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posted by on Wednesday March 01 2017, @03:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the brothers-in-arms dept.

Common Dreams reports:

Proponents of an open internet are holding a rally on Monday [February 27] to mark the two-year anniversary of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) vote that enshrined net neutrality protections that the new Trump administration has already begun eroding.

The 3pm event in Washington, D.C [was] backed by the Color of Change, National Hispanic Media Coalition, Center for Media Justice, and Free Press, and will feature the FCC's only Democratic commissioner, Mignon Clyburn.

[...] According to Timothy Karr, senior director of strategy for Free Press, "No FCC chair over the past 40 years has been so bent on undermining the agency's public-service mission and destroying the safeguards on which hundreds of millions of Americans rely."

Laying out the stakes, Max Anderson, coordinator for Human Rights Watch's general counsel's office, wrote last week:

Should net neutrality be scrapped in the U.S., it will enable service providers to throttle internet speeds or block access to websites based on commercial deals they cut with media providers. That would undermine freedom of expression and access to information. Once these practices have been established, it's a short step to other human rights consequences. Governments that already attempt to stifle lawful online expression will welcome a new tool for silencing critics. The FCC should retain its good example to the world and enforce net neutrality. If the internet stands a chance of enabling the realization of human rights, then access needs to be nondiscriminatory and in line with human rights in the widest sense.

[...] So, what can people do?

"The short answer is to raise hell", said Craig Aaron, CEO of Free Press, to Mercury News columnist Troy Wolverton.

"Net neutrality is an issue that a lot of people care about--millions and millions more than the FCC ever expected", Aaron said. "We need to hear from those people again."

The good old days: U.S. Appeals Court Upholds Net Neutrality Rules in Full
What's that? You thought we fought this one before? FCC Extends Net Neutrality Comment Period (Again)


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 01 2017, @01:28PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 01 2017, @01:28PM (#473292)

    Plan A:
    Couple content to delivery into a great monolith and gain power and profit.
    Examples include radio,tv, cable, telco, newspaper, music, and Hollywood.
    Quite a formidable group.

    Plan B:
    Decouple content from delivery and let a bunch of new, upstarts gain traction.
    Examples include the ISP's and content folks.
    It turns out, a much more formidable group. (Just ask the record industry.)

    Plan C:
    The guys from plan B get comfortable and tired of pesky new startups nipping at their heels.
    They see the wisdom in plan A and find a way to make it so.

    The lesson here should be that big is bad for the little guy.
    It doesn't matter if it is big business, big labor, or big government.
    The Wild West style of the evolving Internet has been an equalizer for the little guy.
    The FCC is enabling new monoliths to put things back to the usual non-equal state.
    Well, it was fun while it lasted.