An incomplete discussion of Net Neutrality.
To be fair, Net Neutrality *has* been in policy for years, and was only recently struck down. The reason why it has come up so much in recent time is the advent of Netflix, Hulu, Steam, and other services which allow consumers to stream digital content online.
In effect, with the entire population of the developed world carrying around powerful data streaming devices in their pockets, the data load on the ISPs has increased exponentially. A large amount of everyone's bandwidth in any one area is choked up with thousands of people streaming TV, movies, and videogames.
The only answer is for ISPs to continually upgrade their bandwidth infrastructure, but this is an investment that ISPs are beginning to balk at. Their point is that Net Neutrality has forbidden them to monetize their bandwidth to content creators. Therefore, bandwidth-light sites, such as Wikipedia, Dictionary.com, and Reddit (largely text, or still-image based) pay as much to the ISPs as bandwidth hogs like YouTube, Netflix and Hulu (spoiler alert: zero dollars)
Another major change from the GeoCities era, is that there really aren't that many "indie" sites out there anymore. Few people have "personal" webpages outside of the deep net. The overwhelming number of users maintain profiles on Facebook. Virtually no one online hosts their own videos, but rather use services like YouTube or Vimeo.
Most information and activity now transitions through the auspices of sites with business aspects. Forums, are generally owned by businesses (and if not, they are hosted on services like Yuku which ARE businesses).
Therefore, one key argument of the Net Neutrality debate, (that of maintaining an "open" internet) is losing its teeth. After all, who cares about an open internet when virtually everyone only interacts with the internet through corporate portals? Generally speaking, the only truly independent sites left are on the deep web, and arguing in defense of the deep web is difficult to do in front of congress, seeing as how many illegal activities take place there.
So ultimately, why should we care if Comcast wants to start charging Netflix to stream to users? Well, as many have pointed out, this can lead to slower internet speeds. After Net Neutrality was struck down a year ago, Comcast told Netflix that they would have to fork over a king's ransom to maintain their bandwidth streaming. They just happened to do this over the holidays. Netflix balked at the multi-million dollar price tag, and so Comcast delivered on its threat and throttled Netflix's bandwidth to a crawl.
The practical upshot was that millions of users who were sitting around Netflix with their family for the holidays suddenly could no longer reliably stream their copies of It's a Wonderful Life, because the bandwidth simply was not there. Netflix began receiving angry complaints and threats of discontinued services from their subscriber base. They caved to Comcast's demands pretty quickly after that.
However, as has been pointed out numerous times, what's to stop Netflix from passing their increased cost of business onto the customer? Many will argue that Netflix exists in a different world now, with actual competition. Amazon prime, HBO Go, Hulu Plus, etc. are just a few examples of streaming services users can visit instead of Netflix. The entire purpose of competition being to keep prices low for the consumer.
And yet, even when Netflix was virtually the sole provider of streaming media, subscription cost hikes sent their user base into protest, and were quickly rescinded. This has caused many people to proclaim the "increased costs of basic services" problem to be a myth.
Personally, I think it's telling that Comcast chose to go after a media giant like Netflix rather than a non-profit group like Wikipedia. First off, the sites that really gobble up our bandwidth are anything but non-profit. But also, even cable companies know they will get a bad rap by visibly attacking non-profits.
And, when Comcast can post profits of millions extorted from Netflix, their complaints that they cannot monetize their bandwidth are gone. So why wouldn't they begin upgrading their bandwidth infrastructures again?
Well this is where you get into whether the internet should serve as a common utility, and whether ISPs function in a fair competitor market, or whether they operate like mini-monopolies. Because, of course, the answer to "the loss of Net Neutrality means that ISPs will start to gouge their customers", is to "go pick another ISP."
However, the reason why things like power and water are considered public utilities is because many economists believe that the investment in infrastructure (i.e. power lines, and water pipes) would be too high to allow free competition. In effect, new companies could not afford the investment, and so the old guard could prevent them from competing and thus maintain local monopolies.
Whether or not this is true is a century-old argument that I won't get into, but the fact remains that Comcast in particular has proven that it has the bargaining power to force competitors out of the market. For instance, Google Fiber has been kept out of several cities by Comcast lobbyists on grounds of unfair competition. (http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/06/06/hundreds_of_cities_have_laid_fiber_for_faster_internet_but_big_telecom_companies.html)
Personally, I see this as a sign more of a problem with government corruption than with greedy corporations, but then I personally believe that capitalism best thrives when corporations are greedy, and its only when the government has the power to play favorites among the greedy corporations that capitalism breaks down (but I'm a major proponent of the free market, and not everyone is).
At any rate, the FCC is not a local legislator. It has something of a better track record with regulation, and so placing the internet under its auspices is less frightening than, say, the government trying to create a *new* regulatory board.
Ultimately, I feel that Net Neutrality is a much more complex issue than most people give it credit for being. Personally, I am very much on the fence about it. But then, the only sites that I frequently use which would be affected allow me to stream TV shows for free, and I happen to know that those have an expiration date no matter what. Hopefully I have given some of you more information to chew on before you make a decision for yourselves.
In effect, with the entire population of the developed world carrying around powerful data streaming devices in their pockets, the data load on the ISPs has increased exponentially. A large amount of everyone's bandwidth in any one area is choked up with thousands of people streaming TV, movies, and videogames.
The only answer is for ISPs to continually upgrade their bandwidth infrastructure, but this is an investment that ISPs are beginning to balk at. Their point is that Net Neutrality has forbidden them to monetize their bandwidth to content creators. Therefore, bandwidth-light sites, such as Wikipedia, Dictionary.com, and Reddit (largely text, or still-image based) pay as much to the ISPs as bandwidth hogs like YouTube, Netflix and Hulu (spoiler alert: zero dollars)
Another major change from the GeoCities era, is that there really aren't that many "indie" sites out there anymore. Few people have "personal" webpages outside of the deep net. The overwhelming number of users maintain profiles on Facebook. Virtually no one online hosts their own videos, but rather use services like YouTube or Vimeo.
Most information and activity now transitions through the auspices of sites with business aspects. Forums, are generally owned by businesses (and if not, they are hosted on services like Yuku which ARE businesses).
Therefore, one key argument of the Net Neutrality debate, (that of maintaining an "open" internet) is losing its teeth. After all, who cares about an open internet when virtually everyone only interacts with the internet through corporate portals? Generally speaking, the only truly independent sites left are on the deep web, and arguing in defense of the deep web is difficult to do in front of congress, seeing as how many illegal activities take place there.
So ultimately, why should we care if Comcast wants to start charging Netflix to stream to users? Well, as many have pointed out, this can lead to slower internet speeds. After Net Neutrality was struck down a year ago, Comcast told Netflix that they would have to fork over a king's ransom to maintain their bandwidth streaming. They just happened to do this over the holidays. Netflix balked at the multi-million dollar price tag, and so Comcast delivered on its threat and throttled Netflix's bandwidth to a crawl.
The practical upshot was that millions of users who were sitting around Netflix with their family for the holidays suddenly could no longer reliably stream their copies of It's a Wonderful Life, because the bandwidth simply was not there. Netflix began receiving angry complaints and threats of discontinued services from their subscriber base. They caved to Comcast's demands pretty quickly after that.
However, as has been pointed out numerous times, what's to stop Netflix from passing their increased cost of business onto the customer? Many will argue that Netflix exists in a different world now, with actual competition. Amazon prime, HBO Go, Hulu Plus, etc. are just a few examples of streaming services users can visit instead of Netflix. The entire purpose of competition being to keep prices low for the consumer.
And yet, even when Netflix was virtually the sole provider of streaming media, subscription cost hikes sent their user base into protest, and were quickly rescinded. This has caused many people to proclaim the "increased costs of basic services" problem to be a myth.
Personally, I think it's telling that Comcast chose to go after a media giant like Netflix rather than a non-profit group like Wikipedia. First off, the sites that really gobble up our bandwidth are anything but non-profit. But also, even cable companies know they will get a bad rap by visibly attacking non-profits.
And, when Comcast can post profits of millions extorted from Netflix, their complaints that they cannot monetize their bandwidth are gone. So why wouldn't they begin upgrading their bandwidth infrastructures again?
Well this is where you get into whether the internet should serve as a common utility, and whether ISPs function in a fair competitor market, or whether they operate like mini-monopolies. Because, of course, the answer to "the loss of Net Neutrality means that ISPs will start to gouge their customers", is to "go pick another ISP."
However, the reason why things like power and water are considered public utilities is because many economists believe that the investment in infrastructure (i.e. power lines, and water pipes) would be too high to allow free competition. In effect, new companies could not afford the investment, and so the old guard could prevent them from competing and thus maintain local monopolies.
Whether or not this is true is a century-old argument that I won't get into, but the fact remains that Comcast in particular has proven that it has the bargaining power to force competitors out of the market. For instance, Google Fiber has been kept out of several cities by Comcast lobbyists on grounds of unfair competition. (http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/06/06/hundreds_of_cities_have_laid_fiber_for_faster_internet_but_big_telecom_companies.html)
Personally, I see this as a sign more of a problem with government corruption than with greedy corporations, but then I personally believe that capitalism best thrives when corporations are greedy, and its only when the government has the power to play favorites among the greedy corporations that capitalism breaks down (but I'm a major proponent of the free market, and not everyone is).
At any rate, the FCC is not a local legislator. It has something of a better track record with regulation, and so placing the internet under its auspices is less frightening than, say, the government trying to create a *new* regulatory board.
Ultimately, I feel that Net Neutrality is a much more complex issue than most people give it credit for being. Personally, I am very much on the fence about it. But then, the only sites that I frequently use which would be affected allow me to stream TV shows for free, and I happen to know that those have an expiration date no matter what. Hopefully I have given some of you more information to chew on before you make a decision for yourselves.
posted by Zack at 8:27 AM
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