Quote Originally Posted by drone View Post
Youtube does pay for bandwidth. The more hits it gets, the more it has to pay.
Yes, they pay for some more servers. They don't pay for any of the cable connections or bandwidth or infrastructure beyond that.

Comcast has already tried packet filtering on P2P traffic and is getting slapped for it. At the moment, the broadband ISPs are whining because they have falsely advertised "SuperBandwidth X" to their customers, and are now hitting their actual limits because peak usage is up.
Yes, and they were slapped down without any net neutrality rule. And the new FCC rule? It allows ISPs to throttle access to 'combat piracy' - AKA it would seem to allow the one and only example of a company doing something the neutrality supporters said needed to be prevented.

True to a point. But a cartel is worse.

If an ISP can't handle the traffic, they need to either upgrade their network, charge per byte, or cap overall bandwidth per user. And be upfront about it.
Oftentimes these cartels are set up by the government. The smart thing to do is force the government to allow more competitors, not enforce more regulation.

Everybody in the US.

Utilities are regulated monopolies.
See the above.

Oh, and the cable companies will start charging more. Streaming video and services like Hulu are going to take up more and more bandwidth. With neutrality, ISPs will be unable to prevent overuse of those services from affecting and slowing their entire network. And why would they be encouraged to build more bandwidth if the high bandwidth sites are going to immediately use it all?
We need net neutrality to be enforced immediately. In the past 5 years companies have finally adapted to the times and are now recognizing the power of the internet in furthering their goals, example: television channels finally putting their shows online in 2008 through Hulu.

The "free market" that the internet has been so called, has not been a free market but an ignored market and now that the companies have an interest in it, like in all markets there will be a need for government to put limits and restrictions on the companies that are now attempting to manipulate the market.
Why, WHY? There's no real reason for it. There is no problem like what neutrality people say will happen, but even they concede has not happened yet. How is a government regulator from an age before color television supposed to adequately write a rule about something that hasn't even occurred yet? Tell me, one of you neutrality supporters, what company is currently managing bandwidth to certain sites?

The internet as we know it, that wonderful thing of communication and commerce, came about without any government regulation, and thank God for that. Government interference would have undoubtedly resulted in a less useful internet. Regulations and diktats would have skewed the economic incentives behind the internet to favor some special group or crack down on what some congressman didn't like.

And thank goodness the internet has been an ignored market, which is often the same thing as a free market. It has been the free market that has allowed for such spectacular innovation in the internet. And now you want to regulate it? You want government restrictions to start on what the internet can and cannot do? My goodness, that's like crying out for the internet to be chained to an iron ball!

If this rule passes it will only be the start of regulation. Every two-bit congressman will see it as a chance to pass some law or regulation to help or hurt some special cause of his, like not selling booze online on Sundays, or prohibiting out of state companies from selling certain items in order to protect some in state company.

The ISPs aren't attempting to manipulate anything - they are attempting to ensure that their limited bandwidth is able to serve all their customers. That's a normal business practice.

Net neutrality would take away from ISPs being able to run their businesses efficiently, because of an imagined problem. Good grief, people, government regulation of this type will stifle innovation because it will limit how ISPs can run their business.

Keep your accursed 'consumer protection' away from me - I would not want to have an internet where the government limits what a business can do! It is because of the freedom of the internet that it is so useful today. If you limit the ability of companies to do what's best for their networks, you will limit the entire future of the internet!

CR