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Tech at Night: Google back on the Net Neutrality train. Anonymous declares war on Israel.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  November 18th, 2012 at 04:00 AM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Tech at Night

Hey everyone. Sorry for not doing this Friday night. I was a bit out of it. So, we’re doing this Saturday night.

Some people just don’t learn, though. Google is still defending Net Neutrality incredibly enough. So are Facebook and Netflix, by the way (shameless plug for Amazon Prime streaming alternative).

Of course, there’s a problem here: Google’s PAC splits evenly D/R in donations, but The people of Google lean so far left they gave $737k to Obama, versus $31k to Romney. Think about that. Mo wonder they’re still trying to feed a beast of regulation that may try to break it up.

If anything does in Bay area innovators, it’ll be their slavish devotion to big-government Democrats.

Looks like the Congress is busy in the lame duck setting up for the next session, since nothing major changed in the elections. The outgoing Republican Study Committee has made an important statement on copyright, one that agrees greatly with my own views on it at least. Naturally for that reason I like it. They recognize that copyright is good, important, and Constitutional, but must also be tuned not to maximize copyright. Copyright can go too far, when it goes beyond the Constitutional mandate of encouraging works.

Of course, copyright can go not far enough, as well, such as in the Internet Radio Fairness Act (IRFA), now opposed by Marsha Blackburn and CAGW. Pandora and other Internet streamers want to get a special provision of law giving them government-mandates lower rates they must pay copyright holders. It’s absurd and should not pass, at all.

Regular readers may remember in the past I’ve been cautious about IRFA, not taking a clear stand. It’s because I wasn’t sure if there weren’t existing regulations that this was simplifying. It’s not the case. This is just people wanting cheaper stuff because it’s the Internets. No sale.

Headline of the week so far: Democrats troubled by Verizon’s free speech argument in net-neutrality case. Yeah, that’s about it, isn’t it? Rights-based arguments trouble those trying to expand the power of the state.

Meanwhile, something I called early: FCC dancing according to the strings of Soros-funded fringe groups, now planning to dictate to the states what rates phones in prisons can charge.

Regulation is a mess right now, so it’s sad (but predictable) that Senate Democrats have defeated Internet regulatory reform. The Internet is good for people, and we must protect it from government.

Well, in the meantime, Congressional oversight will continue in the House.

We’ll close with reports that Anonymous has declared war on Israel. Ooooooh boy. Um. Guys? You say “We do not forget.” They say “Never again.” Time to learn not to sit with your back to a door, kiddies.

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COMMENTS

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  • dpmaine

    > Regular readers may remember in the past I’ve been cautious about

    > IRFA, not taking a clear stand. It’s because I wasn’t sure if there

    > weren’t existing regulations that this was simplifying. It’s not the

    > case. This is just people wanting cheaper stuff because it’s the

    > Internets. No sale.

    Can you clarify this for all of us? My understanding was that over the air radio pays Copyright holders nothing, yet over the internet radio has to pay royalties. Is this is just trying to get us closer to a level playing field (i.e. royalty free distribution via internet or regular radio)?

  • Dave_A

    For organizations like Google or Netflix, the ‘Net Neutrality’ thing is a pure business decision.

    A world where they have to pay large ISPs for customers to have access to their services, or where traffic to/from Google or Netflix is throttled in the name of plussing up a monopolist-ISP’s walled-garden… Is not good for their business…

    They are not ISPs (well, Google is – but only in Kansas City), they are strictly content providers…

    A return to AOL-style ‘online services’ from an open-internet is not in their interest… A world where ‘all packets are equal on the internet’ is…

  • dpmaine

    I am clear that copyright applies, but a radio station does not pay the recording artist anything. It pays publishers, not the copyright holder, via ASCAP, if I remember correctly.

    Isn’t this bill trying to get Pandora et all to pay closer to what Radio pays performing artists (which is zero)?

  • dpmaine

    I don’t see this as a private property issue. It’s hard to argue that government should be “kept out”, when since 1995 Congress hasn’t been able to resist meddling in this matter. Compulsory licensing is already forced upon private copyright holders across the board.

    Congress decided (recently, just in 1995) that public performances (including digital transmission by satellite or internet radio, Pandora and others) would have to pay a royalty to performers that others who employ radio broadcast would not. SoundExchange sets the rates and collects the fees. It’s really a fairness issue. Why shouldn’t radio have to abide by SoundExchange rates, and pay performers like internet radio? Why is one a preferred government protected, and the other is not? Why should internet radio pay more than satellite radio? Why should satellite radio pay more than radio?

    If the principle involved is keeping government out of private property, that’s entirely reasonable, and the answer is to force radio and many others to pay the performers, just like composers, and to unwind the government created monopoly on royalty collection for performances – SoundExchange. A good second step is to undo monopoly exceptions that allow ASCAP and BMI to operate largely without competition.

    I have read the proposed bill and it’s exactly like others approved by the Republican Congresses that have come before it, directing SoundExchange to negotiate with various licensees, and setting rates and exceptions.

    It seems a little late to try to oppose this on principle. The entire system is anti-private property. The only question now is to make it more or less fair to one group or businesses or the other. If we are to respect the copyright holders wish their wishes are almost uniformly opposed to any compulsory licensing in any form.

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    You want gov’t to direct people to negotiate to results they don’t want.

    And what if they don’t? Nationalize them?

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    Funny how you’re the same guy who’s always badmouthing small government. You try to dismiss efforts to oppose Obamacare exchanges, you’re standing up for big government here.

    I think you’re a troll.

  • dpmaine

    Sorry I offended you, however, I suspect you can’t quote me ever badmouth small government. It’s not the case.

    Secondly, I try to operate on facts. I am skeptical that Governors will be able to resist Obamacare subsidies once other states start getting them. This isn’t bad mouth or dismissing them.

    What is the standard? Is it ra-ra enthusiasm required?

    I have responded below on the merits of the policy you are supporting.

  • lineholder

    Neil, I have an IT question but it doesn’t pertain to the topic at hand. Any IT industry buzz about how far along the federal government is on setting up the public health insurance exchange? What I’ve seen indicated (but not stated) is that it isn’t progressing according to desired schedule (shocker, huh?)

    DHHS has a self-imposed deadline to have the exchange up and running by Oct 2013 for open enrollment period. If the feds are running behind…I’m wondering how much this might have to do with extending the deadline to R Governors. Are they hoping they R Governors cave and feds can disburse job duties across the states and it will pick up the pace? If that doesn’t happen and feds carry the responsibility, how much of a delay are we talking about? If the delay is 12 months out from current projected deadline, that would put it right after the midterm elections, wouldn’t it? What happens to the individual mandate tax if real-time “go date” is postponed?

    Just wondering if your high tech ear is hearing anything about this.

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    Well, I’m convinced.

    I haven’t seen such butthurt since the height of the Net Neut debate.

    Down with IRFA. The science is settled.

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    I’m not hearing a lot about medical care stuff, no. All I know is that HIIPA was probably a bad thing, which isn’t a whole lot to know.

  • nesalo

    As copyright is a government-granted monopoly, and not a natural property right, I’m not sure that that’s meaningful.

  • nesalo

    As I mentioned above, copyright is not property. It never has been property. And as long as the Constitution says what it says about copyright — that it’s a government monopoly granted to “secure the progress of science and the useful arts” — it never will be property.

    If you’d like intellectual property to be “property,” amend the constitution. Until then, “ownership” arguments are basically inapplicable.

  • jackm

    The defining characteristic of the Internet is the freedom of the CONSUMER to use whatever web site that the CONSUMER chooses. Not Verizon. Not AT&T. Not Comcast.

    If Verizon were to get its way, then they would set up their own Amazon.com and make sure that the consumer’s connection to Amazon would drop out at random intervals.

    Maybe it doesn’t bother the editors of Redstate.com that Verizon or Comcast are given monopolistic powers and run Amazon out of business. But what if the shoe was on the other foot, and Verizon were to be targeting Redstate.com, using their new found power to deprive this web site of page views?

    I live as a free American. And as a free American, I am free to use the public roads to drive to whatever taco stand I want. Who in their right mind would give the owner of the concrete curb — the thin line between my driveway and the roadway — to limit my choice of taco providers?

    Ditto the freedom to visit whatever online bookseller, or online political site, or online auto parts seller that I, as the consumer want. THAT IS NETWORK NEUTRALITY!

  • jackm

    Such a world, where web sites have to send money to ISPs to avoid getting blacklisted is not very good for consumers either. Or democracy.

  • dpmaine

    Just be very careful. The author of this series has very thin skin on being challenged, it seems.

    I tend to agree with your viewpoint, and it’s to conclude that the author of the diary really has a grasp of the copyright, licensing, and fairness issues at stake.

    It’s one thing to oppose the bill because it’s a bad solution to the problem, or because you’d rather a bigger solution, or because whatever. But to say you oppose the bill because basically people on the Internets want something for free (which, other people get for free), it’s just not reality based.

    Thanks for posting in this thread. I don’t suppose it will end well but it’s good to have a more detailed analysis of the situation posted so clearly.

    There is a huge upside for conservatives to own this issue, and to drive a wedge down the middle of the democratic coalition, but so far we are too stupid to pick up on and it run. I am sure in the next two years Democrats plan on picking up the Silicon Valley side and changing the laws to suit their needs. The recording industry and movie industry are being dwarfed by online services and now by video games – when you consider that Halo 4 just released recently had an opening that would have made it the biggest movie release weekend of all time, and that these are growing in size and frequency, it’s not hard to see which way the wind blows.. protecting the dying terrestrial radio model that is supported by Clear Channel et all is not a long-term strategy.

  • Dave_A

    @dpmaine:

    Google is opposed to the theoretical pay2play world, mainly because as a content provider they’d be paying….

    It’s a thorny issue, in that from a pure conservative-ideology/property-rights perspective ‘no company should be forced to do anything with their property that they do not want to’…

    However, from a ‘preserve the Internet as an open marketplace of ideas’ perspective, requiring the ISPs to serve as content-neutral common-carriers makes sense…

    And then there’s the fact that the overwhelming majority of ISPs are granted government-protected-monopolies, as they are ‘regulated utilities’ (eg POTS-phone & cable companies. Wireless is near-irrelevant in the home-internet market)….

    My bigger beef, is with the folks who think the whole debate is about ‘government trying to censor the internet’… Which has never, ever been in the picture, outside of Alex-Jonesland….

    Reality is, it’s about unbundled content providers vs access providers that prefer to offer a bundled-only world…

    In the end, I sway towards pro-neutrality ALMOST ENTIRELY because of the fact that the ISPs are all old-line public utilities, but am not exactly ‘for’ the FCC being the ones implementing….

    Personally, I would much rather it be a plain old law, with accusations of violations being handled in civil court (not by regulatory fiat)….

  • Dave_A

    It would be nice if, besides dpmaine and jackm, we could get someone to post the actual regs for terrestrial radio vs internet radio…

    IMHO, *if* there is government meddling creating a ‘special case’ for terrestrial radio (eg, if there is compulsory low-rate licensing for FM, and an open-market for sat/internet… Or if terrestrial radio is exempted from paying licensing fees to one or more rights-holders that ‘everyone else’ has to pay), that’s wrong…

    Of course, the question is, what to do about it… IMHO the right thing to do would be to repeal the law ‘protecting’ terrestrial radio – not to create even more compulsory licensing law…

    How ever, *IF* there is no ‘government’ reason why the rates are different, and it’s just the copyright holders sticking it to internet radio… Well, that’s their right & no law should be passed… As for the rights-holders in this scenario – it’s their right, but ‘Good luck with that, long-term’ – the free market tends to adjust such things rather ruthlessly….