FCC and the internet

[Samuel Thurston, III]

On Wed, Oct 21, 2009 at 10:30 AM, Douglas Pollard <dougpol1 at verizon.net> wrote:
>    We have been recently arguing here on sounder about how bad is
> Microsoft which seems to me  like arguing how dangerous is the kitty cat
> when there is a tiger hiding in the bushes.  The Government of the
> United States has a bill in the congress called Net Neutrality.  This
> bill will let the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) get it's ugly
> swollen and deformed foot in the door to run the INTERNET as it does

Granting the FCC the authority to regulate US telecoms with respect to
the internet isn't the same as giving the FCC control of the internet.
 Right now the providers of internet service are already regulated in
many ways, but law hasn't caught up with internet access.  Most major
telecoms have had plans on the board, some of them leaked, to do deep
packet inspection and start charging premium prices for access to
certain sites.

In fact, one plan I saw from Verizon, involved putting all but 15 or
so sites in an "expanded package" that you would have to pay a lot
for, which would mean that unless you paid extra for premium internet
service, you wouldn't be able to get to, oh, say ubuntu.com, but only
"Verizon approved" media

> broadcast television media, radio, and every  broadcast media that is
> our  means of communication and news.  It would like to control the
> cable that supplies the INTERNET, with the excuse of forcing the supply
> of it to everyone.  What is Net Neutrality, is an opinionated e-mail a
> violation of such a doctrine??

No, it's exactly what it's trying to protect and promote.

>   AS A result of FCC controls ABC, NBC, CBS or PBS will not dare to
> disagree with anything the Administration or congress says or proposes.

That's clearly and demonstrably absurd.

The FCC also controls the airwaves over which all that nonsense
pro-war and anti-government talk radio (rush, glenn beck, etc) goes
out.  They don't seem to have any trouble speaking their minds.

>  This  is the biggest danger that free software could possibly face.
> Large software companies can lobby for FCC rules by the use of swollen
> coffers that might  completely eliminate the use of free software or in
> some way control it in such a ways as to make it uncompetitive with the
> big companies.
>    Is it free if you can't use it to say what you want?

It's not free. you pay for it.  Your ISP's terms of service dictate
how you can use it and sometimes even explicitly prevent you from
using your internet access to disparage their service.  Your ISP can
cut you off for any reason or no reason at all.  They can, at present,
filter your internet access at their whim.

>    I suspect that it irritates big federal government that free
> software lies outside it's grasp to control. It is spread across the
> world.   IT cannot be controlled by the use of income tax on it's
> profits, excise tax on it's value or a tariff for it's use on the
> coming  state run INTERNET.

I hate to break it to you, but without congress and the US gov't,
there would be no internet.

>     Anyone who thinks this can't happen is not looking reality in the
> face. I would like for such a person to cite me an example of when in
> the last several thousand years a government has held back on
> controlling it's population  by any means available.

The civil rights movement.  Or I suppose you might argue that granting
equal status to black people and women was controlling those who
didn't want to?

>     With the passing of hate speach laws  and the control of the
> internet our days of being able to write a post like this one whether
> true or misguided are numbered. How long will it be until saying
> something like I am saying here will be deemed hate speech against the
> United States Government???  WE have a constitution that guarantees our
> individual rights but it is up to only us, to see to it that the
> Government does not interfere, by denying it the power to step on those
> rights.   Government control of Freedom of speech is not freedom of
> speech at all.

So instead we should sit back and let the corporate interests run
roughshod over it since they don't have any impetus to abide by the
constitution, or constituencies and voters, and answer only to the
almighty dollar?

>    Those of you who are not US citizens but instead citizens of other
> countries should be eying there own Governments with a considerable
> amount of distrust where the Internet is concerned. There are in this
> world countries that are presently controlling it and in my opinion
> there aren't any countries whose governments are not fully capable of
> doing the same in their own interest given half a chance.

Most foreign countries have only one telecom that is usually state
run.  A vast majority of these have firewalls regulated by the
government to control what you can and cannot do on the internet.

>      I feel sorry for you folks in England, the very country that gave
> us individual rights and whose teachings that endowed our founding
> fathers with the wisdom and education to write our constitution, is now
> prosecuting its own citizens for having opinions and voicing them on
> Christian verses Muslim Ideas.

I feel sorry for my countrymen in the US who have a limited
understanding of economics, politics, and history.

> Believe me I am not being smug because
> we are going down the same road.   Could this post be deemed hate mail
> in the near future when we have given up the INTERNET to Government
> control?

I don't know about hate mail, but with all due respect, I do deem it stupid.

I have no love for the FCC, and I haven't read the bill in congress,
but I sincerely doubt this is an "everybody panic" moment in the
history of free speech.