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from the it-takes-300-pages-to-redefine-neutrality dept.
The bloom may have already fallen off the Net Neutrality rose. As reported yesterday in the Wall Street Journal (paywalled):
When Google's Eric Schmidt called White House officials a few weeks ago to oppose President Obama's demand that the Internet be regulated as a utility, they told him to buzz off. The chairman of the company that led lobbying for "net neutrality" learned the Obama plan made in its name instead micromanages the Internet.
Mr. Schmidt is not the only liberal mugged by the reality of Obamanet, approved on party lines last week by the Federal Communications Commission. The 300-plus pages of regulations remain secret, but as details leak out, liberals have joined the opposition to ending the Internet as we know it.
It seems as though, in their zeal to "stick it" to the ISPs, most proponents didn't consider that when you allow 3 unelected people to issue rulings on something as large and ubiquitous as the Internet, bad things can happen:
Until Congress or the courts block Obamanet, expect less innovation. During a TechFreedom conference last week, dissenting FCC commissioner Ajit Pai asked: "If you were an entrepreneur trying to make a splash in a marketplace that's already competitive, how are you going to differentiate yourself if you have to build into your equation whether or not regulatory permission is going to be forthcoming from the FCC? According to this, permissionless innovation is a thing of the past."
The other dissenting Republican commissioner, Michael O'Rielly, warned: "When you see this document, it's worse than you imagine." The FCC has no estimate on when it will make the rules public.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Gravis on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:46AM
The only ones lamenting the FCCs decision are businesses and fraudsters.
What's been mentioned about the EFF is this:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/02/dear-fcc-rethink-those-vague-general-conduct-rules [eff.org]
Dear FCC: Rethink The Vague "General Conduct" Rule
For many months, EFF has been working with a broad coalition of advocates to persuade the Federal Communications Commission to adopt new Open Internet rules that would survive legal scrutiny and actually help protect the Open Internet. Our message has been clear from the beginning: the FCC has a role to play, [eff.org] but its role must be firmly bounded.
Two weeks ago, [eff.org] we learned that we had likely managed [eff.org] the first goal—the FCC is going to do the right thing and reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service, giving it the ability to make new, meaningful Open Internet rules. But we are deeply concerned that the FCC’s new rules will include a provision that sounds like a recipe for overreach and confusion: the so-called “general conduct rule.”
According to the FCC's own "Fact Sheet," [fcc.gov] the proposed rule will allow the FCC to review (and presumably punish) non-neutral practices that may “harm” consumers or edge providers. Late last week, as the window for public comment was closing, EFF filed a letter [eff.org] with the FCC urging it to clarify and sharply limit the scope of any “general conduct” provision:
[T]he Commission should use its Title II authority to engage in light-touch regulation, taking great care to adhere to clear, targeted, and transparent rules. A “general conduct rule,” applied on a case-by- case basis with the only touchstone being whether a given practice “harms” consumers or edge providers, may lead to years of expensive litigation to determine the meaning of “harm” (for those who can afford to engage in it). What is worse, it could be abused by a future Commission to target legitimate practices that offer significant benefits to the public . . .
Accordingly, if the Commission intends to adopt a “general conduct rule” it should spell out, in advance, the contours and limits of that rule, and clarify that the rule shall be applied only in specific circumstances.
Unfortunately, if a recent report from Reuters [reuters.com] is correct, the general conduct rule will be anything but clear. The FCC will evaluate “harm” based on consideration of seven factors: impact on competition; impact on innovation; impact on free expression; impact on broadband deployment and investments; whether the actions in question are specific to some applications and not others; whether they comply with industry best standards and practices; and whether they take place without the awareness of the end-user, the Internet subscriber.
There are several problems with this approach. First, it suggests that the FCC believes it has broad authority to pursue any number of practices—hardly the narrow, light-touch approach we need to protect the open Internet. Second, we worry that this rule will be extremely expensive in practice, because anyone wanting to bring a complaint will be hard-pressed to predict whether they will succeed. For example, how will the Commission determine “industry best standards and practices”? As a practical matter, it is likely that only companies that can afford years of litigation to answer these questions will be able to rely on the rule at all. Third, a multi-factor test gives the FCC an awful lot of discretion, potentially giving an unfair advantage to parties with insider influence.
We are days away from a final vote, and it appears that many of the proposed rules will make sense for the Internet. Based on what we know so far, however, the general conduct proposal may not. The FCC should rethink this one.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:29PM
But you repeat yourself.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:10PM
What, every fraudster is a business?
(Score: 1) by Lukehasnoname on Tuesday March 03 2015, @07:59PM
Eh, there are many people wary of secret rulings. I'll wait until all 322 pages of "QoS can't be applied to specific parties" typed over and over before I rejoice.