[opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review
- From: Craig Birkmaier <brewmastercraig@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 26 Jun 2016 09:28:38 -0400
On Jun 25, 2016, at 7:47 PM, Manfredi, Albert E <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I posted the history, Craig. Read it. It started with the ICC regulating
telephone and telegraph, 110 years ago.
You posted two links about regulation of the railroads. Yes the ICC was given
responsibility for telecommunications with the Mann-Elkins Act, but they did
not do anything that can be equated to net neutrality. In fact they did almost
nothing, as other articles point out. The agreement to interconnect with AT&T
long distance came as I stated with the voluntary agreement in 1913, in which
the government essentially agreed to the Ma Bell monopoly. The FCC did use
Title II to interconnect the few remaining local exchanges that had not been
sucked into the Bell monopoly by 1934.
The important point here is that all of this is irrelevant to the Internet,
which is based on the principle of interconnecting networks. To date here in
the U.S. the closest we have come to a real net neutrality violation is the
move by some streaming sites to block access to specific devices, like Google
TV.
Here's the best part. Title II had nothing to do with forcing
interconnection of local telephone systems. That had already
happened before the FCC
Are you incapable of reading, Craig? That's what I already posted! I'll not
post it again. You can go back and find the link.
Your Inks said nothing about interconnections of telecommunication services.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingsbury_Commitment
"In return for the government's agreement not to pursue its case against AT&T
as a monopolist, AT&T agreed to divest the controlling interest it had
acquired in the Western Union telegraph company, and to allow non-competing
independent telephone companies to interconnect with the AT&T long distance
network."
I posted that link yesterday Bert. You're a little late to the party....
Imagine that Bert. It took nothing more than an agreement to create a
telco monopoly to assure interconnection.
Read the above quote again.
"... Nathan Kingsbury of December 19, AT&T agreed with the Attorney General
to divest itself of Western Union, to provide long distance services to
independent exchanges under certain conditions and to refrain from
acquisitions if the Interstate Commerce Commission objected."
Still having problems understanding this, Craig?
No. But it is apparent that you are. In 1913 AT&T voluntarily agreed to
interconnections between independent exchanges and their long distance network.
This was not mandated by Title II, which did exist until 1934.
Kings bury understood that his telephone system had limited value as a system
of local exchanges that were not interconnected. The long distance service
added significant value to the phone system, and n the end was the source of
most of AT&T's profits.
Local exchanges were a major capital investment, as were other utilities
including electricity, water and sewage. They were only profitable in dense
urban areas, as the cost to serve rural areas was too high to make a profit.
If you want to gush about the importance of regulation, perhaps you should
focus on something it actually helped with - the Universal Service fund and
mandate. With Title II regulation of the rates local exchanges could charge,
and the creation of the Universal Service Fund -paid for by a portion of local
rate revenues - telephone service was provided in areas where there was no
profit motive. This might have happened eventually, anyway, but it is a better
example of a useful regulation than your interconnection mantra.
Interconnections are essential to both telephony and the Internet. They can be
used to influence the cost and quality of services, as we saw in the disputes
among Netflix, Comcast, Cogent, Tata and Level 3.
https://freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/feamster/why-your-netflix-traffic-is-slow-and-why-the-open-internet-order-wont-necessarily-make-it-faster/
No, Craig. The telco monster created itself the way these natural monopolies
tend to do, and the government had to get involved as a consequence.
Bull.
The entire concept of natural monopolies was crafted by large industrialists
who convinced the politicians that more money could be made, and that
governments could share in the revenues, if these critical services were
operated as monopolies. A century later we are slowly extracting ourselves from
this misguided belief, having paid through the nose for all kinds of regulated
services.
It is not surprising that the politicians want to treat an industry that has
fundamentally disrupted these legacy assumptions as if it is a natural monopoly
too.
There is nothing "natural" about monopolies. They are just more profitable than
competition.
In cases like this, which involve extensive infrastructure that cannot
credibly compete everywhere, the bigger companies end up acquiring the
smaller ones, very much as happened with MVPDs.
Consolidation is a natural occurrence - it allows for economies of scale to
some point. After reaching that point it can lead to monopolies and
oligopolies, which increase costs to consumers.
That is why we have anti-trust laws.
Unfortunately, we have lost many of the benefits of capitalism to government
regulation and protected carve outs. It is now commonplace for industries to
run to the politicians for protection; this may take the form of licensing
regimes and regulations that create barriers for new competitors, favorable tax
treatment, and government subsidies.
But it becomes one, when it starts carrying telephone service and broadband
Internet service. I already explained all of this. There is nothing ambiguous
or difficult in any of it.
That is your opinion, and your desire.
In order for cable to compete in the telco market it took DEREGULATION.
The Internet was created largely free of regulation. Your point that regulated
telephone lines were critical to the initial growth of the commercial Internet
is noted and has merit. But that early phase simply demonstrated the validity
of the Internet concept. This in turn led to massive private investments to
build all of the layers that exist today, few of which have any relationship to
the legacy telco networks - the one major exception being DSL, which is clearly
no longer competitive.
Netflix was beating the net neutrality drum in an effort to keep
from paying the true costs its traffic was creating.
Already covered this. Netflix was paying for their own CDN and Netflix was a
boon for demand for broadband service, which allowed the calecos and telcos
to grab ISP away from the competition, and place it firmly into their local
monopolies.
What competition Bert?
The only sources of broadband, other than cable and telco, here in Gainesville
were a few companies that tried to resell telco bandwidth - until the telcos
convinced the FCC to stop forcing them to open their networks.
We did have many dial-up networks, but I would not classify that as broadband,
and more recently our public power utility has built a network that it offers
to some businesses and large apartment complexes.
I did cut the "DSL cord" with AT&T and move to Cox broadband - streaming video
was a factor, but faster broadband was equally important for the Internet
services we use far more frequently.
None of this is relevant to the interconnection issues and who should pay for
the traffic. At best it helped accelerate the deployment of broadband upgrades
in the cabled systems, but this requires capital investments.
The CDN approach was an important phase of Internet growth; for many smaller
web services it provides adequate QOS at a reasonable price. But for the
largest services, CDNs are now a bottleneck. That is why Amazon, Apple, Google,
Microsoft, Netflix and many other companies are building out their own networks
at a cost of tens of billions.
So, when a company with a conflict of interest began to degrade that Nteflix
competition for content delivery, only Craig has a hard time understanding
why it created an uproar, and why the FCC ended up doing exqactly what the
people demanded.
But that did not happen. You really need to give it up Bert.
I would add, Tom Wheeler was initially very opposed to classifying broadband
under Title II. He only changed his mind when the outrage became apparent.
No, he changed his mind when his boss told him to do so.
http://variety.com/2014/digital/news/president-obama-to-fcc-reclassify-broadband-service-as-title-ii-to-protect-net-neutrality-1201352336/
Too bad, Craig. The people have spoken, and they disagree with you.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/net-neutrality
The White House and it's peeps spoke Bert.
The Republicans do not agree. This issue is still in play.
Regards
Craig
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Other related posts:
- » [opendtv] Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
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- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review - Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier
- » [opendtv] Re: Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Manfredi, Albert E
- » [opendtv] Net Neutrality: Government Control of Your Internet Service | National Review- Craig Birkmaier