Net Neutrality and the FCC's long history of failed 'consumer protections'

Investor's Business Daily ^ | 11/12/2014 | John Merline

[IBD editorial writer]

Whatever the FCC's charter might be, and whatever its intentions, its rules and regulations over the past 70 years have often stifled competition, thwarted innovation and curtailed investment in the nation's communications networks.

Here are five prime examples:

[Travis McGee]

Oh, goody! Dear Leader Obama is going to protect our internet from the greedy, evil corporations!

[Texas Eagle]

No doubt the geniuses at The FCC lied every step of the way because they thought the American people were too stupid to know how to use the new technologies wisely.

Why do we even need an FCC? President Cruz, tear down this bureaucracy!

[Usagi_yo]

I hope they delay it to 2017 so that a Republican President is in office and we can all go back to liking Net Neutrality again.

Looks like Obama would have a hard time selling gold bullion at 15% discount off spot prices.

[BitWielder1]

FCC should only concern itself with radio frequency allocations, a limited public resource.
The purpose is to reduce interference.
Right now they are causing interference of their own.

[DJ MacWoW]

6 Weeks
50%

Donate

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

five prime examples:

• Delayed TV
• Strangled Cable
• Blocked Cable Competition
• Muted Political Speech
• Silenced Cell Phones

The Associated Press was established in the middle of the Nineteenth Century. It was observed at the time that the AP constituted an enormous concentration of propaganda power. The AP replied that everyone knew that the numerous newspapers which belonged to the AP and which contributed stories to the AP newswire notoriously did not agree on much of anything - so the AP was objective. Well, it was true that those newspapers were fractiously independent - but via the mechanism of AP membership they were all associated. And 

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public - Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations

The FCC established in law the fallacious premise that journalism was objective, is objective, or ever will be objective. Journalists are natural demagogues, and they naturally promote politicians who are demagogues. Thus, the idea that a “Fairness Doctrine” could restrict opinion to the universe of what journalists in the Associated Press found it convenient and congenial to transmit to the public, and that could conceivably produce actual fairness is inherently absurd.

[re_nortex]

Abolish the FCC! Its only purpose is to prop up losers like MSNBC, CNN, NPR and PBS. With the FCC eliminated, those and other leftist propaganda outlets will wither and die. And hussien's government wants to bury Free Republic because they fear the truth.

Ted Cruz is right! Let free enterprise be FREE! Crush and kill net neutrality!

[Borges]

So you’re OK with ISPs artificially slowing down the signal of certain sites they dislike - and not telling consumers?

[re_nortex]

So you’re OK with ISPs artificially slowing down the signal of certain sites they dislike - and not telling consumers?

Sure, if they choose to do so, they probably have a good reason. Similarly, I also support Jim Robinson's rights as the owner of Free Republic to control who can and cannot post here. Private property rights are utmost in my mind. Freedom means that a company can choose how it wishes to operates without regulations imposed by a meddling government.

[Borges]

The reason would be that one site is paying them to slow down the bandwidth of a potential competitor (thus stifling innovation). I’ll repeat the point I made on another thread. It would be like a massive retailer taking over the maintenance of sidewalks in a neighborhood (the excuse being that more people use those sidewalks to go to that store than its neighbors). All of a sudden the paths that lead to said store are extremely well maintained while the paths that lead to its smaller competitors are ratty and filled with potholes.