Maine passes Net Neutrality Act.

[techs]

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=40293

Maine gets net neutrality bill

First state to get one


THE US STATE of Maine is the first to get a 'net neutrality' bill to play with.
While the politicians in Congress have dragging their feet to pass such a bill, worried that enacting it would lose them all those campaign contributions from the telcos, Maine has just gone ahead and done it. If in a slightly watered-down version,

Its Senate today gave its final approval to an amended version of the "net neutrality" bill The original bill prohibited Internet providers from charging Web sites for faster load times, required information to be routed on a first-come, first-served basis and barred the blocking of content.

The "amended measure" calls for the Maine Office of the Public Advocate to monitor activity about Internet access on both the federal and state levels and report to the Legislature?s Utilities Committee by February 1.




I don't know if states have the right to do this, but it is definitely a great idea. Now we just need Congress to get on board.

 

[OutHouse]

??? so what does this act mean??

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

The original bill prohibited Internet providers from charging Web sites for faster load times, required information to be routed on a first-come, first-served basis and barred the blocking of content.

The "amended measure" calls for the Maine Office of the Public Advocate to monitor activity about Internet access on both the federal and state levels and report to the Legislature?s Utilities Committee by February 1.

The original bill says it all. The passed bill is b.s. so actually not much, but at least its SOMETHING>

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

That Maine will have one Internet that works for all it's citizens at equal cost while the rest of the U.S. will the tiered Internets that Bush and the Republicans want for the U.S.

One Internet with full access, high speed and high cost for the rich.

Another lowered access, low speed and lower cost for the poor.

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it.

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Without a doubt that is the worst analogy ever made on ATOT, ever.

A better analogy would be giving a company or two the right to set speed limits on every road (even the ones they don't own). So they can build all sorts of services along the few roads they own, on which they set the speed limit at 65 miles per hour and then they can arbritrarily can set the speed limits on the other roads, which they don't own, at say 5 miles per hour. And since they make money off you traveling on the roads they own, they will DEFINITELY lower the speeds on the roads they don't own.

Without net neutrality what will happen is the one or two high speed providers in most areas, mine are Verizon DSL and Comcast, will give prefernece to whoever pays them for priority (the roads they own). The ramifications are the end of sites like Yahoo and Google. Now searches from the Comcast home page will get preference. Downloads from the Comcast or Verizon music store will get preference. You might not even be able to stream any video from any site other than Comcasts or Verizons. In essence without net neutrality it means the small number of high speed providers, WHO HAVE A GOVERNMENT SANCTIONED MONOPLY OR DUOPOLY, will effectively control what sites and content you can easily access.

 

[Genx87]

Without a doubt that is the worst analogy ever made on ATOT, ever.

Hey bunkie in case you didnt notice, i am not the original author. However I do think it still is pretty good compared to your convoluted blathering below.

A better analogy would be the giving the a company or two the right to set speed limits on every road (even the ones they don't own). So they can build all sorts of services along the few roads they own, on which they set the speed limit at 65 and then they can arbritrarily can set the speed limits on the other roads, which they don't own, at say 5 miles per hour. And since they make money off you traveling on the roads they own, they will DEFINITELY lower the speeds on the roads they don't own.

That doesnt even make any sense whatsoever.

Without net neutrality what will happen is the one or two high speed providers in most areas, mine are Verizon DSL and Comcast, will give prefernece to whoever pays them for priority (the roads they own). The ramifications are the end of sites like Yahoo and Google. Now searches from the Comcast home page will get preference. Downloads from the Comcast or Verizon music store will get preference. You might not even be able to stream any video from any site other than Comcasts or Verizons. In essence without net neutrality it means the small number of high speed providers, WHO HAVE A GOVERNMENT SANCTIONED MONOPLY OR DUOPOLY, will effectively control what sites and content you can easily access.

Um they already do as admitted by you, so what is your point?

Most people dont have a tier 1 provider to their home. Most are places like comcast, qwest, or a local telco who own the last 1000 feet. Your notion that these companies will have the authority or ability or want to curtail their customers ability to get to sites is unfounded and silly. What does qwest gain by blocking people from Google? I will tell you, lost customers.

What anti-net neutrality consists of is priorizitations of traffic. This will allow providers and backbone providers the ability to give priority to services such as IP phones or on demand movie\television.

Currently as a nation we have to be paying the most money for the slowest connections. This should set off alarm bells that the old way of doing a true net neutrality didnt live upto all the hype people are blathering out now. But it doesnt, it scares people they may not have first dibs on their packets getting through the router to myspace so they can blab about their fake 250K a year salary and life of indulgences to anybody who happens to stop by their site.

 

[Oceandevi]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

That Maine will have one Internet that works for all it's citizens at equal cost while the rest of the U.S. will the tiered Internets that Bush and the Republicans want for the U.S.

One Internet with full access, high speed and high cost for the rich.

Another lowered access, low speed and lower cost for the poor.

Like broadband vs 56k? better service costs more? I guess I miss your point...

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: Oceandevi

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

That Maine will have one Internet that works for all it's citizens at equal cost while the rest of the U.S. will the tiered Internets that Bush and the Republicans want for the U.S.

One Internet with full access, high speed and high cost for the rich.

Another lowered access, low speed and lower cost for the poor.

Like broadband vs 56k? better service costs more? I guess I miss your point...

No, after buying your better service the high speed providers want to decide what sites you can actually use your high speed for. They could only get away with this if they had a monoply. Oops. They do.

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: Oceandevi

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

That Maine will have one Internet that works for all it's citizens at equal cost while the rest of the U.S. will the tiered Internets that Bush and the Republicans want for the U.S.

One Internet with full access, high speed and high cost for the rich.

Another lowered access, low speed and lower cost for the poor.

Like broadband vs 56k? better service costs more? I guess I miss your point...

No, after buying your better service the high speed providers want to decide what sites you can actually use your high speed for. They could only get away with this if they had a monoply. Oops. They do.

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

That's a terrible analogy, the reason refrigerators cost more to ship than birthday cards is because they are bigger and heavier and take up more postal resources. A better analogy would be the post office charging more for BIRTHDAY cards than graduation cards..they take up the same resources on the "network", the extra charge is for special treatment for certain types of "traffic"...in this case the type having nothing at all to do with how difficult it is to transport it.

And that's exactly why, while I'm not fully supportive of net neutrality, I'm wary of the alternative. If companies have the ability to degrade or improve service based on criteria that's not relevant to transporting traffic on a network, you'll have the marketing guys, rather than the network engineers, making the decisions on how traffic flows. The big companies will be able to extort money from whoever they like, as the risk of loosing priority access to anyone's network is too great for even a giant like Google to take. Of course it's sold as a way to lower prices and help drive innovation, but I just don't see the argument...and my experience suggests that providers don't have the sunny motives they'd like us to believe.

 

[smack Down]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Sorry but you don't have a clue about net neutrality. Net neutrality allows you to make VOIP packets have higher priority then CS packets. It allows you to charge more for a costumer using 100 GB then one use 1 GB of bandwidth. What it doesn't allow is for you to give a higher to priority to one companies VOIP and a lower priority to another.

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Sorry but you don't have a clue about net neutrality. Net neutrality allows you to make VOIP packets have higher priority then CS packets. It allows you to charge more for a costumer using 100 GB then one use 1 GB of bandwidth. What it doesn't allow is for you to give a higher to priority to one companies VOIP and a lower priority to another.

Mostly incorrect. Your analogy for VOIP packets is just one type of internet usage that the high speed provider can set a preference for. And your analogy of using 100 gb of bandwidth versus 1gb is also wrong. Net neutrality doesn't talk about how much you download, currently it is perfectly ok to charge for total internet usage OR max bandwidth speed. You are currently limited to your internet speed you have, with or without net neutrality.
Basically, high speed providers CAN give preference RIGHT now. The reason they don't is they don't want to face the wrath of consumers who will rightly complain they were given a monoply and are abusing it. They want Congress to pass a law to cover their *sses when they do it.
The cable companies are concerned people might remind them how they promised that if they could just offer internet (unregulated) along with their tv programming they would LOWER the tv part of the cable bill.
How did THAT work out?
Basically, if their were 10 different high speed providers competing they couldn't try and pull this cr*p.
How about this? For every PENNY the cable company makes from CHARGING for something that is free today (unrestricted access to the internet under your current plan) they be forced to refund 90 percent to the customer in the way of lower service fees? The cable company still makes more money AND the consumer saves money. Or let anyone who wants to purchase unrestricted access for an additional fee, equal to the amount of money they REDUCE (ha!) internet service fees for?

 

[smack Down]

Originally posted by: techs

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Sorry but you don't have a clue about net neutrality. Net neutrality allows you to make VOIP packets have higher priority then CS packets. It allows you to charge more for a costumer using 100 GB then one use 1 GB of bandwidth. What it doesn't allow is for you to give a higher to priority to one companies VOIP and a lower priority to another.

Mostly incorrect. Your analogy for VOIP packets is just one type of internet usage that the high speed provider can set a preference for. And your analogy of using 100 gb of bandwidth versus 1gb is also wrong. Net neutrality doesn't talk about how much you download, currently it is perfectly ok to charge for total internet usage OR max bandwidth speed. You are currently limited to your internet speed you have, with or without net neutrality.

Learn to read, I said they are allowed to charge more for more bandwidth.

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: techs

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Sorry but you don't have a clue about net neutrality. Net neutrality allows you to make VOIP packets have higher priority then CS packets. It allows you to charge more for a costumer using 100 GB then one use 1 GB of bandwidth. What it doesn't allow is for you to give a higher to priority to one companies VOIP and a lower priority to another.

Mostly incorrect. Your analogy for VOIP packets is just one type of internet usage that the high speed provider can set a preference for. And your analogy of using 100 gb of bandwidth versus 1gb is also wrong. Net neutrality doesn't talk about how much you download, currently it is perfectly ok to charge for total internet usage OR max bandwidth speed. You are currently limited to your internet speed you have, with or without net neutrality.

Learn to read, I said they are allowed to charge more for more bandwidth.

Sigh
Here, read for yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality

 

[techs]

Originally posted by: techs

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: techs

Originally posted by: smack Down

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Sorry but you don't have a clue about net neutrality. Net neutrality allows you to make VOIP packets have higher priority then CS packets. It allows you to charge more for a costumer using 100 GB then one use 1 GB of bandwidth. What it doesn't allow is for you to give a higher to priority to one companies VOIP and a lower priority to another.

Mostly incorrect. Your analogy for VOIP packets is just one type of internet usage that the high speed provider can set a preference for. And your analogy of using 100 gb of bandwidth versus 1gb is also wrong. Net neutrality doesn't talk about how much you download, currently it is perfectly ok to charge for total internet usage OR max bandwidth speed. You are currently limited to your internet speed you have, with or without net neutrality.

Learn to read, I said they are allowed to charge more for more bandwidth.

Sigh
Here, read for yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality
While the first instance where an internet provider attempted to deny a type of service was a small small provider attempting to block voip, voip is NOT the fundamental goal nor result of net neutrality. It basically is a response to a desire by a monopolistic industry, the cable and phone companies, to be allowed to make decisions on how fast the internet runs for different sites and reasons. Most importantly the cable companies want to monopolize voip and either eliminate competition or to just plain shake down the voip companies.
And the real bottom line is these companies want to charge money for something that is currently free and should be free. The ability for you and I to surf the web at our purchased internet speed free of these companies interposing themselves and saying give us more money for what you are currently getting for your current price.

"Net neutrality" is just more socialism. First we give corporations franchises, denying competition. Then we pass a law legalizing the use of the monoply to extort money from other businesses."

 

[WHAMPOM]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: Citrix
??? so what does this act mean??

What this means is Johnnys CS server now gets the same prioritization as your IP phone.

This should push progress by leaps and bounds as telcos weigh the cost of the extra infrastructure to accomadate such a scenario and the likely profit from it. </sarcasm>

I think the end result will be higher costs for consumers or no service or a low quality of service if provided.

I understand the intent of these laws but doubt the expected outcomes of everybody living in bliss.

btw I think one of the user responses says it all.

Consider this: if the U.S. Postal Service was "Mail Neutral" then I would be able to ship a refrigerator for the same price as a birthday card. Such a scenario would not pass the straight-face test. "

Pound for Pound First class mail costs much more than the freight on a refrigerator. But then your are just being silly. The U.S. Postal service won't ship a full size refrigerator, now would they? The Appliance store usually offers free delivery within a certain mileage.