Telecom Giants Trying To Block Free Internet
By Jamie Friday Sep 07, 2007 7:46pm
As if that would be a shock to anyone, but it is worth mentioning. On CNN's In the Money, John Muleta, who is the founder and CEO of M2Z media was talking about the telecom giants trying to block his companies plans of providing free, high-speed, wireless internet to the entire nation.
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Muleta has been pushing for this for quite sometime now. He testified before Congress in May, and now his big hurdle is with the FCC. He is also collecting online signatures for his petition to Congress and the FCC, which you can sign here.
The benefits of this plan are great. I know the capitalistic mind always cringes at the word "free", but think of the boost such a service could offer to online retailers.
Another problem also made news this week. The Washington Post published an article talking about Comcast canceling subscribers account for "excessive usage":
Comcast has punished some transgressors by cutting off their Internet service, arguing that excessive downloaders hog Internet capacity and slow down the network for other customers. The company declines to reveal its download limits.
"You have no way of knowing how much is too much," said Sandra Spalletta of Rockville, whose Internet service was suspended in March after Comcast sent her a letter warning that she and her teenage son were using too much bandwidth. They cut back on downloads but were still disconnected. She said the company would not tell her how to monitor their bandwidth use in order to comply with the limits.
"You want to think you can rely on your home Internet service and not wake up one morning to find it turned off," said Spalletta, who filed a complaint with the Montgomery County Office of Cable and Communication Services. "I thought it was unlimited service."
In today's world of streaming media, news like this is very bad. We need better control of our internet, and control that doesn't hurt the consumer. The United States is quickly falling behind in offering quality, high-speed internet to all the nation. Actions like this just put us even further behind.
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Thanks for this-
Please keep us informed on this subject- no one else will:(
Actually since we're being eavesdropped on so much, I suggest we give up on the internet and switch to a system of homing pigeons that carry data back and forth on mini chips.
It's important to remember that the Internet was developed on the public dollar, for the public's purposes. Companies only started using and contributing to the Internet when the profit motive drove them onto it.
For private companies to essentially assume control of, and make a profit commoditizing, the Internet is if nothing else a clear example of the way much of what the public used to possess has been sold to corporations to serve corporations. From the airwaves to public lands to the Internet backbone, what used to belong to you and me as part of a public trust has been sold for pennies on the dollar so that corporations can charge us for what we used to own.
This used to be government of the people, for the people: it is now government of corporations, for corporations.
I was planning on submitting this to Digg, but by the time I was done I realized that 'MrEMan' had already done so.
The capitalistic mind doesn't always cringe at the word free. They like to talk about the free market a lot.
To me the internet is not the market. It is the infrastructure that the market resides in. Just like the phone service. If AT&T started giving people busy signals when they called one business and let them straight through when they called another business that payed for "premium phone connections" the country would freak out. If the power company started giving regular brownouts and blackouts to businesses who didn't buy premium power service the country would freak out. I don't know why the internet is any different. The free market is what happens INSIDE the internet, it is not the internet itself. Net neutrality GUARANTEES a free market. Taking it away kills the free market.
I guess it's no surprise that capitalists only want a free market when they are controlling it.
Advertiser sponsored internet? That's just a bunch of crap. I don't need an ISP that controls my content, free or not free. Giving up yet another part of the public spectrum to advertiser sponsored "free" content is just a waste of a very limited resource.
But, but, Comcast! What will it do?
It is NOT free internet. You watch advertising in return for a connection. Nor is it internet since they plan to filter it.
We already suffer from there not being net neutrality here.
My ISP is the local telephone/cable company that holds a monopoly on internet service unless you want to go satelite. They don't even allow local numbers to other dial-up companies. Anyway, they have a tiered internet price range depending on usage. If you get their dial-up or the lowest tiered internet you are blocked from all steaming content. I could download and watch wmv or qt clips here at C&L and download music files from say i-tunes but not watch anything on YouTube, google video or listen to streaming radio until I paid extra for their "3 MEGABIT DOWNLOAD/ 3M UPLOAD" plan. They don't tell you that you are blocked from streaming content on their lowest tiered broadband & dial-up until after you've had it hooked up and find out for yourself.
They also block all torrent file sharing on all of their plans. I've had lots of friends try and get around whatever program they are using to sniff out and block torrent sharing by changing ports, encrypting, and limiting speeds to a crawl, ... all of which which may work for a day or two then they always seem to catch it.
This revolution (aka The Camel) is sure holding up a lot of straw. I wonder what the final one will be?
Actually I know which one it will be ... but If I print it in actual words for all to see... The moderator of this "free flowing info sight" will block my post. So until the blogisphere stops censoring itself... I'd stop worrying about the capitalists if I were you.
Everyone Please...Sign the List and send your name off to your representatives.
The Internet belongs to the people. The Government is afraid of us all being able to communicate without their filtering.
Sign now, These Companies are huge, only our loud voice can get their attention.
wouldnt it be illegal to shut off their service if no limit is mentioned in their contracts?
Ofcourse they're going to try to block free internet tubes for everyone...it would cut into their precious profit.
Hopefully the American People will get wind of this and realize what a great idea free interent is and demand it (doubtful).
Another chapter in our sad history like who killed the electric car and why the hell are we still dependent on oil?
It sounds good...but I'm wondering what the clause is about "family-friendly" internet. I'm all for keeping kids safe—I have kids. But there are no specifics in the sample letter. Some people have strange ideas about what should be online or kept off it. I'm just saying. I need to know more about that.
So...I downloaded the pdf from his site on that.
From "APPENDIX 3 - M2Z’S COMMITMENT TO PROTECT MINORS FROM INDECENT
MATERIAL ON M2Z’S NETWORK"
The paper references schools that monitor and restrict their charges as a model for what this M2Z service will do. Is that the model we want? We are children to be protected? All of us? Even adults using this free service?
And if you just send out tons of email? Who is making these profiles, based on what? Perhaps the guidelines are such that you and I could never be profiled as a spammer...or doing anything "indecent." But I dont know. I hope not. Is there a way to know? To address being misprofiled? Does anyone care, if you are getting "Free Internet."? Will it be like "too bad sucker! It's free! Go to PRemium service then if you do'nt like it!" ?
The pdf does not list standards beyond the scary sounding "pornographic." But you will be shut down if you don't meet them. Off the top, without further specifics, it sounds like quite a price for "Free." I wonder if there are other places or docs that list more specifics, or the man just will use his own judgment.
"Work with the authorities" if "indecent materials" are accessed!! Now that's just a tiny bit scary. Maybe I'm overreacting. Thoughts?
"M2Z seeks to put America back on the right track with our mission to provide free, fast, and family-friendly wireless broadband Internet connectivity to at least 95% of the US population."
What does family friendly mean? Does that mean if I get free internet through them I won't be able to look at porn or banned Bugs Bunny Cartoons?
but if you get free internet then the terrorists win!
#13 I think it is a good thing that the proposal is rejected. People have more of a say over there connection - and expect more - when they pay for it. There properly will be no outcry if a "free" connection is censored. I think a government sponsored nationwide wireless connection (net neutral) is a good idea. But this proposal sounds like a horrible idea that might help normalize censorship.
We already don't have net-neutrality here. Our only ISP choice is the local telephone/cable co. They don't even allow a local exchange for other dial-up ISPs (or Tivo) so AOL &/or earthlink etc is not an option.
On their dial-up and lowest tiered broadband all streaming content is blocked (they don't tell you that until after you get hooked up and find out for yourself). Until I upgraded to their $45.00 mo plan I could watch wmv & qt clips here at C&L but couldn't watch Youtube, Google video, or listen to streaming radio. And they block all torrent file sharing on all of their plans altogether somehow.
Well, I guess it's no secret that several major cities have had to back down from plans to provide residents with free internet. God forbid, anything progressive should happen in this country.
I'm not sure if Muleta's proposal is what is really needed, but one can count on the FCC turning down every proposal that doesn't come from the big corps. I'm sure that he didn't get the majority of the Fcc's attention for even 5 minutes in reality. Muleta's service comes with "filtering" and that idea sounds bad from the outset on a net neutrality basis, and he's only proposing 300 kbps (0.3 Mbps) for free, which to me is fairly slow. What we really need is what Japan, South Korea, and many European countries either have or are implementing: close to 100 Mbps to every citizen through the government with no restrictions on net neutrality. Why? Because it's good for their economies. Not their corporate economies, their aggregate economies. The USA has slipped to 13th in the world in broadband coverage (and will continue to sink further). Sort of like Sicko, isn't it?
The online petition requires that you give them your phone number. No, thanks.
Curtilingus @ 2:
Already thought about it. Or, actually use snail mail again. They don't open all those letters. (Not yet anyway.) (Rebel at heart: Question authority.)
What a misleading headline! M2Z is NOT offering free internet access. They have two options: advertisement supported and paid. I don't think ad-supported internet is free. Plus the ad-supported model is also limited to a lower speed. Paid subscribers get a higher bit rate.
And they also plan to filter access on the Internet. Isn't C&L opposed to censoring? (I seem to remember a few angry posting about AT&T censoring some concerts -- which was an accident as opposed to company policy).
knud @ 17:
Of course, doesn't the FCC already censor broadcast television and radio? We must protect the airwaves for the children!
Master @ 23:
I couldn't agree more. This is definitely not what C & L should be promoting, although it is illustrative of how the FCC and Bushco ignore anyone that is not in their club.
Master @ 24:
Yep because god forbid that Elvis Timberflake expose Janet Jackson's breast for a second.
So they are monitoring everyone.....They Are Watching..and keeping count.I know it sounds paranoid...BUT....
Every day this country is getting to be more and more like a damned banana republic. The super-rich few and the rest of us. If it isn't the effing christian in your face crap it's the corporate stranglehold on our way of life. I just want what I deserve - Life, Liberty and the persuit of Happiness. And I want to be left alone by do-gooders trying to sell me something I already own! Fuck the filters!
The CNN dufus was so irritating that I couldn't finish watching the piece. Obviously the FCC is in the hands of corporate interests. Are they trying to tell me something I didn't know ten years ago?
Broadband Internet in Japan is less expensive than it is in the U.S. This is because the government and businesses here understood, almost as soon as it was developed, that marketing was entering an entirely different level.
The greed of the rich in the U.S. is part of the problem. The other part is mostly due to voter apathy which is exacerbated by being constantly crushed by the top 1 percent.
I think it would be a great idea BUT I don't believe it will ever happen because there is simply to much money to be made.
I would rather see a raise from the ridicules $5.50 (or whatever it is) Mimimum wage that people have to work for, and the US Health System and social services fixed before any money is spent on free internet.
Of course, if it can be done without spending money (using existing infrastructure) then sure.
But if others are going to miss out, then I would rather pay my monthly bill so that people less fortunate than myself (and I only earn $250 per week) can live a slightly better lifestyle.
www.SAVEtheINTERNET.com
OK 2 Copy Protest Image at...
http://www.Rogerart.com
& PASS IT ON - IF U WANT 2 save OUR inter-net & HELP OUT
Later & Peace, Roger@RogerART.com
Comcast did the exact same thing to me. I got a call one night from a guy at comcast telling me that I was downloading too much and "abusing the service", and if I didn't stop the "abuse" my service would be shut off. I asked him how much was too much and he told me to "read my subscriber agreement". Right - I keep that at my fingertips. A month later, they suspended my service, i.e. they canceled my account. I called several people at comcast, none of whom could tell me what constituted "abuse of the service", although one alluded that I was probably running an email scam. Such nice people at comcast customer service.
In the end, I told comcast to go piss up a rope and I went to another ISP that has better speed, lower prices, and unlimited downloads.
Let's see, the telecom companies violated the law, our privacy and our civil rights by wiretapping our phones at the request of the Bush administration. What do you think the promised payoff was for them?
Upon further review, it looks like this "free internets" plan would end up helping the ISP providers not hindering. Once you get your free internets and realize you can't access the sites you used to be able to, you'll go crawling back to your ISP begging for a higher tier service and you'll gladly pay more.
Looks like they want to make a Disney Land style internets where nothing offensive to anyone is ever viewed. Looks like an attempt to turn the internets into a typical American shopping mall and nothing else.
My guess is no lefty bloggers will be allowed on this free service but you sure as hell will be able to stream Rush Limbaugh, Orally, and Hannity as well as access Blogs for Bush.
Oh, and all the religious bullshit you can possibly handle.
justabill @ 18:
I don't think different levels of bandwidth access for the internet user is the issue with net neutrality. The issue as I understand it is that, even if you personally have the best connection available, the sites you visit would also need to be paying a special rate or your connection to them would still be slow. So it's about online businesses having equal, neutral, availability to you once you are on the internet. If you are slow they all are slow, if you are fast they all are fast. It's not about everyone having the same speed of connection or if one ISP package allows streaming or not.
don't give them any ideas.
alas! I sit in a square block from some of the biggest corporation and a army recruiter office. Comcast just down a block from me. Nike Hm in the same block. I am so out of place. Nike tried to suggest a bill that would legalize banning of employees to gather together while not working to keep union from forming. With people working 12 hours shift, the people they work with become family. They see there own co-worker more than they see their real family. That proposal was shot down fast, but the nerve of even suggest it still burns me, and keep reminding me we need to free ourselves from corporates attempt to control us.
Wess @ 31:
The deal is that the internet as it is is kicking the corporate interest in the ass. They can control the cable media, but when stories of real news are leak on the internet it expose them. It would be real interesting how this next election turns out. I would rather have free internet for everyone so that the citizen become better inform of whats going on. The corporation just wage a war on the internet. Al Gore knew the importance of providing internet for everyone. The internet is becoming the forth branch of govt after the cable news and city newspaper became owned by 6 rightwing corporation. The internet is the last line of defense for Democracy. This is it, the line has been drawn here!
My 1980's Apple II self says: "I told you nothing good would come of the HTML crap! It's back to reading usenet newsgroup feeds for me! ...and I want my CompuServe account back too! Anything faster than 300 baud isn't needed!"
Sadly, much of Rural America can't get broadband internet...we need another "electrification" project for the entire country. Which Dem will support this?
Special note to comcast and other ISP's: Nerds vote...pissed off Nerds vote & hack...if you piss off one of the Head Nerds, they'll pwn you...
oh....so comcast bans users who download too much, but do nothing to stop the spam or viruses that come through their network
eff these guys
and this free internet wouldnt really be free...it would be paid for by advertising....just like tv
another reason why a dem must be pres
I can't say all this controlling the inet talk bothers me much. If they can't provide the service I require, I'll just keep my 55 bucks a month I pay for a 12mbit connection. Though losing my XBOX live connection would blow.
The inet has changed so much already since I started surfing about 10+ years ago. It used to be a lot more fun years ago, being kinda on the cutting edge so to speak. Pubstro's and torrents are still one nice feature.
That's the same sort of line of crap that I got from a local mini-ISP, a line of sight distributor when I lived in Boquete, Panamá.
When they came out to do a site survey, I asked about download limits.
¿ Their response ?
' Just be a good neighbor and we won't have to penalize you.'
¿ Think I signed up with them ?
No way.
Allen McDonald, El Galloviejo®
Why is the world filled with morons? This helps nobody in the long run.
the robber baron era is back in full swing. We need public financing of elections to get rid of these monopolists. Free internet will help bring people out of poverty by giving them the skills needed for good paying jobs
Oh hell. I am feeling like we should just nationalize it like the highway system. Yeah, it's THAT important.
The Comcast news is pure crap, timed precisely to demonstrate that the bandwidth problem IS OUR FAULT, as Comcast, Verizon, and AT&S gear up to take ownership of the Web. If you have been with Comcast for any length of time, you'll know that it prided itself on bringing us faster and faster speeds. Now Comcast will demonize the users.
How much is the Comcast CEO making per year, by the way?
Kudos to John Muleta, however, ours is a society that allows stolen elections, "free trade" that is free to corporations only, corporate welfare, corporate war profiteering, and the destruction of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. He doesn't have enough money to contend with the wealth and influence of Comcast/Verizon/AT&T.
trez @ 44:
Actually, it does. It helps politicians, mostly the RNC and the GOP. They want the internet regulated and fee-based ... because at the moment, *anyone* can post / read anything, including political dissent. That's the key. They're hiding behind a mantra of 'It's Capitilism', but what it really is, is a plan to price internet access so that the 'common user' (read: voter) would no longer be truly informed by having unfettered an open access to independent blogs and news sites ... because they will have been priced out of existence.
Wake up, people .. it's may always be about the Almight Dollar, but this time the main objective is to prevent independent news and bloggers from posting freely ....
Senator Durbin from Illinois is working on a local initiative to increase broadband access, in Southern Illinois, known as ConnectSI. Although under construction, it is growing.
& isnt the "tiered service" really just a protection racket?
btw i wish i had not signed that petition; ive already received 3 spams from them since last night.
& i dont beleive in "family friendly filters".
I have a question about this. If Comcast wants to control who connects to what at a high speed, how would this affect companies that require employees to log in and work from home, while on-call? It sounds to me that if a site 'pays up', they get fast connections. Would companies see their internet access fees increase if they wanted 'fast connection speeds'? How would this affect health companies that are moving to internet based claims submission, enrollment, claims status, appointment scheduling etc..???
I got news for Comcast. If my internet experience changes one damned bit, unless the company I work for agrees to pay for it in it's entirety, I will simply cancel my account. Period. I had 'dial up' way back when and wont go back to those speeds again, even if the sites I frequent (like this one) and shit on by Comcast.
Seems like stupid policy if in this day and age 1/3 of adult Americans don't have internet access. Granted free internet access is not guaranteed by the Constitution but now-a-days not much is guaranteed by the Constitution. They already have commercials on the pay internet so not sure how much different a free internet would be except maybe they'd have a few more commercials.
I'm not sure why the family friendly filters are needed since there is already software out there that does that. I'm guessing to not only block out Mickey's Disney but also Porn Disney as well because Disney is not really family friendly with the prices they charge.
I worry more about Google's monitoring than the Feds monitoring anyway.
We've all heard of Fractional Reserve Banking, well now we have Fractional Reserve Bandwidth. These jackasses, like the bank does with loans, is allowed to sell more bandwidth than they actually have. They sell you "unlimited" usage, but obviously, if everyone were to use the internet 24/7, they wouldn't have the bandwidth for it. So, why is a company, in this case an ISP, allowed to sell a service it can't deliver? Isn't that fraud? Sounds like it to me. If I were a personal chef, and was hired to cook for a guy whenever he was hungry, I'd get fired/sued if I told him "no, you eat too much".
This is a complex issue, and I don't know if I would muddy the waters by mixing the M2Z and Comcast stories together. However, I do know that the Comcast action is caused, in part, by a limitation in the cable Internet network architecture. Because cable users share aggregate bandwidth over a cable segment, users who use a lot of bandwidth limit the availability of bandwidth for others on the same segment. In contrast, DSL or FiOS (or even dialup) customers have their own dedicated connection to the servers which then connect them to the Internet. It's possible to add server capacity if demand increases (but it costs the provider, and that's why there are contract limitations). It may not be as easy (if it's possible at all) to increase the cable segment aggregate bandwidth, and that's why Comcast and other cable Internet providers are reacting so strongly.
"net neutrality" issues will go away when every packet over the Internet is explicitly paid for by either a producer or a consumer, or (as was the case with voice) a manageable growth rate or upper limit can be seen on bandwidth requirements. Currently, there are no economic incentives that limit increased bandwidth usage, so everyone is using all the bandwidth they can. Why not - it's "free". So we have simple web pages that are 50MB, with sound and HD video. This exploding usage puts pressure on network suppliers to build infrastructure, but with no guarantee of cost recovery.
If consumers or producers had to pay for every packet, you can bet that everyone would be more careful about usage, and that the infrastructure pressure would lessen. We'd have less spam as a result as well.
fwacbar @ 51:
Insurance and health companies will be able to afford it, and then just pass the extra cost onto the customers. So they won't be affected. What will be affected, is our ability to have a choice in where we go. Sites like C&L will either have to charge money for its service, or become so ad infested as to make the site worthless. They, the people in charge, don't like the concept of an open forum where people can share ideas and experiences, mostly negative experiences when dealing with corporate America.
The story about the woman having her comcast service cut-off for "overuse" is quite disturbing. Especially since they won't say what the limits are which trigger such action. This smells to me like a situation ready for abusing our free speech--anyone who is downloading content that they don't approve of, like liberal videos (i.e. like this site) can be cut off for the same reason.
Meanwhile Comcast simply sucks. My wife switched our household over so that we get ALL our information services (phone, cable, internet) through them. I've been noticing that when I call 411, it doesn't just give me the number, but it also first has a smarmy woman's voice, saying "Welcome to Comcast digital information services...". They purposefully make it difficult for you to actually write down the number--immediately after the voice says the number, it goes on to tell about a variety of other options you have, including for them to just dial the number for you. And sometimes, if you have to get help from a human, at the end of the call, the voice comes back with some kind of a smarmy sing-song slogan, ending in an actual schriek, scream, squeal--extremely obnoxious and off-putting. It's so obvious that they are just getting us habituated to putting up with listening to CRAP like advertizing before we get the information we are want. I'm ready to go off comcast completely. We just got Verizon FIOS in our town, so maybe I'll try that.
John
Wait a minute, isn't the big selling point for broadband internet access is that you can download all kinds of cool video and music and stuff? At least, that's what they tell you so that you'll plunk down the 40 bucks a month, isn't it? Cut off for using too much bandwidth?? WTF!!??? Oh, and about this:
The benefits of this plan are great. I know the capitalistic mind always cringes at the word “free”, but think of the boost such a service could offer to online retailers.
For your average capitalist numbskull, the golden rule is : "Free for me but not for thee"
Lou Mazz @ 54:
Oh, I get, Lou! It's OK for the cable and telecom companies to promise you all kinds of neat services and charge you accordingly, but when you actually USE them, then the whip comes down and your service (for which you pay 40 bucks or more a month)is cut off. And you're OK with this, huh Lou?? Hey everybody, meet Lou - another free market jackoff who thinks it's perfectly OK for our Corporate overlords to rip us off. Gee Lou, I guess the next thing you're gonna tell us is since this is America, if we don't like the deal we're getting, we can just go and start our own telecom service, eh? Pay for every packet?? Be my guest. That'll be the day I stop using the Internet.
I wonder what kind of armor those cables have? Telecom companies seem kind of vulnerable. I think that ignorance of history is running rampant. As I understand it the phone companies in the early days had to just about give away service in some areas to create self interest to protect their lines. As more and more people feel dispossessed and angry one wonders.
How long before the US starts to suffer from brain drain? Patriotism scmatriotism. We are sinking in services, education, and the ever elusive "moral clarity" that folks who know which side the bread is buttered on crave. Meanwhile, we are increasingly authoritarian, fanatically anti-intellectual and religiously dogmatic. We all know we are not pulling in the best and brightest from overseas anymore, but what will the US do if our homegrown best and the brightest seeker greener pastures? Cream floats to the top my profs always told me ... and if the US is not longer tops, well, there you go.
Carmikl @ 34:
Your right this is the payoff.
Your companies are crimainls. In bed with criminals to make everyone into suspected criminals.
User Loser @ 59:
Oh if a company did what your companiesdo here they yes we would cut their lines and services. Physically.
Imagine cutting off people internet. assholes.
we are losing our last great hope. and it goes without a bang, without fireworks, or noticeable protest, it goes out with a whimper, we are all fucked.
The FCC plan is to reduce competition to a duopoly and then, when asked about things like net neutrality, the FCC says "let the marketplace decide", fully aware that their policies is to eliminate competition. There needs to be an investigation whether there was a quid pro quo between telco/cable and the government for the reduced competition and any wiretapping.
Also, since our democracy is manipulated by the corporate media so that we choose between two corporate financed candidates, the broadcast model involving restraint of competition and media consolidation is being force fitted onto the internet in order to drive up the costs of mass communications, so that corporations can retain their undue influence on what Americans see and hear, in oder to control what they think and vote. Right now, many Americans are required to buy a product they don't want (phone CATV) in order to not be price gouged on internet. In my area, measured use phone and DSL is cheaper than "naked" DSL.
Since our politicians have been elected through the corporate financing, don't count on them doing anything if we don't hound them.
I'm gobsmacked, to use a word I've dragged with me to down under. Turning off someone's access for 'excessive' downloads is like, well, turning off someone's electricity for watching too many DVDs, or turning off someone's water for taking too many baths, or turning off someone's phone for making too many calls to gossip with the neighbours, or refusing someone entry into a grocery store because you've bought too many peas that month. It's... stupid, even from a mindlessly greedy capitalist point of view. One of the conditions of the job I took in New Zealand was unlimited access to high-speed broadband, which The Boss had already taken for granted I would want and need. But then, this is New Zealand, where they're not quite so paranoid about controlling the public's access to information...
[...] Telecom Giants Trying To Block Free InternetOn CNN s In the Money, John Muleta, who is the founder and CEO of M2Z media was talking about the telecom giants trying to block his companies plans of providing free, high-speed, wireless internet to the entire nation. … Tags:Share This [...]
I'm a free market believer and I love the idea of a company providing free wireless internet. As long as they're not getting government subsidies of any kind; this is exactly the kind of competition the market place needs.
I find it very frustrating when I can't sign a petition because my address isn't in the US. This FCC stuff really affects we expats tremendously!
The government is terrified of a free information net and has been equating Islamic extremism to it for several months now. It is just a matter of time before it is under the control of the Homeland Security office. When the net goes, so will go the last vestige of freedom in the USA.
With sites like I-Tunes and other sites where people can download music and TV shows (some of them very large in size) in mind. Isn't Comcast's cutting off users internet access interfering with inter-state commerce?
Doesn't Congress usually fight anything that prevents, diminishes or limits inter-state commerce?
I signed it, but I like my porn, so I still plan to pay. This will help to break the monopolistic stranglehold of the current ISPs.
[...] Telecom Giants Trying to Block Free Internet [Crooks and Liars] [...]
This seems like another one of those issues that everyone gets upset about, but no one does anything about it.
www.savetheinternet.com
Write as many of your politicians as you can.
http://crashburnalley.com/?p=26
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