{"id":139,"date":"2014-04-25T03:25:25","date_gmt":"2014-04-25T03:25:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/weblog\/?p=279"},"modified":"2014-04-25T03:25:25","modified_gmt":"2014-04-25T03:25:25","slug":"fccs-net-neutrality-rules-would-break-the-internet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2014\/04\/25\/fccs-net-neutrality-rules-would-break-the-internet\/","title":{"rendered":"FCC’s Net Neutrality Rules Would Break the Internet"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"C-Net’s Marguerite Reardon’s at it again, with a new piece on the goodness of the FCC’s proposed rules on “Open Internet.”\u00a0 \u00a0http:\/\/www.cnet.com\/news\/fccs-position-on-net-neutrality-hasnt-changed\/<\/a><\/p>\n

She spends the whole article mouthing soothing platitudes from the talking points Comcast prepared for her.<\/p>\n

I can’t believe anyone is so stupid as to believe these rules won’t terribly harm consumers.\u00a0 So I can only guess that Maggie’s on Comcast’s payroll.\u00a0 I felt strongly enough about it to leave the comment below on the C-Net website:<\/p>\n

++++++++<\/p>\n

This article, coming on the tails of Ms. Reardon’s magnificent piece <\/strong>rationalizing the unbearable\u00a0goodness of the TWC – Comcast merger has me utterly convinced that Ms. Reardon’s 100% on Comcast’s payroll.<\/p>\n

She\u00a0regurgitates Comcast’s and Wheeler’s talking points, 1,2, 3 right down the line, without any measure of objectivity.<\/p>\n

But of\u00a0course, Ms. Reardon.\u00a0 The FCC rules will change nothing.\u00a0 We can rest easy.<\/p>\n

Except that little\u00a0bit about prioritizing traffic from people who pay extra.\u00a0 Whoopsie!<\/p>\n

It’s clear that if some people (Google, Netflix, YouTube, etc.) pay extra for faster connections on the last mile, then the unspoken condition is that all else will be slowed down.\u00a0 And if you believe the ISP’s aren’t above artificially slowing down traffic in order to make bucks selling priority connections, I’ve got a nice bridge I think you’ll be interested in…<\/p>\n

It’s absolutely guaranteed that if these rules pass, traffic will generally slow down for the non-prioritized.<\/p>\n

You wanna watch a video on an off brand web site?\u00a0 Get used to the “Buffering…” notice and prepare to wait endlessly to see the video clip.\u00a0 There’ll be all sorts of lame technical excuses why this happens from the ISP’s, mainly “net congestion.”\u00a0 And the admonishment that if the website would only pay their “troll toll,” then the video would have enough bandwidth to play instantly.\u00a0 It’s not the wonderful ISP’s fault; it’s the cheap web sites that won’t pay their fair share to have their traffic prioritized.<\/p>\n

But of course the ISP’s would not be actually\u00a0blocking websites or anything like that and so it would all be nice and legal.\u00a0 Yeah, right.<\/p>\n

The content providers that paid the troll toll would have their content delivered zip, zip, zip.\u00a0 Magnificent.\u00a0 And the ones that didn’t?\u00a0 You remember what 56K modems were like?\u00a0\u00a0Everything was slow as molasses… \u00a0 Well that’s what non-payer’s content will look like – if these rules pass.<\/p>\n

This is asinine.<\/p>\n

These rules\u00a0clearly demonstrate the idiocy of having industry insiders regulating their own – the fox guarding the hen house.\u00a0 Basically it’s like giving the keys to the kingdom to Comcast and Verizon and pals and saying, “Have at it.\u00a0 Do what you like.\u00a0 You’ve got carte blanche.”<\/p>\n

This is the result.<\/p>\n

But how could it be otherwise?\u00a0 Wheeler was the head of the cable industry’s biggest lobbying association.\u00a0 He was also head of the wireless industry’s top lobbying group.\u00a0 His whole life is built on “what’s good for cable and wireless.”\u00a0 How on earth could anyone realistically believe he could dramatically switch to a pro-consumer standpoint and leave behind all the years and dollars of his life as an industry lobbyist?<\/p>\n

These rules clearly show where Wheeler is at.\u00a0 This is a man who knows which side his bread is buttered on!<\/p>\n

But sadly, what’s good for Comcast and AT&T and Verizon and so on is most emphatically not good for consumers.<\/p>\n

In the final analysis, all these rules do is legalize and legitimize a new, very lucrative revenue stream for these humongous, rich and powerful corporations.\u00a0 All at the expense of consumers.<\/p>\n

And in doing so, they will break the internet.<\/p>\n

This is outrageous.<\/p>\n

Internet access isn’t a frivolous luxury – not in 2014.\u00a0 It’s a basic utility, just like water, electricity and sewer.\u00a0 The ISP’s\u00a0should be classified and regulated as common carriers.\u00a0 That is the only answer that will suffice.<\/p>\n

As to you, Ms. Reardon; \u00a0you should be ashamed of yourself!\u00a0 Much luck in your new job as a PR flak for Comcast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C-Net’s Marguerite Reardon’s at it again, with a new piece on the goodness of the FCC’s proposed rules on “Open Internet.”\u00a0 \u00a0http:\/\/www.cnet.com\/news\/fccs-position-on-net-neutrality-hasnt-changed\/ She spends the whole article mouthing soothing platitudes from the talking points Comcast prepared for her. I can’t believe anyone is so stupid as to believe these rules won’t terribly harm consumers.\u00a0 So […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-broadband"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikepellegrini.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}