Tech Manufacturers Rally Against Net Neutrality 222
An anonymous reader writes "Producers of networking hardware such as Motorola, Corning, and Tyco have come out against Net Neutrality. They support the current senate communications bill, and urge immediate action. 'Don't be confused by these spurious complaints about Net neutrality,' Tim Regan, a vice president with fiber optic cable manufacturer Corning Inc., said. 'Net neutrality is a solution in search of a problem.'" From the article: "Supporters say the Senate measure, which was approved by a committee vote in June but has since gotten hung up chiefly over Net neutrality, is crucial because it would make it easier for new video service providers--such as telephone companies hoping to roll out IPTV--to enter the market, increase competition for cable, and thus spur lower prices. Among other benefits, they say, it would also permit municipalities to offer their own broadband services."
What about telcos? (Score:5, Insightful)
From the summary:
Wait, so telcos are rallying for a bill that would allow municipal broadband? I find that hard to believe.
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So is this:
By the way - "x is a solution in search of a problem" - particularly in this case, is an attempt to dismiss anything that's seriously forward-thinking. Like Gonzales trying to get ISPs to retain records for longer periods of time "only" for child pornography, anyone can see that although there are overtures of non-intrusion,
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Example: like, the stifling of innovation on the Internet due to "pay-to-play" schemes in which every ISP is it's own version of the Chinese government.
Another example: the collapse of Iraq into sectarian violence and increased Iranian influence.
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Even that line about "easier for new video service providers--such as telephone companies hoping to roll out IPTV--to enter the market, increase competition for cable, and thus spur lower prices" is a nice bit of misdirection.
"...increase competition for cable, and thus spur lower prices" isn't the freaking poin
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How did this get modded to 5?
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Re:What about telcos? (Score:4, Interesting)
The link is a map showing cities that have setup municipal broadband access BECAUSE the laws were defeated in many states.
Not that I want my Internet service coming from the government. I'm sure my civil rights would be a top priority for the bureaucrats when the NSA comes looking for my data from the city government!
Think about it, Smaller less intrusive government is the solution. Big governement has no business regulating the Internet in the first place. Without the guaranteed monopoly, I would probably have 4 fiber lines running to my house providing me with 10-20 service plans. Other countries are getting 100Mb service, what has kept the US free market from doing the same?
Re:What about telcos? (Score:5, Insightful)
You might like to ponder the fact that the other countries you refer to have more heavily regulated telecoms than the US.
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In short, bullshit.
They're right (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:They're right (Score:4, Interesting)
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Well, that's how it always starts, but, give the govt. a rope, it wants to be a 'cowboy'.
This net neutrality power, would go to the FCC, and we've already seen them trying to overstep their power before (HD broadcast flag anyone?).
I was originally for NN, but, the more I think about it...I'm a bit worrysome about giving the FCC any control over the internet. I do like the 'consumers rights' appro
No regulation... (Score:2, Interesting)
Change ISP's to whom? (Score:2)
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is it because of their speed? 6mbps on a device that should be able to do 140 or something? nope.
is it because of service? roughly 10% downtime a year... nope.
or is it because my only other option is dialup... yeah, that was it.
No No No (Score:5, Insightful)
Breaking Net Neutrality violates the End to End Principal [wikipedia.org]. Think of it this way: would you want a phone call from Boston to Florida to cost more than one from New York to California because some regional telco in Georgia wanted to charge Miami more to receive calls? The end of a rational peering system won't be the end of the Internet, it will just be the end of this internet.
Re:They're right (Score:4, Insightful)
1. The telcos want the power to regulate the internet.
2. Network neutrality forbids regulation so that we retain a free market on the internet.
Handing the power to regulate the internet over to a few large corporations, with no goal except to maximize their own profits, seems a bad idea to me.
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They're going to regulate the internet anyway. We might as well get them started off in the right direction.
Won't it require a bunch of new hardware too? (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems to me that telcos would also need a lot of new hardware, supporting more traffic shaping and QoS. I wonder if the tech manufacturers have anything that might help them with that...
You wanna talk about solutions in search of problems?
Re:Won't it require a bunch of new hardware too? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Won't it require a bunch of new hardware too? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Apple "iTV" and the handwriting on the wall (Score:5, Interesting)
The whole tiered Internet thing is based on the fact that they want to differentiate these "new" services from what we think of as the Internet right now (e-mail, web pages, etc.). They want to break up the current pricing structures so that they can charge more for certain bits.
They last thing that telcos/cable-cos want is to become generic bit pipes. If moving bits around becomes just another commoditized service (like deregulated electric in some places), then they'll have to compete on price and customer service. Competing on price impacts profits, and competing on customer service...well, I've been a customer of GTE/Verizon, Southwestern Bell, and AT&T at different times and if I were them, I'd be scared of competing based on customer satisfaction.
It isn't new services (Score:2)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_loop_unbundling [wikipedia.org]
Looks like they are. In which case it's up to ISPs, entrepeneurs, co-operatives to grab the oportunity and start t
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I'm not a big fan of local governement-sanctioned cable monopolies, seeing how the price of cable is inflating faster than anyhing else.
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As for IP TV not being the sam
Corning? (Score:4, Funny)
Tim Regan, a vice president with fiber optic cable manufacturer Corning Inc.
Like I'm gonna trust that guy - with all the spam he's been sending me.
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Oh, sp_a_m !
I know the internet is a series of tubes but that would be the end for me I'm afraid.
"Neutrality" is about control of who delivers what (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"Neutrality" is about control of who delivers w (Score:2)
Net Neutrality is now! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well DUH! The whole point of the debate is to prevent bad things from happening, not to stop something bad that's already happening. Do these people really understand the issue?
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Well DUH! The whole point of the debate is to prevent bad things from happening, not to stop something bad that's already happening. Do these people really understand the issue?
The hardware manufacturers understand this as no other. The thing is, they themselves have been pushing for years their own solutions in search of a problem; MPLS and other Quality of Service schemes. The doomscenarios that the net-neutrality camp sketches are in fact exactly the ki
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Just like the Bill of Rights... (Score:2)
Nobody will admit the mistake. (Score:2)
Proponents argued that the property tax savings would be passed on to renters. Opponents claimed that a lot of state services would eliminated or greatly curtailed.
As things turned out, passage of the inititive didn't reduce
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The only thing that would have lowered rent would have been competition. That competition was already balanced and so nothing needed to change there.
It's an interesting insight into a parallel problem
"Net Neutrality" sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
We should start to use "Network Equality" or "Data Non-Discrimination" instead.
Re:"Net Neutrality" sucks (Score:5, Funny)
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The EFF should get on this rephrasing, stat!
Re:"Net Neutrality" sucks (Score:5, Informative)
Those are awful names. They don't apply at all.
Nothing about net neutrality should limit traffic shaping based on data type. The name "data non-discrimination" makes it sound like it forces ISPs to treat HTML traffic the same way as VOIP traffic, or bittorrent traffic. That is bad ISP policy and bad network design.
Instead, net neutrality is about ISPs treating all traffic of the same type the same way, regardless of source. VOIP on Roadrunner cable from Vonage should get the same bandwidth as VOIP from Time Warner's phone service. The alternative - Time Warner throttling competitors to push its own service - is what net neutrality is supposed to prevent.
So, name it net vendor neutrality, if necessary.
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I for one think that the Information will greet us as liberators and won't devolve into civil war or widespread insurgency. Once the Information is freely flowing, this war on DRM should pay for itself!
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The PR war is being won. (Score:5, Insightful)
Google, if you're listening, you're losing big time here.
Adding value to the Internet lowers its value. (Score:2, Interesting)
Quote from worldofends.com [worldofends.com] which still r
Be Confused By Our Vacuous Statements Instead! (Score:5, Insightful)
Translation: don't be confused by trivial things like facts and details regarding the case. Instead, please be confused by our utterly content-free, shaded, and spun vague assertions!
I think it's interesting that most of the anti-net-neutrality statements don't contain any substance. Those that do certainly don't rebut concerns brought up by net-neutrality advocates. They've clearly chosen to try to win over the public and the senate via obfuscation rather than argument. That *alone* should tell you something.
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What should it tell us? That they're going to win? THAT became painfully obvious once the commercials rolled out!
Uh, let's see: Corning's biggest customer-Verizon (Score:5, Informative)
Motorola and Corning have Verizon as a huge customer. Of course they don't want Net Neutrality if Verizon doesn't!!!
Google? (Score:3, Interesting)
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WTF (Score:4, Interesting)
Did I read this wrong? Some municipalities already offer their own broadband services. I know this because I'm "Broadband Services Coordinator" at a municipal utility. So I ask.. WTF?
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I grew up in a small city that handled the water, sewer, electric, gas and trash services. I can safely say it provided better service and cheaper rates than any place I've lived since. My parents still live there and they are still happy to have a single bill for all those services and thier rates are still better than mine on every single service.
I really wish they would take over cable TV and phone.
The Debate Made Easy (Score:5, Insightful)
So, lets look at who supports Net Neutrality: Google, Yahoo, Vonage, Ebay, Skype, Amazon etc. Now take a gander at who is against it: Most (not all) politicians, major telcos such as Verizon, ATT, Comcast, Time Warner and now hardware manufacturers are coming out against it. Now is it so hard to tell who is telling the truth and who is spreading FUD? Who among those mentioned above has the best interests of the consumer and small businesses in mind, and who else is constantly trying to squeeze more and more and more profits from them?
Ethics (Score:4, Insightful)
Network equipment manufacturers lie, because they want to sell equipment.
Bobby Rush lies, because he's selling his community out to the phone lobby by pushing a law which will "Improve competition between VoIP Intenet-based telephone services and local telephone services" (by adding more restrictions to VoIP companies, which means less competition for the local phone companies, not more). He has the audacity to promote a law which will "Allow localities to retain control of their rights-of-way and ensure local jurisdictions still receive the franchise fees they collected under the current system. Additionally, the FCC will be authorized to step in if a locality tries to unfairly use its rights-of-way authority to block new competitors from entering the local market." which is simple doublespeak, since it claims to give rights but also codifies the giving of them away.
The Telcos lie, because they claim no restrictions will be made, while at the same time DESPERATELY fighting any restrictions on their ability to restrict, which wouldn't hurt them at all if they WEREN'T lying.
Nobody in consumer-friendly (read TV) national news simply calls them on this obvious stuff, because they're in tight with advertisers and telcos advertise.
And if all the above didn't curdle your toes, the average schmoe in business school thinks that mirepresentation is just fine.
Bobby Rush's bill (Score:2)
User Friendly had it right. (Score:3, Insightful)
One Simple Phone Call and a few simple letters. (Score:3, Informative)
Here's how:
In all cases be clear, firm, and polite. Net neutrality is important. Make it clear to any elected official that you will vote based upon their stance and donate money accordingly. You get bonus points if they are up for election this year (Senate [senate.gov]).
Keep in mind that you will probably not reach them directly. Most likely your call or letter will be directed to an aide. That aide's job is to tell the individual what to think about an issue. The aide will be loyal to their boss but may be more easy to sway (they don't have to appear omnicient). If you make it clear to them why neutrality is important and why a non-neutral internet will cost them then you can get somewhere.
This tone also goes for letters and for the public.
Common carriers don't operate in a free market (Score:2)
People who argue against net neutrality because they feel government regulation is ultimately bad for development do to not realize that internet access has to exist in a free market for that development to happen. Most places I've been have 1 local telco and 1 cable provider, both of whom will soon be competing to offer the same thing, data service.
Both will also be glad to keep a status quo of nickle and diming for new services, ultimately limiting innovation and increasing their profit
Re:you know (Score:4, Informative)
Oh for goodness sake...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality [wikipedia.org]
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The Internet [wikipedia.org]
Re:you know (Score:4, Funny)
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Come to think of it, even that might be too high-level. How 'bout...
The Internet Made Simple [wikipedia.org]
(C'mon someone was going to do it eventually...)
Dancing around the issue (Score:2)
Re:you know (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:you know (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll get to work, but since my opinion is that "net neutrality" IS a solution in search of a problem, you might consider my efforts to be counterproductive.
The commercial internet has existed now for over a decade, and the tools to allow carriers to shape traffic at will have existed that entire time. And yet, no one has attempted the kind of favoritism that "net neutrality" is concerned could happen.
It seems to me that market forces have been and will be sufficient to guarantee that the net is as neutral as the people want it to be.
Re:you know (Score:5, Informative)
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Net neutrality has existed ever since the dawn of the Internet, but it was called the common carrier laws [wikipedia.org] and it originally applied to carriers of parcels as well as telecom companies. Since Internet was run over telephone lines, common carrier laws provided neutrality until the August 2005 changes that states that internet services are not telecom services. Simultaneously, the FCC added a series
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You are being incredibly naiive. Why do you think that the telcos are spending lobbying dollars on trying to eliminate any re
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Your argument about Earthlink's customers is only true IF they know about it.
Besides, a net neutrality law wouldn't be cast in stone, never to be changed. It often comes to how it's enforced and how it's modified over time... I guess the need
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This is a good read on the subject and my source for the quote. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-ed-markey/net-n e utrality-and-the-co_b_19056.html [huffingtonpost.com]
Whitacre is a Liar (Score:5, Informative)
What [Google, Vonage, and others] would like to do is to use my pipes free. But I ain't going to let them do that."
I can tell you that Google, Vonage and everyone else who has a web presence out there already pays a bill. They're already paying to make sure that their packets get where they're going. How is it the consumers fault that AT&T can't work out a profitable peering agreement with Google's bandwith provider? I can tell you why they can't! Too many AT&T customers sending email, visiting site, etc. that aren't on AT&T's network. Since they can't keep their customers on their own network, they have agreements that let them swap traffic "for free". For example, AT&T swaps with C&W so that everyone stays connected, all the email gets through, and we can all surf where we want. What they really want to do away with is the peering agreements. They're all trying to move to an AOL-ish model where you keep your customers on your 'net and just call it "the internet", even though it's really only sites that are either hosted or cached on their network. Man, this makes the Chinese goverment look like a bunch of role models instead of the censors that they really are.
Well, I don't want anyone telling me "You've got mail!" I want a real internet connection.
I pay my bill to Verizon for a screaming fast 7MB/sec FIOSS connection. If I want to host, which is against my AUP, but I never put up anything that sucks up too much bandwidth, so they've never complained. Still, it is bandwidth that I purchase from my provider. I want to go where I want and do what I want on 'net without some damn pop up saying "Google is over it's service limit with Verizon and so your access to this site is temporarily blocked." If Verizon tries it, I'll be going back to my own T1 with an indie carrier. If the indie carrier tries it, so help me, I'll start my own wireless 'net replacement, invite everyone to join me, and make rude hand gestures at the big boys like AT&T, C&W, etc.
If you don't like this legislation, write your congressman [house.gov] or your sentor [senate.gov] and tell them to get their 90 year old heads out of the sand before it's too late.
2 cents,
QueenB
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A basic form of "net neutrality" already exists in the US because of regulation. Some groups want to destroy this legislation and are willing to lie / misinform people to get this to happen. But only a fool thinks market forces would prevent companies from exercising rights they are spending money to gain.
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What you are advocating is essentially the ability to legally tax the quality of service as well as performance. Sure, they'll sell you that 30Mbps connection, but if you want that speed for anything other than HTTP traffic you'll have to bu
Net Neutrality Existed (Score:5, Insightful)
1) The internet was considered a telecommunication and as thus had to adhere to existing net neutrality regulations. This was the case since the internet existed.
2) At some point, the FCC ruled that the internet was a data service and not a telecommunication. As a side effect of this ruling, Net neutrality was no longer required for the internet.
3) Verizon (I think) started to throtle VoIP, more specificly Vonage traffic.
4) Verizon, Bellsouth and ATT came out and publicly made statements that Google, YouTube, and Vonage have been getting a free ride on their pipes (forgot who started it).
5) The easily defeatable debate of a "free ride" (due to the fact Google/YouTube/Vonage pay for their traffic) made the telecoms change their position and the debate about wanting to serve Television over the internet (TVoIP?). Somehow Net Neutrality would prevent them from offering these extra services to their customers.
6) The "free ride" debate sparked interest in creating a net neutrality bill passed for the internet.
There is a lot more details here, but this is in essence what I have followed. I do not see why it is so hard to see that the greedy bastards are the cable/telecoms? Why are we paying so much for internet access and yet receiving so little when compared to other countries? Where did the $200 billion go to fund a 45mbps duplex fiber line to every home in America? Why do people keep defending the very same companies who tried to rob you of $2/month when the FCC lifted several federal charges on DSL? I am pretty pissed, and everyone else should too!
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This all sounds good right? Well the router providers are making the point that this has not been a problem in the past, so why borrow the t
Mod Parent 'Astroturf' (Score:2, Funny)
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I think all the people posting these "It's going to blot out the sun if we try to enforce net neutrality" need to look at the posts about the ISPs wanting to charge extra for traffic.
What you should be considering, and working on, is whether this is the correct legislation or just a knee-jerk reaction.
Re:you know (Score:5, Insightful)
Good. I don't want my ISP making decisions as to what mail I can get, based on an imperfect filtering algorithm. I think that spam filtering should be an optional service ISPs are able to provide, rather than something that is done across-the-board and that affects all customers, willingly or not.
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Not being sarcastic, but, which people? The individuals who already pay for their Internet service and don't wish to find themselves subject to slow transfers and timeouts due to their favorite site falling victim to a tiered system, or the companies that want to be able to do just that but have already been disciplined by the government in the past?
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The "Physical Internet" as supplied to people is almost COMPLETELY government regulated. You either access via telco (POTS) with a modem... through a government regulated telco, or via broadband cable... again government granted easements, or DSL... through the aformentioned telco... or fibre... with government granted easements.
About the ONLY way you can get the "internet"
Re:Hypocrites (Score:4, Insightful)
Out of curiosity, which ballot spot do you vote for? I'm strictly a second- candidate-from-the-top voter myself. Can't wait to see what order they put them in this time so I'll know who I support.
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Re:Hypocrites (Score:5, Insightful)
This means the government enforces fraud and misreprentation. It means the government enforces environmental laws so all vendors have the same production costs. It means the government punishes or breaks up monopolies that try to abuse other markets. It means the government enforces the neutrality of mediums upon which business is conducted.
If roads were private, and the vendor of the road to my house decided to charge USPS and UPS trucks $10 a package to drive through (but let DHL and FedEx trucks through with no extra charge), I'd be clamoring for the government to fix that problem, too.
Re:Unfortunately, neutrality is bad for fiber to h (Score:5, Insightful)
What evidence do you have that supports the notion that Americans will get faster access if net neutrality is scuttled? This is equating "faster access" with killing net neutrality is the exact koolaid that the telcom industry has been trying to cram into the collective consciousness. Their real goal has nothing to do with fiber in your home. It's all about being able to wring more cash out of Google, YouTube, and especially Vonage (who directly undercuts them).
The first rule of slashdot fight club is... (Score:2)
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Oh yeah, that's right... they've got all these old buildings and streets and such. Harder to run wires around after the fact, but it's easy to deploy wireless antennas.
Now compare this to the US where we have telephones, but not much broadband or cell coverage. Because the country is so fricking huge, it's expensive to run wires and/or put up that many antennas.
Wait a minute! I think you might have determ
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Thus, for telcos to come in and over TV service to a given municipality's residents requires them to go to each individual town and expand the charter. Since there are 10s of thousands of small towns across America, a prospect such as this becomes virtually impossible, even to someone like Verizon.
The proposed bill would eliminate the above restrictions and a
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Multicast would rock. (Score:2)
There are probably really clever architectural reasons why multicast is hard to implement, or doesn't scale to the entire internet, though. Darn.