Net Neutrality

[socalboi88]

It looks like net neutrality in the US is ending later this year, which means Internet service providers will be able to slow down or block any websites they don't like, or charge more to access them. They might just do this to block their customers from going to competitors' websites, but they might also charge more to access "adult" websites, if they think people will pay more for them. Or they might not change a thing, nobody knows.

(Background: The FCC's plan is to remove certain regulations on ISPs that it considers onerous or unnecessary. This will allow ISPs to charge more for certain services, and give them an incentive to improve their networks and expand into rural areas that still don't have high-speed Internet. The FCC's initial vote was in May, and their final vote will be later this year. Citizen feedback has been negative, but the FCC is expected to move forward with their plan. Their decision may then go through the legal system, and the courts may restore net neutrality rules; the FTC (rather than the FCC) may begin enforcing net neutrality on a case-by-case basis; or a future FCC or Congress could restore net neutrality. So these changes could theoretically be reversed in the future.)

Has anyone else thought about how this website will be affected, or if we'll be able to access it after the net neutrality rules are repealed?

(I didn't put this under Politics because this isn't a question about net neutrality, I'm just asking how this website will be affected.)

[Guest bbbearlover1]

Good question

[Guest Upstateguy518]

It's just another way for the monopoly to continue. Select companies corner the market and then enforce their rules because where else are you gonna go?

While we may have to suffer from it for a short while, This kind of thing won't last. First it's restrictions on the internet and then it snow balls from there.

[socalboi88]

On 6/26/2017 at 8:11 PM, Upstateguy518 said:

It's just another way for the monopoly to continue. Select companies corner the market and then enforce their rules because where else are you gonna go?

While we may have to suffer from it for a short while, This kind of thing won't last. First it's restrictions on the internet and then it snow balls from there.

I hope you are right!

[Rookie69]

It sounds like the FCC rules will just change every time there is a new administration in the White House.  Only way it becomes permanent is with legislation passed, which I think is highly unlikely.  

I think the main thing we will see is throttling of major companies like Netflix to try and squeeze money out of them, which supposedly already happening.  I think most changes will be very subtle though, aimed to make major companies pay more to IPs. Any major changes that consumers will recognize, and I think there will be major backlash.  

I've always thought that the American public is politically very passive until you take their TV away. If we start seeing Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, YouTube, etc disappearing from major IPs there is bound to be major backlash.  

I don't think the IPs are interested in censoring content from small websites. They just want to extort money out of major websites.

Then again, anything is possible in the crazy Trump era.

[socalboi88]

I think ISPs will definitely squeeze big websites for all they can, but I don't think smaller websites will be off their radar, though. From what I understand, YouTube has massively demonetized videos that might offend its advertisers, including a lot of political videos...although "official" news channels like CNN and Fox have not been demonetized. I think this is a preview of the kind of informal censorship we can expect once net neutrality is gone. It seems like the corporations will target anything that can make them more money, and anything that might portray them in a negative light (that's what I would do, if I were a corporation). And this website could fall into both of those categories, which is why I was concerned about what was going to happen to it.

Also, it's worth noting that the previous FCC also tried to remove net neutrality in 2014, but there was so much public pushback that they left it in place (temporarily). So it seems like net neutrality and free speech are in the crosshairs no matter who's in the White House, as long as corporations are "donating" to both parties.

The other thing that concerns me is that people don't seem to mind losing their freedoms, as long as it's slow and quiet, or there's a good excuse for it. No one complains about the Patriot Act anymore, no one minds the NSA recording all our conversations and emails, no one minds our ISPs selling our Internet activity (including this post) to advertisers...yet that would all have been unthinkable in 2000 or early 2001, except maybe in some Orwellian science fiction movie. But now it's all normal, which is why I think a censored Internet could become normal too, if it were censored gradually enough and no one noticed it happening.

And I think a really close example is television -- everyone with a pair of rabbit ears used to get the same three channels, no matter what. Now, though, there are expensive "packages" for different channels, and I think sports games are pay-per-view only. If this website were put into whatever Internet "package", how many people would buy that package to keep coming here?