If you're very far to the anti-regulation right, then net neutrality is an unjust violation by the government of a private business' right to set its own policies and prices.
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Vive, vale. Siquid novisti rectius istis,
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
I imagine companies will be against net neutrality because if they can buy better connections than the indies they can spend less effort maintaining a profitable service.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
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“Tell me who you walk with, and I'll tell you who you are.” Esmeralda Santiago Art is life itself.
I imagine companies will be against net neutrality because if they can buy better connections than the indies they can spend less effort maintaining a profitable service.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
Of course they are because it equals another revenue stream:
IE:
$10 basic package gives you access to Netflix, Amazon and select other websites.
$30 gives you 100 more websites.
$100 gives you unlimited access.
This on top of the teired speed fees cable companies use. This would not be an issue if ISP's had viable competition...which they do not.
EDIT: this would destroy google, which likely one of the reasons for they are rolling google fiber out.
EDIT2: Not to mention be boon for yahoo who provides all sorts of inherant content.
The argument is essentially that ISPs are a slave to the people whose content they serve and a slave to the people who consume that content. In a world where hunger for data is increasing at exponential rates, why should a company that provides that connection take on all of that cost and not force the people who disproportionately load that data onto the networks to pay more? If you own a bridge, why shouldn't you be allowed to charge people who bring heavier, longer, or wider things across it more?
Now, that's the base argument and I don't really agree with it. It is not, however, without merit in its entirety.
I understand that argument. It has a critical issue though...the cost of the bridge is already being paid by the consumer while the provider is profitable. It strictly a money grab.
I imagine companies will be against net neutrality because if they can buy better connections than the indies they can spend less effort maintaining a profitable service.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
Of course they are because it equals another revenue stream:
IE:
$10 basic package gives you access to Netflix, Amazon and select other websites.
$30 gives you 100 more websites.
$100 gives you unlimited access.
This on top of the teired speed fees cable companies use. This would not be an issue if ISP's had viable competition...which they do not.
EDIT: this would destroy google, which likely one of the reasons for they are rolling google fiber out.
EDIT2: Not to mention be boon for yahoo who provides all sorts of inherant content.
1) Most likely competition would force internet providers to give you a good deal because you can always find another one.
2) If not, enjoy nature, go for a hike, play outside, lift weights, get lade, have a conversation to real friends, have some fun!
Also, $100 seems pretty fair for unlimited access to unlimited information from anywhere in the world. You are spoiled.
I understand that argument. It has a critical issue though...the cost of the bridge is already being paid by the consumer while the provider is profitable. It strictly a money grab.
God forbid something be profitable!
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I petition for a new pack structure: 1 Mythic Rare 3 Rares 5 Uncommons 7 Commons 1 Token/B. Land
But I also propose even distribution of number of cards in each rarity: Large set: 60 c, 60 u, 60 r, 60 m.
Probabilities of particular cards: Common 7/60, Uncommon 1/12, Rare 1/20, Mythic 1/60.
1) Most likely competition would force internet providers to give you a good deal because you can always find another one.
Which is a problem in NZ. Very few truly independent ISPs, so we get deals like $75 for 30 gigs of data/month. Good luck downloading Steam games or watching online lectures.
Also, exclusivity contracts are already a problem in the US, as gumOnShoe said two posts above yours. Getting a better deal isn't always possible.
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“Tell me who you walk with, and I'll tell you who you are.” Esmeralda Santiago Art is life itself.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Also, $100 seems pretty fair for unlimited access to unlimited information from anywhere in the world. You are spoiled.
Its not the ISP place to restrict access to content they do not produce or own or control. ISP's own the gateway to the highway....they do not own the highway. Say you build a website....pay for the server and web hosting, etc, etc. Guess what? You now have to pay a price for people to come visit your website or the ISP is going to block your page from visitors. This is tantamount to allowing private entities to put a lock on your door to keep people out of your house/business.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
This is not really true. All major countries regardless of where they are on the capitalist / Socialist front all have major anti trust law and take the enforcement of them very seriously.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
This is not really true. All major countries regardless of where they are on the capitalist / Socialist front all have major anti trust law and take the enforcement of them very seriously.
He said unregulated. Anti-trust laws amount to regulation. Unregulated capitalism DOES tend towards monoplolies, unfortunately.
I was watching C-SPAN earlier regarding this topic and it seems as though the people moderating the discussion have very high doubts that the FCC will make an appeal to this court ruling decision against Net Neutrality laws in the U.S. Government although I wouldn't be surprised If the FCC takes this case to SCOTUS and If so this could be as big as the cases they held regarding DOMA and the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare). I'm a bit surprised that the issues regarding the NSA program hasn't gone to SCOTUS yet though.
The main goal for the FCC in terms of this issue is to convince President Obama to direct the FCC to classify ISP's as "common carriers" so that the words of the FCC chairman may be fulfilled: "I am committed to maintaining our networks as engines for economic growth, test beds for innovative services and products, and channels for all forms of speech protected by the First Amendment." Sadly to say even If we do somehow win this fight to perserve Net Neutrality back to the way it was before the court ruling, Congress will just keep trying to pass bills into law to stifle the Internet until they tire us out.
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America Bless Christ Jesus
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
I wonder if it occurs to anyone that the argument against net neutrality is belied by the fact that some of us remember 14.4 kbps modems and websites with five megs worth of animated GIFs with no real purpose, frames within frames, sites made entirely of Flash animation, 500 lines of Javascript, animated mouse trailers, embedded music and video, HIGHLY intrusive popup ads that were really just fork bombs if you tried to close them rather than quitting the program (In Windows, you have to use ctrl-alt-del to stop this.)...Seriously, the entire existence of the 1990s belies the argument against net neutrality. Our technology has gotten better, and (outside of a few conspiracy sites, and even they are more fans of rainbow text these days) web design generally has, too.
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Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
This is not really true. All major countries regardless of where they are on the capitalist / Socialist front all have major anti trust law and take the enforcement of them very seriously.
Antitrust laws in America are a joke. The only company to be hit by one in the last 20 years that had a major effect on the economy was Microsoft.
When it comes to utilities, we haven't broken up any since Bell. Cell phone, Internet, Cable, and many others have been consolidating and merging for the last 20 years to the point where there are only 1-3 providers in a given region and their prices all mysteriously rise with each other, which begs the question is there some sort of tacit price fixing agreement?
AT&T bascially had to pay 7 Billion to T-Mobile to get out of a government thwarted merger.
The FCC just announced that they won't appeal to the recent federal court ruling against Net Neutrality laws in the U.S. however they're seeking an alternative solution to keep the Internet open for consumers whatever that may be although I had a bad feeling that this was inevitable especially with the recent merger going on with Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
LOL..great, now we get to pay a bundeled price to access a bunch of websites we will never vist and pay a premimum for others. Internet is going to become cable TV.
The way I see it, when a market is at this point, the companies who hold most of the power forget what it means to "make money". If money is a representation of value for an economy, then a business is a construct which has the explicit goal of creating value. A taxi service is valuable because it gives people a service they wouldn't otherwise have. And as such, it is understandable that an increase in demand means that taxi drivers can ask for more money; because the demand for them makes them inherently more valuable. But at a certain point, the taxi driver stops delivering value in the interest of obtaining more value, by charging extra to add in commodities that customers do not necessarily want, but not offering them an alternative, much as the internet companies are trying to bottleneck and package surfing deals. It's no longer about providing a sound internet service, it's about making people pay for things they don't want. Cable companies are in many ways the epitome of this; who the hell actually watches all 500 channels they get with their package deal?
But it's understandable why a lot of companies without healthy competition do this; it's not worth their time. If people will value a package deal the same as something less than it, then it's not exactly the company's fault for doing what works. In this respect, it's not only the company who is failing here; it's the customer's as well. That is not to say that the blame for these strong-arm-esque package deals offered by cable companies rests on the consumer, as it's not like the average consumer can just decide to host his own internet service, or go to a competitor. So the company is providing a bad service, but the customer is accepting it, albeit not happily.
The problems are that there isn't an alternative, and companies are not incentivized to provide a great deal for their consumers, because the value of internet is high enough that consumers will just deal with the crap they get with what they want. So either one or both of these things has to change. Honestly, I would like to see both of these things change, and I think most people would agree with that, at least. The problem I have is in figuring out how artificial these changes should be. It is a delicate line to tread between the seller's rights and the consumer's right to access the information web.
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"If you're Havengul problems I feel bad for you son, I got 99 problems and a Lich ain't one." - FSM
"In a world where money talks, silence is horrifying."
They have a monopoly on what has become essential infrastructure, while providing at best a duopoly.
It is problematic that Comcast can just turn off premium websites and the only alternative would be my cell provider.
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What's the big deal? You could have played multiple Righteous Avengers for years now.
Look at this, a topic that this forum's leftists and rightists substantially agree on.
Ultimately, I think the only viable solution here is internet access as public utility. I'm not even necessarily worried about the Comcasts of the world exercising the doomsday scenario (cutting off political debate by blocking fox news or huffington post or whatever), it just strikes me as horrible that netflix could be in jeopardy because Comcast wants people subscribing to their crappy television offering.
Last week I found a couple of news articles pertaining to this subject from my local paper The Kansas City Star that's a MUST read:
FCC to Reverse Stance on Net
by Edward Wyatt from the New York Times (article issued April 24th, 2014)
Washington - The principle that all Internet content should be treated equally as it flows through cables to consumers looks all but dead. Companies like Disney, Google or Netflix would be allowed to pay Internet service providers like Comcast and Verizon for special, faster lanes to send video and other content to their consumers under rules to be proposed by the Federal Communications Commission, the agency said Wednesday. The proposed rules would be a turn-around for the agency on what is known as net neutrality - the idea that Internet users should have equal ability to see any legal content they choose and that no providers of legal content should be discriminated against in providing their offerings to consumers.
The proposal would come three months after a federal appeals court struck down, for the second time, agency rules intended to guarantee a free and open Internet. The rules could radically reshape how Internet content is delivered to consumers. For example, if a gaming company could not afford the fast track to players, customers could lose interest and its product could fail. The rules would also likely raise prices eventually as the likes of Disney and Netflix passed on to customers whatever they paid for the speedier lanes, which are the digital equivalent of an uncongested car pool lane on a busy freeway.
Consumer groups immediately attacked the proposal, saying that not only would costs rise but that big, rich companies with the money to pay large fees to Internet service providers would be favored over small startups with innovative business models - stifling the birth of the next Facebook or Twitter. "If it goes forward, this capitulation will represent Washington at its worst," said Todd O'Boyle, program director of Common Cause's Media and Democracy Reform Initiative. "Americans were promised, and deserve, an Internet that is free of toll roads, fast lanes and censorship - corporate or governmental."
If the new rules deliver anything less, he added, "that would be betrayal." Broadband companies have pushed for the right to build special lanes. Verizon said during appeals court arguments that if it could make those kinds of deals, it would. FCC officials defended the proposal, saying the rules would still protect an open Internet because the agency would evaluate on a case-by-case basis whether particular charges by Internet service providers were fair to consumers and allowed for adequate competition. The providers would have to disclose how they treat all Internet traffic and on what terms they offered more rapid lanes, and would be required to act "in a commercially reasonable manner," agency officials said.
That standard would be fleshed out as the agency seeks public comment. The proposed rules would also require Internet service providers to disclose whether, in assigning faster lanes, they had favored their affiliated companies that provide content. That could have significant implications for Comcast, the nation's largest provider of high-speed Internet service, because it owns NBCUniversal. Also, Comcast is asking for government permission to take over Time Warner Cable, the third-largest broadband provider, and opponents of the merger say that expanding its reach as a broadband company would give Comcast more incentive to favor its own content over that of unaffiliated programmers. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has signaled for months that the federal appeals court decision striking down the earlier rules could force the commission to loosen its definitions of what constitutes an open Internet.
Those earlier rules barred Internet service providers from making deals with services like Amazon or Netflix to allow those companies to pay to stream their products to viewers through a faster, express lane on the Web. The court said that because the Internet is not considered a utility under federal law, it was not subject to that sort of regulation. Opponents of the proposed rules said they appeared to be full of holes, particularly in seeking to impose the "commercially reasonable" standard. "The very essence of a 'commercial reasonableness' standard is discrimination," Michael Weinberg, a vice president at Public Knowledge, a consumer advocacy group, said in a statement. "And the core of net neutrality is nondiscrimination."
He added that the commission and courts had acknowledged that it could be commercially reasonable for a broadband provider to charge a content company higher rates for access to consumers because that company's service was competitively threatening. "This standard allows Internet service providers to impose a new price of entry for innovation on the Internet," Weinberg said. Consumers can pay Internet service providers for a higher-speed Internet connection. But whatever speed they choose, under the new rules, they will get some content faster, depending on what the content provider has paid for.
The fight over net neutrality has gone on for at least a decade and is likely to continue at least until the FCC settles on new rules. Each of the past two times the agency has written rules, one of the Internet service providers has taken it to court to have the rules invalidated. The proposed rules, drafted by Wheeler and his staff, will be circulated to the agency's other four commissioners beginning today and will be released for public comment May 15. They are likely to be put to a vote by the full commission by the end of the year.
Consumer groups rip FCC 'fast lane' rules
by Todd Shields and Chris Strohm of Bloomberg News (article issued April 25th, 2014)
A proposal to let Internet providers charge Netflix, Google and other companies for faster connections to subscribers set off a firestorm among consumer advocates who say it could doom the open Internet. Service providers such as AT&T and Comcast would be able to negotiate deals with content makers such as Netflix and Amazon.com for preferential connections to consumers' televisions and computers, according to a proposal being pitched by Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler. "Netflix is not interested in a fast lane, we're interested in safeguarding an open Internet for our members," Christopher Libertelli, vice president of government affairs for the largest video subscription service, said in a statement.
Wheeler defended the proposal in a blog post Thursday, saying it doesn't abandon the FCC's Internet fairness policy. Advocacy groups, including Public Knowledge and Free Press, that have supported rules to prevent Internet service providers from unfairly blocking or slowing Web traffic - known as "Net Neutrality" - objected. 'Pay-for-priority schemes will be a disaster for startups, nonprofits and everyday Internet users who cannot afford these unnecessary tolls," Craig Aaron, president of Free Press, said in an e-mailed statement. He called the proposal "a convoluted path that won't protect Internet users."
Michael Weinberg, vice president of the policy group Public Knowledge, said Wheeler's proposal "is not Net neutrality." The FCC is inviting service providers "to pick winners and losers," Weinberg said in an e-mailed statement. Former FCC commissioner Michael Copps said in a statement that the proposal is "a huge step backwards and must be stopped." "If the commission subverts the open Internet by creating a fast lane for the 1 percent and slow lanes for the 99 percent, it would be an insult to both citizens and to the promise of the Net," said Copps, who now serves as a special adviser to Common Cause's Media and Democracy Reform Initiative.
The FCC has been seeking to replace a rule rejected in January by a U.S. court. The regulation required companies that provide businesses and consumers high-speed Internet service over wires, or broadband, to treat Web traffic equally and didn't let them charge for faster or more reliable access. As it passed the now voided rule in 2010 on a party line vote, the FCC said pay-for-priority arrangements that favored some traffic "could cause great harm to innovation and investment" on the Internet. Sen. Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat who sits on the Senate Commerce Committee, said different speeds contradict the essence of the Internet and its level playing field.
Wheeler who sent the proposal to the five-member agency, Thursday, will push for a preliminary vote next month and wants to have a rule in place by year end. The FCC will test any proposed deals for harm to competition and consumers. Wheeler said in his blogpost that the proposal he is delivering to the agency will bar Internet service providers such as AT&T and Verizon Communications from blocking legal content. It also requires the companies to disclose their policies to subscribers and users and prevents them from acting "in a commercially unreasonable manner to harm the Internet, "including favoring an affiliate's traffic."
So right now there's an online petition going on at Whitehouse.gov to help protect net neutrality (or whatever is left of it) and much like with Congress's rush to pass a new SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) bill into law instead of doing their job such as increasing the Minimum Wage, passing Immigration Reform, or Gun Control laws it's time for us to step up to the plate once again and ensure that the Internet remains free and open the way it was originally intended. So far as I'm typing this there's only 39,769 signatures on the petition and we need 60,231 more to reach the goal of 100,000 by May 24th, 2014 which is the deadline. Here's the link to the petition:
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
A lot of the people who care realize it's a lost cause as long as the internet is controlled by the government or corporations. Because of this many people are actually working toward and hoping for a mesh based internet that cannot be controlled.
How can anyone be agaist Net Neutraility? Although it just looks like an admistrative issue the FCC has to correct.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
If you're very far to the anti-regulation right, then net neutrality is an unjust violation by the government of a private business' right to set its own policies and prices.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
Sucks for the consumers and innovative newbies, but unregulated capitalism tends towards monopolies.
Art is life itself.
Of course they are because it equals another revenue stream:
IE:
$10 basic package gives you access to Netflix, Amazon and select other websites.
$30 gives you 100 more websites.
$100 gives you unlimited access.
This on top of the teired speed fees cable companies use. This would not be an issue if ISP's had viable competition...which they do not.
EDIT: this would destroy google, which likely one of the reasons for they are rolling google fiber out.
EDIT2: Not to mention be boon for yahoo who provides all sorts of inherant content.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
I understand that argument. It has a critical issue though...the cost of the bridge is already being paid by the consumer while the provider is profitable. It strictly a money grab.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
1) Most likely competition would force internet providers to give you a good deal because you can always find another one.
2) If not, enjoy nature, go for a hike, play outside, lift weights, get lade, have a conversation to real friends, have some fun!
Also, $100 seems pretty fair for unlimited access to unlimited information from anywhere in the world. You are spoiled.
God forbid something be profitable!
But I also propose even distribution of number of cards in each rarity: Large set: 60 c, 60 u, 60 r, 60 m.
Probabilities of particular cards: Common 7/60, Uncommon 1/12, Rare 1/20, Mythic 1/60.
Also, exclusivity contracts are already a problem in the US, as gumOnShoe said two posts above yours. Getting a better deal isn't always possible.
Art is life itself.
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/restore-net-neutrality-directing-fcc-classify-internet-providers-common-carriers/5CWS1M4P
http://act.freepress.net/sign/internet_FCC_court_decision2/
http://www.savetheinternet.com/sti-home
http://www.fcc.gov/
http://www.avaaz.org/en/internet_apocalypse_loc/?bbUepcb&v=34949
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Its not the ISP place to restrict access to content they do not produce or own or control. ISP's own the gateway to the highway....they do not own the highway. Say you build a website....pay for the server and web hosting, etc, etc. Guess what? You now have to pay a price for people to come visit your website or the ISP is going to block your page from visitors. This is tantamount to allowing private entities to put a lock on your door to keep people out of your house/business.
um...I have no problem it being profitable.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
This is not really true. All major countries regardless of where they are on the capitalist / Socialist front all have major anti trust law and take the enforcement of them very seriously.
He said unregulated. Anti-trust laws amount to regulation. Unregulated capitalism DOES tend towards monoplolies, unfortunately.
The main goal for the FCC in terms of this issue is to convince President Obama to direct the FCC to classify ISP's as "common carriers" so that the words of the FCC chairman may be fulfilled: "I am committed to maintaining our networks as engines for economic growth, test beds for innovative services and products, and channels for all forms of speech protected by the First Amendment." Sadly to say even If we do somehow win this fight to perserve Net Neutrality back to the way it was before the court ruling, Congress will just keep trying to pass bills into law to stifle the Internet until they tire us out.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
On phasing:
AT&T bascially had to pay 7 Billion to T-Mobile to get out of a government thwarted merger.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
The FCC just announced that they won't appeal to the recent federal court ruling against Net Neutrality laws in the U.S. however they're seeking an alternative solution to keep the Internet open for consumers whatever that may be although I had a bad feeling that this was inevitable especially with the recent merger going on with Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
But it's understandable why a lot of companies without healthy competition do this; it's not worth their time. If people will value a package deal the same as something less than it, then it's not exactly the company's fault for doing what works. In this respect, it's not only the company who is failing here; it's the customer's as well. That is not to say that the blame for these strong-arm-esque package deals offered by cable companies rests on the consumer, as it's not like the average consumer can just decide to host his own internet service, or go to a competitor. So the company is providing a bad service, but the customer is accepting it, albeit not happily.
The problems are that there isn't an alternative, and companies are not incentivized to provide a great deal for their consumers, because the value of internet is high enough that consumers will just deal with the crap they get with what they want. So either one or both of these things has to change. Honestly, I would like to see both of these things change, and I think most people would agree with that, at least. The problem I have is in figuring out how artificial these changes should be. It is a delicate line to tread between the seller's rights and the consumer's right to access the information web.
"In a world where money talks, silence is horrifying."
Ashcoat Bear of Limited
It is problematic that Comcast can just turn off premium websites and the only alternative would be my cell provider.
Ultimately, I think the only viable solution here is internet access as public utility. I'm not even necessarily worried about the Comcasts of the world exercising the doomsday scenario (cutting off political debate by blocking fox news or huffington post or whatever), it just strikes me as horrible that netflix could be in jeopardy because Comcast wants people subscribing to their crappy television offering.
So right now there's an online petition going on at Whitehouse.gov to help protect net neutrality (or whatever is left of it) and much like with Congress's rush to pass a new SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) bill into law instead of doing their job such as increasing the Minimum Wage, passing Immigration Reform, or Gun Control laws it's time for us to step up to the plate once again and ensure that the Internet remains free and open the way it was originally intended. So far as I'm typing this there's only 39,769 signatures on the petition and we need 60,231 more to reach the goal of 100,000 by May 24th, 2014 which is the deadline. Here's the link to the petition:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/maintain-true-net-neutrality-protect-freedom-information-united-states/9sxxdBgy
Spread the word on this petition through YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc. just make sure this gets out to the public.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Art is life itself.
calling liberals loons=not okay
The standard to which the forum moderators apply the rules here.
The US is only ruining it for the US. Other countries have their own net neutrality issues and what we do here has no impact over there.
Net neutrality only applies to American ISPs.