Also known as the ISP shill/ FCC Chairman that pushed for net neutrality repeal.
I am doubtful as to if it would do anything, but hey- worth a shot, right?
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/we-people-call-resignation-fcc-chairman-ajit-varadaraj-pai
I may be the only one, but I think the new Net Neutrality proposal is great. I figure as long as the customer knows what they’re getting (disclosure of data management policies is part of the proposal), then customers and ISPs should be able to contract for whatever level of service they want. If I only care about high-speed video data, by all means, put it in a fast lane.
Lots of passion on the “net neutrality” side, however, realize that “net neutrality” as implemented is actually very very very very very (insert an inordinate amount of very’s equal to the passion of the bazillions of net neutrality proponents) wrong.
It’s not that the good concepts of “net neutrality” are wrong, what was wrong is the shortcut way it was put in place (square peg hammered into round hole).
So… something did have to be done to undo the absolute wrongness.
Enter fear, uncertainty and doubt… without the bad “rule” in place, the fear is we go back to how things were, not terribly long ago (you know back when planets were colliding with ours and puppies were being murdered, etc…).
I’m not an advocate of monopolistic companies doing price fixing and such (and killing puppies, etc.), and I emailed our current president about doing this “right” instead of the mess that was (incorrectly) put in place.
So rather than getting out my white sheet, my burning torch and heading over to Ajit Pai’s house, I figure, maybe we need for him to actually put forth a proposal, possibly even to do “net neutrality” in a more appropriate (and lasting) way?
Maybe he’s not shill. Maybe it’s what the angry mob made him out to be? Give him a chance on the good ideas of “net neutrality” and see what he can do or suggest.
You may now throw your rocks at me… I’m used to it.
No rocks. I agree completely with you. Cheers
Anything that I “need” - water, electricity, phone, transport, Internet should either allow free competition so I have choices or should be governed by regulation that can protect me from exploitation. Broadly speaking. There are nuances to that, I realize, but that is my stance on Net neutrality.
I pay for a connection to the Internet. I do not see why someone else get to regulate by pricing what may or may not appear on my Internet.
I admit, the previous “FCC Ruling” on net neutrality was far from perfect. At the same time, based on public statements from Ajit and various commentary, I think the title of shill is deserved.
The de facto “region by region” monopoly that the lions share of ISP’s have (For HSI, not including snail powered dial up/ satellite providers) gives them (IMHO) way too much leverage to be effectively “self- regulated”.
(The best solution would be real COMPETITION in the market, but I don’t see that happening any time soon.)
http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2017/db1128/DOC-347980A1.pdf
Again, not against doing “somthing”, but what was done by the prior administration was a shortcut because doing things “right” takes a lot work and time, and they simply didn’t want to do that (not that the current administration hasn’t done similar shortcuts btw).
Government regulation is a sure way too screw something up. I am all for the government staying out of the internet.
Do you have examples of the shortcuts by the previous admin’s regulations and the current Ajit one? I’m genuinely interested in the pros/cons and would like to understand how to make it better.
I hate to get into these discussions. 
Can’t resits though.
It is true that the FCC gained oversight of ISPs through “administrative edict” (there is a better term, I just don’t recall it right now. There is no law that hands oversight of ISPs to the FCC.
However, ISPs are also doing everything they can to limit competition by restricting access to decades old infrastructure (eg. telephone poles), legal challenges to local government sponsored infrastructure development, and by lobbying congress to pass and maintain laws that are in their favor. Note that even Google with it’s deep pockets have been slowed down so much in rolling out Internet in a few select communities that it has essentially given up.
So the playing field isn’t level. The only reason the large, incumbent ISPs would spend so much money on fighting net neutrality should clearly tell you that they hope to gain much, much more if they could operate a network that has different service levels to providers. That eventually will either slow down innovation or be reflected in higher prices to consumers. Either is not a good outcome.
Agree that regulation and government action may be necessary to open up access to infrastructure, most of which is on easements provided in part by public funds (e.g. the telephone poles you mentioned). I personally think Net Neutrality is a distraction from those important, real issues. The masses are up in arms, but the solution they want is a bandaid, while the root cause festers on.
I could see this mess being a mess for some time. If the Democrats get into office again (across the board), wouldn’t it be a surprise to the big ISPs if the government decided to take it all over. Would serve them right (of course it would mean the worst Internet ever for the consumers).
The big picture is that we access the Internet for information and services, your access provider only (for me) passes packets. In the past few years, providers have proven themselves to be low-value, revenue-hungry leeches, throttling Netflix for a new revenue source, blocking access to competitive payment systems and media sources.
Competition can’t solve this problem. Even in my Baltimore-Washington area, I have only two access providers, many households in the US have only one. The free market isn’t a solution.
Correction - Competition COULD solve this problem, if there actually was competition. But, as you say, there isn’t. And until the legislators get out from under the thumb of the incumbents and actually work to enable competition, we’re stuck.
Please read this, its a well reasoned argument showing that you can be pro net neutrality and anti title II
Nice. That is the same link I have been giving to people. It is the best write up on the subject I have seen.
You’re right I misstated the free market can’t solve problem given the current factors. I’d love to see legislation that unbundles the local infrastructure so that a competitive market can form. UK did this