New York Times: Net neutrality fears are 'overblown'

[The Buzz]

You may have seen last week's APCW Perspectives video where our good buddy J. Todd does an excellent job going after FCC Chairman Ajit Pai while spelling out the consequences killing new neutrality would have the online gambling industry.

Well, now comes an op-ed piece in yesterday's New York Times that says these concerns are "overblown."

The piece is written by Ken Engelhart, a lawyer specializing in communications law and a senior adviser for StrategyCorp, a Canadian advisory firm that "specializes in providing strategic advisory services – public affairs, strategic communications, and management consulting – to private and public sector organizations."

Engelhart writes the following:

Critics worry that getting rid of neutrality regulation will lead to a “two-tier” internet: Internet service providers will start charging fees to websites and apps, and slow down or block the sites that don’t pay up. As a result, users will have unfettered access to only part of the internet, with the rest either inaccessible or slow.

Those fears are vastly overblown.

So why am I not worried? I worked for a telecommunications company for 25 years, and whatever one may think about corporate control over the internet, I know that it simply is not in service providers’ interests to throttle access to what consumers want to see. Neutral broadband access is a cash cow; why would they kill it?

Even if they wanted to, service providers would have a hard time extorting money from huge companies like Google and Netflix, because each service provider needs Google and its billions of users a lot more than Google needs it. Service providers could try to go after smaller websites, but they don’t have much money to pay.

The internet did not start out as a neutral invention. Instead, neutrality was an organic outcome of a competitive market. In the early days of the commercial internet, AOL and @Home had “walled gardens” of content that users could get to more easily, but over time service providers stopped favoring sites and just gave customers fast, neutral internet connections. No government policy created that outcome.

The good news is that we will soon have a real-world experiment to show who is right and who is wrong. The United States will get rid of its rules, and the European Union and Canada will keep their stringent regulations. In two years, will the American internet be slower, less innovative and split into two tiers, leaving Canadians to enjoy their fast and neutral net?

Or, as I suspect, will the two markets remain very similar — proving that this whole agonized debate has been a giant waste of time? Let’s check back in 2019.

Here is a link to the entire op-ed: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/o...erns.html?_r=0

So, let's hear it. Are these concerns overblown?

(Also, ICYMI, here is a link to the net neutrality petition, created by MoveOn.org that will be delivered to the FCC:
https://pac.petitions.moveon.org/sig...cc-to-preserve)

[Integrity]

I've read all sides of this argument, and fully understand that there will be a diversity of opinions in any issue like this. But I would like to offer a few points to consider amid all the debate:

1) What's wrong with the Internet now?
Why would we need to change things that are working just fine?

2) Why do the big corporations want to change this rule so badly?
When was the last time a big company supported anything that didn't financially benefit them?
Are we so naive to think they operate in our best interests?

3) They say fears are overblown, and that the dire predictions are only what could happen... not what will happen.
So we wanna roll the dice taking Verizon and Comcast at their word that they will behave and not do these things?
So we go from protection against such actions to the "chance" they could happen... maybe...
Where the hell is the benefit is that???


We have a web that's been working pretty darn well for us, and now they want to change it so that the big corporations could (maybe, perhaps, probably won't) bend us over and take advantage of an opportunity all in the name of profit. If any industry in the world should cry bullshit it should be this one. We know all too well how companies will take any advantage they have, destroy our livelihoods and walk away richer... never giving two shits about us.

Yes, I understand that we (as consumers) will have better protections via the FTC than we do as webmasters. But how much protection is there if the ISP's are legally allowed to do such things? No sir. The mere fact that Comcast, AT&T and Verizon all want this so badly is a big fat red flag waving right in our face. We've been shafted enough, so if it ain't broke....

Maybe the ISP's are just good people who want what is best for us... Maybe they won't take the opportunity to make hundreds of millions in additional profits... Maybe they won't hurt our business by giving preferential treatment to the big boys while small affiliate sites are tossed in the crapper.... Maybe... Wanna bet your business on it?

[Roulette Zeitung]

"The internet did not start out as a neutral invention"

This is Engelhart's most bizarre claim. He also talks about "the early days of the commercial internet" but forgets to mention, that the internet was invented to improve science and research to save money, not to make bucks.

The net neutrality is all about politics and lobbyism.

Obama courted with his "neutral" Internet the Silicon Valley.

President Trump now is doing the telecommunication companies of the "Old Economy" a favor with neutralizing the neutral Internet so that they can fill their wallets with extra money from the customers.

Leopold