Gene Frenkle

http://thehill.com/policy/technology/230226-poll-voters-support-broad-concept-of-net-neutrality http://time.com/3578255/conservatives-net-neutrality-poll/ http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/09/17/349243335/3-7-million-comments-later-heres-where-net-neutrality-stands

They didn't get the outcome they wanted and now they're trashing the outcome. Enlighten me. Or the will of the people was upheld over that of special interest groups. Either way. You've developed some strong opinions about this, considering you didn't know anything about it until a couple of hours ago.

Sour grapes and more fear mongering. Verizon spent more than $15 million in lobbying efforts to kill net neutrality in 2012 alone.

I have exactly as many broadband options via the free market as I had 15+ years ago.

You're equating the three?

That was actually kind of funny. I'm pleasantly surprised!

Your opinion of doom is wrong. But that's just my opinion. I'm looking for a response in our conversation about analogies, which was a lot more interesting to me than the 'your opinion is wrong' and 'your analogies are wrong'. That type of argument is just wrong. Commie!

That's why I'm waiting for your whack job daily reading list to catch up with this topic so you can be informed of your opinion. Like I said, waiting with bated breath here! Like you said, you don't know what the !@#$ is going on, but you've no doubt that whatever my opinion is is wrong.

Oh really? What's the Infowars take on this, oh wise guru? The world waits with bated breath for Alex Jones' your opinion on this miscarriage of justice...

I suppose the dealer analogy holds up in that circumstance. Now that I understand what you were getting at with this: So to fix your analogy, think of auto dealers (ISPs) who need to stock cars for their customers, and the dealers are the ones who are responsible for making sure that they have enough cars on their lots to satisfy their customers. The new regulations say that no matter what cars the customers want and by extension what cars the automakers produce, the dealers have to send the exactly same trucks to each auto manufacturer, regardless of demand or volume. So if you're in the business of selling F-150, you have send the exact same number of car loaders and charge exactly the same amount to Ford, as you would to Suzuki. However, there are some differences here: 1. The dealers do not have to send the exact same number of car loaders to Ford and Suzuki. They simply have to meet customer demand, just like in the real world. 2. Real life dealers do not receive a monthly subscription fee from their customers. They make their profits off of the margins. 3. Consumers have many more choices when buying a car (as opposed to simply relying on a couple of Ford dealers in their area), keeping costs reasonable and choices unrestricted within the car market. Restricted! (lol) Can you give a summary? The negativity seems to stem mainly from fear of government involvement or a view that this is anti-capitalism.

They are not, because they do not stock product.

No, not really. The ISPs are not auto dealers. They are providing access to the auto dealers (content providers) via a finite pipe. Their mutual customer base can get to whatever dealer (content) they like through this pipe. I pay a subscription to Netflix. I (am forced to) watch ads on Youtube. These companies create content on their own and figure out how to make money off of that content. They also pay for that content to be hosted based on bandwidth usage as determined by their hosting provider. The consumers decide what they're going to do with the bandwidth they purchase from their ISPs. Oh, NOW I get it. Thanks for that enlightening sentence. Based on your ISP auto dealer analogy, I think we stop this particular conversation. I'm worried about becoming confused by your confusion.

Oh, just stop with the fear mongering. Please enlighten me on what I don't understand here.

Big deal. How are they any different than any other content provider? They should be afforded special rules and self-favoritism because they're supplying the consumer-paid pipe? If not for this vote, what would keep them from giving themselves the primo bandwidth while slowing down all the other voice and video streaming data. Either way, it's a moot point now. Try to catch up.

Yup. You can thank the Baby Jesus that (three of) these five people made a good decision for you on a topic that will affect your life but that you are relatively unaware of. Your internet content will not be restricted and you can forget about that neutral net? thing you kinda remember but never really understood. I kid, I kid. Sorta. http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2015/02/25/fcc-net-neutrality-vote/24009247/

FCC Approves Net Neutrality Rules For 'Open Internet' The Federal Communications Commission approved the policy known as net neutrality by a 3-2 vote at its Thursday meeting, with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler saying that the policy will ensure "that no one – whether government or corporate – should control free open access to the Internet." http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/02/26/389259382/net-neutrality-up-for-vote-today-by-fcc-board

It's already materialized in the power struggle between cable companies and cable content providers many, many times. Maybe the monopoly argument isn't completely true anymore, but you're making the consumer chose content based on the ISP they choose. The consumer is locked into contracts with the ISPs, who you think should be allowed to restrict access to whatever content they choose whenever they like. Internet Service Providers should provide internet service - that's it. They do not produce the content. They simply benefit from the service demand which stems from the content. Content providers are already paying to have their content served up by hosting providers. End users are already paying for service from the ISPs. Why should the ISPs be allowed to double-dip and/or restrict access to something they neither produced or payed for? It's insanity. Your argument is that there is not a monopoly? Ok, fine. You think I support a federal power grab over the "whole internet"? Bullschitt. I support no restrictions whatsoever. It's up to these ISPs to decide how to make a profit within an unrestricted system, IMO. Net Neutrality is simply about making private companies unable to censor, restrict or otherwise impede access to content. That's it. If you want restrictions, move to China you !@#$ing commie!

Politics and human nature can be quantified and argued based on facts. We all have our "sacred" cows, lol.

An interesting study...note: I'm not trying to spin this. I'm simply linking to a study. Investigating the Link Between Gun Possession and Gun Assault Objectives. We investigated the possible relationship between being shot in an assault and possession of a gun at the time. Methods. We enrolled 677 case participants that had been shot in an assault and 684 population-based control participants within Philadelphia, PA, from 2003 to 2006. We adjusted odds ratios for confounding variables. Results. After adjustment, individuals in possession of a gun were 4.46 (P < .05) times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not in possession. Among gun assaults where the victim had at least some chance to resist, this adjusted odds ratio increased to 5.45 (P < .05). Conclusions. On average, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot in an assault. Although successful defensive gun uses occur each year, the probability of success may be low for civilian gun users in urban areas. Such users should reconsider their possession of guns or, at least, understand that regular possession necessitates careful safety countermeasures. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2759797/

I thought of another analogy. Let's say I lease a Hummer and you lease a Prius. Let's also say that the roads we drive on are privately owned. You and I pay a flat fee to the private road provider company. We also both pay a fee to the companies we are respectively leasing from. The private road provider company decides that my Hummer is causing more damage to their roads than your Prius. Instead of charging me more directly for the added wear and tear my choice of automobile causes their roads, the private road company issues an ultimatum to GM: pay us more for the vehicles your customers are using or we will restrict your access to the roads we own. Currently, GM and Toyota have no direct relationship with the private road company. A settlement cannot be reached between GM and the road company. Hummers are blocked from the roads. I, the consumer who has no say in any of this, suddenly cannot drive the vehicle I purchased on these private roads. There are no other reasonable options to use another company's private roads because, well, the private road company holds a virtual monopoly on providing roads in my area. I got screwed. Screw your Prius and please, for the love of god, think of the Hummers!

No, I get it. Much like the bipolar politics that infects this country, people chose sides on this based on what the other team chose. Now one side feels like they won the Super Bowl (or at least a playoff game) and feels the need to either celebrate, rub the other team's nose in it or both. I get it. I just don't like this aspect of human nature.

The government currently regulates the power companies. That aside, Netflix, Youtube and Mom & Pop's Online Store are not direct customers of Comcast, Time Warner, etc... These companies are already paying their hosting companies based on the bandwidth their customers are using. The consumer ISPs like Comcast and Time Warner are simply supplying connectivity to the end user. They trying to restrict how their paying end users are using the bandwidth they have purchased. They are essentially trying to extort Netflix-like companies based on the usage patterns of their shared customer base. The best direct comparison is with the cable companies, though it's still a crappy comparison because the content providers do not (currently) have to negotiate with the consumer ISPs directly to make their content available to internet consumers. If you start a website today, you do not have to negotiate separate deals with Comcast, Time Warner, etc... to make your website available to people who wish to access it. If the ISPs are running out of bandwidth because of customer usage patterns, they should charge their end users for bandwidth usage directly instead of trying to throttle usage by blocking or throttling individual private content providers. Otherwise you'll run into situations like MSG or HBO not being available to customer on TWC because of failed contract negotiations: "We're sorry, but Netflix is not currently available on Comcast." So, like with so many other things, you are opposed to it because of your view of the people who support it. What a well-thought-out and informed opinion. How about doing some reading on what this is all about before forming an opinion. Strange concept, I know.

Personally, an unregulated internet is an ideal internet in my view. With these ISPs attempting to essentially force their own regulation on it in the form of taxing high bandwidth private content providers, the idea of a truly unregulated system is slipping away. So the question becomes: who should decide the rules. I know most of you will side with private industry, which in your view is represented by the ISPs here, but the content generators are generally smaller private companies. Ultimately, as always, the **** flows downhill. The ISPs are trying to pass the cost along to the content providers who will ultimately have to pass the cost along to the consumers. The ISPs only have their own interests at heart. This entire concept stifles innovation, erects barriers to entry and inhibits the free market beauty of anyone being able to act on a novel business idea.

What's your opposition to the concept? Simply anti government regulation? I'm genuinely curious.

An admitted non-expert with lots of preconceived notions. What an informative post - good reading!