Net Neutrality

Discussion in 'West Mall' started by Seattle Husker, Jan 8, 2018.

  1. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    Creating it's own thread because talking about it in the context of "Dumb Political Correctness" doesn't make any sense. My hope is that we can agree on that.

    The FCC is making another change that will impact you rural consumers. They think our requirements to serve "Broadband" to rural customers are too stringent. In turn, they are proposing a reduction in speed requirements. They'll vote on the rule in February but here is the gist:

    This is analogous to lowering graduation criteria so more students graduate.

    On a different note, Comcast's announced investment in infrastructure for 2018 will match their 2017 and 2016 investments.

    Oh, several states are now passing their on Net Neutrality laws with California, Washington and Nebraska leading the way.
     
  2. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    I don't know much about Mbps so I asked my son what his computer showed (we're on Spectrum). Here it is:

    [​IMG]
     
    • Like Like x 1
  3. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    You clearly are well within the current "broadband" definition. Those numbers will vary depending on peak network traffic (typically 4-8pm PST) and or your home bandwidth traffic. My home tends to be very heavy internet users with 3 teenage boys PC Gaming, phones and my wife and I surfing.

    The proposal in front of the FCC is akin to allowing companies sell "broadband" to rural customers and not deliver much more than dial-up.
     
  4. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    Let me ask you this; in terms of the incentives now created for the ISP's given whatever latitude they now possess, what is the difference between now and prior to the implementation of the law back in 2015 (?)? I asked my son if he recalled any performance issues (he's a huge gamer; League of Legends. He's now coaching a team online) and he said no. What am I missing on this?
     
  5. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    ISP's have been caught on multiple occasions throttling certain internet content providers. It wasn't the FCC that caught them but rather average technical joe's like you and me. Comcast and Verizon are the most high profile of cases. How did they do this? Packet sniffing. This is analagous to opening each individual packet going across their network, determining who is sending it and slowing it down. Imagine your postal carrier opening your mail to see if Home Depot or Lowes was the sender and delaying delivering mail coupons from Home Depot because they have an exclusive deal with Lowes.

    It was always the THREAT of the FCC that forced them to abandon these practices and drove the movement toward net neutrality. In other words, ISPs were moving in that direction and Net Neutrality effectively headed them off at the pass. Keep in mind, absent net neutrality other countries have moved to tiered pricing models. Imagine pricing like your cable bill where certain channels cost you more only in this case Hulu streams faster than Netflix which makes all the difference in the world for your new 4k TV.

    The only people who benefit from the removal of Net Neutrality are the ISPs and their investors. There is no greater evidence than Comcast literally deleting its Net Neutrality pledge the day the FCC voted to change the rules. This pledge was a "do no harm" pledge to convince consumers they'd still live by net neutrality rules even without them. This is really bad for everyone.
     
    • Like Like x 1
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2018
  6. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    That’s wicked good speed.
     
    • Like Like x 5
  7. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    I'm paying for their fastest internet. I could get Google but I'm too lazy to change and my son, the gamer is well pleased with the consistency and speed of the feed.
     
  8. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    And for the record my son (he's twenty one years old) was totally against the repeal of net neutrality.
     
  9. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    My son is huge into LoL as well. He and his friends play all the time.

    Seems like yesterday when they got started with Minecraft. :smile1:
     
    • Like Like x 2
  10. ShAArk92

    ShAArk92 1,000+ Posts

    I'm not as rural as one can get, but I think I qualify ... John Daly can't hit my neighbor's house from my house.

    AT&T cellular wireless. Usually, I'm around 5-7, but this time of morning, things are rocking. (BTW, I've forgotten how to insert the pict like bystander did, sorry)

    This service has expanded due to demand. There are times when the towers are overloaded (the exodus out of the metromess headed south) but for the most part, AT&T has been reliable with acceptable speed.

    It's funny, I suppose, the definition of broadband is 25 mbs? Wow. I've never had 25 Mbs, don't know what that looks or smells like.

    The problem with treating the internet as a public utility is that there's an assumption there's only one way to access it ... like a power line or water service ... or a phone line. There are multiple ways to get there, even at my rural residence; cellular (all 3 majors have good coverage here), fixed wireless, satellite, and ... dial-up. DSL is also available in town (still "rural" AFA population density is concerned, methinks) with comparable speeds to that which I'm getting.

    Some are better than others, but you know what? You get that for which you pay where you pay it. The other interesting tidbit ... of those 3; water, electricity, phone ... none of those are regulated anymore. I paid mightily for the local power company to run the lines to the house. I paid mightily for a guy to drill me a water well. And I'm paying AT&T a nice truck payment for phone service

    Eggs are cheaper in the country, but internet is not. That just life.

    I don't need nor desire a bureaucrat telling me and my provider how we need to do business.

    I'm a fan of NetFlix, but if they try to lobby the change in earnest ... I'll drop 'em. Offer your service and let the market decide. Some of us can get 350 MBs ... some of us have never even heard of that speed. If NetFlix content requires 350 MBs, then they reduce their market share.
     

    Attached Files:

    • Like Like x 1
    Last edited: Jan 9, 2018
  11. nashhorn

    nashhorn 5,000+ Posts

    Good Lord, I'm in Katy and never come close to that speed. My test has once, and only once, shown 74 mps but normally struggles to be above 15. No, no gamers in my house any longer, just wife and I. Netflix and Amazon about all we do.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  12. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    So, what I'm hearing is that our internet speeding is pretty good! That's nice to hear since I'm paying for it. I went ahead and sprung for the highest level they offered. Google dug up all of SW Travis County (SW Parkway) and they are available but we're sticking with this. It should be interesting to see if they raise the price or throttle it back. He also uses an ethernet cable instead of Wi-Fi which I use but I'm not a gamer. I use Youtube quite a bit and can get good stream while he's playing League of Legends.
     
  13. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    I have a free market thought. I figure (or so it seems) that most gamers are basically very young and have no money. So if the ISP's jack up the price for high-end speeds then those kids have to negotiate with their parents or get a job. And it would require collusion for the ISP's to raise the water so to speak. Of course, collusion is and has always been with us but even Verizon cracked when it came to unlimited data plans. They held out a long time but finally did it (I'm on their plan). So, who's to really say what will happen? I get that having an unregulated market for what you can charge is on the whole more expensive than a utility which has to file a rate case but then again, we've seen price wars. Utilities don't cut prices. They don't have sales.
     
  14. ShAArk92

    ShAArk92 1,000+ Posts

    Over Christmas break, my two sons put their XBox1s on my wifi and played one of the shoot 'em ups ... they didn't complain. Of course, they knew if they did, the response would be ... "I haven't received any payment for service" ;)

    Now, I couldn't watch Netflix while they were doing that ... but HornFans was still good to go! :)
     
    • Like Like x 3
  15. bystander

    bystander 10,000+ Posts

    As long as Hornfans is good to go then I'm happy!
     
    • Like Like x 2
  16. Statalyzer

    Statalyzer 10,000+ Posts

    This is akin to defining a "highway" as any road where the speed limit is 40 mph or more.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  17. UTChE96

    UTChE96 2,500+ Posts

    Based on my experience, gaming doesn't take up much bandwidth. It's streaming video that's the bandwidth hog.

    As a cord cutter, I have been pretty interested in the net neutrality discussion. I suspect the long term impact will be ISPs leveraging more money out of the high bandwidth users such as Netflix, Hulu, etc. I am looking forward to 5G wireless home internet which should increase available bandwidth for many users and give more ISP options. It will never be a very competitive market but better than the 1 or 2 options for high speed internet that most folks have now.
     
    • Like Like x 2
  18. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    Maybe 5G will be different, but my wireless internet through my phone is never as reliable or consistent as my home internet.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  19. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    Deez, supposedly 5G is going to be a whole other animal. It should at least be the start of replacing physical transmission lines with long distance wireless.
     
    • Like Like x 2
  20. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    I'm trying to understand how the advent of 5G will add more ISP options. It's still the same 4 wireless carriers that own tge rights to tge airwaves. Is the belief that Sprint or T-Mobile will finally be a viable option or that the cell carriers can compete with the copper wire monopolies (Cable)?
     
    • Like Like x 1
  21. UTChE96

    UTChE96 2,500+ Posts

    That's my understanding as well. It's going to take a while but it's supposed to be a game changer for home internet. Both Verizon and ATT will be rolling out 5G for mobile use in 2018 so we should find out if they hype is real this year.
     
  22. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    5G in theory opens up the market quite a bit. First, to telecommunications companies which are numerous. Second, the barrier to entry, owning physical cable, goes away. There is still tower usage and spectra allowances and all that. But it is where the government could really increase competition by stepping out of the way in terms of licensing.
     
    • Like Like x 3
  23. ProdigalHorn

    ProdigalHorn 10,000+ Posts

    A friend of mine works for Verizon, and that's basically what he said. Of course we'll all have to get new phones...
     
    • Like Like x 1
  24. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    And for it to be a real difference maker, they'd have to drop the data limits.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  25. ProdigalHorn

    ProdigalHorn 10,000+ Posts

    I need to start being smarter about the phone plans I pick, so I haven't looked that closely in the past, but I've typically had a data limit that I occasionally pass. But the way people use the web now and the increasingly blurred lines between mobile and broadband, I suspect we're all going to be looking for unlimited data plans before long (if not now). I don't watch streaming video on my phone, but I can't imagine having limited data on my phone if I did.
     
  26. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    I don't stream video on my phone, but I do on my smart TV.
     
  27. ProdigalHorn

    ProdigalHorn 10,000+ Posts

    You're still using broadband on that right? Not a data plan?
     
  28. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    Yes. I have home internet and phone service through Kabel Deutschland.
     
  29. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    It will start to break up the monopoly of the wired cable operators but unless the government interferes in the next spectrum auction (e.g. rules to limit spectrum to non-big 4 wireless) then the same players that are competing now will gobble up the any new spectrum. Keep in mind, these spectrum licenses are hundreds of millions of dollars thus regional (mostly rural) players like US Cellular can't keep up with the Jones.

    So, competition will still just be Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint against the major cable providers. Oh...can't forget Dish who has spent $billions acquiring licenses that they have don't nothing with.

    Here is a summary article for the last auction. T-Mobile paid $8 billion for low-band spectrum taking 45% of the available licenses. Of course, they have a lot of ground to make up compared to AT&T and Verizon.

    It should also be noted that no all spectrum is created equal. This last allottment was spectrum converted from the push towards digital TV. New spectrum will also need to have other devices moved off of it so avoid interference. The spectrum bands the FCC has proposed for 5G currently conflicts with satellite communications.

    My summary of this ordeal is that competition as it stands is very limited for ISPs and should Sprint/T-Mobile ever tie the know will be further limited.
     
  30. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    Not Deutsche Telekom?
     

Share This Page