Google has strong words for legislators who are currently mulling over net neutrality issues: the company will take any perceived abuse to the US Department of Justice. Speaking at a news conference in Bulgaria, Internet pioneer and now Google VP Vint Cerf said that the company will be ‘happy’ if legislators ultimately opt to support net neutrality principles, but in the absence of such support, the company will take a wait-and-see approach. “If we are not successful in our arguments… Then we will simply have to wait until something bad happens and then we will make known our case to the Department of Justice’s anti-trust division,” he said.
…that today’s “representative democratic institutions” are tools of business.
It’s been going downhill since the 60ies. America is in a big mess.
Was America really any better during the days of the Railroad Tycoons or Oil Barons? Big Business and Government have been bed buddies for quite a while, now. We’re just finally able to see and discuss how bad things are, so maybe we can actually affect some real change this time around.
Big Business/favours is only a small part of the mess. There are the massive hate movements towards american values come to mind. And those hate organisations are getting federal funds.
It’s like this also in Canada… Unfortunately.
There are the massive hate movements towards american values come to mind.
I fail to see how they have anything to do with Google’s pushing Congress around.
With some differences, it was a bipolar world, and sure, they were buddies, but they knew if they pushed too far; there was always the potential for communism or a very hardcore version of Socialism with forced nationalisation and loss of private property.
The problem is today, there is no alternative to the capitalist model, or the “US Model”, so now, you have the government and business move its ‘slap and tickle’ from the bed room to public view, and for alot of people, its shocking.
Ultimately, however, we the people CHOOSE to vote in these parties; people CHOOSE to stick with either democrats or republicans, irrespective of what the third party candidate offers; the US system fundamentally favours a two party state, with little possibility of minority parties having a say in how government is run; until the US throws out its cute little experiement with the republican model, and adopt and MMP like system, the same stuff will keep repeating over and over again.
Edited 2006-07-05 06:25
Unfortunately, whilst America may well be more guilty of this than the rest of the West, TROTW is not blameless by any means.
America isn’t more guilty than the rest of the world. Europe isn’t in such a great shape. Read the news.
So the fact that the European Commission has actually decided to take measures against Microsoft means that it is just as much a friend of big business as Congress, does it?
The EU commission, yes, they did go after the biggest dog in the barn, they also tried selling us out on the subject of software patents.
Do not for a second think that the corporations have far far far greater access to these desision makers then any mere mortal of a voter.
The US is just more open about its bed fellows.
Do not for a second think that the corporations have far far far greater access to these desision makers then any mere mortal of a voter.
If they didn’t have any more access, then the Commission wouldn’t have “also tried selling us out on the subject of software patents.“
Yeah, when the drugs wear off, reality sux huh?
Google saying that if Congress fails to do the right thing it will seek justice via the judicial branch is corporate government how?
I’m not disagreeing with your conclusion, just saying that this doesn’t qualify as proof of that conclusion.
“We will not tolerate” is bullying language. At best it is language Congress should be using towards wayward companies, not the reverse.
I think it’s their right as a legal entity to make legal threats… Most complaints about lobbying to date have been that companies are bribing officials with special deals, or they’re forcing their hand with their unions.
“At best it is language Congress should be using towards wayward companies, not the reverse.”
Depends whether you have more respect for Congress or Google. Google helps me search and gives me free software. Congress spends MY money killing people instead of building windmills/better schools/universal healthcare.
That’s not the point. Unless you’re an anarchist, nations need legislatures; and even if you believe they don’t, Google is not a state institution in the way a legislature is.
Glad somebody’s watching, certainly have shown they can’t police themselves. Sadly the current staff of the justice department are among the biggest tools on the hill and said action would probably guarantee anything but.
So far, they have been able to police themselves. I haven’t seen this as being a problem yet, they’re just threatening to take action in the future. The ISPs are going to have issues with customers and each other if they actually try to do this, and I don’t see them doing it anymore then all of the people in the last election who said “if Bush gets re-elected, I’m moving to Canada”. I know at least 20 friends who said that, but not one of them has moved to canada for some reason. (One did move after the election and tried to say it was Canada, they actually moved to Texas). I think the telcos are bluffing and I will get to watch them fall if I’m wrong anyways.
With that said, wouldn’t net neutrality also create issues for the good things ISPs do with throttling/filtering already, such as blocking the major viruses and trojans that slow down the entire internet? I don’t mind them having that capability as its a good thing for everyone in that case,
One man’s virus is another man’s program.
I undertsand that, but if one man’s program is bringing down the entire internet and creating total chaos generating billions of packets that is slowing EVERYONE down, don’t you think that packets that contain human generated data (regular website requests) should be given priority over a packet containing random data in attempt to DDoS microsoft.com? It will make the internet feel faster for you, regardless of the websites you visit, if packets are prioritized.
The problem only is when the company decides to deprioritize sites that do not pay them, but what are the ISPs expecting? Surely not every ISP can expect a payment from Google. It won’t work, because then the ISPs will start getting greedy with each other, deprioritize each other’s sites demanding payments from each other.
The problem with this whole concept is that everyone just ends up paying each other. BellSouth charges me $X for their customers being able to access sites hosted by my ISP and I now begin to charge BellSouth $X for my customers to be able to access BellSouth’s website and sites hosted by them. The net result: X-X = 0.
I think he just needs to find something better to do. The less bandwidth equals the better user experience equals market share. I believe that net neutrality legislated will save the internet as a media outlet for us commoners.
I undertsand that, but if one man’s program is bringing down the entire internet and creating total chaos generating billions of packets that is slowing EVERYONE down, don’t you think that packets that contain human generated data (regular website requests) should be given priority over a packet containing random data in attempt to DDoS microsoft.com? It will make the internet feel faster for you, regardless of the websites you visit, if packets are prioritized.
But that’s pretty much the same justification many providers use right now for throttling/blocking bittorrent. Is that valid?
The broadband providers have been getting by for ages overselling capacity, it’s similar to the game the airlines play. Want a 2Mb connection? Here you go. Want a 5Mb? No problem. 9Mb? Sure, why not! They don’t care. If all you’re doing is surfing web pages, sending email and watching the odd streamed video, no worries. You’re not even getting close to saturating their network.
But bittorrent for one calls the lie to their model. It’s a protocol that demands bandwidth and will use all of the available bandwidth it can. Unfortuantely with oversold home connections, that results in bandwidth robbed from other users because the network isn’t designed under the assumption everyone will be using their peak bandwidth capacity at the same time.
Who’s right, who’s wrong? Certainly the service providers can’t be totally blamed, broadband connections can be reasonably oversold (as airlines oversell flights) under the assumption not everyone will require their allotment simultaneously. This keeps costs down and has made broadband affordable, it would be a hell of a lot more expensive if those 5Mb pipes in people’s homes actually amounted to a 5Mb pipe straight to an internet backbone.
But to the customer who expects to be able to use whatever internet application they want to use, how do you explain that any more than you explain to the person being bumped from a flight because the ticket they purchased wasn’t actually available? What if VPN connections for teleworkers come next on the list behind bittorrent? And the hot button topic, VoIP? A surcharge here, an uplift to a premium service there, cha-ching.
There’s no easy answers here, both sides have some valid concerns buried under all the hype and noise though my personal inclination is that the providers will require a degree of regulation on this issue to offset the fact that they have the advantage of being protected monopolies and conventional free market rules do not apply in all instances.
They don’t want to add this ugly stipulation: 5Mb/s, at a cap of 42 GB per month. Even if it is equivalent to: 1Mb/s * 30 * 24 * 60.
I don’t think a bitorrent cap would bother me, it gets unpreferential routing here on my Uni campus and that doesn’t bother me.. That’s something on my end that I sign up for and I could sign up elsewhere (well, not so easily at university). It doesn’t hinder anyone starting a business (well it does, but those contracts already say you can’t do that).
Actually, there have been Net Neutrality problems in Canada too:
http://www.savetheinternet.com/=faq#threat
Last year, Telus blocked off access to a pro-union site they were in dispute with. Because of net neutrality rules they were forced to revive access or give up their ISP protected status (i.e. they’d be responsible for any content on the internet).
… unless, of course, that abuse occurs in China — in which case, we’ll put our democratic principles up to the highest bidder…
Ok, so on one side we bash MS for not complying to a country’s/community’s decisions, then we bash Google for complying. Well, this is our world, countries are different, regimes are different, governments are different. And I still say – despite what’s in China – that this is good so. I’d really hate to see americanized countries all over the place.
This isn’t bashing Google for “complying with society’s rules”, it’s bashing them for taking it upon themselves to push Congress around. Society should be able to push Congress around, but not companies, and certainly not one mammoth company, whether that is Google, Microsoft, or McDonald’s.
or is this Net Neutrality thingy incredibly ambiguous?
I have read things on the ‘Net that are the equivalent to fearmongering about this subject.
“There are the massive hate movements towards american values come to mind.”
The what on what?
Edited 2006-07-05 02:46
So Google is returning the favor.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0606260170jun26,0,32…
who do you work for? at$t
“Ok, so on one side we bash MS for not complying to a country’s/community’s decisions, then we bash Google for complying.”
Because there’s clearly no difference between complying with a court decision regarding protocols and complying to supressing free speech and aiding an abusive regime. No, really, there’s no difference.
Google is just using the tools available, in some countries it has got nothing to say, in other countries they have the tools(courts) to stand-up against the government with the correct means.
Don’t blame Google for the situation in China, rather blame the Chinese people/government that doesn’t allow criticism. Google can do nothing to change the situation in China, not going into the market would mean replacement by someone else. Going into the market at least gives them some money and a bit of control should anything change.
We are ALL responsible for China. We– and other countries– value cheap goods over human rights.
“Who else is going to spend billions of dollars to make sure Americans have the same kind of high-speed broadband access that many European and Asian countries enjoy?”
Funny how no European or Asian network companies wants to charge content providers. Of course, maybe they’re just smart enough to realize it’s an absolutely insane and retarded idea and that the Internet is bigger than their respective country/region.
It’s as absurd as charging the recipient of a (non-collect of course) phonecall.
“Funny how no European or Asian network companies wants to charge content providers.”
No, they just want to put those charges on the consumers via things such as Email tax.
“in some countries it has got nothing to say, in other countries they have the tools(courts) to stand-up against the government with the correct means.”
Sure they have something to say, they can chose not to enter the market. That makes for a pretty powerfull statement. But alas, it is so much easier for big companies to make “ethical” statements when they have something to lose instead on a when it would cost them something.
I’m sure it is welcomed that google “fights the good fight” but lets not kid ourselves, if google had something to lose on enforced net neutrality they would have fought it. Big companies, be it Google, MS or otherwise, don’t give a flying fsck about ethics and freedom, only about profit. If they did there wouldn’t be any 3rd world sweatshops.
Edited 2006-07-05 11:07
Am I the only one who though we could one day create our own network? This is happening currently with some wireless city project. We need to take telco from big companies or else we’ll finish up crushed under big corp will.
This world is going so wrong…
I get the feeling you just don’t understand how stupid my elected officials are, read these brilliant comments on net neutrality from the GOP’s finest, Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) and you may just get what were up against:
There’s one company now you can sign up and you can get a movie delivered to your house daily by delivery service. Okay. And currently it comes to your house, it gets put in the mail box when you get home and you change your order but you pay for that, right.
But this service isn’t going to go through the interent and what you do is you just go to a place on the internet and you order your movie and guess what you can order ten of them delivered to you and the delivery charge is free.
Ten of them streaming across that internet and what happens to your own personal internet?
I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o’clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?
Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially.
So you want to talk about the consumer? Let’s talk about you and me. We use this internet to communicate and we aren’t using it for commercial purposes.
We aren’t earning anything by going on that internet. Now I’m not saying you have to or you want to discrimnate against those people […]
The regulatory approach is wrong. Your approach is regulatory in the sense that it says “No one can charge anyone for massively invading this world of the internet”. No, I’m not finished. I want people to understand my position, I’m not going to take a lot of time. [?]
They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It’s not a truck.
It’s a series of tubes.
And if you don’t understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material.
Now we have a separate Department of Defense internet now, did you know that?
Do you know why?
Because they have to have theirs delivered immediately. They can’t afford getting delayed by other people.
[…]
Now I think these people are arguing whether they should be able to dump all that stuff on the internet ought to consider if they should develop a system themselves.
Maybe there is a place for a commercial net but it’s not using what consumers use every day.
It’s not using the messaging service that is essential to small businesses, to our operation of families.
The whole concept is that we should not go into this until someone shows that there is something that has been done that really is a viloation of net neutraility that hits you and me
full audio:
http://media.publicknowledge.org/stevens-on-nn.mp3
did he wear his Incredible Hulk tie?
So Google is basically telling the government that if they don’t shape up, they’ll run and tell another part of the government? Color me impressed.
“Do it my way or I’ll sue!” has become the standard tactic these days, and it’s really kind of pathetic.
It’s a limp wristed, hollow threat. If Google really had any stones, they could redirect every search for one day to a page describing their position. Filing an anti-trust suit with the Justice Department? Yawn…
You are confusing british politicians with network providers.
one way you can find a biased blurb on the internet is no comments are allowed. The telecos allready charge both sides for the bandwith both sending and recieving. now for some reason(greed) they want to charge the middle.