no more open internet :'( sad day in history

[JohnN]

25 Mb is high speed. I live in the sticks (150 miles north of San Francisco on the coast). It is a very small community and Comcast and AT&T are both pulling more fiber lines over 40 miles. That is competition, not mandated. A few years ago, most people were delighted when they could get over 3 Mb. The technology is moving way too fast than government can keep up.

Cellular, satellite, cable, and phone companies are all fighting for our money and doing their best to entice us with better service and a lower price. Fortunately, technology is allowing them to still make an attractive profit or we'd still be using 128 Kb modems.

I 'really' live in the sticks, and my options are limited to 8 Mbps (on a good day) DSL, unreliable fixed wireless and horrendously expensive satellite. No cable, no fiber, I'm one of those 50 million. I have no alternatives and the density is such that (unlike where you live) it is economically unrealistic to expect any buildout.

So why in a flawed (and protected) market are you trying to project the illusion of viable alternatives (hint: it is fundamental to your argument)

 

[JohnN]

If we applied the laws of Net Neutrality to other industries, I believe it becomes painfully obvious that it's incredibly flawed. Let's apply it to shipping.

With Shipping Neutrality, all mail has to take the same amount of time to deliver. Short distance? Long distance? International? It all must take the same amount of time. That's being neutral. Well, what if you want to pay more for overnight delivery? Too bad. What if you want to include shipping in the cost of the item? Too bad, that's favoritism. Amazon Prime is now illegal.

Not the best choice of examples. There are multiple viable alternatives for mail/package delivery. One of the options even offers a fixed price independent of weight and distance. It is a competitive marketplace where the consumer has alternatives. The issue with the direction the FCC wants to take is that for many people (50 million households give or take), there is no competition.

Want to try again?

 

[Schwob]

I live in greater Chicagoland. Suburbs but far enough out that there still is no fiber optic based alternative to Comcast. Only DSL, which were we live does not work reliably enough to stream video in HD resolution in a single receiving stream.
Comcast internet is the only available option for that. And it does not cut it always on plans that it should. We need to go to quite a higher end plan just to stream reliably in HD. Not bothering in UHD or whatnot. And thats with a wired connection to the router...

So, ignoring net neutrality for the moment, I think internet providers need to be regulated more, not less. At the very least I should be able to pay for a plan with a minimal guaranteed bandwidth for my houshold and have protected rights to hold the provider to it. The entire institutionalized hogwash about possible maximum speeds at 2 am during a moonless night needs to stop...

If I buy a gallon of gas, I want a gallon of gas not a "possibly up to one gallon of gas..., but sometimes just a pint..."

Net neutrality:
Yeah, I want it as such, I don't want the provider have any say whatsoever about what I do with the connection or to mess with bandwidth pending on what I am doing (for the bandwidth that I pay for that is) . Not ever.
What to do to actually get that? No idea.

 

[victorzamora]

Not the best choice of examples. There are multiple viable alternatives for mail/package delivery. One of the options even offers a fixed price independent of weight and distance. It is a competitive marketplace where the consumer has alternatives. The issue with the direction the FCC wants to take is that for many people (50 million households give or take), there is no competition.

Want to try again?

No, not really. I think it applies well. They're applying the rules to an area with sometimes less competition, but the rule application would be the same.

 

[JohnN]

No, not really. I think it applies well. They're applying the rules to an area with sometimes less competition, but the rule application would be the same.

OK

Please name an area of the country where I would not have access to multiple carriers for packages.

 

[victorzamora]

OK

Please name an area of the country where I would not have access to multiple carriers for packages.

You're ignoring the point on purpose as you know it goes against your narrative.

 

[JohnN]

You're ignoring the point on purpose as you know it goes against your narrative.

On the contrary. You're the one that presented package delivery as a similar model/surrogate for access to high speed internet. Time to put up or admit you need to try again to establish your position

I've already provided for you a reference that there are 50 million households that don't have this and a specific case of 1 (me).

For a lot of people, there is no competition for delivery of high speed internet

 

[victorzamora]

I'm not discussing the competition and/or lack thereof. I'm discussing the rules that Net Neutrality is forcing upon the internet. You posting that there are 50M americans with no high-speed internet alternatives (I am one of those) has zero relevance or bearing on the point I'm trying to make, which is applying the Net Neutrality rules to another industry. Period.

Not that it matters, but: the town my parents live in is over an hour from a UPS store or FedEx store....so they can essentially only ship things out via USPS. That certainly counts, doesn't it?

 

[JohnN]

I'm not discussing the competition and/or lack thereof. I'm discussing the rules that Net Neutrality is forcing upon the internet. You posting that there are 50M americans with no high-speed internet alternatives (I am one of those) has zero relevance or bearing on the point I'm trying to make, which is applying the Net Neutrality rules to another industry. Period.

Not that it matters, but: the town my parents live in is over an hour from a UPS store or FedEx store....so they can essentially only ship things out via USPS. That certainly counts, doesn't it?

By way of example, UPS charges $5.80 for a next-day scheduled pickup at a residence. If your parents live that far from town, your example seems to fail again (unless they are consumers that don't make optimal buying decisions)

The point you appear to be attempting to make is that Net Neutrality is by its nature bad. Please explain how it has hindered competition or slowed innovation, particularly in a marketplace where the owners of the content are the owners of the means of delivery. I would again refer you to the John Oliver piece if you want a cogent argument why removing Net Neutrality is bad policy

 

[victorzamora]

The point you appear to be attempting to make is that Net Neutrality is by its nature bad. Please explain how it has hindered competition or slowed innovation, particularly in a marketplace where the owners of the content are the owners of the means of delivery. I would again refer you to the John Oliver piece if you want a cogent argument why removing Net Neutrality is bad policy

The John Oliver piece had multiple factual errors and no proper comparison. My point is simply that Net Neutrality doesn't help open up the internet, it just benefits different tech giants. I'm all for keeping the internet open and preventing monopolies from destroying the end-user's experience with it. I'm just saying that Net Neutrality isn't as great as the narrative you're pushing is indicating. John Oliver is one of the last people on TV/radio I'd go to for news.