Senators reintroduce net neutrality bill (Liberals Screwing Up Internet)

Two U.S. senators have resurrected a debate over net neutrality in Congress by reintroducing legislation that would prohibit broadband providers from giving customers faster and more stable access to their own content than to competitors' Web sites and services.

Senators Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, and Olympia Snowe, a Maine Republican, introduced the Internet Freedom Preservation Act Tuesday. The two first offered the net neutrality legislation in May and then tried to amend it to a wide-ranging broadband bill in June, but the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee failed to add the amendment to the larger bill.

Stand-alone net neutrality legislation failed to pass in Congress last year, with many of the majority Republicans opposed to it. Since then, Democrats have taken control of Congress, and net neutrality legislation may find a more friendly audience.

AT&T Inc. last month agreed to net neutrality rules for two years in exchange for federal approval of its acquisition of BellSouth Corp. But net neutrality advocates said the concessions by the largest U.S. telecom carrier doesn't bind other large broadband providers to net neutrality rules.

"AT&T's concessions expire in two years, and they don't apply to everyone else," said Mark Cooper, director of research for the Consumer Federation of America. "The point here is to make these [rules] permanent and industrywide."

The Dorgan-Snowe bill would prohibit broadband providers from blocking, impairing, or degrading legal Internet content. It would require broadband providers to allow customers to attach any legal device to the network that does not degrade service, and it would require providers to notify customers of their speed of service and limitations on their network use.

I am conservative/libertarian and I think you guys are out to lunch.

The government should leave the market alone, but when the government acts to create monopolies it has to regulate them.

That is what has happened here.Take a look at the barriers to someone entering high speed internet service.One needs radio frequencies, or easements on phone poles, or easements on highways. One needs permission to run a competing cable service tv (with internet)--and most municipalities have entered into exclusive deals with cable tv companies.

Having created a monopoly, the government can't then say "and they should be able to charge whatever and however they wish".

I would rather see the monopoly busted, or confined to the absolute minimumum (i.e. cable companies that are regulated, but act as only a carrier, with you free to make any deal you want with providers of services and content). But if I can't havve that, then the government needs to make sure that the telcos and cable tv companies don't get to control what I can use my service for.

There is a reason you saw a lot of misleading advertising on this issue. If the monopoly cabl;e tv and telcos can erect toll gates on the internet it will be big, big bucks for them. Guess who will pay?

The "backbone" of the Internet is not a government asset nor is it "public" property. It is contained, nearly entirely in telecommunications transmission property owned and operated by the telecommunications companies.

It is only improved to the extent that revenue and the ROI on the improvements are justfied without lestening the economic vitality of the owers and operators of the actual physical means of the backbone.

"Net nuetrality" is nothing more than a give-away to multi-billion dollar companies like Google who want the telecommunications companies to have to treat them as if they are not the multi-billion dollar profit centers that they are, that instead they are just like little-ole not-for-profit you; and should be sheilded from mutli-tiered pricing for commercial operations, as has been allowed in all other forms of commercial telecommunications agreements.

Meanwhile, Google has mutli-tiered pricing for its commercial customers; charging some better rates than others based on the terms of those agreements.

But, their current revenue model requires that the telecommunications companies be prevented from acquiring additional revenue when content providers devise new technologies (for more profitable content) that compound the demand requirements of the backbone supplied by the telecoms. The telecoms are supposed to be "nuetral" in the face of the fact that the increased demands for their equipment (and Googles increased profits) are not "nuetral" compared to past requirements, or compared to the requirements of other providers.

If a factory needs a higher demand-load and volume of energy supply, compared to previously, it might move the costs for that energy into a different tier of their supplier's rates. Commercial telecommunications agreements for the supply of private telephone networks, trunk lines and such has also always included multi-tiered pricing, affected by both demand-load and volume. But internet service rates have not (yet) reflected those commercial distinctions, even for large commercial companies.

Google makes their argument as though the multi-tiered pricing is a "punishment" based on content, but it is in fact a recognition that coming into and out of the massive needs and demands of a "Google", different content can build or diminish the demand-load and volume requirements. Therefore it is not the content, it is the demands required for more demanding content to be accomodated without diminishing the actual speed of communications (keeping the pipe-lines big enough and using the most effective traffic controls to achieve the greatest efficiency). Google acknowledges that the telecoms must achieve those efficiencies, and that new content can stretch them, and that they expect to profit more from content advancements, but want to pay no more for the additional overall demands on the backbone derived from that content.

What it will mean is that Google will add to its profit, but unless the telecoms get more revenue from you - to keep up with the requirement demands of the Googles - the telecoms will come back to you with higher rates, because you say your session with Google is too slow at your highest DSL setting.

The alternative (multi-tiered pricing for the Googles from the telecoms) would not be charges from Google to you, but charges by Google to their real customers, their advertisers. That will hurt Google's competition with other business who get their revenue from advertizers because they (Google) would want to increase their ad revenue to cover higher costs. It wants to keep its profits and get the telecoms to pass their higher costs to you instead.

If you think this is not all political, just look at the records of Google's corporate and employee political action committees; who they donate political money to.

"There is a reason you saw a lot of misleading advertising on this issue. If the monopoly cabl;e tv and telcos can erect toll gates on the internet it will be big, big bucks for them. Guess who will pay?"

Your fear tactic-term of "toll gates", is nothing more than the political talking point the liberals and Google use for multi-tiered pricing for commercial (Google) users of the telecoms/cable companies pipelines (which has always existed in every other form of commercial contracts for the pipelines).

First: The "monopoly" is dead, as cable companies now offer cable modems and telephone services while the telecoms are starting to offer "cable" television channels. That's technology and continually increasing competition.

Second: Who will pay when the cable companies and the telecoms can charge Google more for pushing its content through their pipelines? The answer is not you. The answer is that Google will (if it chooses) raise the rates it wants from its real customers, its paying customers which are the advertizers that put their ads on its pages, not you.

Poor Google, an ad-placement on its pages could become anti-competitive to other forms of advertizing if Goggle wants too big a rate increase. Google would then have to decide to lower its rate requests, and reduce its profits-per ad, or keep its rates and lose advertizers, reducing its profits overall.

And should we cry for Google, as other content providers, other technology, and other media venues learn how to compete more with Google??? Not on your life. They've been skating on the pipelines at everyone else's expense, while making billions on the ads. They might actually have to pay rates that are higher-per-load/volume than the residential rates and rates some not-for-profits can get. Oh boo hoo, boo hoo.

Net "nuetrality" is Google wanting it and other big content providers, all very profitable mega-businesses, to be treated no differently than little ole you and the mom-and-pop corner store. Its a political scam.

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