[opendtv] Re: Comments to the FCC
- From: Craig Birkmaier <brewmastercraig@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 01 May 2017 10:06:44 -0400
On Apr 30, 2017, at 8:37 PM, Manfredi, Albert E <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
This is not an election Bert.
They are voting, Craig. Same thing. The FCC is supposed to work for the
people.
Yup.
As a former President once said, "elections have consequences."
We have a new administration that gets to nominate the FCC Commissioners. It is
the prerogative of the new President to appoint Commissioners who support the
agenda of this administration.
This is exactly what happened with the prior administration that created the
Net Neutrality canard to support heavy handed regulation of the Internet.
When they are inundated with 800,000 letters that all say the same thing,
It shows them what their bosses think, in spite of what some of the
commissioners might think. This is the way voices are heard, Craig.
So?
The FCC is NOT a "safe space" for progressives who favor government regulation
of "natural monopolies." The "bosses" voted for a major change in direction for
this country. Everyone's voice will be heard, maybe even amplified by groups
that spend their energy and money to inundate the FCC with "votes."
But the FCC is not looking for, or interested in "votes." They are asking for
meaningful comments about the NPRM that will be voted on next month.
No one, except you and a handful of special interests, argued against net
neutrality.
I did not arguing against net neutrality, and I don't know anyone who did.
The debate is what role the government should play in defining and enforcing
any rules that are needed to assure Net Neutrality moving forward.
And the arguments used to pretend that regulations are not needed are
specious. They are arguments that assume competition exists, for broadband
ISP service. Such arguments are either utterly clueless, or they are
deliberately disingenuous, used by those in the pockets of the special
interests. Either way, Craig. Not much to recommend for them.
There are higher level arguments in play here Bert.
- Is the century old doctrine of regulating utilities as "natural monopolies"
still relevant today? Or is it just a perverse form of crony capitalism that
protects each level of government that profits from it and the industries that
are allowed to operate as monopolies and oligopolies?
- Should the government pick winners and losers in ANY industry?
- Are there adequate mechanisms to enforce net neutrality via legal actions
against bad actors; and which agency is best equipped to deal with enforcement?
- Are there ways in which the government can encourage competition in the
markets for Internet access, and make better use of Universal Service Funds to
bring improved broadband services to underserved areas?
What role should the government play in monitoring our use of the Internet to
"protect us?"
And at the most basic level:
How do we define "net neutrality" and what constitutes a violation?
The Wired article I linked to yesterday makes an excellent point: Internet Fast
Lanes already exist; they are essential to deliver the data intensive
applications with real-time delivery requirements like streaming media.
Bert loves to blame Comcast for the dispute with Netflix CDNs that were in
violation of peering agreements. But the reality was that Netflix was
responsible for the problems and wanted Comcast and others to pay for their
traffic in the name of "Net Neutrality.
In the end, Netflix was able to negotiate agreements for the techniques needed
to handle this traffic, paying for the "fast lanes" needed to assure a much
higher Quality Of Service than is available to most Internet services.
As Wired pointed out, both Google and Amazon ALSO utilize these fast lanes to
provide a level of QOS that is not enjoyed by most Internet services.
Is anyone being harmed here Bert?
The answer is YES, if the FCC creates regulations that disadvantage one type of
Internet service realities to another.
Clue: the nation is fairly evenly divided on topics like Net Neutrality.
Not even slightly. It is only the rabid lunatic yahoos, those who can't think
beyond slogans, who misunderstand what a neutrality mandate means.
Right......
The vast majority of Americans support the fundamental concept of Net
Neutrality. But your response illustrates the real issue here.
Clearly there is one "lunatic yahoo" in this forum who DOES NOT understand what
a neutrality mandate means; or how we CAN promote real competition.
And there are millions of rabid lunatic yahoos out there ready to do or say
anything to protect and extend the progressive agenda that was at the center of
the recent election...
They LOST.
People who try to convince others that a neutrality mandate is the government
"controlling the Internet." Ridiculous rhetoric of extremists.
Not ridiculous at all Bert. One only need look at how quickly the Wheeler FCC
started to use Title II to regulate the Internet, to advantage services they
have no authority over while imposing competitive constraints on the services
they gained the authority to regulate.
It's entirely the other way around. It is government stepping in to make sure
the special interests don't "control the Internet," and it has been this way
for over a century for telephone service. There's no logical argument you or
anyone can make, to claim that telephone service and Internet broadband are
fundamentally different, in their need for guaranteed neutrality.
At last something I can agree with Bert about!
You can buy very cheap telephone service from telco competitors using VOIP via
the Internet. And people are abandoning line lines for phones that are not
connect to a hundred year old twisted pair infrastructure.
So yes, there is no logical argument anyone can make, to claim that telephone
service and Internet Broadband should be regulated as common carriers.
Remember when the government (finally) broke up Ma Bell Bert?
Remember what happened when the market for telephone handsets was opened up as
a result of breaking up the telco monopoly?
Bert can make a valid argument in support of forcing telephone companies to
interconnect in the previous century, when this new industry was being created.
There was no telephone culture at the time, but there was a growing concern
about anti-competitive behavior by powerful industries. We have a century of
real world evidence about the successes and failures of heavy handed regulation
of utilities.
And we have a similar century of real world evidence of how crony capitalism
has corrupted our form or government, trading competitive advantage for the
money to pay for multi-billion dollar election campaigns.
A perfect example of nonsensical rhetoric is when you claimed that Title II
"prevents" ISPs from competing against Google and Amazon. Totally
disingenuous.
It's was not Title II Bert. It was an FCC that used its Title II authority to
enact privacy regulations on ISPs that treated them different from Google and
Amazon.
What value is there in operating a search engine if you cannot collect and
monetize the data that pays for the server farms, connection to the ISPs,
co-location of edge servers, and the developers of the service?
What is "neutral" about forcing one service to allow customers to opt out of
data collection and monetization, while competitors can use your information
when you simply use that service, clicking "I agree" to the terms of use?
Neutral means NEUTRAL.
Regards
Craig
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