Quote:A U.S. Appeals Court just invalidated the FCC's net neutrality rules that would've made it illegal for telecom companies to favor certain types of traffic over others. The court ruled that the commission lacked the authority to implement and enforce such rules which were embedded in a complicated legal framework.
The court describes its reasoning in the ruling:
Given that the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers, the Communications Act expressly prohibits the Commission from nonetheless regulating them as such. Because the Commission has failed to establish that the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules do not impose per se common carrier obligations, we vacate those portions of the Open Internet Order.
In other words, the FCC didn't have the authority to impose its rules because it defined broadband internet as an information service rather than a common carrier service, like telephones.
This is bad news. The ruling basically opens the door for companies like Verizon and Time Warner to cut special deals with websites to serve up their content faster. It also opens up the possibility of paid access to specific sites. Imagine the worst case scenario, where you literally have to pay an extra fee to get access to the websites you like. It's possible! At least the latest federal court ruling on Verizon's appeal to the FCC states that telecom companies have to tell subscribers which sites they're favoring.
This latest development in the years' long battle to preserve net neutrality is going to piss off a lot of people. And it should. The idea of giving preferential treatment to websites willing to pay for it means that smaller websites stand to lose out, and the very idea of competition on the internet is being essentially undermined since companies can simply buy prime placement. That said, the appeals court ruling is being largely viewed as a failure on the FCC's part for not writing the rules under a more solid legal framework.
"We're disappointed that the court came to this conclusion," said Free Press president and CEO Craig Aaron. "Its ruling means that Internet users will be pitted against the biggest phone and cable companies — and in the absence of any oversight, these companies can now block and discriminate against their customers' communications at will.
At least the FCC's still willing to fight the good fight. Chairman Tom Wheeler released this statement a few minutes after the ruling:
The D.C. Circuit has correctly held that 'Section 706 . . . vests [the Commission] with affirmative authority to enact measures encouraging the deployment of broadband infrastructure' and therefore may 'promulgate rules governing broadband providers' treatment of Internet traffic.' I am committed to maintaining our networks as engines for economic growth, test beds for innovative services and products, and channels for all forms of speech protected by the First Amendment. We will consider all available
options, including those for appeal, to ensure that these networks on which the Internet depends continue to provide a free and open platform for innovation and expression, and operate in the interest of all Americans.
Update: The White House chimed in with its own statement on Tuesday afternoon:
President Obama remains committed to an open internet, where consumers are free to choose the websites they want to visit and the online services they want to use, and where online innovators are allowed to compete on a level playing field based on the quality of their products.
As we continue to review the ruling, we remain committed to working with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Congress, and the private sector to preserve a free and open Internet.
Read the full ruling below.
http://gizmodo.com/federal-court-invalid...1501028467
From what I've read, this was stuck down on a technicality. Essentially, the judge ruled that the FCC has no say over the telecoms because of the way internet traffic is defined.
Its a bunch of shit really. I understand that the telecoms want to be able to pick and choose data priorities on the networks they maintain...but at the same time internet is a backbone of so many things in our society that allowing telcoms to dictate traffic would be a disaster. They will re address the wording of the law and then go back to requiring open internet. I don't know how long it will take for service providers to start messing with traffic...but with the way government moves it could take months or years to fix...and we will all suffer in some way from the delay.
I like this quote from a
USA Today article I read about net neutrality:
Quote:Richard Greenfield, an analyst at BTIG, said investors have been asking whether Netflix may be a good short trade if the company has to pay more to reach subscribers and how ISPs could penalize Google, which owns web video giant YouTube.
However, Greenfield argued that it would not make financial sense for ISPs like Time Warner Cable, Charter and Verizon to create paid fast-lanes and non-paying slow-lanes on the Internet.
The largest ISPs have been doing well selling more expensive, faster broadband Internet services to customers and one of the big drivers of this is the need for higher bandwidth to stream videos from Netflix and YouTube, Greenfield explained.
"If all of a sudden, an ISP said to Netflix 'pay us for access to our broadband customers or we will slow you down,' and Netflix refuses to pay, the ISP ends up hurting its own customers and discouraging those subscribers from using the service that is driving them to pay for faster broadband speed tiers in the first place," the analyst wrote in a note to investors Wednesday.
(01-15-2014 05:42 PM)Natures Folly Wrote: [ -> ]Its a bunch of shit really. I understand that the telecoms want to be able to pick and choose data priorities on the networks they maintain...but at the same time internet is a backbone of so many things in our society that allowing telcoms to dictate traffic would be a disaster. They will re address the wording of the law and then go back to requiring open internet. I don't know how long it will take for service providers to start messing with traffic...but with the way government moves it could take months or years to fix...and we will all suffer in some way from the delay.
I don't buy it. If the Internet is so important and such a backbone, any inefficiencies or sub optimal activity will meet quick market backlash.
Maybe, maybe not (I'm willing to bet not). I'd rather not give them the opportunity and leave it as-is.
(01-16-2014 12:08 PM)Gary_Busey Wrote: [ -> ]Maybe, maybe not (I'm willing to bet not). I'd rather not give them the opportunity and leave it as-is.
I prefer letting markets do what they do best and interfere only if needed. Besides in 5 years there will be many ISP options through multiple distribution channels and the best most wanted user experience will rise to the top.
Here is some more info about the whole thing, someone posted this on reddit(of course)
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This is shaping up to be a very controversial decision and, considering the misdirected angst toward the court in other thread, will likely be widely misinterpreted by people who don't understand it. That's not to say it's easy to understand; it's actually very difficult to understand, which is all the more reason not to trust headlines from /r/politics and TMZ. So, against my sense of caution, I'm going to offer just a brief explanation of why the court reached this decision (brief because it's also difficult for me to understand...).
Let's back up and get a tiny bit of information about the FCC powers. The FCC is empowered by the Communications Act of 1934. They are further empowered by the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which is pretty much the only significant overall of communications law since the 1934 act. The Telecommunications Act gives the FCC certain expansive powers in regulating "common carriers." Specifically:
By virtue of their designation as common carriers, providers of basic services were subject to the duties that apply to such entities, including that they “furnish . . . communication service upon reasonable request,” 47 U.S.C. § 201(a), engage in no “unjust or unreasonable discrimination in charges, practices, classifications, regulations, facilities, or services,” id. § 202(a), and charge “just and reasonable” rates, id.
The FCC could force a "common carrier" to provide a service to all reasonable customer requests at the same rate, without discrimination. This common carrier designation only applies to companies providing telecommunications services, and only to the extent that they do so. 47 USC § 153(51) ("A telecommunications carrier shall be treated as a common carrier under this chapter only to the extent that it is engaged in providing telecommunications services..."). The FCC is allowed to regulate other providers in other ways, but the authority to force a company to treat all customers equally only applies to common carriers.
Now let's look at the net neutrality regulations that are at issue in this case. The court says:
The Order first imposes a transparency requirement on both fixed and mobile broadband providers. . . .Second, the Order imposes anti-blocking requirements on both types of broadband providers. It prohibits fixed broadband providers from “block[ing] lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices, subject to reasonable network management.” . . . Third, the Order imposes an anti-discrimination requirement on fixed broadband providers only. Under this rule, such providers “shall not unreasonably discriminate in transmitting lawful network traffic over a consumer’s broadband Internet access service. Reasonable network management shall not constitute unreasonable discrimination.”
So the regulations promulgated by the FCC impose 1) transparency requirements, 2) anti-blocking requirements, and 3) anti-discrimination requirements. As to the latter two, those sound very similar to the sorts of regulations that the FCC only has the power impose on common carriers. This wouldn't be an issue if the Verizon services were considered common carriers, but by the FCC's own rules they're not. Expressly not. The FCC has instead chosen to classify broadband providers as "information services," not telecommunications providers. And as § 153 of the Telecommunications Act says, only telecommunications providers can be common carriers.
We think it obvious that the Commission would violate the Communications Act were it to regulate broadband providers as common carriers. Given the Commission’s still-binding decision to classify broadband providers not as providers of “telecommunications services” but instead as providers of “information services,” see supra at 9-10, such treatment would run afoul of section 153(51)
So the remainder of the decision - the important part - deals with whether those last two regulations (anti-discrimination and anti-blocking) are common carrier regulations. If they are, the FCC has drawn its own box here. It can't call something an information service provider and then regulate it as if it were a telecommunications provider.
Thus, we must determine whether the requirements imposed by the Open Internet Order subject broadband providers to common carrier treatment. If they do, then given the manner in which the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers, the regulations cannot stand.
(Another problem is it's classification of mobile broadband providers as "private" instead of "commercial" services, but that's more complexity than is needed for this post ("Likewise, because the Commission has classified mobile broadband service as a “private” mobile service, and not a “commercial” mobile service, see Wireless Broadband Order, 22 F.C.C.R. at 5921 U 56, treatment of mobile broadband providers as common carriers would violate section 332: . . .))
The FCC responds to this by arguing that the end users (you guys and gals at home) are the customers, not the "edge providers" (the websites and such). Since the FCC is only regulating treatment of edge providers, it's not subjecting the companies to common carrier treatment because they're still free to discriminate against the end user (i.e., charge different rates, choose not to provide service, etc.). The court dismisses that out of hand.
It is true, generally speaking, that the “customers” of broadband providers are end users. But that hardly means that broadband providers could not also be carriers with respect to edge providers. . . . Because broadband providers furnish a service to edge providers, thus undoubtedly functioning as edge providers’ “carriers,” the obligations that the Commission imposes on broadband providers may well constitute common carriage per se regardless of whether edge providers are broadband providers’ principal customers.
They make a couple more weak arguments, such as: 1) that edge providers never "request" service, technically, and 2) never pay for the service, arguing that those are requirements for common carrier status. The court responds that those aren't actually requirements, they are incidental. In any case, the fact that the edge providers haven't done something yet doesn't mean that the rule doesn't impose restrictions on the company. These all strike me as strangely weak arguments...
The court then sinks the last nail into the coffin of the regulation by discussing how the FCC has not even attempted to argue that the regulations aren't essentially the same as common carrier requirements. (I'll leave out most of the complicated stuff, but you can go to the decision if you want to read specifics.)
We have little hesitation in concluding that the anti-discrimination obligation imposed on fixed broadband providers has “relegated [those providers], pro tanto, to common carrier status.” Midwest Video II, 440 U.S. at 700-01. In requiring broadband providers to serve all edge providers without “unreasonable discrimination,” this rule by its very terms compels those providers to hold themselves out “to serve the public indiscriminately.” NARUCI, 525 F.2d at 642.
Having relied almost entirely on the flawed argument that broadband providers are not carriers with respect to edge providers, the Commission offers little response on this point.
...
Significantly for our purposes, the Commission never argues that the Open Internet Order’s “no unreasonable discrimination” standard somehow differs from the nondiscrimination standard applied to common carriers generally—the argument that salvaged the data roaming requirements in Cellco. In a footnote in the Order itself, the Commission suggested that it viewed the rule’s allowance for “reasonable network management” as establishing treatment that was somehow inconsistent with per se common carriage. See Open Internet Order, 25 F.C.C.R. at 17951 U 79 n.251. But the Commission has forfeited this argument by failing to raise it in its briefs here.
In any event, the argument is without merit. . . . The Commission has provided no basis for concluding that in permitting “reasonable” network management, and in prohibiting merely “unreasonable” discrimination, the Order's standard of “reasonableness” might be more permissive than the quintessential common carrier standard.
Whatever the merits of this view, the Commission advanced nothing like it either in the underlying Order or in its briefs before this court. Instead, it makes no distinction at all between the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules, seeking to justify both types of rules with explanations that, as we have explained, are patently insufficient. We are unable to sustain the Commission’s action on a ground upon which the agency itself never relied. . . .. Nor may we defer to a reading of a statutory term that the Commission never offered.
So, now we can go all the way back to page 4 of the brief and sink our teeth into the actual holding here - i.e., the reason why the court struck down the net neutrality regulations:
Given that the Commission has chosen to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers, the Communications Act expressly prohibits the Commission from nonetheless regulating them as such. Because the Commission has failed to establish that the anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules do not impose per se common carrier obligations, we vacate those portions of the Open Internet Order.
TL;DR: The parts of the Open Internet Order that imposed regulations concerning net neutrality were vacated because the FCC classified internet providers as "information services," not "telecommunication services." The anti-blocking and anti-discrimination requirements, according to statute, can only be imposed on types of telecommunication services. It's the FCC's own fault, not a government conspiracy against net neutrality.
http://www.reddit.com/r/law/comments/1v7...context=2.
Just a little more detail into why the law was struck down, I found it informative.
I don't think it's going to get as bad as people think but Netflix may end up having to raise rates if they get charged more.
(01-16-2014 09:07 PM)JAM Wrote: [ -> ] (01-16-2014 12:08 PM)Gary_Busey Wrote: [ -> ]Maybe, maybe not (I'm willing to bet not). I'd rather not give them the opportunity and leave it as-is.
I prefer letting markets do what they do best and interfere only if needed. Besides in 5 years there will be many ISP options through multiple distribution channels and the best most wanted user experience will rise to the top.
The most wanted isn't necessarily the best, and if the telecoms have it their way, the best option won't even be close to the ideal state we're in currently.
Also, I don't trust the masses to choose the best anything, especially when that concerns technology.