Work is the curse of the drinking classes - Oscar Wilde
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Internet capacity alarmism is a corporatist scam
A WRITER at the bog Daily Kos did some research on the sponsors of a study we covered last week that later appeared in articles at the Washington Post and elsewhere. The study claimed that the Internet could become overloaded within two years, or as early as 2010.
The study, published by the "independent analysis firm" Nemertes Research Group claimed that up to $137 billion in new investment will be needed to keep Internet data flowing fast, but that the backbone service providers plan to invest less than half that amount. Among other things, it recommended that the US Congress provide tax credits to the broadband providers and eliminate the tax surcharge on telecom services for rural telephone access.
The Daily Kos bogger writes, "When big figures like $137 billion start getting tossed around, it is always worth looking at the vital question... 'Who would benefit?' Sure enough, the article includes part of the answer."
"The study confirms long-time concerns of the Internet Innovation Alliance (IIA)... with members including AT&T, Level 3 Communications, Corning, Americans for Tax Reform...."
The bog entry properly identifies AT&T and Level 3 Communications as Internet backbone providers, and Corning as a major US manufacturer of fibre-optic cables, not surprisingly. But it also looks behind another member of the IIA, that is, the Americans for Tax Reform.
Americans for Tax Reform is the creature of one Grover Norquist, the arch-conservative activist who wants to reduce the size of the US federal government until he can "drown it in the bathtub." The bog diary cites the Wikipedia entry about Americans for Tax Reform:
"Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) is ostensibly a group that pushes for lower taxes. It has close ties to the Republican Party and has frequently allied itself with the tobacco industry. "ATR is also a backer of the Media Freedom Project: "The Media Freedom Project is a project of the Americans for Tax Reform, a corporate funded non-profit group. "Announcing the formation of the group, the ATR stated that the project is "dedicated to deregulation of the media."
At launch ATR said it existed as a response to, "liberal efforts to re-regulate the media, including attempts to reinstate the so-called "Fairness Doctrine," an antiquated Federal Communications Commission rule that would have the effect of pulling the plug on conservative talk show personalities such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and G. Gordon Liddy."
Limbaugh and Hannity are well-known rabble rousing hate-mongers. Liddy was one of Nixon's "plumbers" in the '70s Watergate scandal His politics are somewhat to the right of Atilla the Hun. The "Fairness Doctrine" used to require FCC licensed media outlets to balance political discourse aired to include opinions on both sides of partisan debates.
The bogger continues, "OK... so now we have the actors in this scenario identified and the script is clear.... Get an 'independent study' done to create the justification for your real goal. Get lots of government bucks to pay for it. ... And we have the arguments all spelled out... big crunch coming, something has to be done...."
And it characterises the study's proposed conclusion:
"1- The government should give the telecom industry more subsidies to invest in expanded broadband capacity and
"2- While they are at it, they should also eliminate service taxes which help assure that essential telecom services are made available to everyone."
The bog entry takes somewhat of a detour at this point, we think. It makes the argument that what is really loading down the Internet is the large volume of spam email, and that getting rid of most spam would resolve or at least put off such a looming Internet capacity crunch. This ignores the volume of peer-to-peer file transfers that are already occurring, as well as the potential added Internet traffic volume expected for video on demand services.
However, all that aside, it eventually gets around to asking the right question. It goes on:
"Isn't a free-market business model one based on identifying [a] developing need and responding to it? Their own 'independent study' is telling them that a massive surge in demand is headed their way and that they are only investing about half of what will be needed to meet it. Shouldn't that be all they need to step up those investments and take advantage of the business opportunity headed their way? Shouldn't those statistics be the ammunition they need to attract eager investors?
"Why is industry asking government to pay for it through subsidies (lost government revenue) and then cutting taxes on the industry itself (more lost government revenue)?"
The bog regards the danger posed by the study's recommendations as enabling an assault on "net neutrality" -- the current policy that all Internet traffic is handled equitably by the backbone service providers without discrimination as to source or protocol. It continues:
"Better yet, a 'clogged' Internet... plays right into the hands of the service providers in terms of 'net neutrality.'
"As soon as the clog occurs (or even if it is just a threat), the providers will argue... 'This is the classic case of supply and demand. We don't have enough capacity, so if you want access to the net, you will pay more... to the richest goes the spoils.'
"And that access control, of course, enables the providers to selectively price their product in ways that can, in the wrong hands (read Grover Norquist) favour one political ideology and voice over another, and one economic class over another. Sort of like getting rid of that pesky 'Fairness Doctrine'."
So there you have it - telecom industry players in bed with the repressive authoritarians. µ
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The telecom act of 1996 allowed all the communications outfits to collect subsidies directly from consumers in the form of surcharges on their bills which as of now total to over $180 billion. What are these bloodsucking leeches asking more for ?

Don't believe me ? 

Check out the following links.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007/pulpit_20070810_002683.html

There is a great documentary at:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/moyersonamerica/net/index.html

And all the gory details for those oriented for it are at:

http://www.teletruth.org/docs/SCANDALFINAL92006.pdf

Although, what with peons of the monied interests running the countries all over the world, don't expect miracles.

Did I read this article correctly or did I mix too many pain pills with my beer tonight??

The Inq citing a Wikipedia entry as a source in an article??

All those 'non-existent' and 'non-relevant' persons who have been deleted from their wacky pages just shed a tear...

;-)
The article is really about access networks, not the core network. 

They are arguably correct about that - having a slow 6Mb/s cable modem and a defacto monopoly isn't helping. See the quote in the article:

The study is the first to “apply Moore’s Law (or something very like it) to the pace of application innovation on the ‘Net,” the study says. “Our findings indicate that although core fiber and switching/routing resources will scale nicely to support virtually any conceivable user demand, Internet access infrastructure, specifically in North America, will likely cease to be adequate for supporting demand within the next three to five years.”
If you guys want a broadband scandal that IS pretty well documented, Google 'fiber optic you've already paid for'. Click the first link. Happy reading.
I like your obvious bias against the ATR; I guess you enjoy giving money away unless you're one of the people who doesn't actually earn any. Quoting the bastion of impartiality, Wikipedia, really does help me hear the color to your words. Nice unqualified statement there about them being buddies with the tobacco industry; care to expound on that link in a way that won't win you any 'devil on their shoulder' points? I didn't think so... it would make your argument fold like a deck of wet cards.

I think we really do need the Fairness Doctrine cause I'm getting sick of all this left-wing, Socialist bullsh*t I get fed across the board these days. I hear people complain that Fox News is too right-wing when it's only one network out of the dozens that constantly plug Communism to the masses.

You people really do think your sh*t doesn't stink...
For those willing to dismiss this because it's DailyKos publishing the original story, I direct you back to the days of dial-up internet. The Baby Bells were charging extra for computer lines and arguing they should be able to charge more (even per minute!) because the constant connection used more resources. They persisted in this until a bunch of bright college kids (from Berkeley) bought some used phone company equipment and showed that the resources were consumed when the system had to generate a dial-tone, not from a sustained connection.

In more current times, the phone companies are the idiots whom tried to shove bloated (and useless) ATM switches onto the internet with the POTS mentality and ended dropping massive amounts of packets and having the switches crash. Laughably the ATM switches cost even more than other IP switches because of the massive memory buffers they required.

I'm not going to outright believe it the story without looking into it a bit myself, but at the same time simply dismissing it because of the source is foolish. Given the telco's willingness to lie through their teeth to make extra money, as shown by history, I'll give the story the benefit of the doubt.
Some corporations and an anti-tax political group fund some research that says "don't tax us" Shocking.

That's as far as the story goes. There is no conspiracy to seize control of the internet (well, I'm sure there are a few, but I mean that this isn't one of them). The only evidence for that theory is guilt by association. 

AT&T is partnered with AFTR -> AFTR is headed by Norquist -> Norquist is right-wing like Rush Limbaugh -> Limbaugh is a radio host like G. Gordon Liddy -> Liddy was involved in Watergate -> therefore AT&T is trying to take over the internet. Brilliant detective work.

This article isn't even "ostensibly" journalism--it's just a rip-off of a dumb conspiracy theory BOG POST. More journalism, less politics, please.
Those daily kos people think that all money is governments and that money they can't tax away is 'lost'. I would love to read some objective research on this issue, but this piece isn't it.
"The bog regards the danger posed by the study's recommendations as enabling an assault on "net neutrality" -- the current policy that all Internet traffic is handled equitably by the backbone service providers without discrimination as to source or protocol."

Bingo! It's good to see the Inq follow up on this story and expose this so-called 'research' for what it really is...A SCAM!!

Unfortunately, however, given FCC boss Kevin Martin's unbridled passion for hitting his knees and knob slobbing the telcos, it would take nothing short of an act of God to prevent the abolishment of all 'net-neutrality' laws in the near future... regardless of the umpteen quintillion dollars Google lobbyists may throw at it.
So now the INQ is getting its news from left-wing activist blogs? To them, everything is a corporatist scam.
...my internet (UK) already has been slowed because of bandwidth issues. I pay for an 8Mbit/s connection, and on a good day from a fast server I get maybe 20Kb/s, and I live a few streets away from the exchange? 

It's because every house in my village has 73 queued downloads of Pirates of the Carribean off of P2P services.