Net Neutrality = CENSORSHIP???

[Unabogie]

So, Glenn Beck is (no surprise) coming out for the side of the ISPs. His argument, however, is completely made up of paranoid delusions about Satanic worship and censorship.

Here is the theory behind net neutrality: Once you establish a website, the speed with which users can access your site is only limited to the speed of your host and his pipeline. If his pipeline is "wide open", users will likely download your content as fast as their DSL lines allow. When they go to your site, they'll see no difference between your content vs. a large corporate site. This enables great innovation and free expression of ideas.

Net neutrality posits that if ISPs (the company who provides you your DSL line) are allowed to charge companies to get on a "fast lane", then only sites with money will be able to provide fast content. Little guys like us will see our sites load much slower than they do now, since we can't afford to pay off all the ISPs for the fast lane.

Here is what Beck says about it though.

"We are dealing with people who think they should rebel until they get their little kingdom like Satan did," said Beck. "You know what? Thanks, Mr. President, but I think we're going to keep the Internet the way it is right now. You know—or at least until people who are worshipping Satan, you know, aren't in office."

[..]

"The FCC is being inundated by a special interest group ironically named Free Press, whose goal it is to limit America's free press and freedom of speech," said Beck in April. "But you see, Free Press isn't about free speech. It's about Marxism. It's about silencing dissent. Free Press is an oxymoron started by an oxy-Marxist. His name is Robert McChesney. In addition to cofounding Free Press, he's also the former editor of The Monthly Review. This is a self-proclaimed, independent socialist magazine—I don't want to call names—an openly Marxist publication. It sounds like a free press advocate so far, doesn't it?"

Ok, so I'm sure our resident Libertarians will chime in about how net neutrality is slapping down the invisible hand of Righteous Freedom!, blah blah blah, but explain to me, exactly, how keeping the internet open (the way it is now) for people like us to put up our various web sites is somehow actually censorship?

 

[NoScotsman]

Since you're referring to speeds of connections ... do people still use dsl? That's like 1Mbps. Right now I get 12Mbps ... Koreans get 30Mbps .... and next month I'll be beta-testing a 290 Mbps downstream and 90 Mbps upstream connection that will tested in several American cities.

At some point (like very soon) this whole issue will be rendered moot. A year ago I would be inclined to agree with you.

The bigger issue is simply universal access ... who cares if a website loads in .003 seconds or .03 seconds? When you can stream multiple equivalents of blu-ray quality video simultaneously over the same connection, who cares?

 

[pipelineaudio]

Chris Castle gives a bit of the background on here, though in this article its more about IP theft http://www.kingsofar.com/2006/07/27...rality-if-you-love-copyright-by-chris-castle/

 

[tyr_13]

Since you're referring to speeds of connections ... do people still use dsl? That's like 1Mbps. Right now I get 12Mbps ... Koreans get 30Mbps .... and next month I'll be beta-testing a 290 Mbps downstream and 90 Mbps upstream connection that will tested in several American cities.

At some point (like very soon) this whole issue will be rendered moot. A year ago I would be inclined to agree with you.

The bigger issue is simply universal access ... who cares if a website loads in .003 seconds or .03 seconds? When you can stream multiple equivalents of blu-ray quality video simultaneously over the same connection, who cares?

Some of us have no choice besides satlite or DSL. I wish I got 1mbps. Drops and major slowdowns are common, about a dozen of them a day.

 

[Unabogie]

Since you're referring to speeds of connections ... do people still use dsl? That's like 1Mbps. Right now I get 12Mbps ... Koreans get 30Mbps .... and next month I'll be beta-testing a 290 Mbps downstream and 90 Mbps upstream connection that will tested in several American cities.

At some point (like very soon) this whole issue will be rendered moot. A year ago I would be inclined to agree with you.

The bigger issue is simply universal access ... who cares if a website loads in .003 seconds or .03 seconds? When you can stream multiple equivalents of blu-ray quality video simultaneously over the same connection, who cares?

Because it's all relative. Right now, websites are limited to the download speeds that their users can achieve. I work in the internet gaming industry, and a big concern is file sizes. If the future is all about 100mb download speeds, then the average gaming site will have amazing graphics and speedy plugins to play the games. In fact, it's likely new technologies will spring up to take advantage of the new speeds and we'll see sites we can't even imagine right now. But if you are on a throttled site, and your speed isn't 100mbs, but 10mbs, your content will be at a severe disadvantage against a company like EA or Zynga and will not be much different from what we see now.

But aside from the merits of net neutrality for people in the music industry, as Pipeline's article discusses, it's clear that this isn't censorship of the internet, right? Glenn Beck is simply lying to his viewers? Does anyone disagree with that statement?

 

[Cleon]

Thanks, Mr. President, but I think we're going to keep the Internet the way it is right now.

Uh, Earth to Beck: Net Neutrality is the way it is right now. It's the status quo.

 

[Axiom_Blade]

I still have trouble believing that Glenn Beck is a real person, and not a parody of right-wing pundits created by a rabid, teenage anarcho-socialist.

 

[rjwould]

Beck knows the truth and is simply lying I think. Television is threatened by the internet and so is conservative values.

 

[Lallante]

I still have trouble believing that Glenn Beck is a real person, and not a parody of right-wing pundits created by a rabid, teenage anarcho-socialist.

Ann Coulter is the other person like that.

I genuinely hope that one day they both admit they are a far-left performance art duo.

 

[rjwould]

I think Beck's future will be similar to that of Morton Downey Jr. Not the physical illness but the future whining that his producers made him do it.

Morton Downey, Jr. (born Sean Morton Downey, Jr.[1]; December 9, 1933—March 12, 2001) was an American singer, songwriter and later a television talk show host of the 1980s who pioneered the "trash TV" format.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton_Downey,_Jr.

 

[Upchurch]

Beck knows the truth and is simply lying I think. Television is threatened by the internet and so is conservative values.

I think it is entirely possible that Beck simply doesn't understand the Net Neutrality issue. It is not an easy issue to understand and it is often mangled in the non-technical media when they describe it.

That being said, it would also not surprise me is Beck's position is being handed down to him from on-high in his particular corporate television network structure. I could even see them leaving it to Beck to come up with his own reasons why it is bad.

When the only tools in your tool box are: "It's communist!", "It's socialist!", "It's Marxist!", and "It's fascist!", it isn't hard to come up with something. Roll a d4 and you're done.

 

[tyr_13]

When the only tools in your tool box are: "It's communist!", "It's socialist!", "It's Marxist!", and "It's fascist!", it isn't hard to come up with something. Roll a d4 and you're done.

I wouldn't trust Beck with a traditional d4. He might hurt himself.

 

[Upchurch]

Does anyone not understand what Net Neutrality is and why it is important?

The corollary question is: Does anyone not understand that Glenn Beck's position is utterly out of touch with reality?

 

[Cleon]

I wouldn't trust Beck with a traditional d4. He might hurt himself.

Well, they've got those newfangled ones, that look like D6s with bulbs on each end. He wouldn't have to get the Pyramid of Pain (anyone who's ever stepped on one without shoes on knows what I mean).

 

[ponderingturtle]

I think it is entirely possible that Beck simply doesn't understand the Net Neutrality issue. It is not an easy issue to understand and it is often mangled in the non-technical media when they describe it.

That being said, it would also not surprise me is Beck's position is being handed down to him from on-high in his particular corporate television network structure. I could even see them leaving it to Beck to come up with his own reasons why it is bad.

When the only tools in your tool box are: "It's communist!", "It's socialist!", "It's Marxist!", and "It's fascist!", it isn't hard to come up with something. Roll a d4 and you're done.

Oh come on it is at least a d6 with two sides being "It's Nazi!!"

 

[ponderingturtle]

Well, they've got those newfangled ones, that look like D6s with bulbs on each end. He wouldn't have to get the Pyramid of Pain (anyone who's ever stepped on one without shoes on knows what I mean).

I like the ones I have that are a dodecahedron with 1-4 3 times each on them.

 

[Random]

I think it is entirely possible that Beck simply doesn't understand the Net Neutrality issue. It is not an easy issue to understand and it is often mangled in the non-technical media when they describe it.

That being said, it would also not surprise me is Beck's position is being handed down to him from on-high in his particular corporate television network structure. I could even see them leaving it to Beck to come up with his own reasons why it is bad.

When the only tools in your tool box are: "It's communist!", "It's socialist!", "It's Marxist!", and "It's fascist!", it isn't hard to come up with something. Roll a d4 and you're done.

It doesn’t help that the ISPs are spending millions of dollars to deliberately confuse people as to the issues involved. When you sit down with Joe Public and clearly explain the positions, the general public supports net neutrality, and the ISPs know it. So we get this “government takeover of the internet” silliness, it’s a giant smokescreen and they know it.

The argument typically goes like this:

ISP: Critics say that without federal regulation to enforce “net neutrality”, we will slow down or cut off peoples access to the internet based on which website providers they want to go to. We have no intention of engaging in this behavior, so federal regulation is unnecessary.

Surfers: If you have no intention of engaging in that behavior, what do you care if the government bans it?

ISP: As we said, it is completely unnecessary.

Surfers: Then why not have the laws in place?

ISP: We are not going to do anything wrong, it is completely unnecessary…

(repeat ad nauseum)

Simply put, if the ISPs are not planning to carve up the internet like a roast, their position makes no sense.

 

[INRM]

Glenn Beck seems to be employing some form of "doublethink" if you ask me.

I personally believe that Glenn Beck's increasingly insane comments that seem to be logically contradictory, seem to all be good reason to distrust him, and are indicative of him being an ideologue with some sort of agenda that is not consistent with the majority of Americans.

 

[INRM]

Net neutrality is the correct way to go

 

[pipelineaudio]

The wikipedia article conflates so many aspects under the heading "net neutrality" that it would actually probably be impossible for ANYONE to be for or against the whole thing. Some of them are even self contradictory.

To most of the public, net neutrality refers to censorship issues by ISP's

To the Freetards though it means that no matter how little you pay, you should have access to the same up and down speeds as companies who pay for tons of bandwidth

We should abandon the term net neurtrality as it has become an all encompassing envelope of everyone's pet project and instead concentrate on the specific issues one by one