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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 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 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/

Posted on February 3, 2015 February 2, 2015

FCC chief prepares to overrule state Web laws

FCC chief prepares to overrule state Web laws

The head of the Federal Communications Commissionis urging his fellow commissioners to block state laws that would prevent cities and towns from building out their own government-run Internet services.

Chairman Tom Wheeler this week will circulate a draft decision to nullify laws in Tennessee and North Carolina, after receiving a request from towns in each of those states.

Cities across the country “should be able to make their own decisions about building the networks they need to thrive,” Wheeler said in a statement on Monday.

“After looking carefully at petitions by two community broadband providers asking the FCC to preempt provisions of state laws preventing expansion of their very successful networks, I recommend approval by the commission so that these two forward-thinking cities can serve the many citizens clamoring for a better broadband future.”

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/231422-fcc-will-move-to-block-state-laws

Posted on May 27, 2014 May 27, 2014

Net Neutrality: Don’t Let the FCC Control the Internet!

Net Neutrality: Don’t Let the FCC Control the Internet!

Nick Gillespie | May 26, 2014

By the time you read this, the Internet—that glorious system of tubes that brings us everything from cat videos to free amateur porn to (trigger warning! NSFW!)free amateur cat porn—might already be dead.

That’s the consensus from proponents of so-called net neutrality, who are alarmed and dismayed by a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposal that might eventually allow Internet service providers (ISPs) to charge users different rates to transmit data across their networks.

The result could be that big companies with a lot of cash could use “fast lanes” to deliver content, while smaller, poorer outfits might be stuck in “slow lanes” that would turn off potential users and customers (who wants to wait for a site to load or a video to buffer?). Such “paid prioritization” would, we’re warned, violate cyberspace’s bedrock principle of digital non-discrimination, lead to the “death of the democratic Internet”, and even kill “the dreams of young entrepreneurs.”

Yeah, not so much. Reports of the imminent death of the Internet’s freewheeling ways and utopian possibilities are more wildly exaggerated and full of spam than those emails from Mrs. Mobotu Sese-Seko.

In fact, the real problem isn’t that the FCC hasn’t shown the cyber-cojones to regulate ISPs like an old-school telephone company or “common carrier,” but that it’s trying to increase its regulatory control of the Internet in the first place.

Under the proposal currently in play, the FCC assumes an increased ability to review ISP offerings on a “case-by-case basis” and kill any plan it doesn’t believe is “commercially reasonable.” Goodbye fast-moving innovation and adjustment to changing technology on the part of companies, hello regulatory morass and long, drawn-out bureaucratic hassles.

https://reason.com/archives/2014/05/26/net-neutrality-dont-let-the-fcc-control

Posted on February 22, 2014 April 9, 2020

Universities in FCC Newsroom Probe Have Close Ties to Soros, Got $1.8M in Funding

Universities in FCC Newsroom Probe Have Close Ties to Soros, Got $1.8M in Funding
By Mike Ciandella

February 21, 2014 – 10:01 PM
Connections include partnerships with Soros foundation on events, projects

The FCC may have suspended its invasion into American newsrooms, but the controversial “Critical Information Needs” study also has George Soros’ fingerprints all over it.

While disturbing, this should come as no surprise since Soros’ gave more than $52 million to media organizations from 2000-2010.

Two schools were working with FCC on the project, according to Byron York of The Washington Examiner. The University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism and the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Communication and Democracy, were tasked by the FCC with coming up with criteria for what information is “critical” for Americans to have. The FCC study would have covered newspapers, websites, radio and television, according to The Washington Post.

On top of the 1st Amendment problems with this proposal, the schools involved have strong ties to liberal billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations and have gotten more than $1.8 million from since 2000.

– See more at: https://cnsnews.com/mrctv-blog/mike-ciandella/universities-fcc-newsroom-probe-have-close-ties-soros-got-18m-funding#sthash.5sw7YISq.l0C7r7gV.dpuf

Posted on February 21, 2014 February 21, 2014

Welcome to Fascism 101: The FCC Wades Into the Newsroom

Welcome to Fascism 101: The FCC Wades Into the Newsroom

Why is the agency studying ‘perceived station bias’ and asking about coverage choices?

Feb. 10, 2014 7:26 p.m. ET

News organizations often disagree about what Americans need to know. MSNBC, for example, apparently believes that traffic in Fort Lee, N.J., is the crisis of our time. Fox News, on the other hand, chooses to cover the September 2012 attacks on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi more heavily than other networks. The American people, for their part, disagree about what they want to watch.

But everyone should agree on this: The government has no place pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories.

Unfortunately, the Federal Communications Commission, where I am a commissioner, does not agree. Last May the FCC proposed an initiative to thrust the federal government into newsrooms across the country. With its “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,” or CIN, the agency plans to send researchers to grill reporters, editors and station owners about how they decide which stories to run. A field test in Columbia, S.C., is scheduled to begin this spring.

The purpose of the CIN, according to the FCC, is to ferret out information from television and radio broadcasters about “the process by which stories are selected” and how often stations cover “critical information needs,” along with “perceived station bias” and “perceived responsiveness to underserved populations.”

https://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304680904579366903828260732