Net neutrality - Page 2 of 2 - THE RIDGEWOOD BLOG.

Posted on February 26, 2015 February 25, 2015

FCC Chair Refuses to Testify before Congress ahead of Net Neutrality Vote

FCC Chair Refuses to Testify before Congress ahead of Net Neutrality Vote

by ANDREW JOHNSON

February 25, 2015 10:19 AM

Two prominent House committee chairs are “deeply disappointed” in Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler for refusing to testify before Congress as “the future of the Internet is at stake.” Wheeler’s refusal to go before the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday comes on the eve of the FCC’s vote on new Internet regulations pertaining to net neutrality.

The committee’s chairman, Representative Jason Chaffetz (R., Utah), and Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Fred Upton (R., Mich.) criticized Wheeler and the administration for lacking transparency on the issue.

Posted on February 24, 2015 February 24, 2015

Democratic FCC commissioner balks at net neutrality rules

Democratic FCC commissioner balks at net neutrality rules
By Julian Hattem – 02/24/15 12:00 PM EST

A Democrat on the Federal Communications Commission wants to narrow the scope of new net neutrality rules that are set for a vote on Thursday, The Hill has learned.

Mignon Clyburn, one of three Democrats on the FCC, has asked Chairman Tom Wheeler to roll back some of the restrictions before the full commission votes on them, FCC officials said.

The request — which Wheeler has yet to respond to — puts the chairman in the awkward position of having to either roll back his proposals, or defend the tough rules and convince Clyburn to back down.

It’s an ironic spot for Wheeler, who for months was considered to be favoring weaker rules than those pushed for by his fellow Democrats, before he reversed himself about backing tougher restrictions on Internet service providers.

Wheeler will need the votes of both Clyburn and Democratic Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel to pass the rules since the two Republicans on the commission are expected to vote against anything he proposes.

https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/233626-fcc-dem-wants-last-minute-changes-to-net-neutrality-rules

Posted on February 24, 2015 February 23, 2015

Obama’s regs will make Internet slow as in Europe, warn FCC, FEC commissioners

Obama’s regs will make Internet slow as in Europe, warn FCC, FEC commissioners

By Paul Bedard | February 23, 2015 | 2:14 pm

As the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Election Commission toy with regulating aspects of the Internet, critics on those agencies are warning that speed and freedom of speech are in jeopardy.

In a joint column, Federal Communications Commission member Ajit Pai and Federal Election Commission member Lee Goodman, leveled the boom on the Obama-favored regulations, essentially charging that it will muck up the freedom the nation has come to expect from the Internet.

In one key passage of the column published in Politico, the duo wrote Monday that heavy-handed FCC regulations like those imposed in Europe will significantly slow down Internet speech.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obamas-regs-will-make-internet-slow-as-in-europe-warn-fcc-fec-commissioners/article/2560567

Posted on February 22, 2015 February 21, 2015

Republican lawmakers investigate White House net neutrality push

Republican lawmakers investigate White House net neutrality push

Republicans want to know whether the Obama administration influenced the FCC’s proposal

By Grant Gross
Computerworld | Feb 20, 2015 2:18 PM PT

WASHINGTON – Congressional Republicans are demanding to know how much the White House influenced the Federal Communications Commission while the agency crafted net neutrality rules.

The FCC has until Monday afternoon to produce unredacted email messages, focused on net neutrality rules, between FCC staff and officials with the Obama administration, U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz said in a letter to the FCC Friday. The Utah Republican is chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Chaffetz’s committee is “investigating the potential involvement of the White House” in the creation of proposed net neutrality rules that the FCC is scheduled to vote on next Thursday, he said in the letter. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler will propose regulations that would reclassify broadband as a regulated telecommunications service instead of a lightly regulated information service.

An FCC spokeswoman didn’t immediately respond to a request for a comment on Chaffetz’s letter.

https://www.computerworld.com/article/2886968/republican-lawmakers-investigate-white-house-net-neutrality-push.html

Posted on February 19, 2015 February 19, 2015

Billionaire Mark Cuban Says Net Neutrality Will ‘Fuck Everything Up’

Billionaire Mark Cuban Says Net Neutrality Will ‘Fuck Everything Up’
February 18, 2015, 6:26 PM PST
By Dawn Chmielewski

Billionaire investor and ABC “Shark Tank” star Mark Cuban unloaded on the Federal Communications Commission’s plan to fundamentally change how it oversees the open Internet.

“That will fuck everything up,” said the voluble Cuban in remarks Wednesday at theCode/Media conference at The Ritz-Carlton, Laguna Niguel, Calif.

In early February, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler proposed tough new rules for Internet lines that would prohibit wired and wireless broadband providers from collecting payment to cut to the front of the line, or blocking and throttling lawful content and services.

Cuban said this bid to significantly expand the agency’s authority to regulate broadband providers is nothing more than an attack on giant media companies like Comcast*.

“Net neutrality is just a demonization of big companies,” Cuban said.

Cuban, who parlayed his windfall from the 1999 sale of Broadcast.com to Yahoo into an array of ventures that include the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, AXS TV and the Landmark Theatres chain, said there is no evidence (beyond an isolated 2008 case) that Internet providers have throttled access to certain websites.

https://recode.net/2015/02/18/billionaire-mark-cuban-says-net-neutrality-will-fuck-everything-up/

Posted on February 17, 2015 February 17, 2015

FCC Commissioner: Proposed FCC, FEC Regs ‘Pretty Dangerous’

FCC Commissioner: Proposed FCC, FEC Regs ‘Pretty Dangerous’

Republican FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai declared that President Obama’s plan to regulate the Internet, coupled with potential FEC regulations would be “pretty dangerous” on Monday’s “Sean Hannity Show.”

When asked how a website like the Drudge Report would be impacted, Pai stated “there’s not much within the four corners of the document that hint at anything regarding content. What I can tell you is one my friends over at the Federal Election Commission, Lee Goodman has been outspoken about the fact that some of the commissioners there are very interested in looking at content online that, in their view, shapes the political discourse. And so if you pair what the FCC is doing in terms of the Internet’s infrastructure, and what the FEC might do in terms of the Internet’s content, you see a pretty dangerous combination in terms of government control over not just what we say, but how we say it.”

Regarding the impact of the plan on Internet users, he declared “bills for broadband are going to go up, this order opens the door to a vast array of federal and state fees because it’s going to be treating the Internet, for the first time, essentially as telephone service…Secondly, it’s going to mean that the speeds that your listeners use—the speeds your listeners get when they’re accessing the Internet are going to slow down because obviously these networks don’t build themselves. The private sector has to take the risk and invest the capital to build those networks and if they know the FCC’s going to micromanage them every step of the way, they’re going to be less likely to build some of those high-speed connections,” and that the regulations would lead to “much less competition” over the long term.

https://www.breitbart.com/video/2015/02/16/fcc-commissioner-proposed-fcc-fec-regs-pretty-dangerous/

Posted on February 15, 2015 February 14, 2015

FCC Commish: Obama Taking Unprecedented Direct Control Over Internet Changes

FCC Commish: Obama Taking Unprecedented Direct Control Over Internet Changes

Friday on Newsmax TV’s “The Steve Malzberg Show,” FCC commissioner Ajit Pai said President Barack Obama is about to succeed in his attempt to take “alarmingly unprecedented direct involvement” into the FCC’s plan to regulate the internet, which he explained will mean “billions of dollars in new taxes,” slower broadband speeds and “less competition.”

Discussing the plan that the FCC has refused to let the public see Pai said, “Unfortunately it looks like the cake has been baked. President Obama gave his direction to the FCC in back in early November and lo and behold, the FCC majority has put together President Obama’s plan for Internet regulation. And it looks to be posed pass it on a 3-to-2 vote.”

https://www.breitbart.com/video/2015/02/13/fcc-commish-obama-taking-unprecedented-direct-control-over-internet-changes/

Posted on February 14, 2015 February 13, 2015

Internet groups in tricky position over US net neutrality

Internet groups in tricky position over US net neutrality

Richard Waters in San Francisco

Be careful what you wish for. That is the message for companies such as Google and Facebook as US regulators move ahead with a plan to enshrine the idea of an open internet in regulation.

On the face of it, the big internet companies will have scored a significant victory if the Federal Communication Commission votes, as expected, for its new “net neutrality” rules this month. The regime is intended to make sure broadband and other network providers cannot block or otherwise hold internet services to ransom.

Who could take issue with such a noble purpose? Telecoms regulation is not usually the kind of thing to excite much public interest, but this is a cause that has reverberated widely. Populist campaigns like the one waged over net neutrality, however, do not allow for much in the way of nuance.

The problem comes with the form the rules will take. With heavy nudging from the White House, the FCC has opted to re purpose an authority it was given under an old telecoms law, known as Title II, to make it apply to the internet era.

https://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f47c4010-b29b-11e4-b234-00144feab7de.html#axzz3ReZ1gmo7

Posted on February 11, 2015 February 10, 2015

Congress probing White House role in FCC chief’s net-neutrality plan

Congress probing White House role in FCC chief’s net-neutrality plan
By JIM PUZZANGHERAcontact the reporter

Two congressional committees have launched investigations into whether the White House improperly influenced the net-neutrality proposal released last week by the head of the Federal Communications Commission.

On Monday, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) asked FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler in a letter to explain his decision and produce documents related to communications and meetings involving the White House and agency officials concerning the issue.

Johnson, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, told Wheeler he was concerned that there was “apparent pressure exerted on you and your agency by the White House.”

https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-net-neutrality-fcc-chaffetz-probe-20150209-story.html

Posted on February 7, 2015 February 6, 2015

The Obama Administration’s Net Neutrality Proposal Could Change the Internet Forever—but the FCC is Keeping it Secret

ajit-pai-titleII-net-neutrality-secret-viaTwitter

The Obama Administration’s Net Neutrality Proposal Could Change the Internet Forever—but the FCC is Keeping it Secret

The FCC wants to regulate the Internet as a utility, but won’t release its full plan.

Peter Suderman|Feb. 6, 2015 1:15 pm

On Wednesday, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Tom Wheeler announced a major new proposal to regulate the Internet as utility, and, in doing so, institute restrictive net neutrality rules on every major component of the Internet. Given the Obama administration’s unusual and aggressive effort to push the FCC chief into putting forth the proposal, it’s better thought of as the White House’s net neutrality proposal.

The proposal is extraordinary in many ways: According to an op-ed by Wheeler and other accounts, it would not only reclassify wired broadband service as a Title II utility, like the phone system, it would also apply to wireless data. In addition, it would give the FCC new authority over the Internet’s backend—the middleman services that transfer data between Internet service providers (ISPs). It would pave the way for new taxes to be applied to Internet service.

It would, in other words, be a fundamental break from the sort of relatively light federal regulation that has defined the Internet since its inception, and it represents a blatantly political reversal on the part of Chairman Wheeler, a technically independent agency head who plainly caved to White House pressure.

But perhaps the most extraordinary thing about the proposal, which is 332 pages long, is that it is being kept secret from the public—and it will remain secret until after a vote later this month in which it is likely to pass on a 3-2 basis, with Wheeler and the FCC’s two Democratically appointed commissioners outvoting the two Republican-appointed commissioners.

https://reason.com/blog/2015/02/06/the-obama-administrations-net-neutralit

Posted on February 5, 2015 February 4, 2015

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler: This Is How We Will Ensure Net Neutrality

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler: This Is How We Will Ensure Net Neutrality

BY TOM WHEELER

02.04.15 | 11:00 AM |

After more than a decade of debate and a record-setting proceeding that attracted nearly 4 million public comments, the time to settle the Net Neutrality question has arrived. This week, I will circulate to the members of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed new rules to preserve the internet as an open platform for innovation and free expression. This proposal is rooted in long-standing regulatory principles, marketplace experience, and public input received over the last several months.

Broadband network operators have an understandable motivation to manage their network to maximize their business interests. But their actions may not always be optimal for network users. The Congress gave the FCC broad authority to update its rules to reflect changes in technology and marketplace behavior in a way that protects consumers. Over the years, the Commission has used this authority to the public’s great benefit.

The internet wouldn’t have emerged as it did, for instance, if the FCC hadn’t mandated open access for network equipment in the late 1960s. Before then, AT&T prohibited anyone from attaching non-AT&T equipment to the network. The modems that enabled the internet were usable only because the FCC required the network to be open.

https://www.wired.com/2015/02/fcc-chairman-wheeler-net-neutrality/