Conservatives band against Net neutrality

United Press International ^ | May 8, 2006

[TBP]

WASHINGTON, May 8 (UPI) -- A group of non-profits launched the Internet Freedom Coalition to oppose efforts to regulate the Internet.

A total of 24 self-described conservative "free-market, limited government, and faith-based grassroots organization, individuals, and policy organizations who have come together on the shared belief that the Internet should not be taxed, regulated, or subject to United Nations control."

"The big government, pro-regulation crowd wants the government to regulate the Internet. Speaking on behalf of our collective membership of over 3 million citizens, we oppose network neutrality and any other form of regulation or taxation of the Internet. Make no mistake: network neutrality is the first giant leap toward government regulation of the Internet," said Jason Wright, president of the Institute for Liberty and co-director of the IFC.

"IFC will primarily use the Internet itself to mobilize opposition to net neutrality regulation," said Michelle Korsmo, executive director of Americans for Prosperity and co-director of the IFC. "We will utilize a massive email campaign, Internet banner ads and calls to action, and web marketing to mobilize opposition to regulation and taxation of the Internet."

[TBP]

Once again, when it really comes down to it, it is conservatives who have to carry the water to support free speech and keep the Internet free.

[KoRn]

"Once again, when it really comes down to it, it is conservatives who have to carry the water to support free speech and keep the Internet free."

Very true. These days its the conservatives/libertarians who support free speech and human rights while the left liberals are all about suppressing thought and speech. They are just afraid of it.

[Navy Patriot]

What is net neutrality? Fairness doctrine for the net?

[TBP]

Essentially, yes. It's a bill in Congress.

[the_Watchman]

People need to be informed that there is severe limitation on freedom of speech in Europe. We cannot depend upon them. Christian pastors are already facing prison time for defending the family against homosexual agendas from the pulpit.

There would be an endless barrage of regulations against "hate" speech which would be applied to any group protected by the liberals. You can bet that even the Islamic cartoons would have brought the wrath of the state.

[AFreeBird]

I'm a little confused. From the definitions I've read on net neutrality, conservatives should be for it.

Network neutrality is a principle of network operational architecture. It means that the network is operated under the three principles of neutrality: non-discrimination, interconnection, and access. The principles can apply to any network. They govern the operation of the network, not the content or business practices of the network operator. Inherent in the definition is that network operations are distinct from the content side. Network neutrality is one way to describe the operational architecture of the global Internet.

More here: Wiki: Net Neutrality

[AFreeBird]

beat me by around 45 seconds.

[Psycho_Bunny]

Wow. What a BS headline.

[TBP]

It's UPI's headline.

[no dems]

Yeah, but c'mon guys. We need an internet tax. How else can we provide health care, education and welfare for our "honored guests" from South of the Border?

Don't you guys have any love? (Sarc.)

[ThinkDifferent]

It's a somewhat complex issue. Net neutrality would place restrictions on how ISPs manage their networks. All else being equal I would oppose mandating it on private property grounds, but many providers are government-backed quasi-monopolies which changes things.

[Navy Patriot]

Thanks, looks like it is dependent on the ethics of the enforcers, like most law.

[Tzimisce]

and by "Net Neutrality" they mean fair, balanced, and unbiased - you know, like PBS, The New York Times, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN and Democracy Now....

[Conservative Actuary]

but many providers are government-backed quasi-monopolies which changes things.

In addition to that large parts of the infrastructure have been built by and maintained with tax dollars.

[Conservative Actuary]

and by "Net Neutrality" they mean fair, balanced, and unbiased - you know, like PBS, The New York Times, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN and Democracy Now..

Net Neutrality won't cause that but the typical legislative creep could lead to that. What is needed is conservative leadership on the issue to make sure the bill only address true Net Neutrality.

[freepatriot32]

ping

[The Red Zone]

If a "neutrality" rule means there should be as much conservative stuff on the web as liberal, well bring it on. Conservatives have far to go before reaching that goal.

[markedman]

Net Neutrality is Welfare for overpriced geeks and rabble rousers.

If Congress passes Net neutrality legistlation, investment by Internet pipeline providers will cease and more Americans will lose jobs.

[Cacique]

Bump for later read

[markedman]

"What do you think NN is?"

A subsidy for Vonage, Google et al, at the expense of Telecom and Cable shareholders. Its also called socialism.

[traviskicks]

"A total of 24 self-described conservative "free-market, limited government, and faith-based grassroots organization, individuals, and policy organizations who have come together on the shared belief that the Internet should not be taxed, regulated, or subject to United Nations control.""

Wa hoo! It's about time.





Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.

[BlazingArizona]

What is net neutrality? Fairness doctrine for the net?

Actually we should be SUPPORTING Net neutrality! Neutrality has nothing to do with politics or censorship of what is discussed on the Net. The neutrality law would prevent any telecom carrier carrying Net traffic from favoring one type of traffic over another. The "anti-neutrality coalition" is really an astroturf organization representing major telecom companies that wish to gain exclusive control over the geographic areas they serve, forcing rates up through the same roof that has already been shattered by your cable rates.

[Navy Patriot]

Thanks, see my #15 and read in "public utilities commission".

[Dallas59]

U.N. KEEP YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF THE INTERNET. What the hell! "non-discrimination" is a loaded word. Those PC leftest, socialist are just a bad as Nazis..The U.N. needs to be....

WE INTERUPT THIS POST FOR AN EMERGENCY COOLING DOWN PERIOD WITH PICTURES OF "FEEL GOOD" STUFF...











WE NOW RESUME THIS POST......

....and that's the way I feel about it...Europe and the U.N. can go jump into Lake Socialist and drown.

[Dallas59]

It's not a UN/Euro/Democrat/Socialist thing with taxes and sterilization?...

Never mind post #31.

[HAL9000]

If Congress passes Net neutrality legistlation, investment by Internet pipeline providers will cease and more Americans will lose jobs.

I doubt it. The telephone companies and cable companies are becoming dinosaurs anyway. The next-generation wireless services could eventually spell doom for wirelines.

A real Constitutional conservative would advocate state's rights on this issue. There is no need for wireline network neutrality to be decided at the federal level. Each state should be able to set service requirements for their local utilities. Unfortunately, the current trend is for Congress to preempt state's rights - or give total authority to the FCC.

[noncommie]

I wouldn't mind some sort of anti-Spam legislation.

When I first heard of "Spyware" 20 years ago, I thought "Great, now I'll only get adds for things I actually WANT for a change."

It didn't work out that way. Spam is basically like junkmail would be if it didn't cost anything to send. But if the cost of getting rid of Spam is regulating everything else, then screw it.

I don't even care about "making the Net safe for children." Bull, the net needs to be made safe FROM children, not the other way around. Letting a barely-literate yard ape on the Internet isn't going to magically turn him into a genius. The only reason kids should be on the Web is for games, and they don't even need that if it interferes with anything else.

[Psycho_Bunny]

Ya. I know.

[Xenophon450]

The Internet is perfect the way it is now...Why can't people see that. The Founding Fathers would have loved it...besides Franklin and Jefferson could have Zotted King george off his forum and totally pwned him.

[TBP]

The only reason kids should be on the Web is for games

If it's properly monitored (by parents, not the nanny state) it can be a resource for research for their papers and things like that. Research that used to take us many hours to do can be done in just a couple of hours on the Net. Nothing wrong with that. It's what else is there that is a problem.

[gondramB]

>>Once again, when it really comes down to it, it is conservatives who have to carry the water to support free speech and keep the Internet free.<<

My first reaction is that it sounds like they may not know what net neutrality is and are allowing their legitimate concerns about the U.N. to warp their view of the Internet.

Net neutrality has nothing to with content -it is about treating traffic on the net equally. Without it, the companies that own portions of the net can exact extra tolls for traffic they don't like.

I'll have to think about this but I am considering putting together a group of conservatives in favor of Net neutrality.

[gondramB]

>>Actually we should be SUPPORTING Net neutrality! Neutrality has nothing to do with politics or censorship of what is discussed on the Net. The neutrality law would prevent any telecom carrier carrying Net traffic from favoring one type of traffic over another. The "anti-neutrality coalition" is really an astroturf organization representing major telecom companies that wish to gain exclusive control over the geographic areas they serve, forcing rates up through the same roof that has already been shattered by your cable rates.<<

Yeah, it has nothing to do with content or taxes. Even China doesn't violate net neutrality.

Losing net neutrality would allow traffic from certain sources to (like google because they have deep pockets) to be charged extra. Anybody who thinks that that the ensuing bias will be good for Christian conservatives doesn't understand the net - there is a liberal anti-Christian bias. Losing net neutrality would allow that bias to gain force of law.

[mugs99]

Law made to address hypothetical abuses?
Doesn't our government have more important things to do?
.

[ndt]

Actually I theoretically support the idea of Net Neutrality although I'm hesitant to support a bill to enforce it. There seems to be a great deal of misunderstanding as to what it is exactly.

First of all Net Nutrality has nothing to do with "equal voice" kinds of issues.

Some ISPs would like to throttle down the speed of certain types of data or data coming from a certain provider (like Google for example). In some cases a valid argument can be made that some data (like video) is inherantly more expensive for them to carry since it is bigger and they would like to limit their losses by making it cross the Internet more slowly. Other cases like VOIP the argument is weak and based primarily on the fear of traditional phone service providers that they will lose customers.

The argument that is often left out here is that the customer (you and me) are already paying monthly to access the Internet. Why should Google or Freerepublic have to pay to service our request? That is like the phone company charging both the calling and receiving party for every call.

That said, I still am hesitant to support regulation to force the ISPs to do what I feel is the right thing. I would rather see customers voluntarily dump unethical ISPs and support those that choose to follow net neutrality guidelines voluntarily.

[noncommie]

[The Internet] can be a resource for research for [children's] papers and things like that.

That's complete nonsense. Millions of crumb-crunchers doing Global Warming "research" certainly explains an awful lot, but we need to face the fact that a bunch of yard apes aren't going to solve the world's problems for us.

When it comes to learning, children don't need to rediscover the wheel. They only need to do three things: shut up; sit down; and read books. Making kids do that is darned hard work, and there is no shortcut or substitute for it.

Of course letting children play with things like matches and computers is as easy as convincing Michael Jackson to babysit, but none of that helps kids learn any of the things that they SHOULD be learning.

[ndt]

Well I don't agree with the sit down and shut up comment, but I do with the "read" part. When reading hard copy, I tend to do so pacing back and forth or sitting on the toilet, clears the mind so to speak.

As for the internet, there are tons of resources, if you are looking for traditional reading materials check out Project Gutenberg. A lot of the classics are available for free.

[noncommie]

Well I don't agree with the sit down and shut up comment, but I do with the "read" part. When reading hard copy, I tend to do so pacing back and forth or sitting on the toilet, clears the mind so to speak.

Dude, computers can't do anything to help with that problem. But, yeah, I had heard that actually making kids concentrate is considered somewhat barbaric in this day and age; apparently something called Ritalin has made that pretty much obsolete now.

[ndt]

"Dude, computers can't do anything to help with that problem."

Actually a tablet PC can work quite nicely in the bathroom.

"But, yeah, I had heard that actually making kids concentrate is considered somewhat barbaric"

Nothing barbaric about it, but not everyone does their best concentrating sitting at the table and any educator that prefers a silent child to a questioning one is not an educator, they are a babysitter.

"...apparently something called Ritalin has made that pretty much obsolete now."

Ritalin is generally abused to enforce your "sit down and shut up" methodology of education.

[traviskicks]

hmm... to be honest, I don't really understand net neutrality. I was just happy to see they were getting the UN out of the internet and opposing taxes, regulation on the internet. :)

I'll have to read more about what they mean by it and what the situation is. Although, it seems the Internet has done fine thus far without it...

[noncommie]

your "sit down and shut up" methodology of education. Actually, the correct term for that is simply "education." Your brilliant idea of letting kids run around like chickens with their heads cut off and buying them laptops for no discernible reason is referred to by either of two interchangeable terms: "liberalism," or "stupidity."

[markedman]

"I doubt it. The telephone companies and cable companies are becoming dinosaurs anyway. The next-generation wireless services could eventually spell doom for wirelines."

That makes no sense at all. Who do you think _owns_ those next generation wireless services and soft switches?

ATT
Verizon
Alltel
Vodafone

They will not invest money in projects where they won't get it back. They were already burned by MCI's line theft, the 96 Telecom Act which helped fuel the Internet bubble and the CLEC Welfare Act.

The bottom line is, with out the 800 pound telecoms who own/manage/and control a lot of the Tier 1 connections, Google, Yahoo et al are toast.

The large telecoms and cable just want to be able to price fairly for ultra high speed, ultra secure traffic. They should not have to give it away for free to Google, Vonage and AOL who wish to sell the same services as the telecoms, but who neither own, invest in or maintain any of the piping or switching technology.

[HAL9000]

That makes no sense at all. Who do you think _owns_ those next generation wireless services and soft switches?

Most of the spectrum hasn't been auctioned off yet, but there should be plenty of competition.

The bottom line is, with out the 800 pound telecoms who own/manage/and control a lot of the Tier 1 connections, Google, Yahoo et al are toast.

Google bought a lot of dark fiber, and reportedly has a project for massive distributing hosting around the country. They have the capability to distribute a vast amount of content on the Internet. It will be interesting to see what will happen if the telcos try to block their customers from accessing Google.

[markedman]

Ypu need money to buy spectrum and the commission and congress learned the hardway that they should only want bidders who can actually pay the freight.

We'll see who is standing 10 years from now. I don't see WCOM and AOL is all but denuded. Genuity is gone and Level 3 is holding on for dear life.