Net Neutrality

[TonyB0D]

I actually heard some clowns arguing on Fox that this is a BAD thing.  I think our country's getting to a point where people will make EVERYTHING political, and about left vs right.  It is imperative to the freedom of the internet to pass these net neutrality laws, and it's funny that the small fraction of people arguing against it haven't a clue that they're actually arguing FOR it!!

Thoughts??

[Spider-Dan]

The Democrats want it.  Therefore, Fox is against it.

Not rocket science.

[Sunstroke]

I'm as non-party affiliated as a human being gets, so "my neutrality" shouldn't be in question as I ask...

"Did the democrats want this 'before' a democratic president was in office?"

[Gabriel]

I'm as non-party affiliated as a human being gets, so "my neutrality" shouldn't be in question as I ask...

"Did the democrats want this 'before' a democratic president was in office?"

I don't know the answer to that question, but Obama did appoint a new FCC commissioner who made a point of saying he supported "net neutrality."

[CF DolFan]

Ok I'll be the one to go ahead and do it.  What is net neutrality?

[fyo]

Ok I'll be the one to go ahead and do it.  What is net neutrality?

It's a concept of an "origin", "destination", and "content" neutral Internet. Basically, it's what we have today. You buy a connection to "the Internet" and that's what you get. Big companies buy connections to "the Internet". This allows everyone connected to the Internet to access their content.

Now, let's say Google wants people to be able to access their content faster. They buy more bandwidth to their server -- or, as is often the case, place more servers around the world with big Internet connections, making the route from YOU to THEM as short as possible.

In this scenario, Google pays their ISP(s) for their Internet connection(s) -- a price that depends on the bandwidth usage and speed of the connetion (duh), and YOU pay your ISP for your connection.

What happens in the middle can get a bit messy, but the content is treated NEUTRALLY. That is, it gets the same priority regardless of origin, content, or destination.

Abolishing net neutrality would allow Google (to continue using them as an example) to pay your ISP extra to get them to prioritize Google traffic above everything else.

The results are many, but one important component is that you (as a consumer) are no longer buying a connection to "the Internet", but also a set of prioritized data paths. One ISP may have a deal to prioritize content from fox.com, whereas another may get money from msnbc.com instead.

Then there's the whole "middle" portion and things start to get really complicated. When you access content over the Internet, the data is typically routed though networks of multiple ISPs. Any one of them could, if not for the principle of net neutrality, increase or decrease the priority of "your" data. Some might have a deal to prioritize YouTube, some... something else. Basically, anything the "market" can think of.

[fyo]

I forgot to give a good example:

Let's say you have "Internet Provider A" as your ISP. One day, they decide to roll out a VOIP product. To make sure they have the best call quality possible (low latency, no hiccups), they prioritize their VOIP traffic above all other traffic on their network. They also decide that Skype traffic really isn't that important and give it a low priority. This makes their product as good as possible compared to the rival. Skype might be able to pay your ISP in order to get "equal treatment" of their data, but that's their only real recourse.

This has happened already, of course, with several examples in Canada in the past few years.

Whether or not you think this is a good thing or a bad thing is up to you. Should an ISP be allowed to decide what to do with traffic on its own network? There's certainly a "freedom" argument to be made (although it's easy to do for the reverse as well).

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

It's a concept of an "origin", "destination", and "content" neutral Internet. Basically, it's what we have today. You buy a connection to "the Internet" and that's what you get. Big companies buy connections to "the Internet". This allows everyone connected to the Internet to access their content.

Now, let's say Google wants people to be able to access their content faster. They buy more bandwidth to their server -- or, as is often the case, place more servers around the world with big Internet connections, making the route from YOU to THEM as short as possible.

In this scenario, Google pays their ISP(s) for their Internet connection(s) -- a price that depends on the bandwidth usage and speed of the connetion (duh), and YOU pay your ISP for your connection.

What happens in the middle can get a bit messy, but the content is treated NEUTRALLY. That is, it gets the same priority regardless of origin, content, or destination.

Abolishing net neutrality would allow Google (to continue using them as an example) to pay your ISP extra to get them to prioritize Google traffic above everything else.

The results are many, but one important component is that you (as a consumer) are no longer buying a connection to "the Internet", but also a set of prioritized data paths. One ISP may have a deal to prioritize content from fox.com, whereas another may get money from msnbc.com instead.

Then there's the whole "middle" portion and things start to get really complicated. When you access content over the Internet, the data is typically routed though networks of multiple ISPs. Any one of them could, if not for the principle of net neutrality, increase or decrease the priority of "your" data. Some might have a deal to prioritize YouTube, some... something else. Basically, anything the "market" can think of.

Actually it is even worse than that......

Lets say your ISP is your cable company.  They could block or slow the access speed to directv.com & dish.com to so slow it is effectively blocked.  This means you could never check out there prices and compare to see if you want to switch.

Your ISP could also have a deal with say verizon wireless that makes it very quick to load their page, but impossible to load AT&T or sprint's page.  Or with Progressive insurance blocking you from all other carriers. 

[fyo]

Actually it is even worse than that......

Outright censorship is speculative at best. The PR ramifications of such a move would likely be disastrous.

[Dave Gray]

The simplest way to explain it is this:

Currently, you buy a connection to the Internet.  That connection is the same for every user and all websites have equal footing.  When you look up a site like Google, you download it at the same speed as a small site, like TDMMC.

Net Neutrality laws preserve this.

Otherwise, you will see larger companies making deals with ISPs to deliver their content faster or exclusively.

[Spider-Dan]

I'm as non-party affiliated as a human being gets, so "my neutrality" shouldn't be in question as I ask...

"Did the democrats want this 'before' a democratic president was in office?"

Yes.  And I understand the nature of your question.

It is not an expansion-of-executive-power question (in which case the power in party is likely to support it and the party out of power is likely to oppose); it is more of a corporatist vs. non-corporatist question.

Net neutrality is effectively a kind of regulation that prohibits ISPs from prioritizing traffic based on on where it's going*.  So basically, all the standard anti-regulation players are opposing it, and the standard pro-regulation players are in favor of it.

I leave the exercise of determining which parties are generally pro-regulation and which are generally anti-regulation to the reader.

*Net-neutrality does NOT prohibit prioritizing traffic based on what kind of traffic it is.  Prioritization based on the kind of traffic is a well-established policy called Quality of Service (QoS), and no one is proposing that it be eliminated.  For example, it's perfectly legal for AT&T to prioritize Voice-Over-IP traffic over BitTorrent traffic; they just can't prioritize certain VOIP traffic (e.g. AT&T's) over other VOIP traffic (e.g. Vonage's).

[fyo]

*Net-neutrality does NOT prohibit prioritizing traffic based on what kind of traffic it is.  Prioritization based on the kind of traffic is a well-established policy called Quality of Service (QoS), and no one is proposing that it be eliminated.

You are confusing QoS and traffic shaping. They are NOT the same.

Net neutrality is not currently law (as such, anyway), so exactly what is covered and what is not, is not trivial. There are certainly a lot of people who disapprove of traffic shaping and no, not all ISPs do this.

[SCFinfan]

I don't think I'd mind some tiering (if I'm using the term correctly here) based on the content of the website to be viewed by said traffic. That is especially true if the the user agent of the individual web surfer provides adequate evidence that they are underage. 

For example, I would prefer it if sites that poured forth vicious white-supremacist filth were given somewhat slower downloading speeds, based on an action taken by the ISP itself, after a vote of its stakeholders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_%28corporate%29).

However, of course, that won't happen. ISPs aren't in the business of regulating morals. So, unfortunately, because the dollar sets the path of businesses rather than a sincere concern for the information they may be helping defenseless young minds view, the only real option seems to me to be absolute neutrality.