FCC reverses stance on net neutrality

By Dan Brooks in corporatocracy 5 Comments
The internet

The internet

Tom Wheeler and the FCC have changed their position on net neutrality, drafting new rules that would allow internet service providers to charge companies for faster delivery of their content. Finally, Comcast and Netflix will get a chance to make some money. Wheeler strenuously denies that his agency is “gutting the open internet rule,” but it’s hard to see this decision making the internet a more equitable place. Perhaps it will be exactly as free and egalitarian as before. Or maybe we are not totally crazy to worry that letting Comcast—which owns NBC and Hulu—buy TimeWarner Cable, owned by AOL and what used to be Warner Bros., will result in some kind of collusion.

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Netflix pays Comcast millions to restore streaming speed

By Dan Brooks in Contemporary Media 1 Comment
A promotional poster for "Scream, Blacula, Scream," one of the many quality films you can stream on Netflix

The promotional poster for “Scream, Blacula, Scream,” a quality film you can stream on Netflix

A mere 10 days after Comcast agreed to buy Time-Warner Cable, the cable/internet giant has announced a multimillion-dollar deal with Netflix. Here’s how it works: Netflix pays Comcast several million dollars each year, and the 25% drop in streaming speed that has plagued Netflix subscribers who get their internet from Comcast will go away. It’s probably a coincidence that this unprecedented deal comes three months after a circuit court judge struck down the FCC’s authority to enforce net neutrality. Welcome to the new internet. Netflix, which accounts for as much of 30% of total internet traffic during peak hours, now has to pay to play.

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Friday links! And dot-com the wolves edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 0 Comment
A federal contractor performs a routine stop to listen to your voicemails.

A federal contractor performs a routine stop to listen to your voicemails.

Let us say, just for a second, that someone invented technology that allowed everyone on Earth to communicate with one another almost instantaneously. People could use this marvelous machine to say anything they wanted, and they could say it to just one person or broadcast their ideas all over the world. You couldn’t use it to exert force or shoot lasers or anything; the machine could only convey speech and the written word, plus pictures. Approximately 20 years after this machine is invented, a government announces it has the right to record and read, at its leisure, everything everyone uses the machine to say. It must do so to protect freedom. Does this government sound democratic to you? Today is Friday, and the wolves have come out. Won’t you shiver in the vast field of prey with me?

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DC circuit court in process of deciding net neutrality

By Dan Brooks in Contemporary Media 1 Comment
The Internet

The Internet

Back in 2010, Congress passed the the Open Internet Order, which authorizes the FCC to prevent internet service providers from blocking particular applications—such as file sharing or telephony—and from charging content providers to make their sites load faster than others. This broad set of rules is called net neutrality, and Verizon hates it. On Monday, lawyers for Verizon and the FCC delivered oral arguments before the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in an attempt to overturn/protect the Open Internet Order, respectively. You can read a broad summary of their positions here. Probably you should read it now, because by the end of the week Ars Technica could load really slowly as your ISP encourages you to get your news from Yahoo.

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