So it's been six months since Net Neutrality was ended, how are the doomsday predictions turning out?

Agreed.

SpaceX Starlink has gone from theory to reality since this ruling. If you don't think the entrenched ISPs are terrified looking at that, you don't understand enough to be commenting here. The last time there was a similar disrupter (Google Fiber), the current ISPs used red tape and a smattering of gigabit to squash Google. Google!

Last I checked, no other ISPs have rocket capability. The second Musk lights this up, he has a knife at their throats.

Also, did anyone notice the Verizon commercial offering "pay only for what you need, not what you don't want?" Take a look at the rate plan on that. THAT IS the precise 'pick your access package' we were warning about. You want your ISP to make you choose between email and Skype? That's what this is. That's what Net Neutrality was guarding against.

Moo Goo wrote:

WWF warned us around 1990 that we will out of oil by 2004. Snowflakes and their fake news.

WTF has the world wrestling federation got to do with it?

There are already subtle changes. Have you tried using a VPN service? My ISP has been cutting off access to these IP addresses. They can say it is for security and maybe it is on the surface. But using a VPN also keeps your ISP from seeing what you are viewing. That is a problem for their data driven business model. What about cases where they are competing with the service you are looking at? Do you think they won't make it harder for you if it is legal for them to do that?

None of the ISP companies are going to advertise that they are throttling data from certain sites. It happens little by little when they are allowed to do it.

If there was significant ISP competition, this would not likely be a problem. Take the example of Fox News and CNN. They are both news sources, but they have an opposing political slant. Pretty much everyone has access to both and can make that choice. But what happens if your ISP (also cable company in many cases) decides to slow down the one they disagree with. Now you don't have access to both. ISPs are essentially a monopoly in most places, so their political leaning can deny you access to information that they don't like. All content is not equal, but who should decide what is worthy? That is where this problems arise.

YES, my pay-for VPN started being problematic about 4 months back, and no longer works. I have been using this EXACT same service for over 5 years, on a router, another desktop, and two phones, and the software does not work - with support telling me what I've suspected. It's an issue with my ISP seeing that I'm USING a VPN.

I have zero problem with the providers of internet network infrastructure generating a return for their multi $B investments. If you restrict their returns, you'll also restrict their investment and innovation. They should be able to throttle bad actors and free riders. And generally manage their investments to provide a return on capital so they can invest in the future. Netflix or porn hogging up all the bandwidth? Simple. Ask them to pay more so they don't ruin the quality of service for the rest of us.

I'd rather have the telcos do it than federal bureaucrats and politicians. Lesser of two evils. We can keep them in check via competition, where possible. Relatively easy to achieve in urban and sub-urban areas. It's not realistic in Podunk, UT, but the what's the alternative? Have the politicians confiscate our $ and inefficiently build and maintain crappy networks in rural areas? Have the politicians regulate the telcos because (OMG, the horror!!!) the telcos are profitable?

This debate has been framed as wanting a 'free and open internet' vs. the evil, greedy telcos. If that's your POV, I'd say that it's time to grow up. There is no such thing as a free and open internet. Never has been. Never will be.

I'm always amazed at how quickly we want to grant power to the government without any thought to the consequences. As if, because they don't have a profit motive, they'll act in our best interest. If you believe that, you really should pay more attention to what's happening and read some history.

I don't want to bring up this argument again, but do you recall the broadband commercial with Marky Mark saying "air, water, internet, we need it to live?"

Yes, categorizing the internet just like electricity, natural gas, water, might be a good idea, as critical as it is to modern civilization. That you fail to see it like this, and instead fall for the "recoup investment" angle (which is BS, those investments were OUR tax dollars), tells me what I need to know.

I hear the Free Market argument often. Who really believes that the EPA or FDA are just evil entities that are there to suck the profit out of companies? If we disbanded the FDA, it would not be immediate, but our food supply would slowly be poisoned. Without the EPA, it would be the Air, Water, Soil (even worse than now). Not because companies are evil, but because corners would be cut in the name of profit. Eventually, those cut corners would add up to something very unhealthy if no entity was able to enforce rules to stop them.

It is a simple rule. Business needs to run without cheating / hurting others. Some entity has to determine what hurting others means and have the teeth to enforce that.

Do the rules get complicated and confining sometimes? Of course. However, government rules for corporations are typically in the best interest of the general population. That is not the motive for a corporation.

If you are unsure what rules are good for the population, it would be a good idea to follow the money that is trying to change or remove certain regulations. You will find who will benefit and likely who won't. Corporations and their government puppets are making following the money trail increasingly difficult for a reason.

The ISP companies are effectively monopolies. There is no "keep them in check via competition". That is just being fanciful.

why do you love monopolies? wrote:

The ISP companies are effectively monopolies. There is no "keep them in check via competition". That is just being fanciful.

Fanciful?

The only people that make that argument are

1) telcos that want to preserve their monopolies

2) trumpy shills that are repeating talking points without understanding what is going on

So it's not even fanciful; it's just propaganda, exactly like the tobacco industries propaganda was for so many decades, and their shills repeated it ad nauseam.

It's not just about throttling. How about when ISPs start turning off your connection completely until you click through an advertisement? Oh wait....

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/12/centurylink-blocks-internet-access-falsely-claims-state-law-required-it/

It takes time wrote:

Our results show that nearly two-thirds of Angelenos live in areas served by just one internet provider that offers speeds meeting the Federal Communications Commission’s current definition of “broadband” service – 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload.

The only provider here used to be Verizon, now is Frontier, and my download speed remains at 1 mbps.

In order to get faster speed, they want to more than double my rate, which is $43 a month.

Gravy wrote:

Lydiard Cerutty wrote:

So far

So good. . . .

So what?

Great album. Think I'll stream it right now.

I was wondering how long it would take for someone to get the reference.

The cable company had to first get permission from the town council before laying down cables on the electric poles. The cable company had to buy the poles or rent them. They invested money to create a network. If there's a blackout, the cable company has repairmen on call who will drive to the site.

The telephone company did the same before laying down fiber optics for fast internet.

What's stopping the average Joe from making a small, internet link for a city block? I bet he could provide better customer service by being your neighbor, and he would charge less money. Embrace capitalism by making a truly free market where the average Joe can put in hard work to build his own ISP.

Or you can vote for socialism. The local town can ask the residents to pay extra tax to build their own ISP infrastructure. You're supposed to be a free American with ideas. Stop complaining about your service provider not giving you fast enough speeds for Netflix, porn, or your trolling addiction on letsrun.

Stop talking out of your ass. The ISPs handle the daily operations, yes, but the infrastructure was largely paid for by the citizens through government grants. "Socialist" programs built the infrastructure we have now. You're the kind of person who collects a social security check while at the same time saying socialist policies will ruin the country.https://www.ntia.doc.gov/grants-combined

Network Engie wrote:

Stop talking out of your ass. The ISPs handle the daily operations, yes

"The Dolans’ rise began with Charles Dolan, a Cleveland native who made his way to New York at 26 and founded Teleguide, an information service for hotels. Six years later he started Sterling Manhattan Cable, becoming the first person to wire buildings for cable television access. (In 1971, he founded Home Box Office, which he sold to Time Life.)

Two years after starting the company, the elder Dolan sold Sterling Cable’s Manhattan operations to Time Inc. and focused on his 50 miles worth of Long Island assets, renaming them Cablevision Systems."

Yes, I think wiring buildings for cable in the 1970s and then becoming a billionaire counts as gaining access and permission to lay down the infrastructure.

What's stopping the average Joe from doing this today in your neighborhood? Reduce regulations and open it up for a free market or ask for socialism where the town not only builds the infrastructure but also owns and maintains the ISP.

You're bringing up an irrelevant point about taxpayer money being used to seed the infrastructure. True socialism means the town owns their own ISP instead of letting private companies buy it up.

So you can either have a true free market or true socialism or any other idea. What's stopping this?

I agree with you 100% about opening the market and finding ways for smaller ISPs to even get started. A lot of municipalities are not giving permission for new poles to get built. The companies which own the current poles are not giving access to newcomers. Taking a multi-billion dollar company to court over pole access is not possible for your average Joe trying to build a local service. I bring up the grants because it nullifies the notion that ISPs invested lots of money into the infrastructure they currently operate on. In present day, not the 1970s. You either go big and get the government grants or go home. The average Joe trying to build a local service doesn't stand a chance.

You would honestly have zero idea what ISPs are doing, but they are surely doing a lot and have plans for more. It may take years to find out what they've been doing. As for speeds, I'd expect them to go up rapidly because our systems are slower than already built out systems in many other countries.

We've gone back to the dark days of 2015 when there was no internet.

So far so good so what? wrote:

Drainthefecesswamp wrote:

Correct, that is a coincidence. In fact, it isn't even remotely related.

The fact that Al Gore is an idiot doesn't change the fact that:

1) climate change is real, man made, and will negatively impact our lives progressively over the next decades.

2) removing net neutrality has the potential to limit access to information in a way the majority of Americans believe would be unfair.

1) climate change is a hoax by the government to control us.

2) so what?

You don’t think the chemicals we put on our planet has any effect? Have you taken a JH science class?

You don’t like clean air or drinking water? Go move to Beijing and let me know if you ever see the sky and how that’s working out. Companies should be able to pollute and destroy the environment because they can?

What are you arguing for here?