AT&T Says Net Rules MUST Allow 'Paid Prioritization'

[snot]

I'm no expert, but to the extent prioritization is the focus rather than building a network that can support our uses, they'll have us all over a barrel AND not only will we pay through the nose for decent service, but we'll get it without any meaningful privacy AND there will be no likelihood, let alone guarantee, that content/communications/etc. won't be surveilled or simply throttled for politically-motivated or other illegitimate reasons.

Given the dearth of media outlets not largely owned and controlled by oligarchs, and how important the internet has become as a result, it is crucial that we take organized, effective action in defense of 'net neutrality.

The whole article is good; here's a few 'graphs:

AT&T said Tuesday that any Net neutrality plan restricting its ability to engage in "paid prioritization" of network traffic would be harmful and contrary to the fundamental principles of the Internet.

Telecommunications providers need the ability to set different prices for different forms of Internet service, AT&T said, adding that it already has "hundreds" of customers who have paid extra for higher-priority services.

* * * * *

The flap over paid prioritization started a few weeks ago when Free Press, a pro-regulatory advocacy group, sent letters (No. 1 and No. 2) to the FCC dubbing the concept "discriminatory" and claiming it will "only benefit the few content giants that have deep enough pockets to pay for favorable treatment."

In a telephone interview on Tuesday, Free Press research director Derek Turner said that allowing paid prioritization would undercut the entire concept of Net neutrality, which had its previous legal foundation swept away earlier this year when a federal appeals court shot down the FCC's attempt to punish Comcast for temporarily throttling BitTorrent transfers.

More at http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20015231-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20#ixzz0yF3NbwBk .

[msongs]

1. make internet a public utlitity nt

[snot]

2. YES!!! No one should own the only public square we've got left.

[boppers]

6. It's built and maintained by private companies.

You want the government to take it over?

You think the censorship we have now is lame, wait until the FCC starts banning swear words from the internet.

You know, "for the children".

[eridani]

8. It was built by the government and then taken over by private companies n/t

[boppers]

11. Are you referring to ARPANET?

er, what?

[eridani]

18. Yes. And don't forget that the TCP-IP protocol was established by the government n/t

[boppers]

22. That's a bit simplified.

ARPANET: Tiny US defense network
NSFnet: US National Science Foundation
MCIMail: Private US phone company mail service
OnTyme, Telemail and Compuserve: Private email companies
UUNET, PSINet, and CERFNET: Private ISP's
Usenet and BITNET: Social public/private hybrids
Telenet/Sprintnet, Tymnet, Compuserve and JANET: Commercial and educational networks
CERN: European particle physics research network

The thing that made it an Inter-net wasn't ARPANET, though a chunk of the initial ideas were developed there, the thing that made it an Inter-networking system was that someone on the Compuserve network could talk to somebody on a *totally* different network like CERN, and not have to care how they got there. It was a mix of business, education, government, all connecting together, on a global basis. It wasn't "built by the government", it was built by a huge combination of different groups acting together. It wasn't "taken over" by private companies, though there has been public/private collaboration from the beginning, guided by the IETF.

[eridani]

24. OK, it was

However a CERN employee pretty much determined how the World Wide Web would function, and he was on a government's (not ours) dime.

[boppers]

3. That's how it's been working so far.

Was the left stopped by it? Were the fees outrageous? Can you afford your internet link?

[TheMuse]

4. When carriers gain the ability to speed up or slow down certain sites

It will be the end of the free exchange of information on the internet. Large media companies will dominate. The small blogger that sheds light on an issue that is overlooked by the mainstream media because the issue is not sexy enough, or because their opinion does not fit into the current media narrative, will be slowed and harder to find.

It will look like cable tv. We will only get information and opinions that others want us to see.

Net neutrality is very important. It is the last of the truly free press. It is the last thing to squash on the way to true Corporatism in America.

[boppers]

7. Did you read the article?

Carriers have had that ability, and have been using it, since the 90's. It predates blogging. Did the internet turn into cable TV? No. Instead, it blossomed.

A choice quote:
'"The (FCC) should view with healthy skepticism the opinions it receives on technical Internet matters from an advocacy group with no demonstrable expertise or operational experience in those matters," AT&T's letter says. "Paid prioritization over Internet access is not, as Free Press maintains, some lurking future menace that would pervert the intent of the IETF. To the contrary, it was fully contemplated by the IETF."

[TheMuse]

10. So I read it, and maybe I am dense

But what I got out of it is that there are now priorities in internet traffic, from real time voice, to email, etc., etc.

But what Verizon, Google, and now AT&T are advocating is individual sites gaining a "high-speed lane" on the internet by paying to have their content provided on said lane, while the rest of the internet, namely those without bundles of corporate money, would be relegated to the slow lane. Nobody has said anything about being like cable tv, where you would have to pay verizon in order to be served to their end users. But that would be the next step.

[boppers]

14. The priorities have been there all along, as have the "high speed" lanes.

They're expensive, so most folks opt for the cheaper "lanes", aka "best delivery" service, over slower network links.

If everyone wanted to pay to be on a true high speed network, they can buy a few T-1's, with a high guarantee of service, and get onto the fast lanes. It costs $1,000-3,000 to start. Per month. If you want faster links, those can run in the tens of thousands, to millions, per month.

[ThomCat]

19. This has nothing to do with buying a T-1 to get more bandwidth.

With the shit that AT&T is proposing you could had a full DS-9 into your house, more damned carrier level bandwidth than you could ever imagine needing.

But if you choose to visit a site that AT&T doesn't like, suddenly your throughput would drop to 56kbps and a page might take half an hour to load.

That would be the effect of what AT&T is proposing. The amount of bandwidth you have isn't the issue when they have a tiered internet. They are segregating content into tiers.

Do you want to discuss politics? Well, did you buy access to the political tier? That costs extra.

Oh, you don't want just the professional commentary? You want to join in the discussion and talk on amateur political discussion boards like this one? THOSE sites are on another tier. Did you pay for that tier? That costs extra too.

Do you shop online? That's it's own tier. You get that one for free. But you only get big corporate sites. All those cool geek friendly small businesses that you can find and shop from on the net now, um, well, those are on a different commercial tier you have to pay for. Unless it's a small business located somewhere outside of the US. Then that's still another tier altogether. International shopping. You have to buy that.

The internet can be sub-divided into an nearly endless number of tiers. It has this amazing level of diversity, you see. And they can take advantage of that by making you pay for that diversity.

Anything you pay for will be delivered to you at "premium" bandwidth levels. Meaning that they simply don't restrict the bandwidth in any way.

But anything you didn't pay for gets shunted to the "public internet." You can still access it, but they artificially squeeze the access rate down to a maximum of no higher than 56kbps so that no matter how much bandwidth you have, you can't watch any videos or load any graphics. You will be forced into slow motion. Your browsing will Suck!

It will be so bad that people will buy the tier for anything they view regularly.

But nobody will freely explore the way they do now. The freedom of the internet will be gone.

[boppers]

23. DNS does not work that way. Neither does TCP/IP. Nor does *cough* NANOG.

You are talking about per-packet *payload* level filtering, or perhaps packet level extortion from content providers? Ain't gonna happen. There's too much competition for any vendor to consider it, it's instant suicide, as people will just set up a different peering points for traffic routing, and stop interconnecting (read: huge monetary loss) to offending networks. BTW: This kind of problem happens all the time, where some rogue ISP is totally hosing somebody's traffic. Those ISP's get blackholed, and lose *all* access to the internet until they fix their shit.

To paraphrase a well known axiom of internet engineering:
The internet treats censorship as network failure, and routes around it.

[woo me with science]

28. +1 nt

[izzybeans]

5. Are they trying to create a separate legal entity between wireless and internet?

Seems like an end run around net-neutrality. We need mobile neutrality as well. It will stifle all the creative motion let loose by the new technologies. There will be no incentive for entrepreneurial activity if the big box providers control it. It'll be payola just like the record industry. We'll get some shiny spectacle, like the wireless version of Lady Gaga, and have to pretend its interesting because the alternatives are so much worse, just like we must with Lady Gaga.

[boppers]

9. They're trying to maintain the internet as it was designed and built.

If you want an unlimited mobile data plan, I believe those are fairly expensive, as the network is much smaller. There are also conflicting network standards, so your phone won't work in all places that other phones work.

[glitch]

12. AT&T finds new ways to blow!

Innovation, AT&T style.

[AdHocSolver]

13. If Net Neutrality "dies", so does the progressive movement.

The corporations will do to communications, what the insurance companies have done to health care.

Outfits like Fox would get high-speed connectivity, and outfits like DU and Kos would get "dial-up" speed.

So-called "paid prioritization" of network traffic means the wealthiest right-wing corporations will dominate the internet.

It isn't about profits, it is about destroying the progressive movement, and eliminating any competition to right-wing corporate ideology.

[laughingliberal]

15. +1000 nt

[boppers]

16. How did it manage to live so far, then?

DU and Kos already get a *tiny* fraction of what places like Wikipedia and Google have. The big players can already pay for vastly more bandwidth, peer points, and delivery guarantees than the tiny guys can.

In other words, your projected nightmare not only came true, it's always *been* true. Only it didn't destroy the progressive movement, to the contrary, actually... it created an ecosystem where DU and Kos can compete with Fox, regardless of how much money Fox throws at the problem.

[ThomCat]

21. You clearly don't understand the difference between

personal bandwidth and capped throughput. You are not in any position to talk about net neutrality if you don't even understand the issues involved.

Buying more bandwidth doesn't solve the problem when the carriers cap the throughput.

The larger issue here is that the government paid the carriers huge amounts of money through the Telecom Investment Act under Clinton. That money was paid to them precisely so they would reach every home with internet access so the US could catch up with every other industrialized nation.

Our Government Paid them Already so that we could all have better Internet access. They all took this money. They were supposed to put in fiber optic service to every community.

They didn't. They made excuses. They claimed that there were delays. They claimed it was impossible.

Every other industrialized nation is decades ahead of us. Every other nation has already been ahead of us for decades. That is why our government invested in this to begin with. But our government let the carriers get away with stealing the money. They let the carriers get away with taking the money and delivering nothing in return.

Now the carriers are not only delivering nothing in return for that money, they are trying to OWN the internet that WE PAID FOR ALREADY.

[boppers]

29. You might be a bit surprised at what I know. :)

First of all, "traffic shaping" are the words I think you're edging around. It's a standard practice in the industry. It's even what started the whole debate, BitTorrent traffic (and possibly Lotus Notes) was being shaped by Comcast with resets, and end-users freaked out that their dinky cable modems and 25 bucks a month didn't have a guaranteed sustained rate equal to 12Mb/s. OH NOES, how will they survive. *hanky wave* Quick hint: unless you're spending thousands a month on a CIR, you cannot, will not, get 12Mb/s sustained. I'm guessing this is what you meant by "personal bandwidth" and "capped throughput".

Secondly, the "dark fiber" scam is one I'm well aware of. For the benefit of others reading this, I'll explain how it worked:
1. Government says: "Hey, can you make that pipe faster?"
2. Carrier says: "Uh, sure, why?"
3. Government says: "Here's a pile of money to make it faster."
4. Carrier says: "Okay, but we're not at full capacity yet."

It was basically free money for already lit fiber, they just didn't bother to upgrade throughput when the time came, and continued shaping instead.

If this (the dark fiber scam) is the larger issue, why are people screaming about net neutrality, instead of government fraud? Why are there all these red herrings about "bloggers not having access", when the problem is a lack of infrastructure, or a lack of consumer protections, to simply tell customers that burst rate IS NOT sustained rate?

[KakistocracyHater]

17. AT&T is from Bizzarro World, obviously, because the fundamental principles

of the Internet are THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT AT&T SAYS.


off by an eye

[Iterate]

20. So why is this not a problem in other counties?

Internet service in the EU and East Asia is faster and cheaper, yet there is little concerted effort from the local telecoms to end net neutrality. The only serious pressure for a change is in the UK, and its coming from Ofcom.

Even Greece is planning 100Mbps connections to 90% of customers within seven years and choice of ISPs as well.

[depakid]

25. Perhaps you ought to direct that question to boppers

[boppers]

30. One word: Infrastructure.

Okay, another word: Landmass.

The nation of Japan is smaller than the state of California, so the physical problem is one of a different scale. The US is still filled with areas where you can drive for an hour and not see a *single* house. Which brings us to the infrastructure issue: how do you get high speed wires/wireless to the many scattered locations that lack it?

That brings us to a third word/phrase:
"Silly Season". It's one Obama uses to describe the bizarre freak out Americans have over political issues, where they assume the worst possible thing about every issue flogged for political reasons.

[Iterate]

32. I've heard the excuses, I'm just not buying it.

Literally, I'm not buying it, because I left the US right after the age of dial-up and early cable modem. What I learned is that people in other countries live better not because they have better doctors(they don't) or better IT(it isn't), but because their economic and political structures don't hamstring what the people want.

So here we go.
Landmass: You mean like Australia-sized landmass?
"Australia to get faster broadband"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7986918.stm

That's from 2009, and sure the Conservatives have proposed cutting the size of the governmental/private five-year build, but the article was from the point where they were getting private construction bids. Want something more current?

"Telcos lob broadband grenade: Abbott may be right"
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/telcos-lob-broadband-grenade-abbott-may-be-right-20100901-14mnc.html?from=smh_sb

It's the telcos and conservatives pairing up to slow the show. Sound familiar?

"Independent MPs should prioritise rural broadband: doctors"
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/01/2999401.htm

People want it:people can't get it. But they are going to build it in time, fiber or 4g.

"Telstra launches world’s fastest mobile broadband service"
http://unplugged.rcrwireless.com/index.php/20100830/news/3131/telstra-launches-worlds-fastest-mobile-broadband-service/

No excuse from Oz. Go USA.

Infrastructure: I suppose that means that concentrated areas of money, talent, and population have already been built, but not so. Plus that, poor neighborhoods get skipped, rural areas bypassed. Sounds like the 1930's when electrification was the issue. The only reason the TVA and REA exist is because the private monopolies claimed the same "we can't afford it, they don't really want it, they're too poor to afford it" excuses. At least we had some leadership that went ahead with those programs, and all was well until corporate/military corruption of the TVA. Now who in their right mind would say we should yank the wires from Alabama because that eeelectricity is just too damned expensive.

A more interesting example comes from the build-out of the telephone network. Same dynamics, same excuses, but a quite a few communities in the Midwest opened local co-op exchanges. I know, that's socialism, but damn, did it ever work. I had some dealings with them in the '70's. They made a shitload of money, had the best facilities in town, top notch all the way, and at the end of the year there was a dividend check in the mail for the community. Win-win, except for the telcos, who hated them and eventually bought them out.

Some of the same communities wanted to build on that model in the 1990's, connecting to the under-used school/state backbone, and all they got for their effort was new laws, new court prohibitions, and constant technical and legal roadblocks from the telcos, who of course complained that it was too expensive to build, and that cities shouldn't allowed to build it because it was unfair competition. Those same towns are stuck today with over-priced dial-up. FYI, of the very few towns that did build their own systems they do not, as far as I know, censor traffic. And as long as mayors, Mormons, and Evangelicals drive the most porn traffic, I don't think it will happen.

"Silly Season". I don't think it's silly, and it's been bad for a long time now.

I would add a fourth item to your triptych: Concentrations of political and/or economic power almost invariably lead to trouble. In western Europe, most of the telecoms started out as state systems, with responsive and representative political systems. The ISPs and phone companies that now use that wire are relatively small and compete freely over those lines;speeds are fast and prices have fallen. In eastern Europe, where the formerly big, concentrated, and unresponsive governments led to endless cockups, it's now a mixed bag. Croatia, for example, is at about the same level of broadband usage as the US ~22%.

Given the limited resources and other priorities, the counties in eastern Europe should be a real inspiration. Take a look at Romania. It's a combination of hacked neighborhoods, city governments, many smallish tech companies from the west, tiny local ISPs, bigger businesses serving the high street, French satellites, cellular wireless, all it with many players and responsive governments. They're doing whatever it takes, and at a reasonable price.

[boppers]

38. GREAT post!

Seriously.

[AdHocSolver]

26. There is a website that seems pretty good at discussing the issues for users.

http://www.savetheinternet.com/frequently-asked-questions


(snip)
Net Neutrality means that Internet service providers may not discriminate between different kinds of content and applications online. It guarantees a level playing field for all Web sites and Internet technologies.

Net Neutrality is the reason the Internet has driven economic innovation, democratic participation and free speech online. It protects the consumer's right to use any equipment, content, application or service without interference from the network provider. With Net Neutrality, the network's only job is to move data -- not to choose which data to privilege with higher quality service.
**********


What's at stake if we lose Net Neutrality?

(snip)
On the Internet, consumers are in ultimate control -- deciding between content, applications and services available anywhere, no matter who owns the network. There's no middleman. But without Net Neutrality, the Internet will look more like cable TV. Network owners will decide which channels, content and applications are available; consumers will have to choose from their menu.
**********

[woo me with science]

27. Thank you. Time for the graphic again:

What the internet will look like without net neutrality

[boppers]

31. Does the internet already look like that?

If not, why not?

There's no legislation mandating that an ISP not behave that way, so why didn't that happen?

The tools to make something like that happen (to an extent) already exist, so why hasn't it happened?

[woo me with science]

34. Do they?

What tools, exactly, are you speaking of, that already exist? Who has them NOW?

Do you seriously doubt this will happen? What will stop it?

[boppers]

37. Per-site filtering, traffic prioritization, tiered access, per user bandwidth caps...

All of this was built-in years ago.

Who has them? Pretty much every ISP, and every router monkey ("router monkeys" are the folks who pretty much control what travels where on the internet).

Do I doubt that it will be used? No, it's been used for years.

Nothing stopped it, and the sky did not fall.

There's priority internet links, and what "everybody else gets". Since very few people want to pay for priority internet, everybody (with exceptions for those with deep pockets and money to burn) has equal access.

[Scuba]

33. Yes, first the Supreme Court allows corporate free speech...

...and then Congress limits free speech to only the wealthy. What a wonderful idea.

[snot]

35. Pls do not rely on boppers as your sole source re- the tech aspects of this.

As I said, I'm no expert so can't argue; but I know others who are and who are deeply concerned about the prospective and ongoing transformation of the 'net from a free, open, distributed network into a centralized one controlled by a few private corporations.

And if I have to choose between being controlled by corps. and the gummint, at this moment in time I'd pick the gummint. I loved what they did with our early phone system -- it reached everyone equally and was efficient, cheap, and easy to use. And at least the gummint is still slightly answerable to the voters, unlike corps.

In any case, if you're concerned as I am about preserving 'net neutrality, pls see my next reply below.

[snot]

36. Al Franken is working to preserve net neutrality; here's how you can help:

Just got this e-mail:

"Big news: Our petition to save net neutrality and stop the corporate takeover of our media just picked up its 100,000th signature!

"The big corporations who want to control the flow of information in America plan to bully Congress and the FCC into allowing mergers like Comcast/NBC and implementing the Google-Verizon "framework" that would undermine net neutrality. And they were counting on us to stay silent.

"Well, we haven't. To borrow a phrase from one of those big telecom companies: Can you hear us now? Good!

"But while 100,000 people is a lot, we're up against extremely well-funded opposition. That's why I need you to make a small contribution today to help us grow our grassroots movement.

"Last week, I spoke at a public hearing in Minneapolis. I warned that allowing corporations to control the Internet would not just threaten competition -- it would also stifle free speech. And at the end of the meeting, the two FCC commissioners in attendance announced that they were on board with our effort to save net neutrality.

"But I can't win this fight alone. I need every single one of the 100,000 people who have signed our petition. And I need their friends, too.

"You can Tweet (http://www.alfranken.com/page/m/6cf77f0/71517399/325b2bec/781647df/4277981773/VEsF/) or post to Facebook (http://www.alfranken.com/page/m/6cf77f0/71517399/325b2bec/781647df/4277981773/VEsF/ ) to get your friends on board. But you can also help us run online advertising to spread our message far and wide.

"Please make a contribution today -- whether it's $10, $25, or $50, every dime we are able to spend on this will help to strengthen our voice. (Contribute at http://www.alfranken.com/page/m/6cf77f0/71517399/325b2bec/781647df/4277981773/VEsF/ or http://www.alfranken.com/page/m/6cf77f0/71517399/325b2bec/781647dc/4277981773/VEsA/ )

"We have a long and uphill battle ahead of us. But it's critical that we win it. And that's why it's critical that these 100,000 signatures be just the start of our movement.

"Thanks for your support, -- Al"