- Eliska Reilman Adema The decision about NN isn't either/or. It did fix a problem that was real, but in the process, gave it over to the government. That part wasn't necessary.
- John Robarts Exactly.
- Jay Ashworth Sure it was. That's /us/, the peepul, spanking the overreaching big corporations.
I do wish that people would stop saying "government Bad!". There is no alternative to government. You may not like the way it works, you may think it's corrupt, but that's a different thing from /thinking that the idea of government is inherently bad/.
If you actually think that, Somalia is waiting to meet you. Hint: bring guns. - Eliska Reilman Adema I don't see anyone here who said the government is bad, so you can ditch that argument. And 'the peepul' didn't do this - 5 individuals appointed by the president did this, and in the process, made the internet a utility. A lot of 'peepul' didn't want that. You don't fix one overreach by creating the possibility of another over reach.
- Jay Ashworth It is implicit in your presentation.
- Eliska Reilman Adema I said that net neutrality gave the internet to the government and that wasn't necessary. Fact. Not an implication. You yourself said - I may not like the way it works, I may think it's corrupt, - all possible things I might think and those are ok with you. but you went further to assume I meant that the idea of government is inherently bad. You drew a lot of possible conclusions - but chose the one you disliked the most and hung it on me. Then you sent me to omalia. That's usually a tea party tactic - America, love it or leave it. Interesting combination of tactics your using.
- John Robarts The Government is bad.
- Alan Petrillo If I'm going to trust the internet to the FCC or to a collection of rent seeking financial capitalists running the largest transnational telecommunications corporations in the world then I'll choose the FCC, thanks.
- Alan Petrillo As far as "giving the internet to the government" goes, where do you think it came from. It did not simply spring fully formed from thin air.
- Ryk Spoor Eliska: The frickin' internet was the government's TO BEGIN WITH. All that the current companies did was build on something the government already owned, had significant control over, and had national interest in FROM DAY ONE.
- John Robarts The "ownership of the net" is a far more complicated concept than can be easily addressed. Back when DARPA was practically the only game in town we posed the question, probably before it was actually meaningful, never had a completely satisfactory answer then or since. The net is merely a form of communication. And as such, freedom of speech must be conserved. Just because the technology of speech changes does not mean the fundamental right is altered in anyway. When an older culture sent a smoke signal, there may well have been some ownership inherent in the blanket held over the fire. But how far does that extend? When Ma Bell strung up copper they owned the copper and collected rent on it. Did they own the phone number? Yep. Did they own the name of the subscriber? Nope. The conversation on the wire? Absolutely not. Even though we had Bell legal thugs try to tell us that back in the VERY early days of dial up BBS systems.
- Jay Ashworth Alan will tell you I'm the most liberal person on this thread. So throwing the TP at me is unnecessary.
The /purpose of government/ is to exert control on things which, if they run away, will be bad for the populace at large, and government does it because no one else /can/.
So there doesn't seem to me to be a lot of air between "it was not necessary for government to be the one to do this" and "government is unnecessary"
Please expand further. - Jay Ashworth And the government has not owned the Internet since NSF ceded it to public providers, 1992 or so, IIRC.
- Ryk Spoor Jay: The /purpose of government/ is to equalize power, ultimately, because without government what you have is "who's the strongest and meanest person here" running small tribes.
- John Robarts "who's the strongest and meanest person here" running small tribes. .... the popularity of the show Survivor indicates how popular that concept is...
- Ryk Spoor John: Actually, Survivor doesn't do that at all, otherwise the way people would leave the show would be in a box or on a stretcher, and the winner would be determined by who was, in fact, the biggest, strongest, meanest participant. No voting involved, just a large club. (It also has nothing to do with actual survival, something which would be amusing to watch)
- John Robarts Ryk. ...that was humor. Just so you know.
- Ryk Spoor HUMOR... I have heard of this tradition of your planet.
- Kevin Maclean I remember changing a customer from an ISP owned by the telco to a different one and having their measured traffic drop to a quarter of what they had been paying for, with no other changes.
- Kevin Maclean I remember a certain US-based telco's ISP routing cross-town traffic via Singapore, presumably because they didn't charge for local traffic...
- Wade Hopkin Ma bell has come a long, long way. My grandma had a crank phone that connected to a 6 line party line. Standard issue. This was 1947. She jumped for joy when the phone company finally put in enough lines to so everyone could have their own private line, for an additional cost.
- Wade Hopkin Carolyn reminds you to think back to Marsh Swamp. The Rockridge Community phone. Ma bell for long distance and then use the separate crank phone to call local people who had a phone. Everybody picked up to see who was on the phone. The local system had two line for the entire community! Talk about everybody knowing what everyone was doing.
- Alan Petrillo Indeed. And if you look at what's happening in the developing world today, they are completely leapfrogging that technology and going straight to GSM phones.
Opponents of Net Neutrality regulation keep asking me if I remember the Bell System. Yes, I remember the Bell System.
I remember not being able to own my own phone because Ma Bell wouldn’t sell me one, only rent it.
I remember my mother being charged rent on a phone she did own for years after she bought it.
I remember AT&T local telcos charging customers extra for connecting with non-AT&T phones.
I
remember AT&T prohibiting businesses from connecting to their
network with non AT&T approved equipment. I also remember some
particularly creative use of acoustic couplers to get around that
prohibition.
I remember being charged more for touch-tone
service even though it was more efficient, and actually cost the phone
company less to run.
I remember, when I wanted to use MCI long
distance, having to dial a local access number, punch in about 30 digits
worth of codes, and hoping the call would go through.
I remember AT&T owned local telcos getting caught deliberately introducing noise into MCI long distance calls.
I remember the attitude “We don’t care, we don’t have to, we’re The Phone Company.”
While I’m not old enough to remember it, my grandparents remembered the old question “Bell or Home?”
I remember the federally subsidized monopoly on long distance telephone communication in the name of “national security”.
Yes, I remember The Bell System. But not with fond nostalgia.
Enforcement
of the Title II Common Carrier provisions on telephone providers put an
end to that. That is why, today, you can use a telephone from any
manufacturer to connect to the local telco of your choice, connect to
the long distance carrier of your choice, and, with fleetingly rare
exceptions, seamlessly direct dial any other telephone anywhere.
In
the end, what Net Neutrality does is simply insure that when you buy
bandwidth from an internet access provider you get the bandwidth you pay
for regardless of what equipment you connect with, what applications
you use, and what services you access. Which is why I have supported
regulation of internet access providers under the Title II Common
Carrier code since I first became aware of the issue in 1996.
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