Best. Net. Neutrality. Argument. Ever.
Best. Net. Neutrality. Argument. Ever.
I also really like the part about how the ISPs shouldn't be getting rights to public areas and still get to operate like they're a fully private company:
'Wheeler could say to the ISPs: "If you want to run your networks as private enterprises, then you can build them privately. You've got 60 days to get your copper out of our dirt, or we'll pay you scrappage rates and turn it over to a company that will give people the bits they want, not the bits that pay you the most."
Instead, he stands ready to oversee the merger of Comcast and Time-Warner, ensuring that there is virtually no competition in the telcoms sector, while simultaneously handing these massive businesses a blank cheque in the form of permission to extract ransom from everyone you want to talk to on the internet.'
Originally shared by John Lieske
Best. Analogy. Ever.
There's a useful analogy to the phone company that I've written about here before: you pay for your phone service every month. The pizza place on the corner also pays for its phone service every month. When you want to order a pizza from Joe's Corner Pizzeria, you call their number. If their phone isn't engaged, it rings and you get to place your order. If they get more orders than they can handle on one line, they buy a second line, a third, even 10 lines to take their orders. Provided one of those lines is free, your call goes through to someone when you ring.
But what if your phone company decided that the way to bring in higher profits was to go around to all the pizza places and shake them down for "premium" access to "their" customers? If Joe's Corner Pizzeria turned them down, your call to Joe's might get a busy signal, even if there were plenty of free lines at Joe's place. Meanwhile, an order to the monied, tasteless sultan of global cardboard pizza-ite, that is, the company who has plenty of money for "premium" access – is easy to reach, because your phone company has promised them that every call will be put through.
The thing is, Joe's is paying for its lines. You're paying for your line. The phone company exists solely to connect people to the numbers they dial. But because there are "natural monopolies" in phone service (because there are only so many mobile frequencies and underground cable space), they can abuse their position to extort additional payments from the services you want to talk to. And the more popular a service is, the better it is, the more the ISP stands to profit from this racket.
It's such a good analogy for two reasons:
1. It perfectly illustrates the problem.
2. It involves many of the same types of interests.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/28/internet-service-providers-charging-premium-access
I also really like the part about how the ISPs shouldn't be getting rights to public areas and still get to operate like they're a fully private company:
'Wheeler could say to the ISPs: "If you want to run your networks as private enterprises, then you can build them privately. You've got 60 days to get your copper out of our dirt, or we'll pay you scrappage rates and turn it over to a company that will give people the bits they want, not the bits that pay you the most."
Instead, he stands ready to oversee the merger of Comcast and Time-Warner, ensuring that there is virtually no competition in the telcoms sector, while simultaneously handing these massive businesses a blank cheque in the form of permission to extract ransom from everyone you want to talk to on the internet.'
Originally shared by John Lieske
Best. Analogy. Ever.
There's a useful analogy to the phone company that I've written about here before: you pay for your phone service every month. The pizza place on the corner also pays for its phone service every month. When you want to order a pizza from Joe's Corner Pizzeria, you call their number. If their phone isn't engaged, it rings and you get to place your order. If they get more orders than they can handle on one line, they buy a second line, a third, even 10 lines to take their orders. Provided one of those lines is free, your call goes through to someone when you ring.
But what if your phone company decided that the way to bring in higher profits was to go around to all the pizza places and shake them down for "premium" access to "their" customers? If Joe's Corner Pizzeria turned them down, your call to Joe's might get a busy signal, even if there were plenty of free lines at Joe's place. Meanwhile, an order to the monied, tasteless sultan of global cardboard pizza-ite, that is, the company who has plenty of money for "premium" access – is easy to reach, because your phone company has promised them that every call will be put through.
The thing is, Joe's is paying for its lines. You're paying for your line. The phone company exists solely to connect people to the numbers they dial. But because there are "natural monopolies" in phone service (because there are only so many mobile frequencies and underground cable space), they can abuse their position to extort additional payments from the services you want to talk to. And the more popular a service is, the better it is, the more the ISP stands to profit from this racket.
It's such a good analogy for two reasons:
1. It perfectly illustrates the problem.
2. It involves many of the same types of interests.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/28/internet-service-providers-charging-premium-access
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