"Restoring Internet Freedom"

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"Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby chump » Mon Nov 20, 2017 12:08 pm


https://www.fcc.gov/restoring-internet-freedom
Restoring Internet Freedom

The FCC has proposed to return the U.S. to the bipartisan, light-touch regulatory framework under which a free and open Internet flourished for almost 20 years. The FCC's May 2017 proposal to roll back the prior Administration's heavy-handed Internet regulation strives to advance the FCC's critical work to promote broadband deployment in rural America and infrastructure investment throughout the nation, to brighten the future of innovation both within networks and at their edge, and to close the digital divide.

From passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 until 2015, the Internet underwent rapid, and unprecedented, growth. Internet service providers (ISPs) invested approximately $1.5 trillion in building networks, and American consumers enthusiastically responded. The Internet became an ever-increasing part of the American economy, offering new and innovative changes in how we work, learn, and play, receive health care, create and enjoy entertainment, and communicate with one another. During that time, there was bipartisan agreement that the Internet should be free of burdensome regulation so that it could continue to flourish.

Two years ago, the FCC abruptly changed course. On a party-line vote, the FCC applied 1930s-era utility-style regulation ("Title II") to the Internet. That decision appears to have put at risk online investment and innovation, threatening the very open Internet it purported to preserve. Requiring ISPs to divert resources to comply with unnecessary and broad new regulatory requirements threatens to take away from their ability to make investments that benefit consumers. The lack of clarity around what Title II requires ISPs to do further appears to harm investment and have particularly harmful effects on small ISPs.

Under Chairman Pai's leadership, the FCC has proposed returning to the longstanding light-touch regulatory framework for the Internet and restoring the market-based policies necessary to preserve the future of Internet Freedom. Specifically, the FCC has proposed to:

Reinstate the "information service" classification of broadband Internet access service first established on a bipartisan basis during the Clinton Administration.
Restore the determination that mobile broadband is not a "commercial mobile service" subject to heavy-handed regulation.
Restore the authority of the nation's most experienced cop on the privacy beat – the Federal Trade Commission – to police the privacy practices of ISPs.

The FCC also is exploring how best to honor its longstanding commitment to Internet Freedom. Starting in 2004, the FCC promoted four principles for Internet Freedom to ensure that the Internet would remain a place for free and open innovation with minimal regulation. These four "Internet Freedoms" include the freedom to access lawful content, the freedom to use applications, the freedom to attach personal devices to the network, and the freedom to obtain service plan information.

To restore Internet Freedom, the FCC has proposed to examine the utility-style Title II rules to determine whether regulatory intervention in the market is necessary. The FCC has asked for comment on whether to keep, modify, or eliminate these "bright-line rules" adopted in 2015. And the FCC specifically has proposed to eliminate the vague "general Internet conduct standard," which gives the FCC far-reaching discretion to prohibit any ISP practice that it believes runs afoul of a long and incomplete list of factors. The FCC also proposed to conduct a cost-benefit analysis as a part of its analysis.

By exploring ways to reduce needless red tape, the Commission hopes that these proposals will spur broadband deployment throughout the country, bringing better, faster Internet service to more Americans and boosting competition and choice in the broadband marketplace.

The FCC is in the midst of a comment period on its proposals and encourages public participation. Comments are due by July 17, 2017, and reply comments are due by August 16, 2017. Comments may be filed via the FCC's Electronic Comment Filing System in WC Docket No. 17-108.


=======================

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... ember-vote

FCC Plans December Vote to Kill Net Neutrality Rules
By Todd Shields
November 15, 2017, 12:22 PM MST Updated on November 15, 2017, 3:20 PM MST

FCC Chairman Pai to set vote overturning Obama-era regulations
Rules ban interfering in web traffic or favoring content
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission next month is planning a vote to kill Obama-era rules demanding fair treatment of web traffic and may decide to vacate the regulations altogether, according to people familiar with the plans.

The move would reignite a years-long debate that has seen Republicans and broadband providers seeking to eliminate the rules, while Democrats and technology companies support them. The regulations passed in 2015 bar broadband providers such as AT&T Inc. and Comcast Corp. from interfering with web traffic sent by Google, Facebook Inc. and others.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, chosen by President Donald Trump, in April proposed gutting the rules and asked for public reaction. The agency has taken in more than 22 million comments on the matter.

Pai plans to seek a vote in December, said two people who asked not to be identified because the matter hasn’t been made public. As the head of a Republican majority, he is likely to win a vote on whatever he proposes.

One of the people said Pai may call for vacating the rules except for portions that mandate internet service providers inform customers about their practices -- one of the more severe options that would please broadband providers. They argue the FCC’s rules aren’t needed and discourage investment, in part because they subject companies to complex and unpredictable regulations.

Democrats and technology companies say the rules are needed to make sure telecommunications providers don’t favor business partners or harm rivals.

Why Republicans Want to Nix U.S. Net Neutrality Rules: QuickTake

The agency declined to comment on the timing of a vote. “We don’t have anything to report at this point,” said Tina Pelkey, a spokeswoman for the commission.

Pai in April proposed that the FCC end the designation of broadband companies as common carriers. That would remove the legal authority that underpins the net neutrality rules.

Pai could also choose not to find authority in the FCC’s powers to promote broadband. That would leave the rules without an apparent legal footing, leading in turn to a conclusion the agency lacks authority even to issue revised, less-stringent regulations.

The April proposal also asked the agency to consider lifting bans on blocking web traffic or on building “fast lanes” that favor those willing to pay more for faster service.
Immediate Reaction

News of the December vote drew immediate reactions.

“Abandoning bipartisan net neutrality principles threatens to kill the streaming revolution and will hurt businesses, large and small, who are migrating to the cloud at record speeds,” said Chip Pickering, chief executive officer of the Incompas trade group with members including online shopping giant Amazon.com Inc. and video streamer Netflix Inc.

“Chairman Pai’s affection for AT&T and Comcast holds great political risk for President Trump and the entire Republican Party,” Pickering said in an emailed statement. “No one wants to see the internet turned into cable and have to pay more for streaming services they love."

Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, part of the FCC’s Democratic minority, said the agency is headed down a “destructive path” that doesn’t help consumers...

con'd


https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/net-neutrality

https://boingboing.net/?s=net+neutrality

http://www.battleforthenet.com
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Wed Nov 22, 2017 10:46 am

Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sat Nov 25, 2017 10:08 am

Schneiderman wrote that someone had launched a “massive scheme” to bombard the FCC’s public forum with fake anti-regulation messages sent using identities of real Americans — some deceased.



Image


TRUMP ADMINISTRATION DETERMINED TO KILL NET NEUTRALITY
In just three weeks, the freedom with which Americans have navigated the web — a terrain that seems as expansive as the universe — may become a thing of the past.

On Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) unveiled a plan to gut net neutrality, the principle that aims to establish a level playing field online. A final vote is scheduled for December 14.

Getting rid of net neutrality would give broadband providers like Comcast and Verizon license to assign faster browsing speeds to platforms that can afford higher premiums — Google, YouTube, Facebook — and essentially throttle smaller services that can’t, including those that compete with the provider’s own services. (Verizon, for example, may grant perks to Yahoo, which it acquired this summer).

Providers would amass the power to decide which content gets heard.

Just hours after the FCC announced its assault on net neutrality,  New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman penned an open letter to Chairman Ajit Pai and accused him of stonewalling a probe into fraudulent comments posted to the agency’s website.

Schneiderman wrote that someone had launched a “massive scheme” to bombard the FCC’s public forum with fake anti-regulation messages sent using identities of real Americans — some deceased.

His office has been investigating the alleged mass identity theft for the past six months — but more than nine record requests made to the FCC yielded no substantive response.

The hoax comments supporting the FCC’s new rule change can be seen as an attempt to neutralize the much larger force on the other side. Two-thirds of the comments on the FCC’s site were against the dissolution of net neutrality rules, according to a study funded by lobbying group Broadband for America.

Proponents of the net neutrality repeal insist that allowing providers to regulate browsing speed and charge for premium access will spur investment and growth — though little credible evidence has been found in support of that claim.

Some supporters claim that a small number of providers already control much of the country’s Internet bandwidth, and that web giants with deep pockets already operate in the fast lane. Better, they argue, to increase competition on the supply side, and prevent the recent Comcast-Time Warner merger from becoming the norm.

The videos below provide a short overview of what net neutrality means, and how its repeal could affect consumers.


https://whowhatwhy.org/2017/11/25/trump ... eutrality/
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby chump » Sun Nov 26, 2017 9:40 am




https://medium.com/@AGSchneiderman/an-o ... 67a763850a
Eric Schneiderman
Official Medium account of New York State Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman.
Nov 21
An Open Letter to the FCC:

Dear FCC Chairman Ajit Pai:

As you recently announced, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), under your leadership, soon will release rules to dismantle your agency’s existing “net neutrality” protections under Title II of the Communications Act, which shield the public from anti-consumer behaviors of the giant cable companies that provide high-speed internet to most people. In today’s digital age, the rules that govern the operation and delivery of internet service to hundreds of millions of Americans are critical to the economic and social well-being of the nation. Yet the process the FCC has employed to consider potentially sweeping alterations to current net neutrality rules has been corrupted by the fraudulent use of Americans’ identities — and the FCC has been unwilling to assist my office in our efforts to investigate this unlawful activity.

Specifically, for six months my office has been investigating who perpetrated a massive scheme to corrupt the FCC’s notice and comment process through the misuse of enormous numbers of real New Yorkers’ and other Americans’ identities. Such conduct likely violates state law — yet the FCC has refused multiple requests for crucial evidence in its sole possession that is vital to permit that law enforcement investigation to proceed.

In April 2017, the FCC announced that it would issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking concerning repeal of its existing net neutrality rules. Federal law requires the FCC and all federal agencies to take public comments on proposed rules into account — so it is important that the public comment process actually enable the voices of the millions of individuals and businesses who will be affected to be heard. That’s important no matter one’s position on net neutrality, environmental rules, and so many other areas in which federal agencies regulate.

In May 2017, researchers and reporters discovered that the FCC’s public comment process was being corrupted by the submission of enormous numbers of fake comments concerning the possible repeal of net neutrality rules. In doing so, the perpetrator or perpetrators attacked what is supposed to be an open public process by attempting to drown out and negate the views of the real people, businesses, and others who honestly commented on this important issue. Worse, while some of these fake comments used made up
names and addresses, many misused the real names and addresses of actual people as part of the effort to undermine the integrity of the comment process. That’s akin to identity theft, and it happened on a massive scale.

My office analyzed the fake comments and found that tens of thousands of New Yorkers may have had their identities misused in this way. (Indeed, analysis showed that, in all, hundreds of thousands of Americans likely were victimized in the same way, including tens of thousands per state in California, Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, and possibly others.) Impersonation and other misuse of a person’s identity violates New York law, so my office launched an investigation.

Successfully investigating this sort of illegal conduct requires the participation of the agency whose system was attacked. So in June 2017, we contacted the FCC to request certain records related to its public comment system that were necessary to investigate which bad actor or actors were behind the misconduct. We made our request for logs and other records at least 9 times over 5 months: in June, July, August, September, October (three times), and November.

We reached out for assistance to multiple top FCC officials, including you, three successive acting FCC General Counsels, and the FCC’s Inspector General. We offered to keep the requested records confidential, as we had done when my office and the FCC shared information and documents as part of past investigative work.

Yet we have received no substantive response to our investigative requests. None.

This investigation isn’t about the substantive issues concerning net neutrality. For my part, I have long publicly advocated for strong net neutrality rules under the Title II of the Communications Act, and studies show that the overwhelming majority of Americans who took the time to write public comments to the FCC about the issue feel the same way while a very small minority favor repeal.

But this isn’t about that. It’s about the right to control one’s own identity and prevent the corruption of a process designed to solicit the opinion of real people and institutions. Misuse of identity online by the hundreds of thousands should concern everyone — for and against net neutrality, New Yorker or Texan, Democrat or Republican.

We all have a powerful reason to hold accountable those who would steal Americans’ identities and assault the public’s right to be heard in government rulemaking. If law enforcement can’t investigate and (where appropriate) prosecute when it happens on this scale, the door is open for it to happen again and again.

I encourage the FCC to reconsider its refusal to assist in my office’s law enforcement investigation to identify and hold accountable those who illegally misused so many New Yorkers’ identities to corrupt the public comment process. In an era where foreign governments have indisputably tried to use the internet and social media to influence our elections, federal and state governments should be working together to ensure that malevolent actors cannot subvert our administrative agencies’ decision-making processes.

Sincerely,
Eric T. Schneiderman

CC:

Mignon Clyburn, Commissioner
Michael O’Rielly, Commissioner
Brendan Carr, Commissioner
Jessica Rosenworcel, Commissioner
Thomas M. Johnson, Jr., General Counsel
David L. Hunt, Inspector General
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 11:25 am

FCC Commissioner Pleads: ‘Please Stop Us From Killing Net Neutrality’

The FCC plans to vote on a plan to eliminate net neutrality next month.

Alexander C. Kaufman
One of the Federal Communications Commission’s top five officials has urged Americans to “make a ruckus” in response to the agency’s plan to vote next month on a policy to gut net neutrality.

In an op-ed published Wednesday in the Los Angeles Times, FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel issued an urgent plea for the public to call or write to the FCC before the Dec. 14 vote.

“Reach out to the rest of the FCC now,” wrote Rosenworcel, who served as a commissioner under the Obama administration from 2012 to 2017 and was unanimously confirmed to return under Chairman Ajit Pai in August. “Tell them they can’t take away internet openness without a fight.”

Net neutrality is the principle that internet service providers can’t offer faster speeds and access to websites that pay them more, meaning that juggernauts like Netflix and Facebook are essentially treated equally to smaller companies. In February 2015, the FCC adopted new rules to preserve net neutrality, classifying broadband providers as public utilities like electricity or phone companies under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934.


Opponents of net neutrality, including Comcast, AT&T and Verizon ― which owns HuffPost’s parent company, Oath ― argue that services such as Netflix and Amazon should have to pay more for the disproportionately high bandwidth they use. During peak hours in North America in 2015, Netflix used over one- third of internet data received by computers. That number has since declined as Amazon and other streaming services have gained market share.

Republicans opposed the Obama-era net neutrality rule. On Tuesday, Pai released his long-expected proposal to reverse the policy, calling the 2015 regulations “politically motivated” and based on “a misguided and flawed interpretation.”

But Rosenworcel says Pai’s proposal is a “lousy idea,” writing that “it deserves a heated response from the millions of Americans who work and create online every day.”

“There is something not right about a few unelected FCC officials making such vast determinations about the future of the internet,” she added. “I’m not alone in thinking this.”

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Earlier this year, the FCC received more than 22 million comments on the rule, most opposing repeal. But more than 80 percent of them were sent by bots, according to an analysis by the data analytics company Gravwell. The 17.4 percent determined to be authentic were “overwhelmingly in support of net neutrality regulations,” the company said.

There is something not right about a few unelected FCC officials making such vast determinations about the future of the internet. I’m not alone in thinking this. Jessica Rosenworcel, FCC commissioner
On Wednesday, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman publicly criticized the FCC for refusing to turn over evidence of fake comments to his office, which is investigating.

“When they do this, they will likely find that, outside of a cadre of high-paid lobbyists and lawyers in Washington, there isn’t a constituency that likes this proposal,” Rosenworcel wrote. “In fact, the FCC will probably discover that they have angered the public and caused them to question just whom the agency works for.”

Repealing the FCC’s 2015 net neutrality rule would notch a win for monopolistic companies that are already wield tremendous market power. Unlike in other countries, where companies compete in local markets to offer the fastest or cheapest services, internet providers in the U.S. enjoy near monopolies in local markets. As a result, the U.S. is far behind other developed countries in high-speed internet access, which is severely limited in poor rural areas.

“You go girl!” Hillary Clinton, the former Democratic presidential nominee, wrote in a tweet promoting Rosenworcel’s op-ed. “This is important; costs will go up, & powerful companies will get more powerful. We can’t let it slip through the cracks.”
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ro ... e6c04e8a40
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sun Nov 26, 2017 12:49 pm

.

Good. Fuck the internet.

Too bad they don't just dispense with the 'timed-release' M.O. and expedite procedures, outlawing the fucking thing outright, but that's not how they operate: they need to soften up the plebes via incrementally timed soft taps to the head until there is enough collective brain damage that the masses simply accept their bondage with nary a whimper (a variation of the Chinese water torture tactic).

Anything that expedites the collapse so that we can start fresh again.

(Plus, there's the added enjoyment of watching all those that tend to their tiny electronic gardens -- in forums, subreddits, meme-generating platforms and/or insipid tweets -- become increasingly irate/frenetic as they are forced out of their virtual habitats, unleashed into meatspace again. They'll be easier to corral that way.)
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 12:54 pm

but you don't live in the U.S. right?

this won't affect you


start fresh again.


good luck with that
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby Karmamatterz » Sun Nov 26, 2017 12:55 pm

Not buying the argument that there is little competition with service providers. When you look at the map of the U.S. that was in the video posted by Chump it make sure you believe the only way people in California get online is via Comcast. That is disinformation. Anybody with a smartphone can get on the Internet without Comcast.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of ... _providers

It's funny to hear people say nobody owns the Internet. LOL....omg that is so funny. It's almost as funny to hear people say the "web" IS the Internet as if it's the only part of it and nothing exists outside of HTTP.

There is no such thing as a free lunch.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sun Nov 26, 2017 12:59 pm

seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 11:54 am wrote:but you don't live in the U.S. right?

this won't affect you


start fresh again.


good luck with that


"Good luck with that"

Indeed. I should have put those particular words in green.
There is no cycle that includes an authentic refresh for us -- at least not in this iteration of reality.

I am an American. Born and raised in the U.S. -- first-generaton; my parents hail from Europe and South America.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 1:02 pm

Karmamatterz » Sun Nov 26, 2017 11:55 am wrote:Not buying the argument that there is little competition with service providers. When you look at the map of the U.S. that was in the video posted by Chump it make sure you believe the only way people in California get online is via Comcast. That is disinformation. Anybody with a smartphone can get on the Internet without Comcast.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of ... _providers

It's funny to hear people say nobody owns the Internet. LOL....omg that is so funny. It's almost as funny to hear people say the "web" IS the Internet as if it's the only part of it and nothing exists outside of HTTP.

There is no such thing as a free lunch.




wow I just heard that same argument from Ajit Pai on my tv



Ajit Pai and the FCC want it to be legal for Comcast to block BitTorrent

Nilay Patel

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai released his proposal to kill net neutrality today, and while there’s a lot to be unhappy with, it’s hard not to be taken with the brazenness of his argument.

Pai thinks it was a mistake for the FCC to try and stop Comcast from blocking BitTorrent in 2008, thinks all of the regulatory actions the FCC took after that to give itself the authority to prevent blocking were wrong, and wants to go back to the legal framework that allowed Comcast to block BitTorrent. Seriously, it’s all right at the top (it’s long, but read my emphasis in bold):

14. In the 2008 Comcast-BitTorrent Order, the Commission sought to directly enforce federal Internet policy that it drew from various statutory provisions consistent with the Internet Policy Statement, finding certain actions by Comcast “contravene[d] . . . federal policy” by “significantly imped[ing] consumers’ ability to access the content and use the applications of their choice.” In 2010, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected the Commission’s action, holding that the Commission had not justified its action as a valid exercise of ancillary authority.

[Bullets 15, 16, and 17 are the history of the FCC first trying to pass rules under Title I, Verizon winning a lawsuit in which the court said the rules would have to be under Title II, and then passing the rules under Title II.]

18. In May 2017, we adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (Internet Freedom NPRM), in which we proposed to return to the successful light-touch bipartisan framework that promoted a free and open Internet and, for almost twenty years, saw it flourish. Specifically, the Internet Freedom NPRM proposed to reinstate the information service classification of broadband Internet access service. The Internet Freedom NPRM also proposed to reinstate the determination that mobile broadband Internet access service is not a commercial mobile service. To determine how to best honor the Commission’s commitment to restoring the free and open Internet, the Internet Freedom NPRM also proposed to reevaluate the Commission’s existing rules and enforcement regime to analyze whether ex ante regulatory intervention in the market is necessary. Specifically, the Internet Freedom NPRM proposed to eliminate the Internet conduct standard and the non-exhaustive list of factors intended to guide application of that rule. It also sought comment on whether to keep, modify, or eliminate the bright-line conduct and transparency rules.

There are pages and pages of legal argument after this, all of which people will argue about endlessly in the weeks ahead of Pai’s planned December vote, but really, it’s all right there. The FCC couldn’t stop Comcast from blocking BitTorrent in 2008, it changed the rules so it would have that power, and Pai wants to undo that change and give Comcast the power to block internet services like BitTorrent once again. Later, Pai says Comcast blocking BitTorrent could have been challenged under antitrust and consumer protection laws on a case-by-case basis, but fails to say who, exactly, would bring that suit against Comcast and bear the costs. The FTC? Groups of BitTorrent users? And case-by-case rulings mean the precedents don’t have much weight. We had a rule, but Pai is saying we should have more lawsuits instead.

We had a rule, but Pai is saying we should have more lawsuits instead
Later in the proposal, Pai says his rules will “significantly reduce the likelihood” ISPs like Comcast will engage in behaviors that harm consumers. Not prevent, mind you, but reduce the chances. Such trust in market forces to work in a broadband market where 51 percent of Americans only have one choice of broadband provider! And if there is harmful behavior? Well, it won’t be so bad because at least we didn’t impose regulatory costs on Comcast and Verizon. Seriously, that’s what it says (emphasis, again, is mine):

Further, the transparency rule we adopt today will require ISPs to clearly disclose such practices and this, coupled with existing consumer protection and antitrust laws, will significantly reduce the likelihood that ISPs will engage in actions that would harm consumers or competition. To the extent that our approach relying on transparency requirements, consumer protection laws, and antitrust laws does not address all concerns, we find that any remaining unaddressed harms are small relative to the costs of implementing more heavyhanded regulation.

That’s not how the internet should work. Call Congress
.

FCC doubles down on its dead-wrong definition of how the internet works
Posted 18 hours ago by Devin Coldewey

In May, when the FCC released an early draft of its plan to undo 2015’s strong net neutrality rules, I pointed out that its case rests almost entirely on a deeply incorrect definition of how the internet works. There can be no mistake now that this misrepresentation is deliberate; the agency has reiterated it in even stronger terms in the final draft of the proposal.

I’m not going to go into great detail on it (my earlier post spells it out) but the basic problem is this: broadband has to be defined as either an information service or telecommunications service. The first is “the offering of a capability for generating, acquiring, storing, transforming, processing, retrieving, utilizing, or making available information,” while the second is “the transmission, between or among points specified by the user, of information of the user’s choosing, without change in the form or content of the information as sent and received.”

It’s important because the two things are regulated very differently — the FCC has much greater power over telecommunications services, under the “Title II” authority that internet service providers are so afraid of.

While it’s certainly true that ISPs do in some ways store and generate data on behalf of the user, usually as part of managing their networks, it’s equally certain that their primary purpose is to transmit data between the user and points of his or her choosing. Consequently, broadband should be classified as a telecommunications service.

But don’t take my word for it. The FCC made the argument for me in its 2015 order, citing many sources of its own in support of this fact. This excellent primer produced by the EFF and nearly 200 experts explains basically from first principles how the internet works and why it should be defined as telecommunications. There are big names on the list, but it seems clear that even the garden variety experts understand this much more clearly than the FCC does (or pretends to).

The FCC dismisses these scholars and founding technologists of the internet in a footnote, describing itself as “unpersuaded” that the internet works the way they insist it does. Meanwhile, the proposal repeatedly and unquestioningly cites the comments of ISPs claiming that something as simple as caching data magically exempts them from being telecommunication services:


Just trust them — after all, it’s not like they have a horse in this race.

The resulting definition of broadband as enabling users to generate, store, transform, and process their data is absurd. It is, as the Internet Engineers comment points out, like saying your phone is a pizzeria because you can use it to order a pizza. It is like saying that because you build a road, you are also building all the businesses along that road.

It is edge providers like Wikipedia, Dropbox, and even simple websites like TechCrunch that provide the services users request; it is ISPs that carry that data, with no change in form, between users and those edge providers. The FCC rejects this fundamental idea and substitutes a convenient fiction that upholds its current ambition to reclassify broadband. There is a semblance of plausibility to all this, but only because of precedents set in times when the internet looked very different.

This may be their downfall. Because the entire proposal is predicated on this spurious and outdated definition, to remove it causes the rest to crumble. Without reclassification there is no rollback of net neutrality. There is hope here: the FCC’s argument (which is to say, the broadband industry’s argument) already failed in court and may do so again. Here’s hoping.
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby Karmamatterz » Sun Nov 26, 2017 1:11 pm

Yup, it's pretty common sense there is no such thing as a free lunch.

51% of Americans have only one broadband provider? Yeah right. Until someone shows me some facts that those 51% don't have smarties then I call bullshit on that factoid, again. You CAN get on the Internetz with your phone. An alternative to using your DSL, satellite, cable or "broadband" provider is tethering your computer/tablet etc to your smartphone and bypassing the landline from the Comcast's of the world.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 1:21 pm

yes let the poor eat cake


Here’s something you probably didn’t know: The recent ruling striking down network neutrality doesn’t just affect websites and internet service providers – it affects libraries, too.


70% of poor people on broadband subsidy will lose their connections thanks to Trump's FCC
Image
https://boingboing.net/2017/11/17/inter ... n-rig.html


Why Net Neutrality's Demise Hurts the Poor Most


Here’s something you probably didn’t know: The recent ruling striking down network neutrality doesn’t just affect websites and internet service providers – it affects libraries, too.

By striking down the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s Open Internet Order this week, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals just gave commercial companies the authority to block internet traffic, give preferential treatment to specific internet services, and steer internet users away from online content based on their own commercial interests. Since the internet is now the primary mechanism for delivering content and applications to the general public, it’s more important than ever that commercial ISPs not have that kind of power to control or otherwise manipulate such communications.

As a school librarian – and the head of the American Library Association – I expect that the court’s ruling will negatively affect the daily lives of Americans in a number of ways, particularly children in K-12 schools. School, public, and college libraries rely upon the public availability of open, affordable internet access for school homework assignments, distance learning classes, e-government services, licensed databases, job-training videos, medical and scientific research, and many other essential services. We must ensure the same quality access to online educational content as to entertainment and other commercial offerings. But without net neutrality, we are in danger of prioritizing Mickey Mouse and Jennifer Lawrence over William Shakespeare and Teddy Roosevelt. This may maximize profits for large content providers, but it minimizes education for all.

And with education comes innovation. While we tend to glorify industrial-park incubators and think-tanks, the fact is that many of the innovative services we use today were created by entrepreneurs who had a fair chance to compete for web traffic. By enabling internet service providers to limit that access, we are essentially saying that only the privileged can continue to innovate. Meanwhile, small content creators, such as bloggers and grassroots educators, would face challenges from ISPs placing restrictions on information traveling over their networks.

Protecting net neutrality and considering its effect on libraries isn’t just a feel-good sentiment about education and innovation, however. Network neutrality is actually an issue of economic access,* *because those who can’t afford to pay more for internet services will be relegated to the “slow lane” of the information highway.

#### Barbara Stripling

##### About

Barbara Stripling is the President of the [American Library Association](http://www.ala.org/aboutala/). She works as the assistant professor of practice at Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York. Previously, Stripling served as the director of school library programs for the New York City Department of Education, a school district with over a million students and 1700 schools.

Public libraries – which serve roughly 30 million patrons each week – could face higher service charges for newly premium online information and services. In a time of already-constrained budgets, paying more for more internet access would require tradeoffs such as fewer books, staff, and open hours.

High-quality internet access shouldn’t be restricted to those who can “pay to play.” Unfortunately, by allowing ISPs to preferentially charge and premium price access, that’s what will happen, and public libraries – and the communities we serve – will be the ones to lose.

Finally, libraries aren’t just passive containers, but prolific generators of internet content – including digitized materials for the purposes of preservation and historical reference. The San Francisco Public Library, in just one example, digitized a collection of over 250,000 historical photographs and provides access to over 10,000 popular songs through its website. Such audio and video resources used to be the exclusive domain of large companies, but the internet – with its core openness including net neutrality – expanded our capacity to obtain information, create new content, and share ideas and applications across the world.

An open internet is essential to our nation’s educational achievement, freedom of speech, and economic growth. Tuesday's ruling flies in the face of intellectual freedom, a key library community principle that supports the right of all people to seek information without restriction. We believe the internet functions best when it is open to everyone, without interference by internet providers. The American Library Association will continue to work to ensure all information resources have equitable internet access – not just those supported by groups with deep pockets.
https://www.wired.com/2014/01/killing-n ... ty-access/
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby seemslikeadream » Sun Nov 26, 2017 1:33 pm

stop writing racists comments on the internet it's not how you win net neutrality it's how you win the presidency
Jon Oliver


yes thank you Pai, 44, a former attorney for Verizon and Congressional aide to attorney general Jeff Sessions, for everything you are doing ..keep up the good work people are rooting for you even here at RI strangely enough :thumbsup


At least 1.3 million comments opposed to net neutrality were likely fake: Report

As the FCC’s vote on net neutrality rules approaches, one data scientist found a problem with the comment process

With the Federal Communication Commission's net neutrality rules for internet service providers set to be voted on, and likely reversed next month, critics have slammed the agency's public commenting process as having been "corrupted" and flooded with more than one million comments that were likely automated by bots and largely in favor of rolling back net neutrality rules.

Consumers have written letters to the FCC and claimed that their names, or addresses were used in comments that they had not written, and some were even listed as having come from people that are deceased, according to the Washington Post.

The public commenting process is in accordance with a law that requires federal agencies accept public comments on proposed rule changes. The FCC intends to repeal the Obama-era net neutrality rules in a meeting on December 14, which critics say will create an unequal internet that favors major telecom companies and provides them with the ability to charge consumers more for certain services.


Data scientist Jeff Kao wrote in a post on Medium that, according to his research, there were at least 1.3 million comments in favor of repealing net neutrality rules.

"It was particularly chilling to see these spam comments all in one place," Kao wrote. "As they are exactly the type of policy arguments and language you expect to see in industry comments on the proposed repeal, or, these days, in the FCC Commissioner’s own statements lauding the repeal."

In his finding, Kao wrote, "One pro-repeal spam campaign used mail-merge to disguise 1.3 million comments as unique grassroots submissions."
https://www.salon.com/2017/11/25/at-lea ... ke-report/


Who is Ajit Pai, the “Trump soldier” remaking America’s internet?

Written by Heather Timmons
Donald Trump’s new Federal Communications Commission chairman Ajit Pai promised last December to bring a “weed-wacker” to the agency that oversees the US’s media and telecommunications industries. He appears to be wielding a chain saw instead.

Since taking the office in January, Pai, 44, a former attorney for Verizon and Congressional aide to attorney general Jeff Sessions, has trashed rules that protected local media competition, eviscerated a program that gives poor people greater access to the internet, and decided that competition exists even when there’s just one internet provider in a market.

On Tuesday (Nov. 21), he made the most brutal cut so far, saying the commission plans to wipe out net neutrality rules that require that all data that goes over the internet is treated the same. The move could force US companies and consumers to pick and choose what they can access online, and let broadband companies dictate what content they see, further dividing the fractured country by politics and paycheck.

Consumer groups that have fought long and hard for Americans to have equal access to the internet say the personable Pai, who joined the FCC in 2012, is taking Trump’s anti-regulatory push to a surprising extreme. It’s a remarkably unpopular stance for a Republican many think hopes to become senator or governor of his home state of Kansas some day.

“He’s such an interesting character in the Trump administration, because he is qualified for his job,” said Craig Aaron, the president of Free Press, an activist group, taking a swipe at Trump’s more inexperienced Cabinet picks. But since Pai took the job, “he has taken a scorched earth approach to everything that was passed in the previous FCC and a lot of things that were passed much earlier.”

Pai has “set out to completely defang the FCC,” Aaron said. He’s pushing “a really aggressive agenda to benefit the biggest companies,” and to show himself as a great “soldier” for Trump, he said.

That’s the point, Pai’s supporters say. Forget the White House’s other achievements, Adam Brandon, the president of libertarian advocacy group FreedomWorks said while introducing Pai at a speech in April, “the things that chairman Pai is working on right now potentially will have the longest impact coming out of this administration.”

“I look forward to returning to the light-touch, market-based framework that unleashed the digital revolution and benefited consumers here and around the world,” Pai said (pdf) in a statement announcing the rollback of net neutrality rules on Nov. 21. Pai was unavailable for an interview, a FCC spokesman said, and the agency didn’t answer specific emailed questions about his motives and ideology.

An unexpected hardliner

Pai’s parents, both doctors, hail from the south Indian cities of Bangalore and Hyderabad. He was born in Buffalo, New York, two years after his parents moved to the US, grew up in rural Kansas, and went to Harvard University.

In a speech at the US-India Business Council in March, he described his family’s journey as the “American Dream manifest:”

In 1971, they came to the United States with just a radio and ten dollars in their pockets. Like so many immigrants, they sacrificed to give me opportunities not available to them as children…Forty-six years after my parents’ journey from India, here I am, the grandson of a spare auto parts salesman and a file clerk, tapped by the President of the United States to be the nation’s chief communications regulator.

His hard-line policies at the FCC seem to have surprised some who knew him long before he took the job.

“Ajit was an excellent debater and a better hearts player,” Brian Galle, a former teammate on the Harvard debate team and a law professor at Georgetown University, emailed Quartz in response to questions. “I have seen him consume more mangoes in a single day than any human should be able to safely digest,” he added.

“Like a lot of people (except, apparently, Paul Ryan),” Galle said, Pai “has changed his mind about some of his political views. I have a lot of respect for his smarts, and I wish we now agreed more on policy.”

Pai comes across as a “very intelligent, pleasant, nice fellow,” said Michael Copps, a former FCC Commissioner and advisor to Common Cause, a grassroots group based in DC that aims to “hold power accountable.” Pai was nominated to be an FCC commissioner by Barack Obama, part of agency’s unusual structure of balancing four of its top seats among Republicans and Democrats.

When Pai was promoted in January to chairman, Copps congratulated him on the job. But on Tuesday, Copps said his reign has devolved into a “farce and a tragedy.”

“When it comes to regulating in the public’s interest,” Copps told Quartz, “and implementing the spirit behind the Telecoms Act, I think he is not very dedicated to that.”

Politics or policy?

The battle over who controls Americans’ access to the internet traces back to the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the first time the federal government rewrote rules about America’s communications network since the 1930s. As Copps notes, the act mentions the term “public interest” over 110 times.

For the first 10 years after the act was passed, the effort to keep the internet “neutral”—with access to the internet and delivery of data treated the same way—was often a Republican one, supported by George W. Bush appointees. But in recent years, as the Tea Party and other libertarians gained greater control of the Republican party, and the Obama administration extended federal consumer protections, things shifted.

Now, like nearly everything else in Washington, the fight is deeply partisan. Pai’s pledge to change net neutrality on Nov. 21 specifically targets rules passed in 2015 by Barack Obama that make access to the internet equivalent to a public utility, and ban internet providers from blocking content or slowing down access to certain sites.

The conglomerates that provide internet services including Viacom, AT&T, and Comcast are lined up with Tea Party Republicans like Texas senator Ted Cruz behind Pai. Groups like FreedomWorks aren’t against net neutrality in principle, said Patrick Hedger, the group’s director of policy, just the way it is being enforced. Treating the internet like public utilities and railroads “could box out new entrants,” Hedger said, creating regulatory barriers so high that no one wants to invest in the industry.

On the other side, the entertainment industry, Silicon Valley giants like Google, and consumer groups are lined up with Democrats and more mainstream Republicans, who have long said FreedomWorks and others are being bamboozled by the big telecoms, and deep-pocketed political donors like the Koch Brothers who stand to benefit from lighter regulation overall.

“I am furious to learn that President Trump’s hand-picked FCC chairman will overturn net neutrality, taking away Americans’ right to a free and open internet,” Tim Ryan, a Democratic representative from Ohio, said on Nov. 21. It is “yet another example of the Republican Party siding with multinational corporations and big business over the interests of the American people.”

Just as is true in the recent Congressional push for health care and tax reform, this battle seems to ignore the fact that US voters have an obvious preference. US citizens overwhelmingly favor keeping net neutrality regulations, a July poll by a Republican group (pdf) found, including Trump voters who voted three-to-one in favor. (They also overwhelmingly favor fixing the healthcare system known as Obamacare, rather than repealing it, and not lowering taxes on the rich).

“Whether you’re a Trump voter or a Democrat, you believe that the internet has gotten better over the past three years,” said Chip Pickering, the CEO of Incompas, an internet association that published the July poll, and a former Republican member of Congress who led the first effort to pass net neutrality rules.

“If the country is divided on everything right now, this is the one issue where people have agreement,” Pickering said. Making the internet more like cable is “bad politics and bad policy,” Pickering said.

Does everyone hate Ajit?

Pai is a popular target of ridicule on the internet he’s trying to regulate, and offline.

Someone has started AjitVPai.com, a Github-powered website that anyone can contribute to with the tag line “Ruining the internet as we know it.” He didn’t attend a recent panel in Washington, D.C. by anti-monopoly group Open Markets Institute, but he was a hot topic of conversation. “Isn’t Ajit Pai the worst,” one attendee griped to the other during the coffee break—typical small talk at the event.

Dozens of heavily annotated articles in tech publications dissect and refute Pai’s argument against net neutrality rules. Tuesday’s announcement started an outpouring of social media criticism directed at him and the FCC from Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Big Bang Theory executive producer Bill Prady, and companies like Netflix chimed in:


The groundswell of anti-Ajit sentiment started in earnest with late night comedian John Oliver, who has made net neutrality a personal cause this year, and singled out Pai on his HBO show, Last Week Tonight.

“The dangerous thing about Pai is he presents himself as a fun, down-to-earth nerd,” Oliver said in May, before embarking on an virtual dressing-down of Pai that mocked everything from his love of the movie Big Lebowski, to his giant coffee mug, to his interpretation of infrastructure investment (starting at 6:30):


https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_cont ... 2vuuZt7wak

Pai responded with a video of himself reading mean tweets, in the style of another late-night talk show segment:



Ahead of an already uncertain 2018 midterm elections, as Trump plumbs record lows for presidential popularity, why is Pai pushing this unpopular idea?

Pai believes it will allow smaller companies to make bigger investments internet infrastructure, he told Fox New on Tuesday. “All we are simply doing is putting engineers and entrepreneurs, instead of bureaucrats and lawyers, back in charge of the internet,” Pai said.

FreedomWorks’ Hedger argues it’s now or never, as criticism of Pai’s plan increases and the 2018 elections loom. “If the cards are completely stacked against him,” said Hedger, “why not use the window of opportunity we do have?”

What about US consumers?

Dressing down of Pai on late night television and social media might make for entertaining viewing, but the FCC changes he is spearheading could seriously impact Americans’ quality of life, consumer advocates warn.

Besides the net neutrality rollback, the commission has already voted to substantially change the “Lifeline” program created during Ronald Reagan’s presidency, which gives subsidies to low-income households to buy telecommunications services. Under the new rules, millions of households may find their internet access cut off, public advocates say.

Dozens of citizens groups, senior citizens groups, and even a trade group representing “wireless” companies like Samsung and Apple spoke up against that decision.

Activists are already threatening to challenging the Lifeline decision and the net neutrality rollback in court, and it is there that Pai’s legacy will be determined. “From his perspective I’m sure he sees himself as a very successful FCC commissioner” already, said Copps. “We’ll have to wait and see if he can survive inspection by the courts.”
https://qz.com/1133973/net-neutrality-w ... -internet/
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby DrEvil » Sun Nov 26, 2017 3:42 pm

Karmamatterz » Sun Nov 26, 2017 7:11 pm wrote:Yup, it's pretty common sense there is no such thing as a free lunch.

51% of Americans have only one broadband provider? Yeah right. Until someone shows me some facts that those 51% don't have smarties then I call bullshit on that factoid, again. You CAN get on the Internetz with your phone. An alternative to using your DSL, satellite, cable or "broadband" provider is tethering your computer/tablet etc to your smartphone and bypassing the landline from the Comcast's of the world.


Yeah, except that's a stupid argument. Smart phones come with data caps. It's not a replacement for wired broadband with no cap. Watch a few movies on Netflix? Listen to Spotify? Your kids play online? Work from home? Bam! That's your allowance for the month gone in about two days, because if you download too much data you use up the internet.

But don't worry, you'll be able to watch Fox News and Disney's new streaming service and check Facebook without digging into your cap, because those companies paid through the nose for the privilege.
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Re: "Restoring Internet Freedom"

Postby Karmamatterz » Sun Nov 26, 2017 6:18 pm

keep up the good work people are rooting for you even here at RI strangely enough


Funny how some people project their thoughts into the comments of others. One does not need to root for a bureaucrat to state the obvious. That is a pretty loose use of logic.

@Dr. Evil
It's an assumption that there are caps on data usage. Again, there is no free lunch. What is stupid is to think there is a free lunch. But socialism and communism has made many to believe some stuff just out to be free...just cuz. :shock2:

My local broadband provider has a cap on my cable modem subscription. What's the diff? I have to pay for both. Both my cell and broadband service providers warn me when I'm nearing my cap. I can choose to pay for more, or not. Why is this a problem? It's like complaining about using electricity in your home. You know, for every kilowatt you burn your monthly bill does go up. I don't have a cap on my utility usage for gas/electric and don't even get a warning. How dare those bastard utilities! Plenty of times my kids would sop up Netflix and other crap and bust my cap. I either paid or would shut down the router. So don't watch so darn much streaming video that you use up all your bandwidth. It only takes a little self-control.


The Internet was not designed and does not function with the purpose of being a free or subsidized utility. In case some don't know it was designed by the Defense Dept. as a hardened communication network for disasters such as war. You can freeze to death if you don't pay your utility bills. You aren't going to die without the Internet. My 85-year-old mother has never been on the Internet and is still alive. She got a hug from my kids on Thanksgiving also, but that's another thread. :D

Funny how even this topic is really all about class warfare. It also makes me roll my eyes when folks believe all information should be "free." There is a never ending whine about ads on websites. Just how are those companies supposed to pay their staff, purchase insurance for them, and pay for their broadband Internet service so they can publish if they don't generate revenue? Oh, that's right! The tooth fairy!

About libraries. Most of them I've spent time in offer free Internet access. I've yet to visit one that let users sit and watch Netflix or YouTube videos all day long.

With an edit I'll add that a good example is using the wifi on airplanes. It's not free. If you do pony up for it they block streaming video and music services. Evil airlines! Why do they block that? It's an obvious answer: because streaming uses a ton of bandwidth and costs money. Not to mention the limited amount of bandwidth available on an airplane would mean a few users watching Netflix would sop up so much that it would leave others with little or none. Does anybody understand how routers, switches and computing devices have a finite amount of capacity? To increase bandwidth and get "bigger pipes" you have to invest in more capacity, which costs money. You don't just flip a switch and more bandwidth suddenly becomes available for all.
Last edited by Karmamatterz on Sun Nov 26, 2017 6:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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