Wouldn’t it be nice if we had Government Neutrality? Imagine if the government didn’t take sides: not favoring one industry over another as with SOPA, or favoring one firm over another as with AT&T.
Because AT&T really is getting an unfair deal. The FCC could have just let the firm drop its application like it intended to do but no, it also gratuitously put out a report against AT&T. It’s a show trial: the verdict was decided in advance.
Oddly enough, Facebook is getting ignored by the radicals but is still getting targeted for abuse by the FTC even though it’s already been shown that laws don’t fix stupid. I guess the Obama administration is already too well trained in meddling.
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What do AT&T, LightSquared, and the late Super Committee have in common? Spectrum.
AT&T is the big story right now, too. They know the fix is in, with Sprint, Eric Holder, and FCC all ganging up on them as a team effort. The Obama administration is all but running guns to Sprint in this effort. So, the firm is trying to slip the noose by withdrawing its FCC application and warning the FCC that they will get sued if the application is not allowed to be withdrawn.
The only reason not to let AT&T pull back until the DoJ effort is settled is to rig the system, which is why the radicals want FCC to pick that particular fight.
AT&T is also proposing bolder sell offs of T-Mobile assets in order to make this work. The firm has repeatedly shown itself willing to negotiate, even as Barack Obama and his subordinates have stonewalled. Tech Liberation Front calls it ‘magical thinking’ that the FCC has been doing lately.
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Some government mistakes slip by with only a few of us shouting about them. The Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, is not one of those. People across the Internet are getting loud against the House bill and its Senate counterpart PROTECT IP, the one I’ve been yelling about for months, but many businesses are supporting.
Yes, I’m going to be that guy, saying I was into the band before you ever heard of him. But, instead of being disappointed that the band’s gone mainstream, I’m glad we’re now at the point where Darrell Issa is changing his Twitter avatar in protest of the bill.
The bill has serious problems. As I previously warned it tampers with the delicate balance of interests present in the DMCA, but on top of that Title I is nothing but a framework for censorship in America that can and is designed to be triggered not through judicial trials, but through mere injunctions. And further, if an ISP or other targeted company cannot technically or economically manage to comply with the government’s orders to censor, the burden of proof is on the ISP to show that as an “affirmative defense.”
This bill goes too far. Kill it. Issa says he will introduce his alternative. I hope it follows the model of the UIGEA: cut off funding to lawbreakers. Censorship is not needed.
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Welcome to Tech at Night, the series the radical left says is shaping the debate. I sure hope I am. After losing on Net Neutrality and on the America Invents Act, I’d like to get a win.
The next chance for a win is in the House, which is debating SOPA, the bill that would create a national censorship blacklist online. Helping to lead the fight against SOPA is actually Google, who joins with other firms to oppose the bill. I know. Whodathunkit? But they’re right on this one, which is why we’re seeing weird things like Darrell Issa stick up for Google as the firm becomes a scapegoat for foreign infringers.
Tumblr has joined the fight, encouraging you to contact your member of Congress while the site draws attention to the issue.
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Censorship’s the big word right now. The FCC’s under pressure to ban pro sports blackouts, and the Supreme Court may end national profanity rules. However I consider those things small. Few people have access to television broadcasts. Most of us aren’t actually censored by these regulations.
We all have access to the Internet though; that’s how a nobody like me is able to shape the debate against well-funded leftist groups. So I’ll freely admit it: It’s a self-serving thing for me to oppose Internet censorship. I don’t want the Obama administration to have the power to collaborate with private leftist groups to steal people’s domains, and force all ISPs to cooperate with that effective creation of a national censorship blacklist.
They want to call the little guys “E-PARASITES,” using copyright as cover to censor whatever the heck they want. Because once you let the government start blanking out parts of the Internet, then what’s to stop them from blanking out oversight of that censorship? Nothing. Just ask Australia, which censored the internet “for the children,” but then started banning oversight of the censorship, as well as unrelated content like American anti-abortion websites.
The committee vote on SOPA / E-PARASITES is coming, and I’m hearing that the witness list for the bill is stacked 5-1 in favor of the bill. In the Republican House, we’re rigging the hearings in favor of giving the President more regulatory power over the Internet. It boggles the mind. Please consider contacting the Judiciary Committee and asking them to oppose this censorship power grab.
If the US Government starts monkeying around with DNS, the world will ignore it, the same way we ignore Chinese attempts to censor the Internet. We will lose our position as world leader of the Internet overnight.
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Why can’t the news come in even intervals, instead of batching up all at once?
So yes, the Senate Net Neutrality vote is coming up. Credit where it’s due: Kay Bailey Hutchison moved the ball forward on this, no doubt about it. Credit also to Marco Rubio making headlines with his strong support of the repeal.
And Rubio is right: the whole thing is ridiculous. This regulation closes; it does not open the Internet. Which is why Obama is threatening a veto: can’t have the Congress undoing a regulatory power grab, can we? The representatives of the people, what do they know?
Don’t forget to tell your Senators, especially if they’re Democrats or Scott Brown, to vote for the repeal!
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Oops. It’s midnight as I type this out. I just remembered I’d better do Tech tonight, so here goes. Fortunately I already did my reading!
Urgent in the Senate this week is the upcoming vote on Net Neutrality repeal, which was already passed by the House. We need 51 votes, not 60. Less Government has a list of Senators to contact with this urgent message: repeal Net Neutrality! Democrats are listed there, but Scott Brown needs to hear from us, too!
The bad Net Neutrality rules are a symptom of greater problems at the FCC and demonstrate a need for greater reform, but we have to start somewhere. Let’s start with repeal.
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There’s been a push lately to attack punitive, unfair taxes on wireless service, one that Erick Erickson signed onto, and was advertised at RedState. Ironically I only found out about it because I saw the ads while working on the code side of the site, but that’s how it goes sometimes. Anyway, that movement seems to have gotten a win, as the House passed the Wireless Tax Fairness Act, a 5 year freeze on new wireless taxes. Sounds good to me.
SOPA, the House answer to the Senate’s PROTECT IP, isn’t dead yet, unfortunately. This attempt to have the US government censor the Internet, and in fact forcibly steal domains from people, and cut off Americans from the rest of the world online, incredibly is being considered by House Republicans. Copyright apparently is sufficient justification for government of unlimited size. Kill the bill.
And what’s worse is that Republicans are being dragged along as dupes to help Democrats continue to justify huge Hollywood fundraisers by smacking the Internet around to favor the movie industry. Which is probably why the MPAA is trying to stifle criticism of the bill. Kill the bill.
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Wireless competition continues to grow, as Cricket edges closer to 4G LTE. I’m losing track of how many 4G providers we’re starting to rack up. So yes, the people who tell you smaller and regional carriers are not an acceptable substitute for national carriers? They’re selling you something.
That something is an attack on federalism via the Sprint/Soros/Obama/Holder attack on AT&T and the rights of T-Mobile shareholders.
Which is why it’s bad news that these coordinated lawsuits are continuing. It’s ridiculous: both C Spire and Sprint are in better shape than iPhone-less T-Mobile.
At least there’s good news in new and continuing Republican efforts against previous power grabs.
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Last week I noted that the FCC is officially moving ahead with its new subsidy program. The administration will convert the Universal Service Fund – currently taxing the public and handing it out to rural telephone carriers – into a grab bag of Internet subsidies. The rural phone companies are unhappy, and everyone else is racing to get a cut. C Spire, apparently serving many rural southern customers, says the order “runs counter to the administration’s goal of promoting broadband deployment.” The Tech/Users Coalition, a group that includes Obama allies Google and Sprint, calls the USF “antiquated” and cheers the reform effort, while pressing for as much subsidy of Internet connectivity as possible. IIA also supports the effort.
Look, I don’t blame any business for looking to get a cut here. The money’s there, it’s perfectly legal, and that’s the way it is. Nobody squawked at the rural carriers collecting checks all these years. But that said, I hope Republicans will look to repeal all of this in 2013.
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