it's not about government setting prices, it's about whether access providers can blackmail large companies by threatening to provide substandard service if they don't pay.
What some of those providers want to do is charge twice for the same bandwidth - and one of those parties isn't their customer. Instead of charging their own customers more for internet access, they want to be able to compete in that market on price while soaking places like amazon for the 'privilege' of letting the ISP customers get to their website normally. That's nothing more than blackmail.
Imagine you run a company that takes a lot of phone calls. You already have phone service you pay for. 50% of your incoming calls come from people with, say, AT&T for their home phone service. One day AT&T comes to you and says "You know, people are using AT&T lines to call you. We know you already pay for your own phone service. But you should pay us an extra fee because a bunch of those phone calls are coming through us. And if you don't pay, your connections with those customers might be really bad and you could end up losing business because of it".
That's mafia like activity. You can't go up to a non customer and threaten them. If they want to make more money, they should charge their own customers more, not shakedown big companies that aren't their customers via threats.
If you own the line you should be able to do what the hell you want with it. Blackmail involves the violation of individual rights; there is no such thing here. Considering the billions spent on the network, regulation of this sort is clearly a taking and is theft.
As for your AT&T scenario, that already happens with cell phones. Say you’re with AT&T (Cingular when they merge with BellSouth) and the only towers in the area where you live are Sprint. AT&T has to pay Sprint everytime you make call that connects through their tower. Usually if about 70% of your calls go through another providers tower then you become unprofitable and they cell company drops you.
Well said FlashBunny.
I will only add that Ed Whitacre (ATT CEO) is the "Greed Devil" incarnate with nothing but aspirations to be the bully of the industry. If he had his way he'd clone himself as Carlos Slim Helo of Telmex and instill a similar monopolistic reign in the US where a family's telecom expenditures are 30% of their income.
Furthermore, there are countless legal cases and FCC hearing records where ATT refuses to pay other carriers under set law and regulation with only a plan to strong arm smaller player into smaller financial settlements.
I say anything and everything that makes ATT step back from their desired path is a win for Americans.
That is unadulterated BS. Only socialists and liberals use terms like "blackmail" to characterize competetive practices. If access rates are so onerous to "large" corporations, let them invest the capital to build thier own infrastructure.
The number one reason that the telecom industry in such a snared-up mess is government regulation. I just have to chuckle when so-called "conservatives" start defending government interference in the markets when it involves something they have subjectively defined as "unfair."
As the article states, this is nothing more than corporatist warfare in which one corporation uses the weight of the government, bought and paid for with PAC money, as a weapon against another corporation, all because they are just too lazy to actually compete.
Your assertion is that an ISP can police traffic inbound to it's network, downgrading traffic of companies it doesn't like...Please illustrate technically how one would manage to do what you assert. I want the exact technical explanation, and don't spare the details, you won't confuse me I assure you.
Regards,
Col Sanders
What if CNN said that not only do you have to carry CNN,CNN2,CNN3 but you also have to have every 5th channel be a cnn channel AND the cable boxes had to be programed to automatically be on CNN every time the TV is turned on AND the vchip could never block any CNN channel.
I am torn on this one. On one hand it is free market, but on the other hand it is about silencing dissent. (why should a large corporation be able to obliterate an upstart by prohibiting bandwith to competitors.)