What happened before net neutrality?

Why does it matter so much. I support the idea but don't understand what it adds. We where fine before it(Americas phone companies have always been monopolistic because the government underestimated there significance) and it seems that improvements to other antitrust regulations would be more effective. This question is mainly for supporters because it seems like a question easily answered by anti net neutrality guys.

The internet is fine without (((net neutrality))). Government kikes that want more control over what we view are trying to convince you that le porn will stop being available if they don't get what they want.

de facto standard - when a industry standard is established by consumer demand as opposed to government imposed standards (example - VHS vs Betamax or Blu-Ray vs HD-DVD)

that's how network neutrality worked before - there wasn't strict legal regulations enforcing it, customers simply expected and demanded it and threw a shit-fit if they didn't get it. most of the times the FCC got involved were over cases where the shit an ISP was doing was in direct violation of their declared terms and services.

There are stronger incentives for ISPs to discriminate data today, mostly because of high res video content.

This is bullshit, net neutrality is what we basically have-- that ISP's can't charge you extra or throttle your bandwidth for specific sites. For instance, since AT&T owns DirecTV, if Time Warner cable came out with their own streaming service, AT&T isn't allowed to slow your bandwidth for TWC streaming down to 2kbps while leaving DirecTV streaming at normal speed, say 20Mbps

But what control would the government gain through net neutrality.

>We where fine before it


Verizon, Comcast and a number of other ISPs were actively involved in subverting the Gentleman's Agreement that represents how the industry observed NN on its own.

This went to court in Verizon's case and the FCC lost on the basis that they should set their Net Neutrality rules in stone and shift ISPs to Title 2.

The Anti-NN shills here keep pushing the narrative that the FCC just up and one day decided they wanted to have to set NN rules in stone and fight the ISPs, this narrative is a made-up one.

The ISPs fired the first shots in this war and now they have a paid shill and former employee at the head of the FCC about to tear into the protections that were made rule specifically to protect us against them.

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This seems like a fair point. But data grows as tech grows. High quality video is the equivalent of a photo back in the earl 90s(bandwidth wise)

(((Net Neutrality))) =/= net neutrality

Internet was fine and traffic was treated equally for 30 years with only a handful cases of ISPs trying to pull shady shit, giving the FCC broad, overreaching regulatory power was a mistake and if we don't repeal the 2015 regulatory expansions it'll end up biting us in the ass the next time the far left gains a foothold in the federal government.

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So net neutrality is a way to enforce anti trust laws?

>Make a retarded number of regulations and grant a few corporations monopoly status
>Get scared at what they could do now that you made them so powerful
>Instead of taking away their power you just create more regulations (co-drafted by the corporations you're in the pocket of) which further keep other businesses from competing
really makes you think.

>nothing will change without net neutrality
so why not leave it how it is then?

No, net neutrality is a doctrine that has long governed how the internet works on a fundamental level. When the US ISPs ran out of traditional ways to expand and profit and realized they were big enough to throw around their weight under Title 1 they started to screw with these gentleman's agreements in nasty ways. The FCC made them rules to counteract this.

The big ISPs need to be broken up by way of Anti-trust but in the meantime, NN let them keep their empire but made them a modicum more benevolent.

This is exactly what I think. It seems that people are focusing on a nothing burger rather than trying to rally for a diversified market. Then again, explaining to people that big companies are bad is relatively easy.

Check your reading comprehension - shit was fine before 2015, it'll be fine after we repeal the 2015 legislation

did you see this? sounds like things were far from fine

Sounds fine to me. ISP fucks up and then gets fucked. What will net neutrality add to the process.

>and then gets fucked up
*by the regulators

To add to this. It seems like these problems were dealt with current regulation.

>>Make a retarded number of regulations and grant a few corporations monopoly status

Retarded by what standard? ISPs manage one of the most important resources of the 21st Century, do you not think it should have significant rules?

>grant a few corporations monopoly status

It has been granted on the ground by local governments that are anti-NN in principle and by the ISPs gobbling up eachother

>>Get scared at what they could do now that you made them so powerful
>scared

The FCC was actively challenging ISPs like Verizon in open court, how were they "scared"?

>>Instead of taking away their power

We should be pushing for stronger Anti-Trust in the US, yes tht is not the issue in dispute

> you just create more regulations

The courts told them to do so if they had any hope of stopping the ISPs from screwing over their customers, and so they did.

I think this is a major problem with libertarians.

Not all markets are suitable to an environment of perfect competition. Most places in the US will have 2 or 3 ISP's. Some of the rural areas will have 1. There is not really much competition in this scenario.

There is such a thing as a natural monopoly. Some markets just tend to favor one or two big players, instead of lots of little players

This is why the US telephone(and by extension the internet) market is so bad. It needs improvement in order to keep the USA ahead. But I fear no one cares.

I feel like if they go all the way through with the whole various subscriptions level of internet, many will just hack, dox and DDOS the ever loving fuck out of the corporations.

Remember when AT&T tried to block Sup Forums? It was horrific for them.

And how is no NN a step for more choice? Fucking ISPs want to monopolize the god damn internet, something they didn't create, nor develop, in fact, they drive innovation down. They actively plot against Google Fiber.
The whole point for NN is a step towards freedom of choice.

Yes these are natural monopolies but they constantly collude with each other. But I'm sure more providers could exist than currently.

I like what Google was trying, I felt it was good for the market. But nn wouldn't stop the monopolies from shutting it down.

The big game changer is that the telecommunication companies are looking to merge with media companies. The internet may be fine right now, but they're going to change that. One jew wants to take control of the internet using the government, another jew wants to merge their media companies with the ISP's and take control that way. They're both working towards similar goals using different tactics.

Who were apparently perfectly capable of doing their job in 99% of cases with the regulations that already existed.

Supporters of the 2015 bill are asking the rest of us to accept an incredible expansion of the FCC's power to impose standards on ISPs while leaving the door wide open for them to expand the language of the regulation to include regulating content and content providers down the line.

What happens if the next administration declares that peer-sharing software isn't in line with their accepted standards? Under the 2015 bill they would have the power and authority to force ISPs to ban p2p traffic outright. Or what happens if they decide to label certain sites and services as a 'threat' to the security and neutrality of the internet?

The problem that supporters of the bill don't seem to grasp is that while giving power to the government is easy, taking that power back when the government starts abusing it is almost impossible.

Can you please explain how nn opens the door for more regulations?

And what about all the startups who can't meet the FCC's new standards? What if I wanted to start a new ISP that specialized in one particular type of traffic, say, video streaming. There's definitely a market for that, a lot of people might like something like that as an alternative to cable if it could be made affordable... but under the FCC regulations if I my network isn't able to provide unrestricted access to all types of traffic, my company isn't allowed to operate. How is that conducive to competition? Shouldn't I, as a consumer, have the freedom to choose a service like that if I want?

The 2015 bill will do for the next twenty years of the internet what the 1996 telecom bill did for the last twenty - it'll force dozens of competitors out while benefiting a handful of major ISPs with deep pockets for lobbying.

This seems like a good argument. I never thought of specialization. But wouldn't ISP try to compete at being the best possible in all suits. Leading to the decrease in bandwidth for less used sites in order to appear faster.

Regulations aren't the same as laws - they're much easier to change and expand and in most cases only require approval from the regulating agency as opposed to a congressional vote. The 2015 bill changed the law to greatly expand the power the FCC has to enforce its regulations, and the FCC can change those regulations with little effort.

If it was a bill giving the Department of Education more power to enforce curriculum standards on public schools we'd all be outraged.
If it was a bill giving the ATF greater power to enforce regulations on gun stores and manufacturers we'd all be taking to the streets.
But because it's about the internet and because the left has done such a successful job of painting this issue as "if you don't support our bill you don't support network neutrality" we're divided as a community.

>What happened before net neutrality?
pic related

Net Neutrality is now a necessary evil, but it is nonetheless evil. It is another layer of regulation and the government now has to bolster the FCCs capability to monitor the internet and enforce NN.

And government intervention into the market is why this fucking problem exists in the first place.

The government subsidized "common carriers" infrastructure builds... and only a few major carriers got to build and own it. In return, the big carriers had to allow smaller and local service providers to use their lines. This had to be enforced by FCC...

so guess what the big boys did? They threw their own bought and paid for operatives into government to work as the regulators... and they rigged the system to stay in the hands of the big mega corporations... like a legalized monopoly with no choices for the people...

NN as a law is just another boondoggle that's destroying natural market forces... right now the US is not even in the top 10 in internet speeds... meanwhile shit-tier soviet bloc countries like Romania are top 5.

Regulation is STUPID for this industry and it is what put us in this mess with no competition or choices.

>But wouldn't ISP try to compete at being the best possible in all suits.
Do all vehicle manufacturers try to compete at being the best at all possible vehicles, or do some specialize in cheap sedans, flashy sports cars, etc?

Capitalism is all about finding your niche - for some companies that's doing a lot of things alright, for others it's doing one thing really really well

That makes sense. So nn could be changed in the future to whatever the government wants?

I'm not supprised the government is trying to put a band aid over a bullet hole. I just hope it is temporary.

Is it better for us to have the temporary solution of granting the FCC the power to regulate ISPs to such a high degree while guaranteeing nn but risking problems down the line from the left taking over and passing bullshit regulations, or long term solution of letting capitalism occur? I feel that ISPs would most certainly abuse the freedom of fast lanes and what not, but I'm also fearful of the current monopolies expanding further without and restrictions

How many times can you think of where the federal government gave up power after it was granted it?

The regulations wouldn't stop monopolization but it would stop monopolies from slowing certain things down for whatever reason. If the monopolies were broken up this wouldn't be a problem.

If only there was some kind of FEDERAL regulatory agency that dealt with TRADE, some kind of COMMISSION that specialized in anti-trust law.

But, since no such agency exists, I guess we'll just have to give the FCC more power.

It easy to get them to give it up, all it takes is decades of complaining and elections. Like taking meat from a starving wolf.

What does Sup Forums think of the type 2 utility classification. I personally think that the internet is a utility.