It’s not that I don’t think Net Neutrality is important. It’s just that I can’t be energized by every issue under the Sun. Discussing broadband throttling rates is less interesting to me than discussing macramé. So, I can’t take even the tiniest sliver of credit for the grassroots victory here. I didn’t care. I didn’t participate. And I’m still too bored by the issue to write about it.
So, I give you David Dayan:
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler’s announcement that he will seek to re-classify broadband as a common carrier under Title II of the Communications Act, ensuring equal access to all websites by treating the Internet like a public utility, is the biggest victory for bottom-up organizing since the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in 2010.
When pro-net neutrality groups like Free Press, Demand Progress, and Fight for the Future opposed Wheeler’s initial proposal for “fast lanes” for companies that pay for speedier website loads, hardly anybody gave them a chance of securing a truly open Internet. But despite the gloomy determinism about money in politics, despite the expectations of corporate hegemony, despite the certainty that powerful voices can just drown out everybody else, sometimes people can make a difference through concerted effort.
Why did it succeed where so many others failed?
Basically, the answer is that almost everyone uses the Internet and they like it the way it is. By contrast, almost everyone hates the telecoms.
The conservatives on the Supreme Court don’t really care what people think though, do they? I guess we’ll enjoy this until Justice Kennedy throws a cigarette butt in the punch bowl.
By the time Kennedy gets there with this butt, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito, will have played rock, paper, scissors, to see who could take a dump in that punchbowl first.
The real reason this happened is that the rich and powerful are split on the issue, unlike topics such as screwing the working class.
Yes, the Telcos and a few others could use a non-neutral net to make a pile of extra cash, but they people who would pay them the most would be other big companies – who currently don’t need to pay extra to reach their customers. Why, if you are BigCo, would you want something that would a) cost you more to get what you currently have and b) allow a competitor to outbid you and effectively lock you out from reaching customers?
So, that’s an overly simple description of the situation, but even if you add in all the details the end result is the same – a non-neutral net benefits some of the rich and powerful but hurts others – probably many others.
Other than that I’m with Boo, it’s boring. Glad others have the energy to think about it though. I believe we got the Affordable Care Act through an alliance with rich people on one side of a profits divide too, and immigration reform should have worked the same, had the Republicans not become so deeply insane.
“Yes, the Telcos and a few others could use a non-neutral net to make a pile of extra cash, but they people who would pay them the most would be other big companies – who currently don’t need to pay extra to reach their customers.”
Yes, this was an important part of the win. When I heard that Facebook and other online titans were for Net Neutrality, I knew the grassroots’ chance of victory had gone up substantially. That said, grassroots activism from those with less individual power had much to do with this win as well, and I’m happy when we win.
I am quite interested in hearing knowledgeable people on our side parse through the policy details of this proposal, though. I could see the powerful people Wheeler had worked for in the past getting the Chairman to hide some policy turds under the covers here.
You should be interested in this issue. Without it, the telecoms could slow your website to a crawl if you printed something they didn’t like. or they might do it to all leftie sites. Case in point: Wow! (wowway.com) gave me an e-mail address like every ISP does. I have never used it. The mailbox is full of bile from a bunch of bigots calling themselves “The American Family Association”. The only people who knew that email address were me and my ISP. Obviously they either sold it or they are Chick-fil-A/Hobby Lobby type religious fanatics and gave it away. Since corporations are people and SCOTUS has said they have the right to impose their religion on their employees, perhaps they also have the right to impose it on their customers.
Might not be interesting to you, and I fully agree with your “every issue under the sun” (that’s what you have your informed readers for!) but this is a big deal. A no-brainer for the customer of granting equal access to all users cuts into the profits of the telcos. Simply metering bandwidth is actually just a pricing structure, since every new technology development of fiber is making bandwidth approach infinite.
No one can be up on every issue but this a big fucking deal. I actually find this stuff fascinating both on a political and technical level.
Is right there with “a series of tubes”.
This is, like the ACA, a big fuckin deal. Does it solve all the world’s problems? Of course not. But we appeared to be going off a cliff, selling out the internet to the highest bidder. Now, at least for now, it’s not happening.