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Net neutrality demise

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  Net neutrality demise RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-11-21 17:29 -0500
    Re: Net neutrality demise RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-11-21 17:33 -0500
    Re: Net neutrality demise Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2017-11-21 22:57 +0000
      Re: Net neutrality demise The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> - 2017-11-22 13:38 -0800
        Re: Net neutrality demise Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2017-11-22 21:59 +0000
          Re: Net neutrality demise RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-11-26 18:58 -0500
            Re: Net neutrality demise Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2017-11-27 02:12 +0000
              Re: Net neutrality demise Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-11-27 08:34 +0000
                Re: Net neutrality demise RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-11-27 15:52 -0500
                  Re: Net neutrality demise Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2017-11-28 08:04 +0200
                  Re: Net neutrality demise Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-11-28 08:35 +0000
            Re: Net neutrality demise Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-11-27 08:32 +0000
              Re: Net neutrality demise Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2017-11-28 02:13 -0400
                Re: Net neutrality demise Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-11-28 09:29 +0000
                  Re: Net neutrality demise Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2017-11-28 10:29 +0000
                  Re: Net neutrality demise Paul Sture <nospam@sture.ch> - 2017-11-28 13:56 +0100
                Re: Net neutrality demise Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2017-11-28 11:01 +0000
        Re: Net neutrality demise Larry Sheldon <lfsheldon@gmail.com> - 2017-11-23 23:04 -0600
    Net neutrality is dead RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-12-14 14:49 -0500
      Re: Net neutrality is dead Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-12-14 21:57 +0000
        Re: Net neutrality is dead snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe) - 2017-12-14 22:23 +0000
          Re: Net neutrality is dead RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-12-15 01:00 +0000
          Re: Net neutrality is dead Paul Sture <nospam@sture.ch> - 2017-12-15 16:19 +0100
          Re: Net neutrality is dead Marko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> - 2017-12-15 18:18 +0200
            Re: Net neutrality is dead Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2017-12-16 01:55 -0400
        Re: Net neutrality is dead Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2017-12-16 21:24 +0000
          Re: Net neutrality is dead Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2017-12-17 10:15 +0000
            Re: Net neutrality is dead Paul Sture <nospam@sture.ch> - 2017-12-17 14:54 +0100
              Re: Net neutrality is dead Peter Mc Donough <mcd-mail-lists@gmx.net> - 2017-12-17 18:27 +0100
                Re: Net neutrality is dead Paul Sture <nospam@sture.ch> - 2017-12-20 10:19 +0100
                  Re: Net neutrality is dead Peter Mc Donough <mcd-mail-lists@gmx.net> - 2017-12-23 14:57 +0100
            Re: Net neutrality is dead RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2017-12-18 00:12 +0000
              Re: Net neutrality is dead Larry Sheldon <lfsheldon@gmail.com> - 2017-12-17 19:25 -0600
            Re: Net neutrality is dead Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2017-12-20 02:02 +0000
              Re: Net neutrality is dead arnold@skeeve.com (Aharon Robbins) - 2017-12-20 19:18 +0000
                Re: Net neutrality is dead Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2017-12-23 03:50 +0000
      Re: Net neutrality is dead RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2018-06-11 14:29 -0400
        Re: Net neutrality is dead RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2018-06-12 12:34 -0400
          Re: Net neutrality is dead Sylvia Else <sylvia@not.at.this.address> - 2018-06-18 12:05 +1000

Page 2 of 2 — ← Prev page 1 [2]

#15154 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:

> On 2017-12-14, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> > On Tue, 21 Nov 2017 17:29:49 -0500
> > RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> >
> > Well, congratulations to the oligarchs: they did it.
> > https://nypost.com/2017/12/14/fcc-repeals-landmark-net-neutrality-rules/
> >
> > //-- clip
> >
> > WASHINGTON — The US Federal Communications Commission voted along party
> > lines Thursday to repeal landmark 2015 rules aimed at ensuring a free
> > and open internet, 
> 
> Sad now.

Don't be sad, it's the way of the world.  The money drives 
everything; just accept that and it won't hurt so much.

-- 
^Ï^.           Sn!pe           <snipeco.1@gmail.com>

My pet rock Gordon just is.
 

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#15158 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-14, Sn!pe <snipeco.2@gmail.com> wrote:
> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>
>> On 2017-12-14, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> > On Tue, 21 Nov 2017 17:29:49 -0500
>> > RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > Well, congratulations to the oligarchs: they did it.
>> > https://nypost.com/2017/12/14/fcc-repeals-landmark-net-neutrality-rules/
>> >
>> > //-- clip
>> >
>> > WASHINGTON — The US Federal Communications Commission voted along party
>> > lines Thursday to repeal landmark 2015 rules aimed at ensuring a free
>> > and open internet, 
>> 
>> Sad now.
>
> Don't be sad, it's the way of the world.  The money drives 
> everything; just accept that and it won't hurt so much.
>

So, according to that article, the article was: "everything was working fine
prior to 2015, and then that scumbag Obama imposed this extra burden of
regulation upon us, and it's not fair, waaa, waaa, waaah."

But ostensibly that regulation was a reasonable safeguard.  Just because no
one had ever behaved badly doesn't preclude them from doing so.  And in
fact, in a weird, perverse way, somehow the freedom of having the rules
lifted almost feels like an invitation to behave badly.

Big money bought this government, and is now exacting the pound of flesh
they feel they deserve.  Airlines got a present this Xmas, now telecom has
too.  Oil and coal will get theirs soon enough, I'm sure.

Getting tougher and tougher to be a start up these days, that's for sure:
the big guns are doing what they can to close the doors of the walled
garden, and get out the milking equipment.

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#15159 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-14, Sn!pe <snipeco.2@gmail.com> wrote:
> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>
>> On 2017-12-14, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> > On Tue, 21 Nov 2017 17:29:49 -0500
>> > RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > Well, congratulations to the oligarchs: they did it.
>> > https://nypost.com/2017/12/14/fcc-repeals-landmark-net-neutrality-rules/
>> >
>> > //-- clip
>> >
>> > WASHINGTON — The US Federal Communications Commission voted along party
>> > lines Thursday to repeal landmark 2015 rules aimed at ensuring a free
>> > and open internet, 
>> 
>> Sad now.
>
> Don't be sad, it's the way of the world.  The money drives 
> everything; just accept that and it won't hurt so much.

A cynical but light hearted look at the situation:

<https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/14/net_neutrality_vote_great/>

I've a feeling the comments section is going to run and run on that one.

-- 
Never underestimate the bandwidth of sending the office gossip for the
coffee every day...

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#15160 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):

> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>> Sad now.
>
> Don't be sad, it's the way of the world. The money drives everything;
> just accept that and it won't hurt so much.

The world is the world, but the US has a Constitution, whose 1st
Amendment famously states:

   Government shall not encroach on the right to make a buck.


Marko

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#15163 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

M
arko Rauhamaa <marko@pacujo.net> writes:

> snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
> 
>> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> Sad now.
>>
>> Don't be sad, it's the way of the world. The money drives everything;
>> just accept that and it won't hurt so much.
> 
> The world is the world, but the US has a Constitution, whose 1st
> Amendment famously states:
> 
>    Government shall not encroach on the right to make a buck.

Not, of course, in those explicit words.  The US Declaration of
Independence was big on "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness".
In the ensuing years, during the debates over what the country should
become, liberty was upstaged by -- the revolution hijacked by --
private property. 

Madison rated posession of property equal to or above liberty
(Federalist #10), a view echoed a couple of centuries later by George
Bush I, "free markets and free elections" where he put markets first.
And the US Constitution went Madison's way.

Further reading: _Private Property and the imits of the American
COnstitution_, Jennifer Nedelsky, U.Chicago, 1990.

-- 
Mike Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada

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#15165 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-14, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> Sad now.

I don't know, are people's lives so wrapped up in the danged internet
at this point that this is such a big deal? Aside from work, I find the
'net convenient for certain things and use it for a few items of interest,
but could certainly live without it.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Roger Blake (Posts from Google Groups killfiled due to excess spam.)

  NSA sedition and treason        -- http://www.DeathToNSAthugs.com
  Don't talk to cops!             -- http://www.DontTalkToCops.com
  Badges don't grant extra rights -- http://www.CopBlock.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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#15166 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-16, Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> wrote:
> On 2017-12-14, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>> Sad now.
>
> I don't know, are people's lives so wrapped up in the danged internet
> at this point that this is such a big deal?

Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to people
other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that will happen.


-- 
Today is Sweetmorn, the 59th day of The Aftermath in the YOLD 3183
        Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.

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#15167 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> On 2017-12-16, Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> wrote:
>> On 2017-12-14, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>>> Sad now.
>>
>> I don't know, are people's lives so wrapped up in the danged internet
>> at this point that this is such a big deal?
>
> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to
> people other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that
> will happen.
>

I had a small foretaste of that in the mid-nineties when folks in the UK
who could were bailing out of BT by switching to alternate providers.

I tried calling BT's Directory Enquiries to get the number of someone
who had switched and was told that without the name of the alternate
provider they couldn't help me.

-- 
Never underestimate the bandwidth of sending the office gossip for the
coffee every day...

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#15168 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

Am 17.12.2017 um 14:54 schrieb Paul Sture:
> On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
...
>>
>> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to
>> people other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that
>> will happen.
> 
> I had a small foretaste of that in the mid-nineties when folks in the UK
> who could were bailing out of BT by switching to alternate providers.
> 
> I tried calling BT's Directory Enquiries to get the number of someone
> who had switched and was told that without the name of the alternate
> provider they couldn't help me.

Which makes sense. Looking up a number cost time and that is money. Why 
should they spend what you save?.

cu
Peter

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#15175 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-17, Peter Mc Donough <mcd-mail-lists@gmx.net> wrote:
> Am 17.12.2017 um 14:54 schrieb Paul Sture:
>> On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> ...
>>>
>>> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to
>>> people other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that
>>> will happen.
>> 
>> I had a small foretaste of that in the mid-nineties when folks in the UK
>> who could were bailing out of BT by switching to alternate providers.
>> 
>> I tried calling BT's Directory Enquiries to get the number of someone
>> who had switched and was told that without the name of the alternate
>> provider they couldn't help me.
>
> Which makes sense. Looking up a number cost time and that is money. Why 
> should they spend what you save?.

You are missing the point.  The fact that I suddenly needed to know
someone's supplier was completely unexpected.  I'd not heard it
discussed in any of the news items about Directory Enquiries that I'd
listened to.

BT had already started charging for Directory Enquiries at that point,
so it was in the news.  IIRC the old free/minimal cost system had been
abused by business users seeking whole batches of numbers in a single
call, with the result that the new charges also introduced a maximum
or 2 (or 3?) enquiries per call.

-- 
Never underestimate the bandwidth of sending the office gossip for the
coffee every day...

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#15179 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

Am 20.12.2017 um 10:19 schrieb Paul Sture:
> On 2017-12-17, Peter Mc Donough <mcd-mail-lists@gmx.net> wrote:
>> Am 17.12.2017 um 14:54 schrieb Paul Sture:
>>> On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>>> ...
>>> I tried calling BT's Directory Enquiries to get the number of someone
>>> who had switched and was told that without the name of the alternate
>>> provider they couldn't help me.
>>
>> Which makes sense. Looking up a number cost time and that is money. Why
>> should they spend what you save?.
> 
> You are missing the point.  The fact that I suddenly needed to know
> someone's supplier was completely unexpected.  I'd not heard it
> discussed in any of the news items about Directory Enquiries that I'd
> listened to.

You are right.
What I noticed, that often people expect some service without 
considering that providing that service will have to be paid by group 
"somebody". They are then astonished that they are suddenly assigned to 
group "somebody".

cu
Peter

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#15169 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to people
> other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that will happen.

They can call it ... Compuserve.  Or AOL, either of which refuses to
communicate with the other in the year 1993.

I've always thought we'll sooner or later revisit the age of BBSes.  But it
now occurs to me it won't be the sort of revolutionary act I'd thought, but
rather because competing systems wall each other off (Google refuses to let
Amazon devices broadcast Youtube; Amazon refuses to sell Chrome streaming
devices), effectively forcing us into that type of ecosystem by design.

Hope I get lumped in with the kermudgeons, because that's where I'll fit in.

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#15170 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 12/17/2017 18:12, RS Wood wrote:
> On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to people
>> other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that will happen.
> 
> They can call it ... Compuserve.  Or AOL, either of which refuses to
> communicate with the other in the year 1993.
> 
> I've always thought we'll sooner or later revisit the age of BBSes.  But it
> now occurs to me it won't be the sort of revolutionary act I'd thought, but
> rather because competing systems wall each other off (Google refuses to let
> Amazon devices broadcast YouTube; Amazon refuses to sell Chrome streaming
> devices), effectively forcing us into that type of ecosystem by design.
> 
> Hope I get lumped in with the curmudgeons, because that's where I'll fit in.

I'll stay, as always, with the lowercase "r" republicans.

http://www.bookwormroom.com/2017/12/15/bookworm-beat-121517-net-neutrality/


-- 
quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
-- Juvenal

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#15174 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to people
> other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that will happen.

How do you know that will happen? (I would just go to another phone provider.
There are many.)

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Roger Blake (Posts from Google Groups killfiled due to excess spam.)

  NSA sedition and treason        -- http://www.DeathToNSAthugs.com
  Don't talk to cops!             -- http://www.DontTalkToCops.com
  Badges don't grant extra rights -- http://www.CopBlock.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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#15176 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

In article <20171219210059@news.eternal-september.org>,
Roger Blake  <rogblake@iname.invalid> wrote:
>On 2017-12-17, Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
>> Imagine that your telephone provider won't allow you to make calls to people
>> other than its own customers. That's the kind of thing that will happen.
>
>How do you know that will happen? (I would just go to another phone provider.
>There are many.)

See 

https://np.reddit.com/r/NeutralPolitics/comments/7i595b/will_the_repeal_of_net_neutrality_actually_help/dqwzn1g/

If past behavior is an indicator, things will not be good.
-- 
Aharon (Arnold) Robbins 		arnold AT skeeve DOT com

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#15178 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 2017-12-20, Aharon Robbins <arnold@skeeve.com> wrote:
> https://np.reddit.com/r/NeutralPolitics/comments/7i595b/will_the_repeal_of_net_neutrality_actually_help/dqwzn1g/
>
> If past behavior is an indicator, things will not be good.

Doesn't really matter to me, since I make little use of the internet despite
having worked with it since the 1980s. It can be fun or informative at times
but in the end it just does not seem all that important. I would have no
problem living without the 'net if it came down to it.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Roger Blake (Posts from Google Groups killfiled due to excess spam.)

  NSA sedition and treason        -- http://www.DeathToNSAthugs.com
  Don't talk to cops!             -- http://www.DontTalkToCops.com
  Badges don't grant extra rights -- http://www.CopBlock.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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#16079 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On Thu, 14 Dec 2017 14:49:25 -0500
RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> Internet service providers say they will not block or throttle legal
> content but that they may engage in paid prioritization. They say
> consumers will see no change and argue that the largely unregulated
> internet functioned well in the two decades before the 2015 order.
> 

It's official:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/net-neutrality-repeal.html

Net neutrality is dead in America.  Can't wait to see all the awesome
innovation America's tech sector is now free to explore: bundled
internet packages, premium websites, pay-to-play.  Let's do to the
internet what we did to cable tv - that seemed to work pretty well,
didn't it?*


* if your definition of success is monetizing the slow, expensive death
of a platform for short-term profit.

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#16087 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On Mon, 11 Jun 2018 14:29:55 -0400
RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:

> On Thu, 14 Dec 2017 14:49:25 -0500
> RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> > Internet service providers say they will not block or throttle legal
> > content but that they may engage in paid prioritization. They say
> > consumers will see no change and argue that the largely unregulated
> > internet functioned well in the two decades before the 2015 order.
> > 
> 
> It's official:
> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/net-neutrality-repeal.html
> 
> Net neutrality is dead in America.  Can't wait to see all the awesome
> innovation America's tech sector is now free to explore: bundled
> internet packages, premium websites, pay-to-play.  Let's do to the
> internet what we did to cable tv - that seemed to work pretty well,
> didn't it?*
> 
> 
> * if your definition of success is monetizing the slow, expensive death
> of a platform for short-term profit.
> 

Interesting piece from NYT:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/how-net-neutrality-repeal.html

Today, the internet is run by giants. A handful of American tech
behemoths — Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft — control the
most important digital infrastructure, while a handful of broadband
companies — AT&T, Charter, Comcast and Verizon — control most of the
internet connections in the United States.

The very idea that large companies can’t dictate what happens online is
laughable now. Large companies, today, pretty much are the internet. In
this world, net neutrality didn’t have a chance.

So, what now?

There’s a misunderstanding that the repeal of net neutrality will
result in immediate and drastic change online. That won’t happen. With
lawsuits and legislation pending, with the media still paying attention
and with activists poised to pounce on obvious infractions, broadband
companies are going to be extremely careful, in the short run, to be on
their best behavior. The internet won’t be slower tomorrow. You won’t
be blocked from certain sites. You aren’t going to be charged more.

But as I argued last fall, a vibrant network doesn’t die all at once.
Instead it grows weaker over time, with innovative start-ups finding it
ever more difficult to fight entrenched incumbents.

As I’ve noted often in the last few years, big companies have been
crushing small ones over and over again for much of the last decade.
One lesson from everything that has happened online recently —
Facebook, the Russians and Cambridge Analytica; bots and misinformation
everywhere — is that, in the absence stringent rules and enforcement,
everything on the internet turns sour. Removing the last barriers to
unfair competition will only hasten that process.

It’s not going to be pretty.

“History shows us that companies that have the technical capacity to do
things, the business incentive to do them and the legal right — they
will take advantage of what is made available to them,” said Jessica
Rosenworcel, an F.C.C. commissioner and a Democrat, who voted against
the repeal of net neutrality last year.

By repealing neutrality rules, the government has just given our online
overlords that legal right, she cautioned.

“Now they can block websites and censor online content,” Ms.
Rosenworcel said. “That doesn’t make me feel good — and if you rely on
the internet to consume or create, it shouldn’t make you feel good,
either.”

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#16093 — Re: Net neutrality is dead

On 13/06/2018 2:34 AM, RS Wood wrote:
> On Mon, 11 Jun 2018 14:29:55 -0400
> RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> 
>> On Thu, 14 Dec 2017 14:49:25 -0500
>> RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>>> Internet service providers say they will not block or throttle legal
>>> content but that they may engage in paid prioritization. They say
>>> consumers will see no change and argue that the largely unregulated
>>> internet functioned well in the two decades before the 2015 order.
>>>
>>
>> It's official:
>> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/net-neutrality-repeal.html
>>
>> Net neutrality is dead in America.  Can't wait to see all the awesome
>> innovation America's tech sector is now free to explore: bundled
>> internet packages, premium websites, pay-to-play.  Let's do to the
>> internet what we did to cable tv - that seemed to work pretty well,
>> didn't it?*
>>
>>
>> * if your definition of success is monetizing the slow, expensive death
>> of a platform for short-term profit.
>>
> 
> Interesting piece from NYT:
> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/how-net-neutrality-repeal.html
> 
> Today, the internet is run by giants. A handful of American tech
> behemoths — Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft — control the
> most important digital infrastructure, while a handful of broadband
> companies — AT&T, Charter, Comcast and Verizon — control most of the
> internet connections in the United States.
> 
> The very idea that large companies can’t dictate what happens online is
> laughable now. Large companies, today, pretty much are the internet. In
> this world, net neutrality didn’t have a chance.
> 
> So, what now?
> 
> There’s a misunderstanding that the repeal of net neutrality will
> result in immediate and drastic change online. That won’t happen. With
> lawsuits and legislation pending, with the media still paying attention
> and with activists poised to pounce on obvious infractions, broadband
> companies are going to be extremely careful, in the short run, to be on
> their best behavior. The internet won’t be slower tomorrow. You won’t
> be blocked from certain sites. You aren’t going to be charged more.
> 
> But as I argued last fall, a vibrant network doesn’t die all at once.
> Instead it grows weaker over time, with innovative start-ups finding it
> ever more difficult to fight entrenched incumbents.
> 
> As I’ve noted often in the last few years, big companies have been
> crushing small ones over and over again for much of the last decade.
> One lesson from everything that has happened online recently —
> Facebook, the Russians and Cambridge Analytica; bots and misinformation
> everywhere — is that, in the absence stringent rules and enforcement,
> everything on the internet turns sour. Removing the last barriers to
> unfair competition will only hasten that process.
> 
> It’s not going to be pretty.
> 
> “History shows us that companies that have the technical capacity to do
> things, the business incentive to do them and the legal right — they
> will take advantage of what is made available to them,” said Jessica
> Rosenworcel, an F.C.C. commissioner and a Democrat, who voted against
> the repeal of net neutrality last year.
> 
> By repealing neutrality rules, the government has just given our online
> overlords that legal right, she cautioned.
> 
> “Now they can block websites and censor online content,” Ms.
> Rosenworcel said. “That doesn’t make me feel good — and if you rely on
> the internet to consume or create, it shouldn’t make you feel good,
> either.”
> 
> 
The underlying problem is that last-mile delivery of internet access is 
a natural monopoly, just as it is for electricity, gas, water and 
sewage. It's next to impossible for find a business case for parallel 
construction of such infrastructure, even if the incumbent is prevented 
from improving its service or cutting its prices to see off the 
interloper (as it would usually do).

In Australia, we are seeing the national broadband network being 
constructed for last-mile delivery. While its implementation has been 
somewhat bungled, the principle is sound, and presumably it will work 
properly eventually. I only hope that some future government doesn't 
sell it to the highest bidder with few if any restrictions in a short 
term cash grab (there is some precedents for a government doing that - 
see Sydney Airport for an example).

Until the US government sees the light, the US consumer is going to get 
ripped off.

Sylvia.

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