and so it starts - net neutrality

Well, the BGH (think one step below US Supreme Court in Germany) decided a couple of days ago in Germany that the ISPs can now be forced to restrict access to internet sites if a copyright holder claims there is copyrighted material on the site - or if the site provides links to copyrighted material.

I'm sure the music industry and other copyright holders will in no way abuse this... *sigh*

Would be a shame if a negative review would be taken down "by accident" by this for games with a completely buggy or botched release (Batman PC version anybody?).

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Col_Jessep wrote:

Well, the BGH (think one step below US Supreme Court in Germany) decided a couple of days ago in Germany that the ISPs can now be forced to restrict access to internet sites if a copyright holder claims there is copyrighted material on the site - or if the site provides links to copyrighted material.

I'm sure the music industry and other copyright holders will in no way abuse this... *sigh*

Would be a shame if a negative review would be taken down "by accident" by this for games with a completely buggy or botched release (Batman PC version anybody?).

Thanks, completely missed that verdict! Here's more info on it. However, I think the terms are for too strict to remove e.g. an unfavourable review (which has already been happening in Germany, for example on Amazon.de - didn't save any evidence, so I can't prove it).

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deathflower wrote:

The internet isn't free. We pay these ISPs and local telecom monopolies. The original neutrality debate involves ISPs charging more for certain kinds of data like Voip or streaming video. These ISPs and local telecom monopolies want people who use more bandwidth to pay more. Road tolls on the internet folks.

That's fine. But they are lying to a customer when they say you pay for and they provide a certain speed when they don't give you that speed. Either charge the customers or charge the deliverers. Asking companies to fork over extra money for what the customer is already paying for is bullshit.

Do toll road charge you both to get on and also to get off the road?

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LostForm wrote:

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Argwain wrote:

How does it personally affect you?

this is literally a change that can potentially increase the cost of everything, once one company raises it prices to 'pass the charge along to the consumer' pretty much everything across the board potentially is going to get more expensive due to basing their product price against what others are selling their product for

This goes beyond cost. IMHO this is a potential opening to attack democracy itself. Now, I hope I'm being melodramatic, but think about it. One of the foundations of democracy is that the people have access to all relevant information to make decisions (i.e. vote) in their best interest. Let's say one a large media conglomerate or ISP has close ties to a particular political party, it doesn't take a genius to come to the conclusion that content/information from sources that do not align with their political agenda may suffer from low bandwidth or even complete blackouts.
One could argue that politically controlled media is already a fact, but currently that still leaves you with the option to consume additional news sources. What if that ability goes away and everything you know about what's going on in your country and the world comes from a single source like FOX News or MSNBC (for the US)?

That kind of stuff should scare everyone!

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mark1030 wrote:

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deathflower wrote:

The internet isn't free. We pay these ISPs and local telecom monopolies. The original neutrality debate involves ISPs charging more for certain kinds of data like Voip or streaming video. These ISPs and local telecom monopolies want people who use more bandwidth to pay more. Road tolls on the internet folks.

That's fine. But they are lying to a customer when they say you pay for and they provide a certain speed when they don't give you that speed. Either charge the customers or charge the deliverers. Asking companies to fork over extra money for what the customer is already paying for is bullshit.

Do toll road charge you both to get on and also to get off the road?

ISPs don't actually buy enough capacity for every customer to hit their maximum speed all at once - broadband services would cost a fortune if they did.

The World wide Internet connectivity is realized via distributed routing which involves multiple providers. Internet is only possible when providers coordinate their efforts with each other, however they are often are in competition with each other.

High bandwidth hog like Voip and streaming video create congestion. Under net neutrality, No specific types of traffic are prioritized, P2P, gaming and VoIP traffic are all treated equally. No traffic is slowed down, blocked or prioritized. In the event of traffic congestion, everyone is slowed down.

What they are suggesting is for you to pay them to make your traffic prioritized so you can avoid the traffic congestion. Traffic that actually need such service are actually those that need fast internet connection and use the most bandwidth. Basically they want People who use more bandwidth to pay more, if you want fast internet that is. They aren't blocking the internet.

PS: United States of America is a republic.

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Thyrandor wrote:

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Col_Jessep wrote:

Well, the BGH (think one step below US Supreme Court in Germany) decided a couple of days ago in Germany that the ISPs can now be forced to restrict access to internet sites if a copyright holder claims there is copyrighted material on the site - or if the site provides links to copyrighted material.

I'm sure the music industry and other copyright holders will in no way abuse this... *sigh*

Would be a shame if a negative review would be taken down "by accident" by this for games with a completely buggy or botched release (Batman PC version anybody?).

Thanks, completely missed that verdict! Here's more info on it. However, I think the terms are for too strict to remove e.g. an unfavourable review (which has already been happening in Germany, for example on Amazon.de - didn't save any evidence, so I can't prove it).

You just wait and give those copyright lawyers a couple of months and they will find a way to use this law to poke holes into all kinds of things. They will go for the torrent sites first but I suspect companies like Ubisoft will soon start thinking how they can rid themselves of reviews they don't like.

Don't forget about corporate power creep.

I don't want to live in a world whare EA and blizzard are the only company rich enough to purchus a "fast lane" for their products.