Net Neutrality

Just recently, the Canadian government passed a law that ISPs cannot throttle, misdirect, or in any way change a signal that is coming from a customer's modem. In other words, all internet based requests to such companies as Google, cannot be tampered with. Anyway, this is only in Canada as far as I know. Maybe once on the US portion of the backbone, your signal might get botched.

IMO, I don't believe that the internet will ever get censored like you think it might.

Its just a bunch of nerds scared that The Man is going to take away or restrict what is essentially their whole life.

If government doesn't pass laws on it, which I'm sure would be the case in many places, and if they actually decide to go through with it, it makes it pretty easy for the little guys to come in and offer less restricted services. Around here, Comcast has a 10Mb down and 400 Kb up cable connection for pretty cheap while Verizon has a slightly cheaper 3360 Kb down and 832 Kb up service. Although it sounds a hell of a lot worse, I know of plenty of people who have switched to Verizon despite its slower speeds because they will actually let you use all your bandwidth if you wish, not have some secret, unknown limit that you can use each month that they only tell you about when you pass it and they shut off your connection. Probably helps that Verizon doesn't have those really lame *** commercials with people rubbing that metallic seminal fluid all over stuff to make it go fast.

Also, the whole concept of it is just stupid. What do they plan to do, give us a list of domain names and IPs we're allowed to connect to for a given price range?

"And here, in the $100/mo package, you get access to 5000 sites created by 12 year olds, consisting of a total of 3.5 million animated gifs, averaging 300 per page!"

Not to mention that tons of those ad images and links would end up dead if you're not allowed to connect to the address they're hosted on.

Its all about as threatening as the big huge super awesome plan (or plans) they have to stop people from pirating and downloading boobies. Face it, if they charged that much for so few sites, preventing you from doing just about anything on the internet (and no, I don't consider YouTube as "doing something"), cutting off your private emails, online games or even direct connections to friends (voice chat, video, etc), not enough people would pay for it for them to make any money off of it. I know I wouldn't, and I spend way the hell too much time on the intrawebz.

The phone number listed at the bottom of that link has the country code for Belgium. The issues are likely different here in North America. The approach to consolidating control over the internet won't likely be so overtly commercial. I think it more likely that the assault would occur as part of the war on some terrorists, the war on drugs or some other bugbear capable of generating the necessary fear. To that effect, here are a few links to recent news items (with an eye towards the situation in the US).

Coming June 3: the twin towers of Internet censorship and atomic reactor terror

Quote:

... Calling it a "ludicrous" attack on free speech, The New York Times scoffs at the claim that the Internet is "one of the primary drivers" of terrorism. The charge comes in Lieberman's report on "Violent Islamist Extremism, the Internet, and the Homegrown Terrorist Threat." The Times found it "profoundly disturbing that an influential senator would even consider telling a media company to shut down constitutionally protected speech." The ACLU has warned that similar efforts "could be a precursor to proposals to censor and regulate speech on the Internet." ...

Zombies and botnets: OECD warns of hidden armies in cyber wars

Quote:

The OECD warns that all forms of hacking have gone far beyond the adolescent disruption of the early days of the personal computer, to become a powerful and growing weapon in the hands of serious criminals.

Air Force Colonel Wants to Build a Military Botnet

Quote:

While most government agencies are struggling to keep their computers out of the latest Russian botnets, Col. Charles W. Williamson III is proposing that the Air Force build its own zombie network, so it can launch distributed denial of service attacks on foreign enemies.

Download al Qaeda manuals from the DoJ, go to prison?

Quote:

... In mid-May, University of Nottingham master's student Rizwaan Sabir apparently sent the electronic manual to a school clerk, Hicham Yezza, for printing. This triggered an investigation in which counter-terror police arrested the two and held them for six days, after which Sabir was released without charge. However, Yezza was held on an immigration violation and is in custody, threatened with deportation to Algeria. ...

Study finds Cox also blocked file sharing: Comcast not alone in impeding data transfer, survey says

Quote:

Comcast Corp.'s interference with Internet traffic has prompted a federal investigation and is at the center of calls for network neutrality laws, but another U.S. cable company appears to be doing the same thing without drawing scrutiny.

Cisco grilled for allegedly helping Chinese censor, spy on dissidents

Quote:

Internet networking giant Cisco Systems took the hot seat at a Senate Judiciary Human Rights Subcommittee hearing Tuesday for reportedly having a role in the Chinese government's construction of a system for monitoring, censoring and prosecuting online dissidents who speak in favor of democratic values.

Pfft.

They can take my internet; I don't care! [smile]


I think that this is just something to give some people something to worry about. Think of all the other things that the media used to make us worry about in the past: Global warming, West Nile virus, SARS, etc...

In any event, I don't think they can control the internet. [smile] (Government will probably tax online purchases, but that's as far as I think it will go)

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Original post by Spodi Also, the whole concept of it is just stupid. What do they plan to do, give us a list of domain names and IPs we're allowed to connect to for a given price range?

Limiting access to websites is probably not going to happen, but connection shaping and charging different rates for different types of data is a very possible and scary outcome. With a lot of ISPs having over-sold their bandwidth they'd dearly love to start charging higher rates for things like streaming media (think BBC's iPlayer and Skype), file sharing (Bittorrent) and anything they deam as "non-standard" web traffic (charging extra for you to play WoW, ftp files, etc. etc.).

I would worry more about the government than the ISPs.. If providing services the old fashioned way is what the users want, then the market will likely arrange for it to happen. People will rather choose an ISP that doesn't charge differently and viola - "stupid new idea out of business".

Same thing goes for the old idea of adding a hardware protection circuitry to computer soundcards, to prevent copy-protected tracks from being played (hardware-wise).. Bad bad.

Quote:

Original post by Spodi "And here, in the $100/mo package, you get access to 5000 sites created by 12 year olds, consisting of a total of 3.5 million animated gifs, averaging 300 per page!"

Half my surfing is for animated gifs!

you know what, i hope they do do it. cause then i'll make my own provider (with the help of you guys of course) and we'll all make squillions!

but seriously , if thats what they are planning on doing someone with the knowhow will just revert back to the old way, undercuting them and make shiteloads.

Quote:

If government doesn't pass laws on it, which I'm sure would be the case in many places, and if they actually decide to go through with it, it makes it pretty easy for the little guys to come in and offer less restricted services.

I don't know about the U.S., but where I live most "little guys" don't the time and money required to create a nationwide backbone that's competitive with the huge providers. Remember, the real danger is the backbone providers, not the consumer ISPs.

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Original post by Sparks you know what, i hope they do do it. cause then i'll make my own provider (with the help of you guys of course) and we'll all make squillions! but seriously , if thats what they are planning on doing someone with the knowhow will just revert back to the old way, undercuting them and make shiteloads.

We can launch a new site called ISPdev.net and have threads called "I'm going to make a new provider" and you'll be able to get married on it and there'll be comics about it and oh... ;)

It may well happen but I doubt anyone would get funding for the idea as it would appear un-economical in our private equity driven world.

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Original post by RealMarkP Just recently, the Canadian government passed a law that ISPs cannot throttle, misdirect, or in any way change a signal that is coming from a customer's modem.

No such a thing exists. There is a great deal of debate among internet users in Canada, and a great deal of action by internet providers, and a great deal of lobbying by large multinational entertainment conglomerates, but absolutely no government action on this topic in Canada.

The situation is that the internet backbone providers in Canada have been throttling the internet to the tune of an effective speed of 33 kbs. The largest backbone providers in Canada also happen to be (a) content providers and (2) competitors with the internet, in that they also provide satellite or cable and also own much of the media that fills the cable and sattellite. It is in the interest of the people who own the pipes to discourage people who use the pipes from using them for things such as obtaining television programming, and throttling accomplishes that very effectively. Since these providers have monopolies in their geographic regions, subscribers must use their pipes and swallow whatever the providers stick in their mouths, and have no recourse for complaint. This throttling has recently been extended to data flowing between third parties. Throttling requires opening and reading the packets being carried over the fibre.

The government itself is busy bending over for the American entertainment lobby and passing the butter. It has in the works both a bill almost identical to the US DMCA and a trade agreement to make unwarranted search-and-seizure of recording devices and destruction of suspect devices legal.

Recently, a private member's bill was introduced to enforce network neutrality, but that's not a law and private member's bills stand the same chance of passing as a snowball in Florida has of lasting the summer.

Don't look to Canada for an example of net neutrality.

I've also heard of plans from the other side - charging the websites different amounts. Basically websites could pay providers extra to be put on a faster connection so that they load faster than others. This sounds even more plausible than what is suggested in this thread. And I can totally see it happening, knowing the greedy corporates...

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Original post by trasseltass I would worry more about the government than the ISPs.. If providing services the old fashioned way is what the users want, then the market will likely arrange for it to happen.

You overestimate the mallable group mentality of the public, my friend...