Because the only services it really affects are high bandwidth serrvices like Netflix, Hulu, and Youtube. By intentionally keeping their peering systems small they force these services into side deals so customers can get the bandwidth they paid for.
Meanwhile Comcast gets to exempt all of their traffic since it gets to be in network for free.
No.
The bandwidth is being used by US, THE CONSUMERS. And we pay for that bandwidth.
The fact that we choose to use a lot of that to use Netflix is our choice.
I do not want ISPs dictating to me what content on the internet i should be accessing by slowing down content from providers that haven’t paid extra fees.
That isn’t what rent seeking is in economic terms.
Rent seeking is using non free market tools in order to drive an artificially high income. To earn income through means other than through productive work.
Practically speaking this can be using monopoly status in order to drive higher than market prices (why utilities are regulated, they are an example of an industry that trends toward natural monopolies), using legislative solutions to artificially control market supply (see things like taxi badges), using artificial subsidies to prop up prices/ profits (things like the farm bill contain examples).
So don’t pretend rent seeking has fuck all to do with rent, as the term is used in real estate. Now rent is shorthand because it fits the bill, but it is merely one facet of rent seeking behavior. This is undergrad economics, you’re a lawyer, you should know that.
But by the very nature unregulated rent seeking is because of distortions and failures of the free market. Because in a true functional free market rent seeking behaviors are not possible, due to it being inefficiency. And with that being true, doesn’t that very fact indicate that internet does not function as a true free market? Does that not mean that government intervention is warranted since the normal free market solutions have already demonstrably failed? What recourse does a Comcast customer have if they decide to slow Netflix bandwidth in order to prioritize their own house offerings? Or block access to the ESPN website and redirect to Comcast Sports Net instead? What practical benefit does that offer, other than to pad their bottom line at the expense of customer choice and the open internet? Would we see a turn towards walled garden ecosystems where the global internet is broken in order to create petty feifdoms for cable companies to protect their legacy business interests?
Oh, and the epitome of rent seeking behavior is when these telcoms file lawsuits to prevent local municipalities from establishing municipal broadband, a thing several cities have attempted to do. But then you see cases where the state then passes a law preventing cities from building such infrastructure.
I wonder why that would be? Certainly not because state lawmakers got a nice fat paycheck in their back pocket from the cable companies not wanting to face competition (because they have, like cartels, conspired with each other to divvy up regions and not compete in their exclusive zones).
The clear recourse here is antitrust law, since what you describe would be textbook anticompetitive conduct (unless there was some compelling economic rationale for Comcast’s behavior, which is what I was suggesting, but others here dispute that, too). The federal government brings antitrust suits all the time for exactly this reason. Net neutrality would not apply, though, because even under the proposals offered by Obama’s FCC, interconnection deals are outside the scope of net neutrality. Maybe this is pedantic, because I’m not saying Comcast’s behavior is good. But I’m saying net neutrality is not the proper way to address it, even under the Obama administration’s conception of net neutrality.
But the side deals (interconnection agreements) affect traffic prior to arriving on Comcast’s network, right? I do not think the Obama net neutrality regulations (since repealed by the Trump FCC) even addressed that, based on the CNET article for example. Are you saying Obama’s conception of net neutrality did not go far enough?
This is reasonable, but again, I don’t think it’s a net neutrality issue unless you significantly expand the scope of net neutrality beyond the one proposed by Obama’s FCC.
No one is arguing that the specific peering dispute between Comcast/Netflix is within the scope of “net neutrality” as defined by Obama’s FCC.
It is merely illustrative that the incumbent broadband providers have both the means and the inclination to engage in the sort of bad behaviors that network neutrality is designed to prevent.
https://imgur.com/gallery/DNeJ7
Net Neutrality is the very definition of needed legislation as people have pointed out at least a hundred times.
Not having it kills all internet innovation. It creates monopolies among the existing players and kills any competition or chance for new people to get into the game.
ISPs are already de facto monopolies that should be broken up. This gives them more power than any corporation has possibly had since the railroads. They could strangle the entire internet to death and destroy all criticism.
Except, inasmuch, as that agreement was not one entered into volutnarially by both parties. Comcast was basically running a mafia protection racket to get this. Because just prior to the agreement, Comcast started singling out Netflix traffic for throttling.
Nice business you got there, shame if your customers couldn’t see it.
So they basically strong armed Netflix into the agreement. And, miraculously, as soon as it was signed things went back to normal speeds. Rather suspicious don’t you think?
This is interesting (although I dispute that Comcast’s behavior here is necessarily bad). Are there any significant examples of bad behavior by telecoms that the rules offered by Obama’s FCC would have actually prevented? If not, that’s why I feel the legislation is too prospective. Because the net neutrality rules provided by the Obama FCC would not have prevented what we are talking about. Do you think that’s a deficiency of the Obama FCC’s rules, or should other areas of law (like antitrust) do that legwork?
I agree with you (imagine that) that in the pre-Trump paradigm, anti-trust law might be the way to address the Comcast/Netflix shenanigans. The problem is that anti-trust law is a hammer, and for these kinds of peering disputes you need toenail clippers. Obama’s anti-trust wasn’t interested in looking at the issue. Now, with Trumpists in charge of the Justice Department, anti-trust will only be used to punish companies that don’t hew to the party line. Maybe Comcast will have to worry after all, since they own MSNBC?
To enforce an efficient marketplace in broadband and telecom in general would require a coordinated effort from the FCC, anti-trust, and state and local government (who grant cable franchises). Unfortunately, the telecoms now own the FCC and many state and local governments, and Trump’s anti-trust doesn’t care. In order for you to be picked by the Federalist Society to be appointed to the federal bench you have to demonstrate that you are a cheer-leader for corporate rent-seeking, The best we can hope for is rear-guard actions like what California is doing.
First, previous examples from the US:
https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/net-neutrality-violations-history/
And a more egregious example from another country:
https://twitter.com/RoKhanna/status/923701871092441088
Second, above you mentioned a lot about ISP peering business deals and the “Comcast blocking netflix” hubub that started this entire thread in the first place.
Lots of people here are conflating the two, which muddles the waters even further.
The Netflix vs Comcast / Verizon / etc. throttling issue from 2014 is not a net neutrality issue. It is a matter of backroom business deals that have existed for literally decades, where different businesses try to get the best peering deals they can get.
The problem with peering deals is in a lack of competition, and the inability for a consumer to say “Fuck you Comcast for your shitty peering deals bringing down Netflix, I’m moving to CenturyLink instead” or whatever.
Lack of competition in US ISPs is a major issue. And so is net neutrality. But they’re almost completely unrelated, and confusing the two risks undermining the completely independent solutions they require. And Ajit Pai is fucking you over trying to make both worse for you, while lining the pockets of the rich telecoms he’s bought and sold by.
And meanwhile, here is some more Ajit Pai being a piece of shit:
The Portgual example you cite with the photo, in addition to not being from the US, is highly misleading though. Snopes disproved it, rating the image as “mostly false” for several reasons, including that it misrepresents the state of the Internet in Portgual, as well as the state of its net neutrality policies: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/portugal-net-neutrality/
Regarding your US examples: Wasn’t the Verizon tethering issue resolved in the absence of net neutrality restrictions, via a multi-million FCC settlement? Again, seems that was handled under other laws. Ditto ATT’s Facetime blocking. If these harms existed only briefly before being resolved without the comprehensive additional regulation, why the need for comprehensive additional regulation? The case for net neutrality would be made by a current or ongoing harm that is not resolved by current laws.
@antlers – You are right that antitrust law is only as strong as the willingness of the current administration to enforce it, but that’s true of net neutrality regulations as well (as we’re seeing). Perhaps the answer is something more permanent than a net neutrality regulation. I think the Obama administration erred by not pursuing more antitrust net neutrality-style cases, and a future administration, ideally a Democratic one, should try to get more case law established in that area. That would create enough deterrent to prevent telecoms from abusing their monopoly to harm consumers, I think.
Good for them and Yay!
Other states, such as California, New York, and Illinois, have made significant progress towards passing state-level net neutrality protections, but so far only Washington and Oregon—which has a law that won’t go into effect until next year—have signed them into law.
For us too. I am sure our Federal government will drop everything and combat this new evil of States rights because they stand against… oh wait.
It is bizarre to see the GOP dig in their heels to fight against states’ rights.
Are any of their policy positions widely held, genuine principles? Or is it all about power, money and currying favor with their fuhrer?
Nope.
Yep.
It helps to look at the GOP as a oligarchical white supremacist party. They care about states rights when the federal government is telling them they can’t discriminate against a race, religion, sexual orientation, etc. Other than that it’s just protecting the donor class to make sure they’re not taxed to provide things like healthcare to the undesirables.
Viewed in that light, they’ve consistent in their policies.
The irony of these criticisms, of course, is that it goes both ways: liberals who traditionally have mocked the concept of “state’s rights” as a code for racism are now depending on it as a bulwark against Trump’s arguably racist policies. Yes, conservatives and liberals have somewhat flipped on the issue.
Regardless, in this case at least, a strong case can be made that it’s ideologically consistent for conservatives to favor federal net neutrality rules. No conservative supports states’ rights where it would conflict with the federal government’s explicitly constitutional authority to regulate interstate commerce (As the 10th amendment says). The Internet is fundamentally an interstate commercial entity – really, it’s an international one. You can convincingly dispute, as @Timex has, whether net neutrality laws in one state actually interfere with federal commerce authority, or burden interstate commercial activity. But it is simply facile to claim that conservatives must always support states’ rights to remain ideologically consistent. Any conservative who does always support states’ rights is simply an ideologue.
Marketplace did a couple of Net Neutrality-focused things recently, which I enjoyed. An interview with Ajit Pai, and some discussion on Make Me Smart.