government laws are enforced by the threat of violence (forcibly throwing someone in jail or worse if they won't comply with the law). You're talking about threatening someone with violence because they didn't have enough bandwidth to supply your (and thousands of other people's) personal entertainment. That strikes me as incredibly immoral. Also, the fact that you measured the bandwidth suggests to me that you still found Netflix usable enough, in spite of the slow down. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 19:07 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
add remark about US-centrism
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 18:50 | comment | added | Kendra | @BenCollins I worded that poorly, I wouldn't think you naive enough to claim abuse would never happen. Apologies there. (And thanks for the useful information well outlined in your post! It's helpful for those of us unsure where we stand.) | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 18:48 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Kendra just to be clear, I'm not claiming that abuse will never happen. What I'm claiming is two things: a) I don't perceive a business incentive for ISPs to behave badly on purpose, and b) we already have enforcement mechanisms for handling instances where abuse does happen (antitrust law). As it happens, I empathize with you because I also live in a place were provider options (and speeds) are more limited than in other places. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 18:45 | comment | added | Kendra | @BenCollins Well, if the FCC gets their way, I'll sit back and hope you're right about no abuse happening... Because I'm in one of those locations, a small town, where I have no other choice on who to use. Sure, I could use wireless, but 1) It's considerably more expensive for as much as I use the internet and 2) Even with the best provider in my area, the service is still patchy at best in the areas where I need it. (I am still not sure where I stand on this whole thing. I have not read enough to tell me one way or another where things really sit.) | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 18:39 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
update with data from broadbandmap.gov
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 18:31 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Servy this is the argument I hear repeated a lot, but I just don't think it's true. According to broadbandmap.gov/summarize/nationwide, virtually everyone in the US has access to at least 4 providers (counting wireless, as we should), and a majority have access to more than that. You can drill down quite a lot in this data, and it's kind of interesting, but in only a few minutes of digging I don't see any obvious evidence to suggest the commonly claimed provider monopoly is common. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 17:57 | comment | added | Servy | @BenCollins If they do a bad job of managing congestion then customers won't do a damn thing, because they have nowhere else to go, and their only choice is to just deal with it. It may be the outcome that you want for a major company to be forced to pay a bribe in order for a company to provide the services they had already been paid for, but that's not an outcome that many other people consider desirable, hence the regulation to prevent such behavior. You may not see how it's necessary or fair for a government to put policies in place for the benefit of society, but many others do. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 16:04 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Shog9 ok, so if they aren't doing a good job of managing congestion, then customers will go elsewhere, and the provider will either adapt or die. In this case they adapted. Now Comcast customers get Netflix via Xfinity as well as better network access to it. It seems like the outcome everyone would have wanted is the one we got. In any case, I don't see how this makes it necessary (or even fair) for the federal government to resolve private economic negotiations in favor of only one side. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:54 | comment | added | Shog9 | It's the network you - as a customer - are paying them for, @Ben. Managing congestion is a critical function of running that network; hamfisted restrictions meant to avoid having to manage congestion isn't. This calls back to the old days of AT&T, where you couldn't attach a 3rd-party phone or answering machine because (they claimed) it could harm the network in some way; in practice it amounted to a thin excuse to maintain a monopoly on expensive equipment rentals. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:38 | comment | added | Servy | @Won't Cable company monopolies is a part of the forefront here. Sadly, the industry itself is a natural monopoly. It's not a service that lends itself well to competition, as it requires a large and expensive infrastructure, which would need to be duplicated for real competition to exist, and expensive and inefficient solution. The common solution to natural monopolies in various domains (power, water, etc.) is government intervention. As far as extortion, there's a general definition of the term and a legal definition, that differ in a matter of degree. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:36 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Servy I just don't see it that way (sabotage or extortion) at all. I think Comcast and other ISPs have a legitimate right (and even duty) to manage their networks in the way they think best for their customers (and still try to make a profit), which I think they do, generally speaking. Maybe sometimes they get it wrong, but this is the way the world works. Customers purchase services that are managed by the providers. Sometimes some are better than others, and that's not a reason for any government intervention, let alone the federal government. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:34 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
add link to David Clark quotes
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:33 | comment | added | Servy | @BenCollins It's my understanding that Comcast wasn't throttling/blocking BitTorrent until they paid more money, they were doing it because they simply didn't support that traffic. (Unless I'm unaware of an offer to remove that for money.) That would make it sabotage, but not extortion. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:32 | comment | added | KRyan | @Won't The options are monopoly (or monopolistic oligarchy, which amounts to the same thing), or regulation. Those are the options. None others are presenting themselves. ISP competition is a myth. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:31 | comment | added | KRyan | @BenCollins I don’t know who you think felt BitTorrent throttling was acceptable, but I don’t and I don’t perceive net neutrality advocates as being so. It’s just a more niche, and less “pretty” case to hold up because of the associations of BitTorrent with illegal activity. Much easier to focus on Netflix, which is popular, well-known, and not tarnished by illegal usage. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:31 | comment | added | user1228 | @KRyan we're back to a solution looking for a problem. A solution that turns internet providers into Ma Bell, a stifling regulatory purgatory that suppresses innovation. If you don't get the reference, go look into it. I'd prefer that not happen to the internet as well. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:29 | comment | added | user1228 | @Servy maybe the issue with cable company monopolies should be forefront? I know you're being a bit hyperbolic, but extortion is actually a crime, and if what happened between those two companies was truly extortion, then Netflix would be running Comcast now. The intervention of the federal government also prevented companies from combining forces to offer customers special deals--say, for example, AT&T partnering with Netflix to give their customers free access in order to lure them from Comcast. There are costs to regulations that need to be considered as well. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:28 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @Servy I think that's broadly not true (that Comcast's customers are all monopolized). But back to your earlier point - let's ask the same question about a comparable situation: was it "sabotage" and "extortion" for Comcast to throttle Bit Torrent traffic? I mean, that's what their customers wanted to do, right? I fail to see why the Bit Torrent scenario is perceived as merely network management by most people (seems to me), but with Netflix it's "extortion" and "sabotage". | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:26 | comment | added | KRyan | @Won't We have net neutrality. The incident in question in fact prompted it, in large part, because we don’t want Comcast doing it again. If Comcast continued to extort Netflix, I have little doubt that prices would have gone up. Moreover, Netflix was, as mentioned, a huge company able to afford bribing Comcast. A hypothetical up-and-coming Netflix competitor would not. And that is the biggest problem. Net neutrality prevents ISPs from picking winners and losers, and that allows for greater competition. ISPs, being monopolies themselves and seeking yet more control and profit, don’t like it. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:25 | comment | added | Servy | @Won't Comcast is still around because they have a monopoly, and their customers have no choice but to use them if they want internet access. Netflix is still around because they paid the extortion money, and then eventually the fact that they were extorted ended up coming out and as a result of the subsequent publicity improved regulations were passed to make the net more neutral to prevent such behavior from happening in the future, removing Netflix's need to continue paying the extortion money, thanks to the intervention of the federal government. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:22 | comment | added | user1228 | Its amazing both Comcast and Netflix are still around and their customers are still getting internet and movies for reasonable prices at reasonable speeds without the intervention of the federal government. How the hell did that happen without NN? | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:22 | comment | added | Servy | @BenCollins How is it inaccurate to characterize dramatically slowing down a single company's traffic, with the sole purpose of intentionally disrupting the company and its consumers' ability to use the service that they're paying Comcast for, sabotage? How would you characterize it? | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:16 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @puzzlepiece87 I don't disagree with your rewording - but I don't see why that would then imply that Comcast wouldn't have the right to approach Netflix for a peering agreement to make that access better (and less disruptive to access to other content). | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:14 | comment | added | user352257 | Ben Collins I don't agree with your characterization, I think @KRyan 's is more accurate. You're saying "It seems to me more the case Netflix content was having a huge impact on Comcasts networks". I would definitely rewrite that as "Comcast customers, having paid Comcast with the expectation that they would be able to access any part of the internet they want at the speeds Comcast advertised, were connecting to Netflix in large numbers." | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:14 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @KRyan "Defrauding" is a very specific legal claim for which I suspect you have very little evidence. You probably know that consumer ISP agreements don't guarantee anything, which is how they are affordable to consumers. And again - you characterize what Comcast did as "sabotage", which I think is inaccurate. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:11 | comment | added | KRyan | @Won't I’m a Comcast customer and a Netflix customer. A portion of what I am paying Comcast money for is to deliver Netflix content. Comcast’s sabotage not only affected Netflix—it affected me, too. In fact, during that time, I measured dramatically lower bandwidths than advertised when connecting to Netflix servers. In short, Comcast was not providing me with the service I was paying for at that time. And Comcast suffered absolutely nothing for doing so, and ISPs in generally routinely defraud their customers without any problems. Yes, I think we need net neutrality protect us from ISPs. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:10 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
another pothole I left due to late-night editing
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 15:05 | comment | added | user1228 | @KRyan you know you're talking about two companies worth billions duking it out, right? Do we really need "net neutrality" to protect the interests of these huge corporations? | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 14:59 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
grammar, fix misaligned edits
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 14:26 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @KRyan I don't agree with your characterization. It seems to me more the case Netflix content was having a huge impact on Comcasts networks, and in order to better serve their customers, they needed to come up with some peering arrangement that they could both live with, which they did, Netflix's public protestations notwithstanding. I see this very much in the same vein as a similar dispute between Comcast and Bit Torrent which was similarly resolved. Neither of these instances seem to me like an obvious gap that net neutrality would have helped. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 14:21 | comment | added | KRyan | “There is the one famous instance between Netflix and Comcast (which they resolved without the help of regulators).” So you would characterize an ISP sabotaging a customer and shaking them down for money, and the customer finally caving to their extortion, a satisfactory and healthy resolution? Kind of a case-in-point against your position, if that’s the kind of thing that’s being touted as the success of the unregulated position. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 12:22 | comment | added | Braiam | I don't know if you know about slow boiling a frog. There's no tell where they ball will stop rolling (if it ever stops) and considering that infrastructure operators have natural monopolies (due the costs of rolling out the infrastructure, which is kind of the point why it's preferred that the state incurs on those costs) it means that you are at mercy of your operator since they have a massive leverage over whatever terms of the contract between clients and they are. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 6:11 | comment | added | Ben Collins | @AlexanderO'Mara that's a fair point (about Verizon admitting it in court), but that same article kind of provides an effective counterpoint: AT&Ts threats about FaceTime didn't materialize, and their action against Skype was short lived. Besides, saying that they'd be "exploring these types of arrangements", even taken at face value, is not the same thing as making a case for a business model, and is hardly a smoking gun. | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 6:00 | comment | added | Alexander O'Mara | ISPs sure seem to think there is incentive to do this. In fact, Verizon has even admitted in court they would do it if they could. Why else would they keep spending so much money trying to push the limits? freepress.net/blog/2017/04/25/… | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 5:46 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
drop my opinion bomb
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 5:39 | comment | added | Ben Collins | Alrighty then @Shog9, I've elaborated ;-) | |
| Jun 30, 2017 at 5:34 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
drop my opinion bomb
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| Jun 30, 2017 at 1:39 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
update to reflect correction to mistake about the timeline
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| Jun 29, 2017 at 23:49 | comment | added | Azendale | I really appreciate this reasoned and measured response. As a software engineer who wears many hats at a small (~3k customers) ISP, I support the idea of what I think net neutrality is, but have thus far been able to technically define it. From what I have seen in our telephone subsidiary, the tons of regulations and red tape around telephone service should not be applied to the world of technology. (Our telephone subsidiary has merged with the rest of the company but has not renamed because it would be prohibitively expensive (thousands of dollars?) to file the paperwork.) | |
| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:57 | comment | added | Shog9 | Well, I'm not gonna lie - I think revoking the current rules is a bad idea, and I'm gonna say that. I'm not gonna say you suck if you're against 'em, but I am gonna ask folks to come here and elaborate on their reasoning. | |
| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:56 | comment | added | Ben Collins | Ah, so you're right - I didn't realize the 2015 rules had gone into effect - I thought they still had a future date. That being said, I don't think that really changes much of my point: I hope the post is better than "RA RA Net Neutrality" and "You suck if you're against this", or as others have already done in other answers, "you can't possibly be rational if you're against this", which as I say, would make this whole exercise pointless. | |
| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:40 | comment | added | Shog9 | In short, the classification and relevant rules (which, I should in fairness note, do not include all rules commonly applied to common carriers), have been active for over two years, sufficient time for at least the initial outcome to be observed and discussed. | |
| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:36 | comment | added | Shog9 | While I agree with the desire expressed here to be careful in how we frame this, I gotta emphatically dispute the assertion that ISPs are currently not classified as Title II carriers. As with the current proposed rule-making, the change to classification was proposed in 2014. It was then voted on in February of 2015, passed, and issued on March 12, 2015 (PDF linked to there contains the two dissenting opinions). | |
| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:28 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 53 characters in body
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| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:15 | history | edited | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Jun 29, 2017 at 22:09 | history | answered | Ben Collins | CC BY-SA 3.0 |