People in the TV business know what happens when someone in a rush to get something, anything done by a deadline puts out a half-baked product that is doomed to failure. Ask anyone involved with just about any show that has debuted on NBC in the last few years, only to be pulled a few weeks later. So when the minds behind hundreds of TV shows tells the FCC Chairman that his plan for net neutrality needs a rewrite, maybe he should listen. [More]
net neutrality
Comcast Brags About Net Neutrality Commitment, Fails To Mention Legal Obligation To Neutrality
By 5.13.14
Dear Comcast: Please stop bragging about how your company is dedicated to net neutrality. You’re not. As a condition of your merger with NBC, you are legally obligated to follow the recently gutted net neutrality guidelines through 2018. This is like a prisoner saying she’s a supporter of wearing orange uniforms, or someone sentenced to community service saying he really believes in keeping our highways clean. Yet this hasn’t stopped Comcast from taking out ads trying to turn this obligation into a positive. [More]
FCC Chair May Be Softening Stance On Ridiculous Internet Fast Lane Proposal
By 5.12.14
Since it was revealed that FCC Chair Tom Wheeler’s new net neutrality proposal includes allowances for “fast lanes,” in which deep-pocketed content companies can pay extra for faster and better access to customers, he’s taken heat from tech companies, consumer advocates, lawmakers, and even members of his own commission. Now comes news that Wheeler may be up to relaxing his stance on this issue. [More]
Web Host Protests Botched Net Neutrality By Throttling FCC To Dial-Up Speeds
By 5.9.14
The FCC’s pending net neutrality proposal would allow Internet service providers to provide “fast lane” access to websites and online services willing to pay a premium. In response to this idea, which is counter the entire notion of an open Internet, the folks at one web hosting service have decided to open a “slow lane” just for people working at the FCC. [More]
A Second Large Coalition Calls On White House & FCC To Not Screw Up Net Neutrality
By 5.8.14
The day after around 150 Internet and tech companies asked FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to remove discriminatory loopholes from his net neutrality proposal, another large coalition — comprised of everything from consumer advocates to educators to Reddit to… the Harry Potter Alliance — has written to both Wheeler and President Obama, calling for the FCC to drop the controversial plan to allow Internet “fast lanes.” [More]
Two FCC Commissioners Voice Concerns About Net Neutrality Proposal
By 5.8.14
Next week, the full FCC is scheduled to vote on commission Chairman Tom Wheeler’s controversial proposal for new net neutrality rules. But judging by comments made this week by two of Wheeler’s fellow commissioners, it looks like this proposal won’t be moving forward without changes. [More]
Amazon, Google, Reddit, Netflix, 4Chan, Dozens Others, Plead With FCC To Protect Net Neutrality
By 5.7.14
In perhaps the most motley crew (as opposed to Mötley Crüe) of tech and Internet companies ever assembled for a single cause, around 150 businesses representing everything from content and infrastructure to gaming, crowdfunding and 3-D printing have written the FCC to ask that it not completely screw up net neutrality. [More]
Sen. Al Franken Calls Net Neutrality “The Free Speech Issue Of Our Time”
By 5.7.14
While FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler works to make Verizon’s skewed vision of net neutrality real, Senator Al Franken of Minnesota has made an impassioned plea to the American people to stand up against the notion that deep-pocketed companies should have better and faster access to Internet users than everyone else. [More]
FCC Chairman: I’d Rather Give In To Verizon’s Definition Of Net Neutrality Than Fight
By 4.30.14
With every word he writes, recently installed FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler shows he has little interest or belief in net neutrality as most consumers understand it. In another flimsy attempt at defending his position on “fast lanes” — i.e., allowing Internet service providers to charge more to content companies seeking priority access to end-users — Wheeler contends that consumers should do what Verizon and other telecoms want because well, it could take a while to do it correctly. [More]
Stories You Might Have Missed Because You Were Too Busy Being Awesome
April 26, 2014
We post a lot of stories during the week, and we know that most of you have jobs, families, lives, hobbies, nagging itches and other more important things to do than read every single thing we write. So for those who might be playing catch-up on the weekend, here are some of the things you might have missed… [More]
You Know Who Made A Great Case Against Internet Fast Lanes? The FCC
By 4.25.14
Judging by new FCC Chair Tom Wheeler’s vision of net neutrality, one might think the commission has no understanding of the very concept it is claiming to try to enforce. But that wasn’t so only a few years ago, when the FCC laid out a version of neutrality that is very, very different from the snake oil Wheeler is attempting to sell as a cure-all tonic. [More]
FCC Chairman Insults Consumers’ Intelligence With Attempt To Defend Flimsy Net Neutrality
By 4.24.14
Today, FCC Chair Tom Wheeler is walking around to the offices of his fellow commissioners and passing out freshly mimeographed copies of his proposal for new net neutrality rules. He’s also typed up, presumably on a trusty Imperial A, a defense of his baffling decision to disregard the whole “neutrality” aspect of net neutrality by allowing deep-pocket content companies to pay for “fast lane” access. [More]
FCC Makes Mockery Of Net Neutrality With Proposal To Allow Internet “Fast Lanes”
By 4.23.14
Recently installed FCC Chair Tom Wheeler apparently has no interest in actual net neutrality, as the new rules he’s proposing this week allow for Internet service providers to create so-called “fast lanes” for content companies willing to pay extra to more reliably deliver their data to the end-user. [More]
FCC Chair Almost Ready To Share His New Take On Net Neutrality
By 4.23.14
——-
Earlier this year, a federal appeals court eviscerated the FCC’s Open Internet (aka net neutrality) rule following a legal challenge by Verizon, effectively allowing ISPs to give priority access to their own content (or content from sites and services that pay for the privilege) while also blocking or throttling access to competing services and content. Net neutrality has been recuperating from that back-breaking defeat in a virtual underground prison, but is now preparing to scale the wall and return to the real world. [More]
Netflix Increasing Prices, Thinks Comcast-Time Warner Merger Is A Terrible Idea
By 4.21.14
This afternoon, Netflix released its latest earnings report, where the company told the world about its $53 million quarterly profit and impressive growth in subscriptions. That’s all very interesting, but not what we at Consumerist are interested in. We care about one other piece of information that Netflix mentioned: they plan to raise prices for the first time in years. [More]
Stories You Might Have Missed Because You Were Too Busy Being Awesome
April 5, 2014
We post a lot of stories during the week, and we know that most of you have jobs, families, lives, hobbies, nagging itches and other more important things to do than read every single thing we write. So for those who might be playing catch-up on the weekend, here are some of the things you might have missed… [More]
FCC Isn’t Considering Pay-For-Access Deals In New Net Neutrality Rules
By 4.2.14
Back in February, after a federal court gutted net neutrality but before Netflix agreed to pay a premium to Comcast to alleviate its data bottleneck, we predicted that any new neutrality rules would not do anything to prevent the slowdowns that users of Xfinity, FiOS and U-Verse had complained about. If you were more optimistic and holding out hope that the FCC would at least consider this issue, prepare to be disappointed. [More]
Everything You Need To Know Before E-mailing The FCC About Net Neutrality
A lot of people have had a lot to say about the FCC’s proposed “fix” to the recently-vacated Open Internet Rule, better known as net neutrality. The official proposed rule will become available to the public on May 15, but the FCC has already established a way to accept public comments by e-mail. But the process is fraught with questions: is it worth your time? Will they publish your personal information? Does the FCC even take any e-mailed comments into consideration when they’re making their new rules? [More]