Thursday again already? We’ve created a monster, now haven’t we? Anyway, here we go with yet another Top 10 list.
You might’ve read the news that net neutrality rules are set to become law on November 20th. Of course, how “neutral” the net becomes depends on whether you’re connecting the old fashioned way, by a wire running into your house, or through the gee whiz magic of wireless service. The wireless providers get a break because evidently they aren’t charging enough already or something.
This got us wondering what the ISPs across this great land think about the concept of net neutrality, so we put our ace investigative reporter, Ms. Dos, on it because the public has to know! Lo-and-behold-and-would-you-believe-it, she discovered that the ISPs are dead set against even the thought of net neutrality. Who would’ve guessed?
Our reporter didn’t stop there, she delved deeper in a quest to find out exactly what the ISPs don’t like about the new requirements, and came up with a long list of reasons. We’re only going to give you 10, in case we need the rest for another Top 10 list later on.
- High bandwidth users must be doing something illegal and we want a piece of the action.
- You think you should be able to hook up a server farm to our system and be charged like you’re a single user? Hey, it happens all the time.
- Why should Netflix, Google and Amazon make all the bucks?
- You wouldn’t believe the strain that just one movie puts on that old Univac vacuum tube computer of ours.
- Electricity and water are metered, so why should Internet use be any different? It’s the American way.
- Hey Netflix, wanna keep our customers as your customers? Show us the money.
- We don’t want to run a well managed business, we want a license to print money.
- We’re adopting the Gambino business plan.
- Just how much data do you think we can push through those little wires anyway?
- Buy your movies directly from us. No throttling guaranteed!
Well, that’s the top ten reasons why ISPs are against Internet neutrality that we know about. Perhaps you know about a few of your own that you can tell us about below….
On the subject of net neutrality, Bob Gibson, Executive Director of the University of Virginia’s Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership, recently said: “It’s a debate that is going on in the Congress, and it’s really: Is the Internet going to be something that everyone has free and open access to, or, is it going to be something that is sort of controlled? What we don’t need is a lot of government control in the businesses of the internet. I think what we need is more of what we have with National Public Radio, which is a really true and balanced set of reporting that unfortunately has become politicized. What we are seeing is a shift from “anything goes” on the Internet to a shift where major corporations are shaping the news outlets and buying up more and more of the news outlets and putting them under corporate control and one set of a small number of hands…. We need freeware, we need shareware, and we need open access. People need to be able to trust sources that they can find on the internet, rather than have them controlled in a small number of hands or by the government.” (Gibson appeared on the Charlottesville, VA, politics interview program Politics Matters with host and producer Jan Madeleine Paynter discussing journalism http://bit.ly/pm-gibson)
Nine of these comments (the Gambino comment is the exception) make the same comment: “The ISP wants people to pay for the amount of the pipe they consume.”
With the network as designed, it’s not possible, but suppose you neighbor could and did consume the whole pipe to your house (think of the old cable days). Would the be acceptable? What is wrong with charging for data instead of bandwidth? It would incentivize the ISPs to provide what we ultimately want. Data! If they want to sell more data they will have to provide the bandwidth. Data which cannot be provided in a timely fashion (video, e.g.) will not be sold and will not make the ISP any money.
It’s a bit unfortunate that the writer decided to try to be funny (and failed). The objections of ISPs against net-neutrality could have been summed up as they are, with some clarification if it isn’t immediately obvious what the problem is.
The basic idea of net-neutrality: the ISP sells bandwidth, you decide how to use it. The ISP delivers what you request, regardless of the content or deliverer. Pretty simple, however…
1. I’m an ISP who caters for religious subscribers and I offer filtered internet. When net-neutrality is forced, I can no longer offer my customers internet as they want it. No, technical alternatives won’t do.
2. I’m not an ISP! I’m a Telephone Company! I don’t sell internet, I sell smart phones with data plans. You don’t buy bandwidth from me, you buy the right to Skype or visit Youtube. At least for as long those companies pay us to deliver their signal.
3. I’m an ISP and I love net-neutrality. However, to ensure the best possible use of my network for the benefit of my customers, I use DPI (Deep Packet Inspection) to monitor the use of my network. I will not abuse this for privacy sensitive things nor will I use the data to charge content deliverers for the same bandwidth as I charge my customers. Honestly.
4. I’m an ISP and I’m bound by the same laws as everyone else. Or maybe not but that’s not the point. However, as an ISP I’m not allowed and I don’t want to be an accomplish to child pornography and cyberterrorism. Oh, and piracy of intellectual property. Net-neutrality harms the job creators! And children!
5. Net-neutrality is an inexcusable incursion into the free market by the government. If anything, ISPs (& TelCos) need protection against the vagaries of consumers!
Because, when you think of it, it’s not neutral at all. Our lobby efforts will surely set this aberration straight but we like to make sure it won’t come up again when there’s another unreasonable communist politician in search for some populist fascist votes.
Before you accuse me of also trying to and failing to be funny: I’m from the Netherlands and we have legislation for net-neutrality (which doesn’t make things any funnier but anyway).
Point 3 was the reason we got that law in the first place. It became known that TelCos used DPI and made plans to make money from it.
Point 1 was an objection that nearly derailed the initiative even though it didn’t have anything to do with it (the legislative initiative was fueled by the behavior of the TelCos, not those few (4) ISPs-for-christians).
Point 2 is the reason TelCos didn’t want net-neutrality. They originally sold calls + SMS + unlimited data but then customers figured out that using the data was more interesting, especially since you could call and text message over the internet. TelCos are used to charge per call, SMS, MMS et cetera. Selling bandwidth isn’t interesting to them.
Point 5 was brought up by a member of parliament, formerly a managing director of the former state telecom company. She even had the nerve to suggest that net-neutrality would turn the Netherlands into something resembling North Korea.
Forcing unilateral restrictions to information is painful and unacceptable to all those who do not agree with the restriction.
However, if we allow access unilaterally, but give every individual a tool which can restrict access to information based on their ideals, we can avoid the situation of *any* individual feeling hard done by. Thats to say, **everyone** gets what they want, without having to compromise.
This tool already exists in many forms. Its sometimes referred to as Parental Guidance or Net Nanny software.
As for the pedophile argument, or the p2p traffic “problem”, consider this:
In England, we have very restrictive gun laws. Obviously, these gun laws were implemented to stop anyone using guns to shoot people. Unfortunately though, shootings in London are just as frequent as in most other worldly cities. This tells me two things:
A, Those that want guns to shoot people, will get them, laws or not.
B, Those who do not have guns because it is illegal, yet would like them for self defense, are now far more vulnerable to the whims of those with guns then if the law had not existed.
Result: The burglar with a gun that wants to break into your house, or, the coming of age teenager who wants to prove themselves knows it is VERY unlikely you will be able to defend yourself. Thus, the balance of power shifts to those who want to do bad things. Exactly the opposite of what most people think.
Any unilateral restriction placed on the net will result in exactly the opposite of its intended aim.
So please, anybody who thinks restrictions are a good thing, download an application that blocks what you do not want to see, and leave everyelse to make up their own minds.
Thank you!