Just as I was saying copyright was soon to replace Net Neutrality as the big tech issue of the moment, circumstances prove me wrong. Instead, regardless of the results of the December FCC meeting and the future of that whole Net Neutrality debate (more later), the coming issue now is going to be peering.
Some will play word games and say it’s all covered under the blanket issue of Net Neutrality, but be careful. Net Neutrality as promoted and sold by Free Press, the FCC, Google, Verizon, and others has been all about the so-called last mile from the Internet to your home or business, including wired and wireless access. That’s what the FCC is talking about regulating as Net Neutrality, that’s been the focus of the scare stories calling the need for Net Neutrality a Crisis™, and we cannot now let them do a bait and switch.
So in your mind, I suggest separating the Comcast/Level 3/Netflix issue from the Free Press/Net Neutrality issue. The former deals with the back end of the Internet, from the user’s perspective, while the latter deals with the front end that we directly pay for and use.
They’re both important though, so here’s my explanation and view of the Comcast/Level 3 Peering controversy broken out as a separate post because it got so long. To sum it up, Comcast did the right thing, because Netflix and Level 3 were being unfair and trying to take advantage of sharing deals made in good faith.
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I know it’s a big day for Net Neutrality when I wake up and my Email Inbox is jammed full with links, so many basically saying the same thing: The FCC is on the move. I’m told it all goes back to a November 15 speech by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, in which he expresses an urgency for the FCC to pass a bunch of new rules quickly. It’s a crisis, he says.
He then called out Google and Verizon, saying that their temerity to contribute to the debate “slowed down some other processes.” You see: the whole process of talking to industry is apparently a sham, and the only speech that counts is speech that leads the FCC closer to the Obama administration’s predetermined outcome.
And it’s that Net Neturality outcome we may be nearing after all. That’s the Red Alert.
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Good morning. Last night Tech at Night didn’t quite come because I was not feeling well at all. But there’s stuff I want to highlight so this morning I’m going to make it happen. Here we go!
Want to be more like Europe? Well, in one way, we do: The EU has rejected Net Neutrality regulation as unnecessary. The EU’s equivalent of an FCC Chairman says “We should allow network operators and services and content providers to explore innovative business models.”
Can we actually stand to be more regulated than Europe, and drive innovation across the Atlantic? I don’t think so. We absolutely cannot tolerate proposals like this to force AT&T, Verizon, and others to open their wireless networks to each other, essentially partially nationalizing and socializing a major part of our telecommunications infrastructure going forward.
I can think of no better way to kill the wonderful wireless revolution we have going on, and end investment in it, than to turn everyone into free riders off of each other. This would devastate rural Internet access by creating a tragedy of the commons out there. We cannot let this happen.
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Hello. The longer the Democrats are in Washington, the more the mask slips with respect to their true beliefs regarding freedom online. They claim they don’t want a government takeover, they claim they don’t want to regulate content, they claim they don’t want a kill switch, they claim they want to respect privacy, but time and again all of these issues just keep coming up.
Witness the new disaster coming out of the White House which would force private firms like Facebook, Skype, and RIM to assist the government with spying on you. They are to cripple, deliberately, any safeguards they have on your privacy to make it easier for government snoops.
Remember: already nothing prevents them from listening in on the Internet. What they are demanding now is a huge expansion of power to require encryption in America to be crippled for the benefit of domestic Internet spies. Or at least, that’s the phrasing the left used throughout the Bush administration, so I’m going to throw it back in their disingenuous faces every single chance I get.
Remember when fining Janet Jackson’s breast was the worst thing going on in Washington with respect to this stuff, and how horrible that was? As the sign goes, “Miss me yet?”
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I skipped Tech at Night on Friday because I was in Austin for the Red State Gathering 2010, but I’m back now, so here we go.
We start off with what would have been the lead story on Friday, too: Net Neutrality hero and all around socialist gasbag Al Franken is now under a cloud of suspicion for ethics violations, violating Senate rules to spend money inappropriately on Net Neutrality advocacy, as well as using his role as Senator to raise money for private groups.
He’s crooked enough, he’s dishonest enough, and doggone it, people pay him.
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Happy Friday! In case you’re not a regular follower of the Net Neutrality issue, over at Frum Forum Jon Henke outlines the state of the debate. The Frum title sounds like advocacy, but Henke doesn’t promote the Google-Verizon Net Neutrality proposal here. It’s worth a read if you’re catching up.
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Yes, I’m sorry. When I found out yesterday morning that it was Labor Day, I did shift gears and relax a bit. By the evening I was treating it like a weekend and forgot all about Monday’s Tech at Night. So we’re making it a Tuesday morning Tech in the Morning instead.
Let’s get started with what happens when you let government regulate: they begin to ban things over their content. Yes, The DSCC is sending lawyers after the book Young Guns. Or at least, the Democrats are trying to ban the promotion of the book, which effectively amounts to banning any mass-produced book of this nature, because you can’t afford to publish a book without making sure it sells.
Just imagine what they’d do online once we gave them regulatory power there.
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Good evening. I’ve been hung up today and unfortunately could not do my usually full range of reading for tonight, but I have a few Net Neutrality points to make tonight, so here we go.
First, AT&T has apparently come out against the Verizon-Google Net Neutrality proposal, writing to the FCC in favor of paid prioritization of Internet traffic. So much for this proposal being a huge benefit for big, wireless-heavy firms, eh?
Of course, there’s some political scheming already going on with Net Neutrality, too, beyond the corporate posturing going on.
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Good evening. Yes, I’m late again on Tech at Night. Even later than I was on Monday in fact. But instead of scolding me, let’s take out our anger on Democrats like Barbara Boxer and Jerry Brown for threatening California’s long-established high tech leadership.
More and more companies and their good, high-paying jobs are fleeing the state. Green tech firms, medical supply firms, information service firms, you name it, they’re leaving. Every field a state wants to be good in over the next 20 years is being hurt by California’s oppressive regulation, increasing taxation, and refusal to cut the kickback spending to union fatcats.
I have to wonder if Texas will reclaim the high-tech crown from California, leaving the Silicon Valley to be more like Death Valley when it comes to jobs, growth, and innovation.
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