Comments on: Net neutrality to get new life in Congress

Next month, Democrat Edward Markey plans to reintroduce bill that would punish network operators that discriminate against Internet content. Action is expected next year.

[Pete Bardo]

Congress wants it both ways!

Do these Congress-critters ever talk to each other? This guy wants to assure "Net Neutrality" while others want colleges and universities to reign in P2P file sharing networks.

I wonder how they are going to reconcile all this.

[Dalkorian]

technically different issue

The bill to force universities to reign in P2P is a different issue
from net neutrality. Net neutrality means Comcast can't force
other online entities to pay extortion in order to be served to
Comcast customers. Comcast can't favor Yahoo over Google just
because Yahoo paid for "priority" consideration.

The universities aren't being asked to throttle P2P to anyone but
themselves. If the university was acting as an ISP to the local
community, that would fall into net neutrality territory.

Bottom line - net neutrality = good. Forcing universities to
police their networks for the RIAA/MPAA = pure unadulterated
evil.

Put another way ...
net neutrality = anti-bush, pro-American
forcing universities to be RIAA/MPAA cops = pro-bush, anti-
American

[Al57]

Net Neutrality is Wrong

Why do we want the government involved in the internet? This stuff will just open up a huge can of worms. And haven't we learned? Every time the government gets involved, there are usually very nasty side effects that involve even more regulation and legislation.

Very quickly, each and every party becomes a special interest. This means that the customer is put in the back seat as each party tries to influence the various government entities involved. So what happens? What happens is the big guys are the ones who can afford lobbyists and to other ways to influence and the small guys are pushed out. Very quickly, the biggest technical and economic challenges that entrepreneurs have to overcome become tiny as compared to the legal and political issues that Net Neutrality will create.

I don't know why more people don't see any of this.

Net Neutrality is in fact the opposite of Democracy. Without thinking, it sounds good, but it's a terrible idea. I make sure to bring it up with people to show them how nasty this is. I suggest everyone do the same. KEEP THE GOVERNMENT OUT - NO SOCIALISM.

[directorblue]

Wrong. TCP/IP is inherently neutral...

...and what the carriers have talked about doing fundamentally breaks TCP/IP:

http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2006/05/enforcing-net-neutrality-with-two-by.html

And here's an illustration of what we can expect if the carriers are able to turn their bastardized vision of the Internet into cable television:

http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2007/10/comcasts-world-without-network.html

[R. U. Sirius]

Net Neutrality is Right

> Net Neutrality is in fact the opposite of
> Democracy


Only if you are head of Comcast or AT&T or Verizon would you be stupid enough to say such dreck.

[catbutt5]

Net Neutrality is right on!

We already have tiered access to Internet services that should
protect quality of service for all. After all, it's the plan the service
providers came up with in the first place.
When I call my cable/dsl company for a connection, they usually
offer me one or more options like: Basic speed = $24/mo,
Medium speed = $50/mo. and Fast speed = $60/mo.
I pay for the connection on my end, YouTube and other 'High-
value' sites that consume lots of bandwidth pay for the
connection on their end.
Even if I used the full amount of my bandwidth to download
video after video from YouTube, I've already paid for that
bandwdth and so has YouTube.
Companies that argue against net neutrality are just to charge
us again for the same service we're already paying for.
As for people who try to compare this issue to something like
Socialism, they're just trying to confuse you by muddying the
waters of the real issue.