Thread: Net Neutrality in Danger

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080117/...9HGtUA7xsjtBAF

Net neutrality has been a pretty big thing for the last couple of years. If for some reason you live in a cave, then look it up. Since the main proponents for control of the internet, i.e. cable companies and big internet providers, have pretty much been blocked and even now Comcast is facing charges of throttling traffic, it seems that one of them has found a way around it.

Time Warner wants to initiate a program that will charge its customers by internet usage. I don't know about you all, but when I hear that I hear all kinds of alarms and warning bells going off inside my head and depending on how many casual net surfers they have, they might actually get away with it. If that happens, the shit could literally hit the fan and net neutrality will fly right out the window. They will have effectively accomplished what they wanted to begin with without breaking any rules doing it. Is this the writing on the wall?

Originally Posted by Ranger10

It looks like that would only hurt gamers and porn lovers.

Oh shit... Uh.. sorry guys. You won't see me around the battlefield too much in the near future... I have some .. uh... downloa- ..I mean family business to attend to....

yeah...

This also affects people who download music and videos (I do it legally). I get about 4 or 5 new albums a month to make sure my radio show keeps fresh with great music. I listen to streaming internet radio as well. My radio station is also making it so our new website lets us review albums through the site. I review about 10 albums a week. If Suddenlink starts this I'm going to raise hell. I also know people who use things like Vongo (consider the size of one movie).

Yeah, if Time Warner has success and a lot more ISPs started doing this as a result it would affect a lot of us. Shit, it would affect all of us since we're all gamers here as well.

-Redownloading any video game through steam or EA downloader
-PATCHES
-Just using content rich websites like say TTP with all of the pics the wonderful users post

The last few games I've bought have been through Direct2Drive, mainly for the convenience factor. They'll always be there, so you don't need to worry about losing the disc/cd key, and you can download them from anywhere within a few hours. Now, if ISPs start charging more for bandwith usage, it basically shafts everyone using legal online distributors.

Bullshit. Does cable TV charge by usage? I'm sure there's also the "5% of customers using 50% of bandwidth" disparity there (couch potatoes), and that's been going on for decades. I don't think the cable companies are hurting for it.

Whoever tries this shit first, will lose a lot of business to those who are smart enough NOT to try it. I'll go straight back to DSL if all the cable companies do it.