The FCC claims that its famous Carterfone decision opened the door to the Internet

In the Section III. Report and Order on Remand: Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet of the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules, they claim that their famous Carterfone decision freed up technological innovation and helped create the Internet later on.  The Carterfone was a device that bridged two-way radios to each other over a phone line, greatly extending their reach beyond the range of a typical consumer radio-signal broadcast. In the 1960s, AT&T was the largest telephone company in the United States and provided most of the physical telephone lines for communication.  But AT&T created a rule that banned any non-AT&T device from connecting to their phone lines, thereby preventing their customers from using devices such as the Carterfone on AT&T telephone lines.

In 1968, the Federal Communications Commission ordered that AT&T’s ban was unlawful, thereby, by federal government decree, allowing these and other acoustic coupling communication devices such as fax machines and modems, to connect to AT&T phone lines.  Win for the consumer, right?

Well, not so fast!

While the FCC was patting itself on the back for outlawing an AT&T business practice that gave their customers more freedom, we must go back to what allowed AT&T to create and enforce such a ban to begin with, a rule that was clearly unpopular with their own customers.

AT&T, like other local telecommunication companies, had long been in bed with local governments that gave them government-protected monopolies in nearly all areas of the United States, preventing pretty much any competition from starting up where AT&T was the de facto telephone provider.  AT&T claimed that the initial investment into the telephone infrastructure (the phone lines and switching equipment) would not have been profitable if other companies were allowed to build their own networks alongside AT&T (or use AT&T’s infrastructure).

This, of course, was nonsense.  This government-protected monopoly almost guaranteed AT&T’s profits for decades by reducing their costs and allowing them to not have to worry about competing.  And when a business doesn’t have to worry about competing, they are free to provide poor products and services, enforce high prices, and threaten to cut off their customers altogether from using telephones at all.

It was this GOVERNMENT-PROTECTED MONOPOLY that allowed AT&T to ban customers from using non AT&T devices on their telephone lines.  If AT&T did not have a monopoly then competitive telecommunications products and service providers would have been able to swoop in and fill in the gaps that AT&T left, such as the Carterfone.

So in reality, what we had was the government getting in bed with a huge business to protect their monopoly, then later government comes in to “save” us from the monopolistic business practices that they helped create.

It never seems to occur to government officials to just stay out of our business to begin with, does it?  Let us choose a telecommunications provider on our own.  Let us choose our own telecommunications rules, products, services, restrictions, and freedoms.

It’s important to understand that the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights was written because our founding fathers recognized that the only way our freedoms could ever be taken away was by government, and the Constitution was a required guideline to follow to prevent the government from taking our freedoms away.

Businesses cannot take our liberties with government assistance.  If you ever feel as if your rights are being trampled on by a business, look closely and you will find government regulations giving them that authority to do so.

That being said, government is not our savior from ourselves or each other.  They have no power to “grant” us freedoms, only to take them away.  If you ever hear a government official talk about giving us liberty, rest assured they were responsible for the loss of that liberty to begin with.  Every time.

Read the Unconstitutional regulations of Net Neutrality yourself, downloaded from the FCC in three formats: PDF | Word | Text

Net Neutrality may make it illegal for ISPs to block spam, popup ads, and some malware

In the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules,

II. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY, A. Strong Rules That Protect Consumers from Past and Future Tactics that Threaten the Open Internet, 1. Clear, Bright-Line Rules, 15. No Blocking:

Consumers who subscribe to a retail broadband Internet access service must get what they have paid for—access to all (lawful) destinations on the Internet. This essential and well-accepted principle has long been a tenet of Commission policy, stretching back to its landmark decision in Carterfone, which protected a customer’s right to connect a telephone to the monopoly telephone network.16 Thus, this Order adopts a straightforward ban:

A person engaged in the provision of broadband Internet access service, insofar as such person is so engaged, shall not block lawful content, applications, services, or nonharmful devices, subject to reasonable network management.

Spam, popup ads, and most malware are neither illegal nor harmful to your computer or mobile device; they’re just annoying.  Some broadband providers, especially those that offer email services, provide this additional service to their customers to make their Internet experience more enjoyable.

But under the FCC’s new Net Neutrality rules, it may be illegal for ISPs to do this from now on, and we may start seeing lawsuits filed by advertisers and software companies that have had their ads or software blocked at the ISP before ever reaching the customers’ computers.

Stay tuned.

Read the Net Neutrality rules yourself, downloaded from the FCC’s web site in three formats: PDF | Word | Text

The FCC mistook special interest lobbies for well-informed public opinion when they considered the Net Neutrality rules

In section II. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY, #13, the FCC claims that there was diverse input from the public in support of Net Neutrality, after some 4 million comments were received.

Congress could not have imagined when it enacted the APA [Administrative Procedure Act, 1946] almost seventy years ago that the day would come when nearly 4 million Americans would exercise their right to comment on a proposed rulemaking. But that is what has happened in this proceeding and it is a good thing. The Commission has listened and it has learned. Its expertise has been strengthened. Public input has “improve[d] the quality of agency rulemaking by ensuring that agency regulations will be ‘tested by exposure to diverse public comment.’” There is general consensus in the record on the need for the Commission to provide certainty with clear, enforceable rules. There is also general consensus on the need to have such rules. Today the Commission, informed by all of those views, makes a decision grounded in the record. The Commission has considered the arguments, data, and input provided by the commenters, even if not in agreement with the particulars of this Order; that public input has created a robust record, enabling the Commission to adopt new rules that are clear and sustainable.

This is such nonsense.  The FCC first passed a form of Net Neutrality 5 years ago and has publicly thrown its full support behind every measure they’ve considered.  There was never any attempt to consider all viewpoints in their public forums nor closed-door meetings.  Even worse, the public opinion which consumed their ears had a strong pro-Net Neutrality leaning, as it was led by anti-broadband and anti-business groups that lean hard to the Left.

These groups activated their support networks of like-minded individuals across the country and successfully lobbied on social media, television commercials, blogs, news columns, and interviews for Net Neutrality.  And since they’ve always had the majority of the mainstream media on their side, they easily cast any opposition to Net Neutrality as shills for big business and broadband providers.

There was never any fair consideration of the free market opposition to Net Neutrality.  The FCC had already made up their minds of which laws they were going to write, then went through the motions—as required under the APA—to make it appear as if they solely had the public’s interests at heart.  But they’ve shown repeatedly they care much more about expanding their power base than allowing the free market to grow and prosper.

Download the Net Neutrality rules from the FCC’s Web site in three formats:

• PDF
• Word
• Text

The FCC falsely claims in their Net Neutrality rules that the Internet will only continue to expand if they clamp down on broadband providers by restricting their decision-making ability

From the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules, section II. Executive Summary, #11, it reads:

Three overarching objectives have guided us in answering these questions, based on the vast record before the Commission: America needs more broadband, better broadband, and open broadband networks. These goals are mutually reinforcing, not mutually exclusive. Without an open Internet, there would be less broadband investment and deployment. And, as discussed further below, all three are furthered through the open Internet rules and balanced regulatory framework we adopt today.

Again, this is ridiculous.  The FCC is trying to claim that the only way for Internet access options and broadband performance to continue to improve is if they FORCE broadband carriers to cater to every whim of every content provider on the Internet and have no discriminatory powers over their own private networks whatsoever.

Take a retailer analogy.  Under the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules, every retailer in the United States would be required to resale every product from every single supplier and would have no legal right or recourse to either charge more to specific suppliers or ban a supplier altogether.  That’s totally absurd.

It is BECAUSE retailers have the legal right to refuse certain suppliers or certain products that we have so many types of retailers today!! 

Imagine a Wal-Mart in Honolulu being approached by a manufacturer of snow shovels.  Under the FCC’s rules, that Wal-Mart would be required to stock those snow shovels on their shelves AND they would not be able to charge the snow shovel supplier a higher shelf rate than they charge other suppliers, nor would they be allowed to transfer those snow shovels to other Wal-Marts in colder zones where customers would actually buy snow shovels.

Wal-Mart would be required to stock those snow shovels…FOREVER.  Even if a single shovel was never sold, Wal-Mart would still be required to let those dusty snow shovels take up valuable shelf or floor space in their store.  Forever.

That is exactly what the FCC is trying to do with Net Neutrality.

Read the Net Neutrality rules yourself, downloaded from the FCC’s web site in three formats:  PDF | Word | Text

The FCC is using Net Neutrality to lock down the Internet under the guise of keeping it “open”

From section II. Executive Summary, #8, the FCC wrote:

Threats to Internet openness remain today. The record reflects that broadband providers hold all the tools necessary to deceive consumers, degrade content, or disfavor the content that they don't like. The 2010 rules helped to deter such conduct while they were in effect. But, as Verizon frankly told the court at oral argument, but for the 2010 rules, it would be exploring agreements to charge certain content providers for priority service. Indeed, the wireless industry had a well-established record of trying to keep applications within a carrier-controlled “walled garden” in the early days of mobile applications.

This is very dishonest and disingenuous by the FCC. Sure broadband providers hold all the tools necessary to “disfavor the content they don’t like”. As do cable providers, satellite companies…blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, Instagram accounts, Reddits, Diggs, radio stations, TV stations, music halls, movie theaters, football stadiums, public libraries, churches, schools, even the town square.  EVERYONE who controls a venue has that kind of power at the fingertips.  And guess what: they all use it!  All of them!!  Even public schools, public libraries, town squares, sidewalks, streets, national parks, the U.S. Senate floor.  NONE of these places allow 100% unfettered access WITHIN THEIR VENUES to say or publish whatever content you want.  NONE of them!

And just like a coaxial cable line coming into your house, a broadband provides Internet access to you over their own private property, private network lines, private routers, switches, data centers, management hubs, employee labor, etc. They own these things.  THEY PAY FOR THEM.  So of course they should have the rights do decide what content flows through them!  And they turn around and charge you as their customer to use their services.  If you don’t like it, find another ISP.  There are hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of them.  Every single square inch of the United States is covered by 1 or more Internet Service Providers.  Everywhere.

For the FCC to say that a broadband provider shouldn’t have the rights to disallow certain types of content through their private property, that’s exactly the same as REQUIRING cable companies to carry every single channel in the entire world, regardless of whether they have a contract with that content provider or not AND regardless of the nature of the content.  So the FCC, using the rules akin to Net Neutrality, world force Time-Warner Cable to carry a Nazi-propaganda channel piped out of Austria right into your living room or an ISIS channel that depicts the daily beheadings of Syrian Christians.

But no!  The Internet will be slowly deteriorated by Net Neutrality as it seeks to quash the profits and legitimate business practices of Internet Service Providers.  As the number of ISPs dwindle over the next decade, your speed, reliability, and price of Internet access will suffer.  I promise you this.

Net Neutrality is bad for the Internet, bad for consumers, bad for Americans, bad for Internet Service Providers, bad for the economy, bad for our freedoms, and bad for the future of the United States.

 

Download the Net Neutrality regulations from the FCC and read them yourself:  PDF | Word | Text