@ RU0517581: Are you...are you seriously attempting to say that Net Neutrality is communism? What is this, the red scare? The 1950s? McCarthyism? By god, look at the facts, not the conspiracy.
Also, I just LOVE it when people assume that companies, because they're "capitalist", are so benevolent, while the government is "Big Brother" and the worst thing ever. Fun fact: Neither necessarily has your best interest at heart. Furthermore, we aren't close to the best infrastructure in the world. We're 26th or so out of 198, with country 198 having 1.18 Mbps download while we have 33.33 Mbps download. Sounds good right? Except to crack the top five, we'd have to almost double our speeds to 64.29...in order to be faster than Romania. That's right. Romania. Not that I'm saying anything bad about Romania. But for a country that seems to constantly pound its own chest about being the best, we're still losing out to Romania. To be the fastest in the world, we'd need to be at 111.63 Mbps, beating out Singapore. Now, I understand that we're not nearly as small as these countries, so getting that kind of average speed is unlikely, but we have the technology to have cable at over 1 Gbps. Doesn't seem like these companies are working too hard at innovation.
http://www.netindex.com/download/allcountries/
Capitalism doesn't mean striving to provide the best at all times. Capitalism means making as much money as possible, even if that means your customers get crushed, because hey, if you have almost no competition, what can they do?
MaximumPC has a pretty good article on this.
http://www.maximumpc.com/fcc_tom_wheeler_net_neutrality_verizon_2015
Some highlights:
"
No Blocking: broadband providers may not block access to legal content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
No Paid Prioritization: broadband providers may not favor some lawful Internet traffic over other lawful traffic in exchange for consideration or any kind-in other words, no "fast lanes." This rule also bans ISPs from prioritizing content and services of their affiliates."
"Broadband service will remain exempt from state and local taxation under the Internet Tax Freedom Act. This law, recently renewed by Congress and signed by the President, bans state and local taxation on Internet access regardless of its FCC regulatory classification. "
"
This is amusing because Verizon previously forced its hand through the FCC by saying it is a common carrier under Title II Regulations. In fact, it's not recent at all. According to an
In a report by The Verge,
Verizon's own documents say:
"As noted, Verizon NJ has been upgrading substantial portions of its telecommunications network with FTTP technology as a common carrier pursuant to Title II of the Communications Act of 1934..."
Straight from the horse's mouth. Talk about hypocrisy.
Verizon uses Title II to gain common carrier benefits, such as regulated lower prices, for when it wants to push out infrastructure and dip its hands into tax dollars for the build-outs, but shams Title II for when it wants to throttle broadband speeds so that it can siphon money from content providers--all after the Verizon customer has already paid for the access.
How exactly can Verizon claim Title II? Easy: Verizon also has a landline telephone business. Telephone carriers are classified and regulated under Title II of the communications Act. This regulation controls costs, and allows telephone carriers to use backbones of other utilities, to ease the build-out of networks by piggybacking on existing infrastructure. Since landline businesses are dying, Verizon and others keep this part of its business around as a very powerful tool.
So, Verizon jumps back and forth on Title II classification, depending on whether or not it perceives an advantage, and even outright classifies itself under Title II. Yet today it is publicly trashing Title II as an antiquated regulation from the 1930s."
