Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality
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@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Then why has stuff like this happened before before the FCC told them to stop on grounds of net neutrality?
Because those are different things?
It's part of the concerns NN supporters believe is going to happen very soon after today, and history has proven them right.
Your question was no less a non sequitur for all that.
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@erufael said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@masonwheeler Then maybe, just maybe, a real solution will be found. What happened in 2015 is very much not the solution.
When is the best time to find a good solution:
- Before removing the hack that is the only thing keeping the entire system from collapsing
- After removing the hack that is the only thing keeping the entire system from collapsing
LOL. It's great when people make my arguments for me!
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@pie_flavor said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar The first one doesn't happen, unfortunately. So let's wait for it to collapse, and the FCC will go holy shit let's get this regulated quick.
The first one doesn't happen because we removed the hack that is the only thing keeping the entire system from collapsing before we tried to find a solution.
This would be like if Michelle Obama promoted healthy eating by starving school children and then yelling at their parents that it's their fault for not feeding them vegetables.
Well, that's not what she was trying to do, but it's not far off from what she did, actually.
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
- AT&T can invent and sell related services at any time they feel is worthwhile, thus winning the market value of being the first mover in a market.
This is the one people are objecting to. It wouldn't make sense to have a law that says your water or electricity company can "add new features", so why does it make sense that an internet company can? Internet is a utility just like any other "pipe" that comes into or out of your house.
Um, actually, electric companies do add extra features, like fancy meters that can turn your power off during some high use periods.
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@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Because God forbid that someone who has experience working with Title II regulation, and who has seen how three small rural telephone companies in Middle of Nowhere, Midwest, had to employ two full time staff members each just to deal with the paperwork and regulatory compliance those regulations imposed, share that experiential knowledge.
Look, the big guys said everything is A-OK, and if you can't trust the Big Guys, then who can you trust?
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Why haven't any of the big phone companies complained about this? Oh right, because they're not changing their infrastructure spending plans.
Big companies can almost always thrive more easily in the face of heavy regulation than smaller companies. It raises barriers to entry, which is good for existing and entrenched participants.
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@masonwheeler
Because God forbid that someone who has experience working with Title II regulation, and who has seen how three small rural telephone companies in Middle of Nowhere, Midwest, had to employ two full time staff members each just to deal with the paperwork and regulatory compliance those regulations imposed, share that experiential knowledge.Or who has sat in on meetings where the explicit decision to pursue a policy of only providing the absolute minimum service required to keep the government from giving away taxpayer money (the Universal Service Fee you pay on your phone bill) to finance a competitor, since spending any more than that to upgrade Title II regulated infrastructure just meant that the telephone company was financing their competitor themselves.
Or who has had to tell potential customers they couldn't have the service they wanted because it didn't fit within our tariffed product offerings, and we didn't have an estimate of when the tariff would be approved.
Well, considering that dozens of small ISPs have written and spoken out in favor of net neutrality, and have said, in so many words, that there is literally nothing burdensome or onerous about the regulations unless you are specifically trying to screw your customers over, I can only assume one of four things is true. In no particular order:
- You're making stuff up.
- Your employer was engaged in exactly the sort of predatory behavior that 80+% of the country believes--with good reason--should be illegal.
- You're incorrectly conflating different things in your argument.
- The people you were working with were badly incompetent.
Not sure which it is, but one of those has to be true.
Right. There's noooooooo possibility that you're wrong.
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@masonwheeler
Well, given that the OIO already proved that the FCC thought they had the right to change the legal classifications of an entity at a whim, while ignoring black letter law about the meanings of those classifications, I think it's perfectly reasonable to presume that if the FCC's illegal order were upheld they might proceed with changing the rules further.They changed the classification because the courts explicitly told them that they were, in fact, able to reclassify ISPs under Title II and that that was the only way to make net neutrality regulations stick. And then the big ISPs went ballistic and sued over it, and it was upheld in court. You are inventing whims where none exist.
What do you call it when a court decides to ignore a law?
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@lolwhat said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
A level-headed take on the situation:
Not level at all. It starts out with a blatant lie: that one of the most highly regulated sectors in our entire economy was "a deregulated environment." This was never true in any way; the fight has been over which regulations would be most appropriate.
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Not level at all. It starts out with a blatant lie: that one of the most highly regulated sectors in our entire economy was "a deregulated environment." This was never true in any way; the fight has been over which regulations would be most appropriate.
I think you're taking that out of context. Also, that's several paragraphs in, so I'm not sure what you mean by "starts out." In fact, above that in TFA he writes:
Which of these regulatory regimes best ensures that internet access is broadly available, and not subject to unreasonable restrictions or abuse of ISP market power in certain areas, is an empirical question.
So, your statement there about "which regulations would be more appropriate" is pretty much exactly what he's saying.
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@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Um, actually, electric companies do add extra features, like fancy meters that can turn your power off during some high use periods.
LOL. It's great when people make my arguments for me!
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Um, actually, electric companies do add extra features, like fancy meters that can turn your power off during some high use periods.
LOL. It's great when people make my arguments for me!
I can understand why you'd misunderstand this.
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@onyx said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
The whole attempt to make a distinction is stupid, IMHO.
Ultimately, the core of the distinction is:
- Common carrier law: You don't own the infrastructure you built - the government mandates you allow other people to resell service over your infrastructure at government specified wholesale ("tariffed") rates. The Canadian ISPs work like this; Bell owns all of the infrastructure in Central and Eastern Canada, and other ISPs are just reselling service over Bell's lines. The Canadian friends I have are... less than impressed with the results of the system.
- "Unregulated" law: You own your own infrastructure, and competitors have to build their own to offer service. This can potentially lead to monopolistic behavior if the cost of starting infrastructure is high (a "natural monopoly"), or there are regulations in place that make it difficult to start your own infrastructure (right of way regulations that prevent putting up new utility poles, zoning or FAA restrictions on where / how you can build towers for wireless signal, etc)
There are also a bunch of other compliance restrictions lurking in Title II (that the 2015 OIO promised to not enforce), but the core of it boils down to who owns the infrastructure a company builds.
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@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Then why has stuff like this happened before before the FCC told them to stop on grounds of net neutrality?
Because those are different things?
It's part of the concerns NN supporters believe is going to happen very soon after today, and history has proven them right.
Your question was no less a non sequitur for all that.
On the specific post I replied to, yes. Mea culpa.
On the general topic we are talking about? Not at all. It is a valid concern that the repeal could very well lead to if the FCC cannot enforce ISPs blocking VOIP or whatever else.
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@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
- Common carrier law: You don't own the infrastructure you built - the government mandates you allow other people to resell service over your infrastructure at government specified wholesale ("tariffed") rates. The Canadian ISPs work like this; Bell owns all of the infrastructure in Central and Eastern Canada, and other ISPs are just reselling service over Bell's lines. The Canadian friends I have are... less than impressed with the results of the system.
- "Unregulated" law: You own your own infrastructure, and competitors have to build their own to offer service. This can potentially lead to monopolistic behavior if the cost of starting infrastructure is high (a "natural monopoly"), or there are regulations in place that make it difficult to start your own infrastructure (right of way regulations that prevent putting up new utility poles, zoning or FAA restrictions on where / how you can build towers for wireless signal, etc)
We have a mixture of the two, but the first part is actually a contract. Most of our infrastructure was built back in the communist system, so the infrastructure was state property. That got sold to Deutsche Telekom (for way too cheap). Other providers can, and are, build their own infrastructure regardless. It's just going slowly.
And with all that there was never any mention of any of the bullshit ISPs / telcos in US tried and do pull off (I was shocked to hear some or other mobile provider, AT&T I think, blocks tethering on the phones they sell you or some shit like that?). I'm not saying we have less scumbags here, but there are probably laws that prevent them from doing such shit, and they are not tied to the freaking copper running through or above ground.
Conclusion: Your laws are even more fucked than I thought. Fix your fucking shit, yo.
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@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@the_quiet_one said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Then why has stuff like this happened before before the FCC told them to stop on grounds of net neutrality?
Because those are different things?
It's part of the concerns NN supporters believe is going to happen very soon after today, and history has proven them right.
Your question was no less a non sequitur for all that.
On the specific post I replied to, yes. Mea culpa.
On the general topic we are talking about? Not at all. It is a valid concern that the repeal could very well lead to if the FCC cannot enforce ISPs blocking VOIP or whatever else.
Sure. I don't think that's as big a deal as everyone makes it out to be, but I'm not saying they aren't legitimate concerns. They're also different because they were things that the previous net neutrality regime actually did.
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@izzion not to mention municipal or regional governments giving monopoly power to incumbents (either through exclusive contracts or through sweetheart deals that preclude competitors that don't get those deals).
The only stable monopolies are those enforced by the government. Even "natural" monopolies like water and power can and have been disrupted (and water/sewer is strongly local and don't really benefit from scale beyond a municipal level). In my lifetime, internet service has gone through the following disruptive changes:
- First was dial-up. This was disrupted by DSL (same lines, different technology).
- DSL was disrupted by cable and then by fiber (different lines).
- These three are being disrupted by wireless service--most of the kids I know get the majority of their non-school internet service from their wireless service provider. This shares backhaul with the more traditional ISPs, but the last mile (and thus the "monopolistic" nature) is very different with different challenges.
Government-supervised competition tends to ossify and become sclerotic. When I lived in the Latvia, the land-line phone system was owned by the (state) post office. Calls/texts between cell-phones were cheap, calls between cell phones and land-line numbers were exorbitant. Like more expensive per minute than international calling. But there was no incentive to change and people abandoned the land-line network almost entirely. Only us missionaries (who at the time weren't allowed cell phones by our rules) really used them. Oh, and the old folks.
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No more AOL Instant Messenger!
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@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
No more AOL Instant Messenger!
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@erufael said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
The concept is therefore as vague as I imagined. But the law must have been more precise than that?
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@ben_lubar We'll get the video rental shops back.
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@sockpuppet7 Assuming he used the insurance money to fix it, Randy Marsh can finally get his return on investment.
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I'm wondering if it will help ISPs to kill botnets
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@sockpuppet7 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
I'm wondering if it will help ISPs to kill botnets
They can already do that. It's just that such measures cost money.
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
They are also providers of telephones, which makes them
immunealready subject to this regulationsomehow!FTFY
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
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@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar Just ignore Izzion. He is (or used to be) in the ISP industry, and has Sinclair's Law problems up to his neck on this particular issue.
Just ignore primary sources. They always have inherent biases that invalidate all their raw data. After all, we don't want to muddle our discussion with something so inconvenient as facts, now, do we?
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@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Just ignore
primary sources.data points with a sample size of one. Theyalwaysfrequently have inherent biases thatinvalidate allmake their raw data far less useful than it appears at first glance.FTFY
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@chozang said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@erufael said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
The concept is therefore as vague as I imagined. But the law must have been more precise than that?
Nope.
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@masonwheeler With any two points you can interpolate in any way you want. Doesn't mean you should, but hey if it works for for the press…
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
Ah, I understand your confusion now. Think more like, "It's illegal to drive faster than the speed limit." So in 2015 they started going too fast and then they just now let off the gas pedal a bit and are now driving within the legal speed limit.
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@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
Ah, I understand your confusion now. Think more like, "It's illegal to drive faster than the speed limit." So in 2015 they started going too fast and then they just now let off the gas pedal a bit and are now driving within the legal speed limit.
Except that in your analogy, driving within the speed limit is not illegal. This would be more like speeding in one direction in 2015 and then speeding on the way back now in an attempt to fix it.
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
Ah, I understand your confusion now. Think more like, "It's illegal to drive faster than the speed limit." So in 2015 they started going too fast and then they just now let off the gas pedal a bit and are now driving within the legal speed limit.
Except that in your analogy, driving within the speed limit is not illegal. This would be more like speeding in one direction in 2015 and then speeding on the way back now in an attempt to fix it.
Yes. That's the point. They went back to operating within the law. Your analogy is like an analogy that's flawed because it's wrong.
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@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
Ah, I understand your confusion now. Think more like, "It's illegal to drive faster than the speed limit." So in 2015 they started going too fast and then they just now let off the gas pedal a bit and are now driving within the legal speed limit.
Except that in your analogy, driving within the speed limit is not illegal. This would be more like speeding in one direction in 2015 and then speeding on the way back now in an attempt to fix it.
Yes. That's the point. They went back to operating within the law. Your analogy is like an analogy that's flawed because it's wrong.
Wouldn't it technically depend on whether they reclassified it or simply removed the previous classification?
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@chozang said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@djls45 said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
So the current action wouldn't have happened because the 2015 action was illegal.
The current action did happen, so are you saying that the FCC broke the law for literally no reason just to annoy liberals?
The current action undid the breaking of the law that the FCC did back in 2014-15.
If the FCC broke the law by changing the classification of a type of carrier, then doing that exact same thing would also be breaking the law.
Ah, I understand your confusion now. Think more like, "It's illegal to drive faster than the speed limit." So in 2015 they started going too fast and then they just now let off the gas pedal a bit and are now driving within the legal speed limit.
Except that in your analogy, driving within the speed limit is not illegal. This would be more like speeding in one direction in 2015 and then speeding on the way back now in an attempt to fix it.
Yes. That's the point. They went back to operating within the law. Your analogy is like an analogy that's flawed because it's wrong.
Wouldn't it technically depend on whether they reclassified it or simply removed the previous classification?
Can you explain why you think it might?
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@boomzilla Is there a law that says ISPs are not common carriers?
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@boomzilla Is there a law that says ISPs are not common carriers?
I believe @izzion has mentioned it several times.
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@boomzilla @ben_lubar
So, I did actually do a little more looking into the Verizon v FCC cases in 2010 and 2012, and it's actually a little more muddled from pure legalese than I would prefer to claim...- The Telecommunications Act of 1996 specified that DSL service was classified as an information service (and thus only subject to Title I of the 1934 telecommunications act and specifically exempted from Title II of the 1934 act).
- The FCC made an evaluation shortly thereafter that other ISP services (cable, etc) also should be classified as Title I, in view of that specific classification of DSL.
- In classifying the other services, the FCC reserved the right to change its mind (I'm paraphrasing a bit, because the legal jingo is too hard for me to remember and I CBA to go look it up)
- Several court cases have concurred with the FCC's evaluation that classifying other ISP technologies as Title I information services was valid. The 2012 Verizon v FCC case did note that the earlier FCC had reserved for itself the right to reclassify ISPs as Title II, without making any judgment on whether such a reclassification would be legal.
So, there's actually kind of a little of column A, a little of column B at play.
- Personally, I think it should be blatantly obvious that since DSL was specifically classified by Congressional Law as a Title I "information service", then all ISP technologies must fall under that classification until and unless Congress changes the law
- Depending on what court challenges to a bureaucratic (FCC) regulation gets litigated in, there's often a fair amount of deference from courts to what the regulatory body chooses to do, so there's a fair chance that the FCC could have defended the Title II reclassification in a sympathetic court, at least for non-DSL ISPs.
I still stand by my position that the Title II reclassification was not a valid reclassification by the FCC, but in doing further research to "prove my point", I can definitely see evidence to support the other side of the argument.
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@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
I still stand by my position that the Title II reclassification was not a valid reclassification by the FCC, but in doing further research to "prove my point", I can definitely see evidence to support the other side of the argument.
Well, only if you think that the FCC should be able to legislate instead of Congress, IMO.
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@boomzilla
Legally speaking, under the Chevron Deference regime that the courts adhere to, since Congress specifically mentioned DSL service and didn't specifically mention cable ISP (or fiber, or satellite, or fixed-location wireless, or...), then the courts will generally find in favor of however the FCC (the bureaucratic department on the sharp end of implementing the legislation) chooses to fill in the gaps and classify the other services.Personally, I think that the "looks like a duck" test should apply here, but legally the Chevron precedent is pretty broad and there's definitely a legal argument that the FCC could regulate non-DSL ISPs as Title II under some of the other precedents within the field. OTOH, there's been a fair amount of speculation that the Gorsuch appointment and other general shifts in the thinking of the Supreme Court are enough to tilt the playing field toward a narrowing or reversal of the Chevron precedent, so who knows how the court cases around the 2015 OIO would have ended up.
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@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
DSL service was classified as an information service
Which is weird, because it comes over phone lines and is provided by the phone company.
I'm not a lawyer, and I don't think I could be one without my head exploding.
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@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Personally, I think that the "looks like a duck" test should apply here
As do I. Literally everything about ISP service looks like a communication service and quacks like a communication service, not like an information service, and it's a bit mystifying that the 1996 act got it so obviously wrong. But the FCC did have the authority to change that, and they made the right call in doing so.
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@ben_lubar said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
DSL service was classified as an information service
Which is weird, because it comes over phone lines and is provided by the phone company.
I'm not a lawyer, and I don't think I could be one without my head exploding.
It's not lawyers at fault here, its politicians. Since they're the ones writing the laws, not the ones interpreting them, they're not bound by things like logic, common sense, or implementation issues. It's like non-technical people writing tech specifications. They have no concern for the fact that you're being asked to do something forbidden by sanity and by the laws of nature itself. "Just figure out a way. That's why we're paying you; we're not paying you to argue."
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@masonwheeler said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
@izzion said in Benefits of the repeal of Net Neutrality:
Personally, I think that the "looks like a duck" test should apply here
As do I. Literally everything about ISP service looks like a communication service and quacks like a communication service, not like an information service, and it's a bit mystifying that the 1996 act got it so obviously wrong. But the FCC did have the authority to change that, and they made the right call in doing so.
How do you make the leap from "Congress said A" to "FCC should act as though Congress said B?"
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@boomzilla Congress set up a default setting, but the FCC still had the ability to classify things. This is not a particularly difficult "leap" to make, especially when backed up by judicial review.
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@masonwheeler So basically, you're ignoring it. Gotcha.
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@boomzilla So basically you're ignoring my entire line of reasoning, particularly the whole "Judicial Review" part, just pretending that inconvenient detail never actually happened because it doesn't fit the narrative you'd like to push. Gotcha.
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@masonwheeler I'm trying to find your line of reasoning. Yes, some courts agreed that it was legal. No, I don't agree with them. You want to launder your opinion through a court decision (though not even up through SCOTUS)? Sure, fine, but don't pretend that you've provided any rationale for what you're saying.
It's very common to ignore the facts about the law when it contradicts what you think the law should be. Just don't pretend that you aren't doing it, even if courts like to do that, too.