Kang's Argument Analysis

The second video “Moyers & Company: Is Net Neutrality Dead?” is about a debate regarding net neutrality, which is the right to communicate freely online, keeping the major internet service providers like Verizon and Comcast from increasing costs for costumers to not slow down or block any content they want to use, also called price discrimination, a service offered at different prices by the same provider in different markets. As there are only few internet providers, barriers are set by limiting the area where some of them are allowed to supply their services to, limiting competition and increasing costs for consumers.

After Obama’s Presidency, President Trump believed that net neutrality is a principle that limits the progress and innovation of many companies. In addition, President Trump claimed that he heard a lot of complains about net neutrality; therefore, he decided to take actions and support the repealment of net neutrality. A Republican named Ajit Pai, recently appointed as the chairman of FCC, started to raise voice against the principle of net neutrality. Note that Ajit Pai is also a former lawyer of Verizon. Ajit Pai argued that “higher profits for broadband companies would allow them to invest and expand their networks to rural America.” Furthermore, he claimed that “Entrepreneurs are constantly developing new technology and services. But too

Part three seems to underuse the subject chosen, but in this part, there will be a shift of focus, it is primarily given to the method the article uses, as well as the concept of scientism.

The author of the memo stands as an advocate of net neutrality. Title II of the Communications Act and Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 serve as strong legal foundations for Open Internet rules. They also provide the assurance needed for innovators and investors, and offer the freedom demanded by the public. Many of ISPs already have monopolistic powers. Net neutrality only makes the ‘game’ fair for startups. Lowering the cost of launching new companies and bringing the communities closer, the Internet is one of the most essential element to the American economy as well as society and should be kept open to all. One of the arguments the debate called into question include: what was the public’s sentiment related to net neutrality.

At the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this year, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler told his audience, “John Oliver took the ultimate arcane issue, Title II, and made it something that got people interested. And that’s good.” (Macri, Guiseppe) Mr. Wheeler was referring to a segment by John Oliver, comedian, political satirist which aired June 2014 in which Mr. Oliver cleverly explains Net Neutrality and why it is important to each of us. “During his 13-minute segment, Oliver name-checked Netflix, Google, Usain Bolt, Superman, the game Monopoly, and Mein Kampf, and compared the FCC hiring former cable company lobbyists to ‘needing a babysitter and hiring a dingo.’” (Brody, Ben) (John Oliver on Net Neutrality, can be seen here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpbOEoRrHyU.) He concludes by telling his audience that the FCC is now accepting comments on the matter and encourages us to take advantage of the FCC’s invitation. He then provides the web address. The following day, the FCC receives 45,000 comments resulting from Oliver’s show, which crashes their website. (Macri, Guiseppe)

Berners-Lee questions whether America “[wants] a web where cable companies determine winners and losers online?” and cable companies are able to “decide which opinions we read”. To an extreme level, cable companies would be able to determine “which creative ideas succeed” (Berners-Lee 2). This opposes the freedom that American citizens strive for. It puts a limits the equal opportunity that so Americans find so important. Furthermore, “the change would allow internet-service providers to throttle some online traffic and allow companies to pay extra for faster delivery of their content” (Martinez & Hoisington). Without net neutrality, internet-service providers would be able to smother small or upcoming businesses by limiting their audience. However, the impact of the repeal of net neutrality does not stop here. The repeal of net neutrality “also eliminates several other consumer protections, such as a requirement that ISPs be more transparent with customers about hidden fees and the consequences of exceeding data caps” (Brodkin 1). Repealing net neutrality would deregulate internet-service providers, allowing them to have far too much control over their

Federal Communications Commission, otherwise known as the FCC, voted two-to-one in May of 2017, to begin the tearing down of the net neutrality law (Rushe), that which protected individuals from companies that purposefully slowed down service lanes so as to regulate what was being broadcasted across computers. Chief internet official Ajit Pai at the FCC stated that he believed that the dismantling of the net neutrality laws could pave the way for a more competitive marketplace, that which would “lift ‘heavy-handed’ internet regulations that overly restricted internet providers” (White). The repealing of net neutrality seems to mainly garner approval from big companies, such as Verizon, and more recently, Comcast, companies that would do well by the repealing of such a law. With net neutrality gone companies such as those listed above would be able to, legally, regulate and control what people saw on the internet by slowing down or speeding up lanes depending on the affiliation the company has with that specific website (Finley). However, even with Title II in effect, some companies have found a way to circumvent those rules in order to ‘play favorites’ as it were. For instance, when AT&T customers access the Direct TV’s streaming service they may find that the data extrapolated from the service used did not count towards their current data limit’s (Finley). It is also believed that with no regulations in place regarding net neutrality, companies have the potential of becoming dictators and blocking

The youths led by their chairperson Geoffrey Mengo, said they are conducting a civic education to urge youths process IDs and voting cards in preparation of electing leaders in the next elections.

As protests continue to protect net neutrality, more online companies join in by displaying warnings on their websites, stating how the FCC, or the Federal Communications Commission, will change the rules for net neutrality which would affect the way people will use the internet. Sites such as Reddit, Esty, and Kickstarter included these warning in the form of pop-up boxes and Kickstarter cleared its home page to communicate to users with the message “Defend Net Neutrality.” On Tuesday, the large tech companies did not participate in the protest. A senior vice president at Public Knowledge, Harold Feld, said: “the biggest tech companies were less vocal because they were facing more regulatory battles than in past years.” Moreover, big tech companies encountered complaints from some lawmakers stating that they became too influential.

With the continually changing methods of reporting information, such as the internet, regulators struggled with monitoring and controlling the information that people were providing. On August 12, 2008, FCC Commissioner Robert M. McDowell stated that the reinstitution of the Fairness Doctrine could be intertwined with the debate over network neutrality, a proposal to classify network operators as common carriers required to admit all Internet services applications and devices on equal terms, presenting a potential danger that net neutrality and Fairness Doctrine advocates could try to expand content controls on the Internet.(AuBuchon) The has always been mixed emotions with the public’s opinions on this issue, but with rapid increase in technologies it would possible that any viewpoint could be aired through the many types of communication available to everyone, and go

I am Aric See and I am a senior in the Weidner School of Inquiry at Plymouth High School in Plymouth Indiana. Net Neutrality is a very important issue facing the United States, with many Republican members of Congress opposing the FCC’s Open Internet Order and the reclassifying of broadband to Telecommunication Services from Information Services. The members of the GOP who are completely against the Federal Communication Commission’s (FCC) reclassification, and attempts to keep the internet free, give many reasons that are simply not true, such as the FCC’s regulations will destroy the free nature of the internet. Because of the attempts by Congressmen with the GOP to fight the regulations, many Americans, especially small business owners that use the web as a base, feel that their equality and freedoms on the internet will be

In the late 2010, U.S. Federal Communication commission imposed "network neutrality" regulations on broadband access providers, both wired and wireless. Networks cannot block subscribers' use of certain devices, applications, or services, or unreasonably discriminate, offering superior access for some services over others. The commission argues that such rules are necessary, as the internet was designed to bar "gatekeepers". Networks routinely manage traffic and often bundle content with data transport precisely because such coordination produces superior services. A truly "open internet" allows consumers, investors, and entrepreneurs to choose among many models, discovering effeciencies. the FCC mistakes the benefits

In this field, competition refers to network owners (ISP). Their differential in pricing and control of information alters the competition. Anti-competitive acts by network owners would be barred due to the impact of net neutrality (St. Petersburg). The major companies (telecom and cable) could enforce a fee for faster Internet or prefer content that is associated with their partnered conglomerates. The cause would be a halt in innovation and end up giving larger companies the power to nudge aside the smaller start-ups from expanding (Linux Journal). Also, net neutrality saves the internet as an ideal marketplace. For the previous 10 years, the Internet has been a public marketplace where privatized companies are able to expand and grow, and this reputation will continue to serve (Opposing Views). More importantly, without net neutrality in affect, price discrimination risks start-ups from emerging out of their cocoons. Net neutrality once paved the concept of free market endeavors. Without these regulations, innovators are at the hands of network owners and building new online entrepreneurships or

Yet at the same time, these two sets of companies compete for customers, creating a glaring conflict of interest. Whilst these issues seemed to be resolved by the middle of the twentieth century, the advent of the internet introduced a whole new set of problems. The term net neutrality, first coined by Tim Wu, Professor of the Columbia University Law School in 2003, came to represent a question that had long been perceived as being of relatively little concern – is unfettered access to the internet a right, or a privilege? (Cheng and Bandyopadhay 2011: 60) (Greenstein 2007: 61, 85) The debate around internet regulation and net neutrality first gained traction in 2002, when the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) controversially ruled that broadband internet was to be classed as an information service rather as a telecommunications service, and thus made it exempt from a considerable range of content and conduct regulations that it would otherwise have been subject to. For those Americans, as exemplified by organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who saw the internet as a space of uninhibited free expression that needed to be protected from the influence of corporate meddling, this decision was very frustrating. As promoted by Wu and others, net neutrality came to represent the belief that ‘internet data packets should move nondiscriminatorily’ – that is, the data (‘packets’ essentially being a technical

Senator Al Franken of Minnesota calls net neutrality a “First Amendment issue of our time.”1 The lack of discrimination of data has allowed the internet to remain open and free for anyone to contribute. Net Neutrality provides opportunity for small business owners, startups, and entrepreneurs.2 It keeps the barrier for entry low, safeguarding a level playing field whether a small blog or multibillion dollar company is being operated. Preserved is the ability to innovate simply with a great