They want to
take their ball and go home. Except that the "ball" is the internet as a whole and "they" are the big telecoms (telecommunications companies like AT&T ... well I wanted to list more but can't find reference to any other big telecoms). A lot of the blogs I read have been proclaiming how it's going to squeeze out the little guy. Small startups won't be able to foot the extra cost of paying the telecoms for fast connections and thus will get squeezed out by the big corporations that can afford it (or have the capital to fund the frontside and then pass the costs on to us).
NET Neutrality in the News
But as this site points out, companies already pay for their bandwidth. If they use more they pay more. And what it seems like the telecoms want to do is make a sliding scale so that if you use more you pay extra for that more. That hardly seems fair. They've got a pretty good analogy ...
'Let's say you're a SBC telephone customer. You pick up the phone to call a local business. After you dial the number, you get a message that says, "You have chosen to call a number that uses GTE as it's local phone service. We are unable to connect this call between the peak hours of nine AM to five PM. If you wish to connect to this business during non-peak hours, you must pay an additional service charge."
So, let's say you're lucky, and the business remains open until 5:30 PM. Now, when you call, you get this message: "To connect to this number with a low-quality connection at the rate of twenty-five cents a minute, please press 'one' now. To connect to this number with a regular, high quality connection at fifty cents per minute, please press 'two' now."
Do you think you'd like a phone service that operates like that? If not, then why would you want a tiered Internet that works like that?'
I know if the phone company did that to me (on either side) I'd be outta there in a second.
But the Republicans (I wonder how much money the telecoms donate to them?) keep trying to pull any teeth out of the legislation which are meant to keep the internet free (not meaning you don't pay for it but that providers can't dictitate or control content).
Net Neutrality Counterattacks
This one has some interesting things to say and it appears that we may be reversing the initial setback. However if the telecoms insist that big consumers (Google, eBay and Skype) aren't contributing to the maintenance of the infrastructure, is that their (the consumers) fault that the telecoms can't set up a business model which will fund infrastructure improvements? It almost screams to me that they're saying to Congress "help us, we're incompetant and have to have you protect us from ourselves", something that pisses me off when other people need to be protected from themselves (let them step in front of the bus and get killed, the gene pool will be improved).
No love for network neutrality in the Senate
This one stipulates a bit about what will happen. Extra pricing for bandwidth speeds above 200kbps. And you can be damn sure that the costs on the companies part will appear on your (my) Mediacom bill (I'm already paying nearly $100 a month for cable, expanded cable - so I get Sci Fi & FoodTV, and my cable modem). Great. A $100 for gas and then an extra charge on my cable bill. Thanks my faithful elected representatives, Mister Talent, Mister Bond and Mister Hulshof. You can be damned sure I'll make note of your position on this matter and vote according when the time comes.
Sign the petition
Find out more
NET Neutrality in the News
But as this site points out, companies already pay for their bandwidth. If they use more they pay more. And what it seems like the telecoms want to do is make a sliding scale so that if you use more you pay extra for that more. That hardly seems fair. They've got a pretty good analogy ...
'Let's say you're a SBC telephone customer. You pick up the phone to call a local business. After you dial the number, you get a message that says, "You have chosen to call a number that uses GTE as it's local phone service. We are unable to connect this call between the peak hours of nine AM to five PM. If you wish to connect to this business during non-peak hours, you must pay an additional service charge."
So, let's say you're lucky, and the business remains open until 5:30 PM. Now, when you call, you get this message: "To connect to this number with a low-quality connection at the rate of twenty-five cents a minute, please press 'one' now. To connect to this number with a regular, high quality connection at fifty cents per minute, please press 'two' now."
Do you think you'd like a phone service that operates like that? If not, then why would you want a tiered Internet that works like that?'
I know if the phone company did that to me (on either side) I'd be outta there in a second.
But the Republicans (I wonder how much money the telecoms donate to them?) keep trying to pull any teeth out of the legislation which are meant to keep the internet free (not meaning you don't pay for it but that providers can't dictitate or control content).
Net Neutrality Counterattacks
This one has some interesting things to say and it appears that we may be reversing the initial setback. However if the telecoms insist that big consumers (Google, eBay and Skype) aren't contributing to the maintenance of the infrastructure, is that their (the consumers) fault that the telecoms can't set up a business model which will fund infrastructure improvements? It almost screams to me that they're saying to Congress "help us, we're incompetant and have to have you protect us from ourselves", something that pisses me off when other people need to be protected from themselves (let them step in front of the bus and get killed, the gene pool will be improved).
No love for network neutrality in the Senate
This one stipulates a bit about what will happen. Extra pricing for bandwidth speeds above 200kbps. And you can be damn sure that the costs on the companies part will appear on your (my) Mediacom bill (I'm already paying nearly $100 a month for cable, expanded cable - so I get Sci Fi & FoodTV, and my cable modem). Great. A $100 for gas and then an extra charge on my cable bill. Thanks my faithful elected representatives, Mister Talent, Mister Bond and Mister Hulshof. You can be damned sure I'll make note of your position on this matter and vote according when the time comes.
Sign the petition
Find out more
posted by banzai at 10:55
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