FCC chairman formally proposes net neutrality rules
By Nilay Patel 
posted Sep 21st 2009 2:07PM
posted Sep 21st 2009 2:07PM
We knew it was going to happen, but we're still stoked to report that FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski formally proposed a set of net neutrality rules this morning, calling them "the fair rules of the road for companies that control access to the internet." There are two big new rules, which say broadband providers of any kind can't discriminate against content or applications, and must be transparent about their network management policies -- a big change for wireless carriers like Verizon and AT&T, who would have to open their networks to scrutiny, and a direct response to Comcast's secretive packet-filtering techniques. What's more, Genachowski also proposed that four existing agency policies be granted formal rule status, meaning network operators would be required to allow users to access the content, apps, and services of their choice, and they would also be required to allow any "non-harmful" devices to connect to their networks. We knew all that open-access hullabaloo was leading up to something good.All told, these are some big policy changes, and while we're excited that the FCC is this gung-ho about net neutrality -- seriously, Genachowski comes off as the best kind of fanboy in his followup HuffPo editorial, it's kind of awesome -- we're still only cautiously optimistic, since the rulemaking process has only just begun and there are some potentially huge loopholes for network management and prevention of copyright infringement. But those are details to be worked out -- for now, the real news is that net neutrality is on its way to becoming the law of the land, and that's enough to warm even our darkened robot hearts. Check a video of Jules after the break.
Read - Genachowski's speech proposing net neutrality rules
Read - Genachowski's Huffington Post followup editorial
Read - The FCC's new openinternet.gov website
Read - WSJ piece with industry reactions
This will just accelerate the move to bandwidth caps.
here comes tired pricing for application use over IP, dammit!
And slower more expensive internet for all!
Thanks Obama FCC. You are ruining the internet!
Hey, I'll welcome bandwidth caps over data discrimination any day. Plus, it's not like you actually get 'all you can eat' data with those 'unlimited' plans. I'll rather AT&T advertise the data plans at 5G/month than UNLIMITED with a hidden footnote of a 5G cap.
you're very uneducated you know that? Besides the Telecom FUD what reason do you see to cause this?
what the hell are you people talking about? this is great news if this is passed isp would no longer be able to discriminate against what we download they would be nothing more than dumb pipes transferring data. also, this isn't going to cause bandwidth caps. they only reason caps are put in place is because isp are to lazy in invest in infrastructure so even if this wasn't passed bandwidth caps would of been put in place anyway.
As a telecom company shareholder I demand the telecom providers switch to a rate per MB of data used. Free up to some small level and $X per MB after that. Problem solved. Boy, that there barrack run gubmint sure be smart.
This is pretty simple.
+1 for big downloaders (i.e. torrent users)
-1 for casual web users
The net effect of this policy will be an increase of traffic on the internet. Either the networks retain similar infrastructure and performance slows down OR infrastructure upgrades and those costs are passed on to the consumer. Actually, the most likely situation is that there will be minimal network improvements and very large price spikes.
It's not liking big ISP's are going to simply enhance their network for more usage and then take those costs in the shorts. They will end up on your bill and my bill. For big DL'ers the cost increase will be worth it. For casual users you will get no benefit but have a higher bill.
Typical right wing tactic: Tell everyone that the plan does opposite of whatever Obama intends to do. Healthcare? He wants to kill grandma! Reign in on telecoms abuses and stifling innovation? He's trying to kill our internets!
bjsguess that one aspect that have gain from this new rules
but you have to think about what about all those legit torrents. also there are some good things that can now happen and maybe not be apparent now. such as IPTV, IP telephone(not voip) is some of the things that can happen now since they are not restricted by the broadband provider.
There is no way that net neutrality is bad for consumers ever. I'm shocked and appalled that anyone bright enough to read Engadget thinks otherwise on this situation.
Net neutrality is great. Big government is not. You can have one without the other. The unintended consequences of this regulation, however well intended, willlikely have the oposite effect of limiting competition and empowering the telecoms.
From the Cato Institute:
:New regulations inevitably come with unintended consequences. Indeed, today's network neutrality debate is strikingly similar to the debate that produced the first modern regulatory agency, the Interstate Commerce Commission. Unfortunately, rather than protecting consumers from the railroads, the ICC protected the railroads from competition by erecting new barriers to entry in the surface transportation marketplace. Other 20th-century regulatory agencies also limited competition in the industries they regulated. Like these older regulatory regimes, network neutrality regulations are likely not to achieve their intended aims. Given the need for more competition in the broadband marketplace, policymakers should be especially wary of enacting regulations that could become a barrier to entry for new broadband firms."
Laughton, I couldn't agree more.
OMG POLITICAL INDOCTRINATION!!! CENSOR IT!!!
His education speech was nothing of that sort, but the Republicans just won't give up.
That's AWESOME NEWS!!! Freedom finally!!!!!!!
FREEDOM
FREEDOM
FREEDOM to downloads....
What a disgusting development, and sheep all to happy to put government ropes on us just so they think they will be able to have all the happy bit torrent downloads they can stomach!
Bullshit! Do you knuckleheads not realize how much power you are putting in the hands of people that DONT answer to you? ISPs can be dumped for another, but the FCC WILL NOT GIVE A FLYING FUCK about some complaint from some geek when he finds that "net neutrality" may keep the "evil" ISPs under lock and key, but government will have a nice easy road right into your computer.
Just ask the Belgians how well neutrality worked for them. And THINK about trading freedom, even if its the freedom of people you dont think deserve it, for the E-nanny state.
I'm guessing you are one of those people who run around screaming "WTF SOCIALIST" and "I WANT MY COUNTRY BACK".
Now, I'm against BitTorrent downloading of illegal software. That's a big part of it.
But other things, such as dumping your bandwidth for certain things, are just wrong. The government is supposed to step in and fix the problems. Bush let all the problems get so bad there was no turning back. You're acting like he did nothing wrong and Obama is to blame for every crisis there is.
Get with the program.
"But other things, such as dumping your bandwidth for certain things, are just wrong."
WHERE IS THIS TAKING PLACE?? I'm still trying to find the "crisis" that people keep talking about, but cant seem to provide an personal example that doesn't involve massive file downloads and streaming on their part.
F*ing Obama-bots will sell out every freedom and liberty for a bucket of kool-aid and a warm puppy.
Mycroft, the ISPs don't believe in net neutrality, so yes you can have one without the other, but it's very unlikely. So unfortunately we have to allow the government to force their hand since apparently they don't listen to their consumers. Although now would be a good time to do so if they DON'T want government intervention.
so i can tether my iphone and not pay extra is what you're telling me :)
and I can use slingplayer over 3g.
YAY.
Not quite. The ISP(AT&T if you're talking about the iPhone) has to allow everything through but it can still pressure Apple not to accept such applications into the market. If you can figure out a way to do such things without needing any kind of 3rd party application then sure, you can.
As I understand it an application is not required just a carrier settings file that allows it. The iPhone supports tethering natively AT&T just needs to allow it and currently it's only blocked on the users end not the towers
@Victor
That was the case before OS 3.1. Now with OS 3.1 the carrier files have to be signed. Sure, there'll be hacks to get around that in the future, but it's still not as simple as it once was (if you updated).
Yes, if you're jailbroken than you can tether and user SlingPlayer over 3G regardless of what the FCC or AT&T attempt to dictate.
Wow, a thread with content. @Mark... good points all. Will be interesting to see how this develops, since obviously writing that editorial or giving that speech didn't change anything. I doubt that all of a sudden my Sling Player application will start working over 3G. I assume there will have to be some lawsuits or FCC fines against individual companies (maybe the whole Google Voice thing say), to set some precedents. Will Apple be allowed to do this sort of thing while AT&T cannot? I'd say "Situation Cloudy, Ask Again Later!"
One can only hope.
Until this issue is resolved I'll just keep downloading my > 100MB podcasts and watch slingplayer videos over 3G using my MyFi, which is still doing all of this over 3G its just that the iPhone doesn't know that...
on the surface it sounds like yes. a company can't say there is internet access, but only for the things we like.
however it doesn't mean that they can't put up bandwidth caps that would then cut you off from access, or cause you to have to pay more. something with tethering is more likely to invoke
also there's this 'harmful' thing. if a company can prove a certain function is harmful they might be able to get around the rule. so hopefully the rules will be conditional. such as ATT says they don't have the structure to support tethering without harming the non tethers. the FCC says 'okay no tethering for now. but you have X time to get things up and running or pay a huge fine/credit to your customers'
frankly I would rather see "no more simlocks on smart phones" than worry about the rest. although I am glad to see the possible ding on comcast. they shouldn't be allowed to pre-filter what everyone is doing. not when they have an out via the DCMA so long as they react if something hinky is pointed out to them.
WIN!
whats with the USA-flag in the back?
I don't know. What's with the basketball in the back?
I'm sure it has nothing to do with them being a US government agency
in soviet russia, internet uses u!
I just ordered an 3G phone and it happened to be iPhone.
Would you like a cookie?
...
well, if he's not gonna take it, i will!
I bought a 3G phone that wasn't an iPhone, and I'm capable of obtaining cookies on my own. This utterly useless fact was brought to you by: someone just as boring as you are.
Can't wait to see how the rules in place to "protect" us eventually get turned on us and protect the powers that be.
If only we didn't have a government, then we'd really be safe from corporate abuse.
...because we are so safe now with huge governement.
The role of the federal government should simply be to ensure that the union of states is protected from foreign threats, and that the few commonalities between the members have a universal standard within which they can operate (i.e. federal highway system, federal monetary system, etc). It's a slippery slope, to be sure, and I'm afraid we slipped about a century ago, and we've been falling ever since.
Now we need something like this in Canada, where the CRTC has taken a firm stance to let the Internet police itself. It's helped us gain many rights, but has also legitimized practices like traffic shaping.
Just what I've been thinking. I figure that since the current government's attempts at copyright law updates have been based on a deep research method of "what did the U.S. Government do," we can hope for the same thing with net neutrality...though I think that that particular research method only works in Canadian government when it would benefit big businesses and hose the consumer.
Let's hope this speeds 4G network build outs to support demanded bandwidth and encourages competition based on price rather than exclusively available devices.
I wonder what the astro-turf movement do next on this subject.
Does this mean anything for espn360.com, to have access to it now?
Blow it out of your ass, Huffington Post.
This is a great first step, but what we really need is an end to the enforced monopolization of ISP's. I don't care how they do it. I don't care if it's government internet(socialist service > monopoly service any day), having only 1 choice in ISP company(yes, a government monopoly would be much better than a corporate one) for any single area hurts everyone except that ISP. Fix it.
Would that not mean and end to pirating? Plus a government run ISP could be dangerous...imagine if they started filtering anything "bad" or "negative" about a recent law that passed. Big Brother is watching.
@flyersph9: Considering the net neutrality talk in this article versus the wishes of the ISPs currently in charge, I'd be more concerned about the corporate Big Brother than a government one when it comes to the internet.
That would make sense. Turn the backbone over to the USPS. It was email that killed the USPS so they take over the internet and everything is back to normal. Actually I'm only partially kidding. The internet is called the information super highway and the government has been in charge of highways for a long time.
I doubt the government will setup their own internet service BUT I do think we American's pay more for internet than other European countries. Same goes for Wireless providers. Take a look at all the wireless provider's. They all are the same prices for the minutes and some messaging.
AT&T: 450Min - $39.99 + SMS Add $5
VERI: 450Min - $39.99 + SMS Add $10
SPRI: 450Min - $39.99 + SMS Add $10 for the Messaging Plan.
TMO: 300Min - $29.99 + SMS Add $5
I found all the same minute plans they cost the same, besides Tmobile ofcourse. All the prices are the same for 900Mins, 1350Mins, etc... Seem's like PRICE FIXING. Isn't that illegal? Yeah different providers have different features, rollover, select 5 people for free calls, better coverage than others but does that mean it's ok to have all the same prices?
Heh, there will never be a "government ISP". There are government domains(.mil, .gov, etc.). Those domains are fairly restrictive but that's for good reason.
I think in the bigger picture, the three largest telcos owning the backbone of this country is the best move. All the spam mail and advertisements is better absorbed electronically rather than wasting millions of tons more paper by doing it through USPS, not to mention the extra fossil fuel required to ship all this junk mail to the people around the nation. Let USPS hadle package shipping and bulk freight. It's better that way.
"This is a great first step, but what we really need is an end to the enforced monopolization of ISP's. I don't care how they do it. I don't care if it's government internet(socialist service > monopoly service any day), having only 1 choice in ISP company(yes, a government monopoly would be much better than a corporate one) for any single area hurts everyone except that ISP. Fix it."
Wow. I'm sorry, but whatever issue you have with your ISP is nowhere near important enough for socialism.
I'm curious how this will affect services like ESPN 360. Since it's the content provider that is refusing to play ball with the end user unless they are on the "right" ISP.
Hopefully companies like Comcast don't bring out the moneybags and lobbyists to try and stop net neutrality. That'd be terrible if the internet worked like cable with its program-based packages. "Upgrade your internet bundle from $19.99 a month to $29.99 and gain access to Facebook and Twitter!"
And for $39.99 you can use email.
This still doesn't solve the fact that most internet providers are also content providers. Whats to stop Comcast from imposing a 20GB a month download limit to 'encourage' people to buy a 10 dollar pay-per-view movie instead of an online netflix rental. And as the saying goes, the devil is in the details. These ISPs have teams to lawyers that will find any loophole they can in these new rules and just keep doing what they are doing.
That said, this is a step in the right direction. Even if these companies find other ways to restrict access, it'll only be a matter of time before the laws are updated to maintain open access.
+1. That's exactly why we need to end the enforced monopolization of the ISP market. Any corporate monopoly is gonna end up like this.
"This still doesn't solve the fact that most internet providers are also content providers. Whats to stop Comcast from imposing a 20GB a month download limit to 'encourage' people to buy a 10 dollar pay-per-view movie instead of an online netflix rental."
A loss of customers, tons of bad PR, drop in stock price, unemployment for the top brass?
Amazing what people can do when they act in their own self-interest, and in a group, and not give Washington D.C. new powers over us.
Dude, while I might think that's true IN THEORY, in actual practice you don't usually have any choice. Most places have exactly ONE cable provider. No AT&T U-Verse. No Verizon. Just Time Warner or Comcast. Both have caps in place, and have reasons that might motivate them to discourage you from watching free stuff they could otherwise sell. So even legal things like Hulu or ESPN360 or whatever might someday be blocked or disallowed or charged for. And your alternative is what exactly? Complain. Sure. Lots of people doing that already, especially about the puny caps TW is putting in place. Switch to a different ISP... like what? A telecom provider? Typically that means DSL, and usually that means thruput less then 1.5Mbps. Which means no streaming of video other than YouTube type stuff. Certainly no highdef streaming. So you can watch that football game but not at a resolution good enough to threaten Comcast's revenue. What is the competition exactly? 4G? You mean that WiMax thing that is available in exactly one city in the US? Or LTE that we might see start to roll out by the end of the year? And given the shared nature of those wide-area networks it seems highly unlikely they'll offer you the bandwidth to compete with these cable providers.
So maybe someday when Verizon is competing everywhere (profitable) there might be real competition in a lot of places. But right now you're living in denial.
Ironically, openinternet.gov is blocked by my company
Huh... mine too. For malware/spyware... very odd.
do you work for Comcast?
There's a Youtube video of the speech embedded in the front page. That may be why.
Excerpt from the commissioner's address: "This principle will not prevent broadband providers from reasonably managing their networks. During periods of network congestion, for example, it may be appropriate for providers to ensure that very heavy users do not crowd out everyone else."
That's the only sign of bandwidth caps I saw. And say what you want about capping users' throughput. It becomes a necessary evil. Compare it to roadway traffic laws. They are necessary to avoid collisions as well as congestion, allowing everyone from every origin to participate. Really, how much speed do you need? If you can download 5 minutes worth of HD video on youtube in less than 10 minutes, I'd say you're sitting pretty.
I was living in an apartment complex and I routinely got 800Kb/sec off of a crappy cable (copper) service. Imagine when FTTH rolls out all over U.S. cities (it has largely begun already). You'll be getting at least 1Gb/sec downloads and probably 500Kb/sec uploads - who's gonna argue with these figures even if they're capped at that? Certainly not me and I use the Internet a lot.
I think that the issue is that there's a lot of very legitimate reasons to need much more bandwidth than even the max caps give(netflix streaming/1080p XBox movies(soon)/zune pass comes to mind for ones in my home). When they aren't even attempting to improve their infrastructure, bandwidth caps look like their trying to capitalize off their own lack of progress.
Using your logic, we should give you 56Kbps back. Would you be happy with that?
1Gb/s downloads on FTTH? What provider is offering these speeds?
My grandfather gets that throughput on Verizon Fios in Florida. Not all telcos will have this speed right out of the box; it depends on what service you pay for. But I feel that eventually this can be the baseline. R&D companies are, right now, trying to standardize 100G devices based on fiber optics. Once they can do away with electro-optic interfaces, that's when the speeds will really start to shine. Right now, you probably have fiber to the curb or fiber to the premises, if that. Just depends on where you are/how developed your local infrastructure is. Once you get FTTH, you get the idea.
@killeryo2002: Uh, wow, you really have no idea what you're talking about.
You think your grandfather gets 1Gbps downloads on FIOS? Sorry but the max download speed on FIOS is 50Mbps. The BACKBONE of the internet runs at multiples of 10Gbps but not large multiples. There isn't enough bandwidth in the whole network to give everybody 1Gbps.
Which doesn't really matter because nobody really needs 1Gbps speeds. Sure we all want to download video (at maybe 6Mbps for HD) plus do multiple other things at the same time. So maybe we want 50 or even 100Mbps sometime soon. But 1Gbps? Sure someday, but right now we wouldn't be willing to pay for it.
Fanfoot, uh, wow, it was like, a typo. Happens to the best of us.
Meant to say he usually gets 10Mbps. I had the 1Gbps stuck in my head from the earlier point.
Funny, so he says it's OK to do what the whole net neutrality is a fight AGAINST, and then says he's FOR net neutrality? So the guy is a dumbass who tries to keep his lucrative well paid powerposition by rubbing up to every party, just as you'd expect from the FCC head.
Rather then lobby the government to restrict the ability of companies to regulate their own property why not lobby the government to deregulate the industry and allow real competition and let market forces handle things? If customers don't want tiered services the companies won't create them.
Get rid of government created monopoly privileges, stop the subsidies, drop state ownership of the airwaves, allow real competition. Putting this in the hands of the government will absolutely come back to bite you. It doesn't take a degree in economics, political theory, or history to understand this.
"drop state ownership of the airwaves"
It sounded great till that. You'd have thousands of competing companies using the same frequencies and everything would come to a stand still. Capitalism is great, but it can't do anything to change the laws of physics.
The market in the UK is very competitive. We have an abysmal service. It is a race to the bottom for pricing, the services are over congested, the ISP's have been trialling data pimping to try and make it pay. The free market is not the answer.
Matt, are you kidding me? I had a much better connection in Poland (by provider owned by government!) than I have now in Central London. Internet in the UK totally suck, data caps and fair use policies are ridiculous, your "8 mbit" pipe never works as 8mbit should. Back in Poland I had 6mbit and downloads like 750 kb/s all the time, not just at 3am on Friday.
@Marty. I was agreeing with you, the service in the UK is crap. I'd much rather have the government deal with it, and provide the best service possible at a reasonable rate, without commercial considerations. Unfortunately all the past, current and future governments are interested in is privatising everything.
Jaw dropping " The free market is not the answer."
How is it not?!?! You want an ISP that allows everything all the time..THEN START ONE YOURSELF!
You can charge jack s*it per month and have super-unlimited bandwidth. And once all of the people stop cheering, then you can watch your servers crash and melt under the strain of 10 losers using 90% of your pipe to stream Ultra HD resolution Movies, while 99% of your customers are waiting 5 days for a youtube video.
The free market is the only thing keeping this sucker from imploding as it is.
Well stated, people forget that this also hurts those who wanted to have service that perhaps priorities 720P video streams, higher quality VOIP etc. The real issue is that current government regulation basically gives you one cable provider. If they were to actually compete with each other for your service, it would be a great incentive to not piss their customer's off.
Progress at last, lets just hope the Networks lobby will refrain from interfering with what appears to be a fair mandate.
good in theory, bad in practice. there needs to be some sort of smart filtering to prevent torrent traffic from eating up bandwidth. also, most of the dumbasses supporting this fail to realize that only the government is the only ones that are going to benefit for this, not consumers. they control the bandwidth, they sell the bandwidth... so by forcing providers to do this, they are going to sell more bandwidth. it's that simple. and with engadget being owned by aol it would seem that engadget would support a way to make things more efficient, not putting a strain on providers.
How about we all stop calling each other names in this thread. How would that be.
Oh forget it. You're a shithead.
What the hell are you talking about?
"the government is the only ones that are going to benefit for this, not consumers. they control the bandwidth, they sell the bandwidth"
The government doesn't own the bandwidth. The companies that created the networks do, ie. AT&T, Level 3, Verizon, etc. You obviously have no idea how the internet works.
1) Net Neutrality (DONE) 2) Let consenting adults marry consenting adults 3) Eliminate gun restrictions from law abiding citizens 4) Everyone paying taxes is entitled to health care 5) No federal regulation of abortion. Keep it by state.
YEEAAAAA! Way to go FCC! This NEVER would have happened during the Bush administration! One down, five to go. Make me proud, Congress!
1.) What? Done? No, not really.
2.) They already can. My mother and father both consented to marriage. They were not forced into anything. Also, this has nothing to do with the FCC.
3.) This has nothing to do with the FCC.
4.) This has nothing to do with the FCC.
5.) This has nothing to do with the FCC.
I think you need to rewrite your FCC wishlist. Also, this is a tech blog. You will not find many who give a sh!t about your political agenda. That may be harsh, but also true.
I think he means any consenting adult marry any consenting adult. I.e. gay marriages.♠
I think the gay marriage thing is a joke..... but only because I think it's stupid that the government has *anything* to do with marriage. The fact that the government favors married couples more than singles. That tax code is written to deal with marriage is what is wrong... not that the government doesn't allow gay marriage!
Why shouldn't marriage remain a religious or personal contract between two people of any shape, sex, race.
It's funny, people are "outraged" that a certain law excludes people... when in fact it should have never been put in place. We all have natural rights and we give the government a small fraction. That attitude was lost somewhere between 1776 and now.
It is a dark day when the government starts controlling who provides us internet and how. If there is a demand for a neutral internet, there will be ISP's to provide it (which there are). This is a foot-in-the-door tactic to make internet the next gov't controlled utility. Do you really want the FCC to have even the slightest stake in governing internet traffic?
Ask the people in Beijing how much they are loving that government "protected" internet.
the Federal Communications Commission is governing communications? heresy!
Dan, you are an idiot.
The FCC was originally started to assign radio frequencies to prevent signals from overlapping. A perfectly legit function, that should have been left up to states.
And because of succeeding generations of idiots giving them power, now they are telling private businesses what they can and cannot do with the service they offer, BUT DO NOT FORCE, people to use.
@Look_Around_You
Yeah, just what we need. Let the states control the wireless signals so when you go into another state you have to buy a new cell phone because your old one won't work there. And what about overlap across state borders?
I agree that there are a lot of things that should have remained at the state level instead of at the federal government, but this is one thing that better off at the national level (if not globally).
Holy ****!!! People in hell must be drowning in ice water!!
Did the government just do something good for us??
This is awesome! Go "the man"!!
Did anyone not read "Proposed"? Everyone is acting like this is now policy or law. I propose naked tuesdays... There. Off my agenda...ugh.
Mark, When you say "they", are you referring to the content providers you mentioned here? Or do you mean the ISPs and/or telcos that actually lay down the hard infrastructure (fiber, coax, satellite, etc.)?
As far as content providers imposing BW ceilings, that may have been worked in as a part of a contract you sign with them, or it might just be a logical cap created in accordance with the sheer number of users downloading at any given instant. They might actually have a legitimate need for that capping, due to their servers only being able to support so much traffic. This could very well be backed up by independent research, but the real key is: if you're serious about knowing that you're getting what you paid for, you have to be able to find the information that says you're getting a square deal. Otherwise, you're just pissing in a pond.
And then you have to know a little something about your ISP practices too, as well as what kind of capabilities and limitations does your connection possess?
To the common end user that utilizes the Internet for entertainment and occasional scholastic interests, they are really unaffected by any policy change the FCC creates, unless the change is drastic. But they're not here to provide enforcement on us; they're here to ensure connectivity for all people in America - right down to the hillbilly town with a population of 300. Capping is inevitable in the future, even if everything goes FTTH because multimedia quality will only improve and the world population is expanding at a scary pace. But really, how much speed does one person really need?
Like I said, I'd be plenty happy with 1Gbps down and 500Kbps up.
SleepyWag, you're a douche. Go away, you peon.
Bile, states don't own airwaves, the FCC controls the spectrum.
I don't know what everyone is making a stink about. This is just a notice telling people that the FCC is reviewing trends and formulating policy to ensure the Internet remains bias-free of any one entity, whether it's commercial or governmental. Did any of you even read the commissioner's address? Everyone is so quick to point to a conspiracy theory these days; it proves nothing more than you don't know WTH you're talking about.
This is an important issue and it's good to see that the new Chairman has moved to put Net Neutrality on the front burner of communications policy. His vision of an open Internet that preserves the "freedom to innovate without permission" is one that our organization, the Center for Democracy & Technology, shares; it's an idea believe all Internet users and innovators should vigorously support. The move to expand the basic Internet principles the agency laid out in 2005 by to include nondiscrimination and transparency addressed two areas where we thought the original principles fell short.
Ideally, the launch of FCC proceedings would prompt Congress to take up the matter too. CDT has long said that FCC activity on Internet neutrality would benefit from clear congressional guidance, authorization, and limits, so that the FCC's task and regulatory authority are not open-ended. You can read more about our thoughts on this by looking at our more inclusive comments we submitted to the FCC on its overall Broadband Plan. http://www.cdt.org/speech/20090608_broadband_comments.pdf
". His vision of an open Internet that preserves the "freedom to innovate without permission" is one that our organization, the Center for Democracy & Technology, shares;"
Well, "innovate" and start your own ISP.
Democracy dependent on restricting the basic right of a business to control what goes on with their optional service? What a joke!
Hey the government announced something that most of us are in favor of. I can only assume there must be some bad news around the corner that they are using this to distract us with. :-)
Now if they could just stop Comcast from resetting the DNS every night, I'd be set. Friggin thing DC's me every night around 1:30am.
If that bothers you, you should find another ISP. Wireless,. Dial Up, Sat, DSL are all choices. Cable is clearly the fastest but (surprise) it comes at a cost. In theory the free market would have allowed you to chose another cable company but the government setup regulation long ago that stopped multiple companies from servicing you in most cases.
You are the same person that loves the iPhone, hates Att and wants the government to get involved.... tisk tisk. With the good comes the bad. If Att is so bad, eventually the iPhone will move to another carrier or an iPhone like device will be made on Sprint T-Mobile etc.
Free market is great. Why on earth would you deny that?
Hmm, let's not get the FCC involved with the internet at all, or we might as well abandon it right now and here.
Can't another body handle this? Seriously if the FCC starts messing with the internet all is lost.
These people seriously dont care.
They have a childish grudge against ISPs for being too "hard" on bandwidth hogs and Bit Torrent jockeys, and are hiding behind a baseless fear that ISPs will one day take away Google and Facebook, because someone may say a dirty word. It's such bull.