Don't offer me advice, give me money - Spanish proverb
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The FCC's net neutrality rules are a sham
GRAB YOUR WAR PAINT, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has issued a call to arms to stop the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) net neutrality proposals, which could allow US Internet service providers (ISPs) to block or degrade all Bittorrent file transfers with impunity.
The draft FCC regulations have a gaping legal loophole that could permit US ISPs to prevent all of their customers from using the Bittorrent protocol under "reasonable network management" practices, as long as those are intended to "prevent the unlawful transfer of content".
The reply comment deadline date on the FCC's net neutrality draft (PDF) is March 5 this year, but if it goes unchallenged it could be signed off to become official FCC regulations, or even included in future legislation by the US Congress.
The amusing irony of the proposed "reasonable network management" loophole is that it could give ISPs enough rope to carry out the same Internet policing practices the net neutrality draft was designed to vanquish. Laugh? We nearly cried.
Channeling well known Scottish actor, Mel Gibson's bravado call to action in Braveheart, EFF's Richard Esguerra said, "Carving a copyright loophole in net neutrality would leave your lawful activities at the mercy of overbroad copyright filtering schemes, and we already have plenty of experience with copyright enforcers targeting legitimate users by mistake, carelessness, or design."
There are a couple of key issues to consider here.
A large ISP has already been half-nelsoned for arbitrarily and surreptitiously blocking and restricting peer-to-peer Internet traffic on its network, which is in part what had prompted the FCC to launch its net neutrality regulation action in the first place. Back in 2008, the FCC ordered Comcast, the largest ISP in the US, to redress the way in which it was handling Internet traffic. This blossomed into a class action lawsuit in December 2009. Comcast was ordered to cough up a massive $16 million settlement because it was caught delaying transfers of large media files.
Part of Comcast's remit from the FCC and local authorities in its service areas is to offer punters full and unencumbered access to the Internet. But the FCC's current draft net neutrality proposals could allow Comcast and other ISPs to get away with blocking Bittorrent activity again, despite the fact that the FCC's net neutrality regulations ostensibly are being drawn up precisely to put a final halt to such egregriously abusive practices.
The other key point here is that the Big Music and Big Movie media companies, through their trade associations the RIAA and MPAA, are pushing an aggressive agenda to impose draconian copyright enforcement laws, and the large ISPs like Comcast are coming under increasing pressure from those media interests, which we prefer to call the MAFIAA for obvious reasons. Only two weeks ago the RIAA insinuated that the FCC was aiding so called 'piracy' by not green-lighting regulations allowing ISPs to block their subscribers from filesharing. In fact, the RIAA was actively encouraging the FCC and ISPs to become Internet rozzers.
The RIAA wrote in part that, "ISPs are in a unique position to limit online theft. They control the facilities over which infringement takes place and are singularly positioned to address it at the source. Without ISP participation, it is extremely difficult to develop an effective prevention approach."
On top of being pressured to act as content protection enforcers by the RIAA and MPAA, ISPs in the US are using the excuse of constricted network bandwidth to plead for full license to do whatever they might damn well please to their often captive Internet access subscribers. In the original lawsuit against Comcast, the ISP said that the reason it was restricting Bittorrent traffic was because of network congestion issues rather than any potentially illegal copyright infringement activity.
Naturally, the RIAA concurs and in the same letter to the FFC it gives the impression that the US - one of the earliest adopters of broadband cable, DSL and fibre-optic technologies - has only narrowband dial-up Internet bandwidth, circa 1999.
It wrote, "Piracy wastes scarce network resources and crowds out legitimate uses of the network. It costs more to bring broadband to additional areas because of this inflated bandwidth usage."
So not only is illegal online traffic responsible for practically bringing the Internet to a standstill, but it's also responsible for the increase in price tariffs levied by ISPs on their customers. Despite the fact that Bittorrent traffic makes up only 20 per cent of traffic on the Internet, the RIAA hysterically claims that it's all the fault of a burgeoning criminal underclass of dodgy, copyright infringing 'pirates' that the ISPs have increased their prices. As opposed to the rampant greed of the ISPs themselves in soaking their punters for all they can extract.
With the various vested interests pulling in different directions, a fair resolution doesn't look all that likely in the foreseeable future. We'll track progress on the FCC's regulations as they come and keep you updated. This technological and political dustup over net neutrality is one that looks to run and run.
If the EFF's urgent call to the ramparts in defense of Internet freedom and true net neutrality in the US rouses you to take action, you can sign the petition here. µ
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...unless you expect ISPs to stand with their customers against copyright owners. Which is a bit too much, I think.
Net neutrality is about ISPs who are also copyright owners (you see the problem?) allowing their users equal access to other copyright owners' material through the same Internet tube. Not slowing down or blocking, say, the BBC.
Another thing it isn't about is granting international access to copyrighted material that may be free in one country supported by advertising. But allowing users to negotiate, pay if necessary, and get access to copyright content is a separate problem that really should be, is, technologically solvable - particularly for domestic citizens who happen to be overseas.
For instance, BBC material is mostly funded by the near-universal-in-Britain television user annual licence fee. Overseas, a lot of it is blocked. There is probably no contract to make that material available worldwide and to reward participants in content creation properly, but there could be.
Don't they understand that they cannot stop this?
So let them block bittorrent traffic, rest assured a different method of delivery would be used. A new protocol, an encrypted channel, a workaround etc etc.
I am using an ISP that is known for heavy traffic shaping. The filters are easy to trick. It seems that only unknown content is inspected properly, so torrents are slowed, SSH transfers, FTP etc. BUT guess what, if you rename your 4.5GB file to a .doc everything runs just great.
Sure, some ISPs are better than that, but all that will do is cause another leap of ingenuity.
At first there was BBS (still are), then FTPs & "warez" sites. P2P & now torrents. The complexity and creativeness of file sharing is continuing. It does not slow down for legislation and RIAA/MPAA campaigning.
All their efforts are like pissing against the wind because they do not understand the problem.
They yell and cry, "BUT BUT BUT it's ours!"... "we lose revenue when you 'pirate' " blah blah blah.
Life aint fair, get used to it.
When people will fear their ISP they will change ISPs, when all ISPs will use the same methods, loopholes will be found.
You can stop 1 person, 10, 100...but when they outnumber you by millions of times, it's like punching waves.
"BUT BUT BUT, it's not right!"
Obviously you were not paying attention.
Where there is a demand, there will be a supply.
Using their reasoning the U.S. Government is responsible for all illicit drugs sold on U.S. streets. They own the streets which facilitate the street dealers.
"The draft FCC regulations have a gaping legal loophole that could permit US ISPs to prevent all of their customers from using the Bittorrent protocol under "reasonable network management" practices, as long as those are intended to "prevent the unlawful transfer of content". Here lies the problem. In the USA we have a Legal proses that no body wants to follow. If you suspect something is illegal you go to court and get a court order or a judgment to stop illegal activity. To do otherwise you presume guilt and in America you are innocent till proven guilty. IMHO
The rules are actually damn good. For a puppet organization run by Chicago style thugs that is.
Yes, net neutrality is under attack and has been for some time. One of these attacks has been in the form of a growing cancer in the U.S. that few Americans are aware of and maybe even the FCC itself is oblivious to. It is the despicable act where American media corporations regularly censor media content outside the U.S. including blocking content to U.S. citizens abroad. This is especially heinous considering the longstanding "land of the free" tradition of not tolerating censorship in any form.
Here's a list of some of the offenders that I've personally experienced blocking content:
ABC
NBC
CBS
MSNBC (Microsoft & NBC)
HULU
Netflix
eMusic
Pandora
Clear Channel Communications (largest owner of U.S. radio stations)
Steam (to a very limited extent on new releases, but they will listen to reason)
This list is in no way complete as it only represents my personal experiences and I haven't documented all instances but I'm sure there are many many more.
The range of blocked content runs the gamut from TV programming, movies, music, audio books, games, streaming media, and even radio station simulcasts. The most shocking example of outright censorship was by MSNBC. On two occasions MSNBC blocked me from viewing U.S. news videos. One was of a U.S. military unmanned drone attack in Afghanistan last year that unfortunately resulted in many civilian deaths. When I clicked to view this video I received the following message: "this video unavailable outside the U.S.". My tin foil hat began to glow as I remember thinking that the U.S. government must have been involved in this decision. The second example was much more benign being a report of a Fed Ex cargo plane crash landing at Tokyo's Narita airport. Luckily, in both cases I was easily able to find coverage online elsewhere.
Each time censorship raised its ugly head I sent an email to the offender explaining that I'm a U.S. citizen in Thailand and asking them to please unblock their content to me. ABC, CBS, and NBC never even bothered to reply. Most of the others responded with a polite: "Sorry, due to contractual obligations we can't offer content outside the U.S.". There was at least a ray of hope when one or two even added: "maybe sometime in the future". I had functioning Hulu and Pandora accounts that I had opened and used back in the U.S. but it didn't matter; sorry Charlie. When I complained to eMusic they promptly terminated my account. Clear Channel used to allow outside access to their online radio simulcast content, but no longer.
The one area that these cockroaches didn't block was advertisements. While I was prevented from viewing media content from the above websites, I was many times presented with commercials in all their online glory. Hulu would always show a full video commercial before displaying the media-blocked message. How nice of them!
So why do they do it? Obviously, it could be an attempt to thwart piracy or potential copyright infringement but there may be another, more sinister, reason. And that shining example that is so pervasive everywhere is advertising revenue. All of these websites depend upon advertisements for income. These website designers employ a never ending array of sadistic methods dreamed up solely to force us to watch dull boring repetitive ads, but that's another story.
Obviously, U.S. based ads have little success with foreign perusers, hence limited if any economic return, so our rogues gallery simply elects to block content. It frees up their servers and more than likely reduces operating costs. We can't really blame them for that, can we? Of course we can...and should. This is just another form of subverting net neutrality. Not only that, it is blatant discrimination. I, and all other American citizens abroad, shouldn’t be denied access to publicly available content based solely on physical location (IP address).
On the bright side, there are two U.S. based media outlets that immediately come to mind that choose to buck the trend: iTunes and Audible.com. I don't like Apple in the least, but give the devil his due, His Jobness doesn't block media downloads, including movies, at least not here in Thailand…yet. Let me clarify that this is according to an iPod wielding expat buddy of mine who had just downloaded a movie from iTunes. Audible.com also takes the high road and appreciates foreign IP address customers.
This brings us back to the original question: Does net neutrality allow U.S. corporations to censor media content? That's a difficult question to answer since net neutrality is currently under siege, and no, I don't have the answer and don't know if anyone truly does. In my opinion it doesn't and I think this media censorship plague is a very shortsighted vision, at best. All I can say is that if this cancer continues growing unabated there will eventually no longer be a global Internet as we know it. Conversely, in the future corporate owned websites worldwide might only allow access to their tiny, narrow-minded, demographic markets deemed economically viable.
The bottom line? Buckle up. I believe we're in for a bumpy online ride! Go get ‘em Electronic Frontier Foundation! And MSNBC’s blatant censorship of U.S. news on at least two occasions should warrant a full Congressional investigation at the very least.
The USA is a victim to it's own "freedom". The only "free" to do whatever they want are those with enough money to do so. One can imagine that it won't be long until slaveship return to USA. Not in form of ownership of a person, but legal restriction.
Big companies now say what americans can eat, what they can watch (or think). And what is a crime or not. If one is out this line, the american legal system is there to crush him. I'd say that's awesome for the "land of the free". Corporations became the new dictators, they make their wishes turn into laws not by fear, but by throwing money at regulatory agencies and the congress. Way to go!
All that while americans are only concerned about figuring out how to pay for their overwhelming mortgages and what to do to buy more stuff...
And we pity cattle for being raised just to be slaughtered.
Not that I really care for them, but I figure that when MAFIAA has had it's way in the USA, they will start to bully other countries as well.
I find these arguments interesting as it seems to question the grounds of true ownership of the item. The RIAA and MPAA in some ways have mis-marketed their product which I think contributes to the problems of copyright enfringment. If it were marketed more as a lease, rather than an individual ownership, people may understand more of the terms of their ownership. This is not to say that I agree with the ability to have the control over them that they use, but I think this is part of the fundamental error in ownership arguments made by consumers. As for the impact of this on net neutrality, I think it would be a horrible hole to leave within the system as it would most likely lead to broad interpretations that could be utilized for just about any amount of data transfer that contributed to eating up significant bandwidth.
There is the potential for abuse in MANY aspects of transfers of data, even if the overall functional use is not illicit. As we have seen over time, the increase in file size increases as the ability of the processors to manage it increase. Something like this could potentially be a big blow to cloud computing! I think the potential abuse outweighs the possible gains and lead to consumers having to fight for access, rather than corporations fighting to close specifics. I would not mind this more specific language to things already considered societally damaging enough under the first amendment that are limited. Additionally, it is my belief that it is not the right of corporations to enforce the laws of this nation, but the role of state and federal agencies charged with doing so.
Their argument that it would eat up bandwidth and increases the cost to everyday users is specious considering the billions the major broadband providers make in PROFIT, which they are not directly reinvesting in their network. I'm sure they could lay afford a few more cables, add additional routing support, and add a few more servers where they are experiencing congestion. I'm not saying piracy isn't a problem currently with copyrighted material, but to put a limit on the direct rights of individuals for a segment of the population engaging in illicit behavior is overtly punitive. In the same train of thought, maybe we should stop letting people purchase the copyright to music altogether because it will only engender individuals to distribute it and contribute to piracy. If there is no access to it, no one will have to worry about it being stolen and we may be given our constitutional right to the free flow of information and ideas put within the first amendment.
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap2.html
who is he calling a punter?
The consumers might as well roll over and play dead. The corporations are going to win out, they have the money and political connections. Ive said this before if you shut your wallets the consumer wins if not the corporations win. It seems the marketing people have won also. The consumers don't want to give up their toys or even scale back. The lawyers and lobbyists, as long as they get paid by the consumers through the corporations, will keep dragging this on and on and on and on..........