Google, Microsoft And Amazon Join Forces To Appeal FCC Net Neutrality Ruling

[Rengar]

Several of the US’s Major internet firms have banded together to form a group known as the Internet Association with the sole intention of suing the FCC and preventing the government body from overturning the Title 2 2015 net neutrality rules.
The IA which is backed by heavyweight tech firms including Google, Microsoft and Amazon, intends to file the lawsuits when the FCC repeal bill reaches the Federal Register toward the end of January this year.

The IA will focus their legal arguments on how the FCC allegedly knowingly deliberately ignored overwhelming public opinion in favor of continuing the status quo regarding net neutrality, and also because they disregarded the opinion of independent experts when they made their decision.

The FCC building; shortly being sued by some of the world’s largest companies.

Whole lotta bots
Research last summer for instance, found that the vast majority of the 22 million comments submitted to the FCC during the consultation period were against net neutrality, but that most of these ‘against’ comments were written or submitted by ‘bots’. Research by Gravwell, a data analytics company showed that only a mere 3,863,929 comments had been individually written and were unique. The other 18 and a bit million appeared to be copied, pasted, and resubmitted multiple times, most likely by bots.

Ignoring the facts
Perhaps the strongest argument the IA have however is the fact that the FCC intentionally chose not to give weight to the abundance of independent objective data as it rushed to kill popular net neutrality rules, allegedly at the behest of major Internet Service Providers such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast.

“The final version of Chairman Pai’s rule, as expected, dismantles popular net neutrality protections for consumers,” IA President Michael Beckerman said. “This rule defies the will of a bipartisan majority of Americans and fails to preserve a free and open internet,” he added. “[The] IA intends to act as an intervenor in judicial action against this order and, along with our member companies, will continue our push to restore strong, enforceable net neutrality protections through a legislative solution.”

Consumer protection?
Supporters of the rules argue that they represent a vital consumer protection, and have vowed not only to fight the FCC decision in court but also to seek solutions at the state level and in Congress.

The IA is not alone in their current fight to maintain an open and equal internet. Opponents of the rule changes have been preparing legal arguments to try and force the FCC to reverse their decision

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman for instance has announced he is leading a multi-party lawsuit to halt the new net neutrality rules on behalf of several US States.

Pieces of the Pai
The FCC’s current chairman, Ajit Pai, is a Republican ideologue. Pai was appointed in January, 2017, and has long argued that the idea of net neutrality amounts to undue regulation that hurts business. As a Republican, he has the majority of votes on the FCC, and seems set to destroy the current rules late in the summer. “Do we want the government to control the internet? Or do we want to embrace the light-touch approach,” said Pai in April. Until very recently, Pai worked for Verizon, a company with a vested interest in ending net neutrality.

 

[upnorth]

Ain't this a bit too late?

 

[Tiny]

Ain't this a bit too late?

Maybe not?

 

[AtlBo]

Does it have to be government ignore or government control? Can't there be a respectful middle ground where government can regulate against just plain disgusting activity and or otherwise malicious activiy, while full freedom other-wise is assured? Problem with changing the rules I feel is that there doesn't seem to be a clearly stated vision for fair and sensible regulation. Tell us where you want to go with this.

The whole concept of net neutrality seems to me to be a little bit of a crafted fantasy. I don't really feel like it is even 100% anything to seek to achieve. However, I tend to like the idea in general, and I do feel like special freedoms associated with individual empowerment to communicate between nations freely and openly are worth fighting to the last breath for, honestly. Still, I would really like to see sensible regulation, and, for sure, there is no way internet activity is going to find itself above the law in the U.S. So I just hope a sensible balance between maintaining decency and freedom can be achieved, whatever it gets called...

 

[DavidLMO]

Its all a matter of perspective. I been here since before AlGore realized that HE invented it. My attitude has been and is the less oversight the better. Anti-trust laws can be used in many cases rather than feet of regs.

 

[Chimaira]

Its all a matter of perspective. I been here since before AlGore realized that HE invented it. My attitude has been and is the less oversight the better. Anti-trust laws can be used in many cases rather than feet of regs.

Well whatever method keeps the corporations in check, protects the people, and keeps the internet free, I support. Right now it seems that all the powerful backing is on the side of regulations.

Considering I don't trust the republican controlled congress to ever even consider anti-trust laws, I support keeping net neutrality. It is sad too because all the rhetoric the right spout about having the power be with the states and letting them inact laws that protect their people, I like that, but they lie. Their only motivation for dismantling the power the federal goverment has and shrinking the size of the federal government is so that the government becomes too weak to control the corporations.

Without a power big enough to control corporations they will be free to do anything in favor of profits. Destroy ecosystems, pollute, create monoplies and gouge consumers for every penny they have while at the same time offering as low quality product as possible, paying their workers as little as possible.

Government regulating everything is a shitty system. Honestly this entire system needs to go, it is archaic, the underlying foundation of using money for the exchange of goods is so old. How can we strive to innovate technology and create a better future on the foundation of an outdated system? So many work so hard to push science and technology forward but almost nobody cares that are system that supports these efforts are incredibly old and unsuited for nuturing that progress we are attempting to make. We are basically attempting to run virtual reality technology on the old IBM systems from WWII.

So I think the very foundation of society needs to change. Having said that, since we are stuck with what we have for now, using the goverment to keep corporations from total centralized power that is free from intervention from the people, is the only way that makes sense. We can't vote who the CEO of a corporation is, we can't vote on what decisions shareholders should make. We have zero control over what a corporation does. With the government we do have a say, we can vote, we can push politicans to support legislation. Not enough people do this, but the power is there.

Honestly corporations were only invented so that the rich could have a body of power equal or more than the government, but without the intervention of the people getting in the way of their strive for total control and never ending pursuit for more and more profits, indifferent to the consequences.

 

[AtlBo]

Honestly corporations were only invented so that the rich could have a body of power equal or more than the government, but without the intervention of the people getting in the way of their strive for total control and never ending pursuit for more and more profits, indifferent to the consequences.

Quote from one of my favorite people:

"The rich are always with us, so we should learn to enjoy them."
-T. H. Robsjohn Gibbings
Personal decorator for Aristotle Onassis

How could anyone not love this guy? Seriously, he worked around stupid money his whole life and found a way to leave behind a great legacy of furniture.

The sword cuts two ways. Noone can have it at all times. Anyway, the rich keep us on our toes and alert. Maybe we should learn to laugh at them ...

Well, Hollywood claims to agree with you. Where is there a greater concentration of wealth with access to media resources than Hollywood? Do corporations really have the power to control things as you say? What about the things they make that make our lives better? Who will make them if they don't?

If those who favor larger government were skilled at working in details or interested enough in them, maybe we could get good regulation of business too. Regulations aren't controls as far as I am concerned. They are guiding principles to follow. When used to regulate corporate activities, they work for us, making sure we have the proper rights to seek compensation should a person or corporation step outside the regulations that justly govern his/her/its activities...AND we can still have cool things...

 

[Chimaira]

Quote from one of my favorite people:



How could anyone not love this guy? Seriously, he worked around stupid money his whole life and found a way to leave behind a great legacy of furniture.

The sword cuts two ways. Noone can have it at all times. Anyway, the rich keep us on our toes and alert. Maybe we should learn to laugh at them ...

Well, Hollywood claims to agree with you. Where is there a greater concentration of wealth with access to media resources than Hollywood? Do corporations really have the power to control things as you say? What about the things they make that make our lives better? Who will make them if they don't?

If those who favor larger government were skilled at working in details or interested enough in them, maybe we could get good regulation of business too. Regulations aren't controls as far as I am concerned. They are guiding principles to follow. When used to regulate corporate activities, they work for us, making sure we have the proper rights to seek compensation should a person or corporation step outside the regulations that justly govern his/her/its activities...AND we can still have cool things...

Actually we have all the technology to completely end poverty and completely restore all the ecosystems and turn the planet green.

If we took all the land we currently use for agriculture and replaced them with vertical hydroponic farms that grow any kind of fruit, vegetable, and grain you can think of, we would have enough food to feed roughly 24 trillion people.

We could open source all ideas and inventions and end intellecual property so that technology would be freely accessible to those that need it, instead of simply being used for profit.

We could use our vast computer network, internet, and artifical intelligence to catalog and monitor every resource available, determine which regions of the planet have needs for certain things vs others, have this system also directly accessed by all people, sharing ideas, inventions, merging those inventions with other ideas. Like Linux on steroids but instead of just computers it would be for everything.

We don't need rich people. Rich people NEED us in order for them to BE rich. We do all the work for them while they take all the profits.

The biggest lie the rich need you to believe is that there are winners and losers, there isn't enough for everyone and that they've worked harder than everyone and deserve it more than the rest of us.

That is a lie. We can create an abundance on this planet. The reason we don't is because the people with the power and money don't want to pay for it, and also it would take away all their power.

The scariest thing everyone and you need to realize is that eventually once all the jobs can be automated, they won't need us anymore. They can isolate themselves from the rest of society, hogging all the resources and completely sustaining themselves while the rest of fight for lives for table scraps.

 

[AtlBo]

The scariest thing everyone and you need to realize is that eventually once all the jobs can be automated, they won't need us anymore. They can isolate themselves from the rest of society, hogging all the resources and completely sustaining themselves while the rest of fight for lives for table scraps.

For me, the scary thing would be a vision that isn't connected to a real plan of action that is achievable (the plan I mean). This is a distraction that doesn't count for anyone, especially the poor. Again, it's the details. Big idea but too few details to inspire action. For sure, a plan of action needs a starting point in order for the plan to be implemented. At any rate, don't see the world headed this way by any means whatsover...

 

[Chimaira]

For me, the scary thing would be a vision that isn't connected to a real plan of action that is achievable (the plan I mean). This is a distraction that doesn't count for anyone, especially the poor. Again, it's the details. Big idea but too few details to inspire action. For sure, a plan of action needs a starting point in order for the plan to be implemented. At any rate, don't see the world headed this way by any means whatsover...

Yeah, the world is going in the opposite direction but there is a group of people who have outlined this plan along with all the science to back it up.

It certainly isn't mainstream, but there are a lot of people talking about these things, holding events, giving lectures. At the very least I'm glad that out there somewhere there are people who can work together toward a better world.

If you are interested check out the book The New Human Rights Movement by Peter Joseph. It completely dismantles the idea that the way things are now is the best we can do.