In These Times

Latest Comments view all 5

• • 27 Mar 07
  • 3:37 pm

  Beejay, the telecoms of 1996 were different animals. The players are different today, and more importantly, they're free of the regulation they were still emerging from at the time. The market is more competitive than it was then, so there IS pressure to innovate and compete in a way there just wasn't at the time. But about CWA -- I happen to work for a group that they're a member of, Hands Off the Internet. I don't want to speak for them, but this time around there is re-regulation looming that seems highly likely to scare off potential investors. I am …

  Posted to Not Neutrality

• • 28 Mar 07
  • 10:50 am

  Beejay, if you call us "astroturf" then the term has no meaning. Look at the front page of our website -- AT&T, Alcatel and the many other groups in our coalition are listed. What is your standard for astroturf. Is your definition simply "a group I don't like"? I don't endorse blondemike's choice of imagery, but he is correct that you haven't actually addressed the substance of my comments. Your conspiracy theory about telecoms wanting to "destroy" the Internet is year-old rhetoric that nobody with a serious interest in the debate brings up anymore. If they did try to do so, …

  Posted to Not Neutrality

• • 29 Mar 07
  • 1:17 pm

  @ Walter "If this is true, I am surprised that your union would be willing to allow for a situation, where the public would only be able to read what the greedy corporations and the Republicans want us to read on the Internet." Luckily, this is not true. Frankly, I'm flummoxed that this notion that cable and telephone companies would want to make their service less useful to customers by blocking them from their favorite websites. Maybe because it helps drum up support among people who can't follow the technical details? Nobody is going to outright block sites, period. What could …

  Posted to Not Neutrality

• • 02 Apr 07
  • 11:37 am

  "the telecomms AND cable cos have already discriminated in the matter of VOIP" They have? Example, please. Last year net neutrality supporters went out of their way to find examples of what they thought were examples of discrimination like this, and none of them held up. I don't even remember which one you would be referring to. But I do remember when everyone said that Cox was blocking Craigslist and *obviously* that was because of net neutrality... until, of course, it turned out that it was all a software problem on Craigslist's end -- which they fixed and has been working …

  Posted to Not Neutrality

• • 04 Apr 07
  • 9:58 am

  Beejay, that TechDirt quote takes McCurry badly out of context. Where he wrote that Google "never have to pay a dime no matter how much bandwidth they use" refers to what Google is asking out of the Dorgan-Snowe bill, not what they pay now. In context, he is absolutely correct: Google, like eBay and Amazon are engaged in rent-seeking: They are asking Congress to make it illegal for ISPs to charge for a service that they want, but don't want to pay extra for. The Madison River case is complicated, but it actually undercuts your own point: the FCC looked into …

  Posted to Not Neutrality