I think the Wired article misses the bigger picture. As you mentioned, the industry of providing network access is one with huge economies of scale. The result (if left unregulated) is always a monopoly or an oligopoly - with certain regions belonging to certain providers. Introducing a new competitor is very, very difficult in such a market, regardless of regulations and lowering prices for right of way. Google learned this the hard way - they have stopped their expansion back in 2016. As a government you can either heavily regulate such markets to make sure the consumers get a fair deal (which is what net neutrality is about) or you can turn it into a public service, ie. allow municipalities to provide internet access (what your third article alludes to).

> For example, I don't see how Netflix paying Comcast to zero-rate Netflix traffic is fundamentally different from Amazon contracting with mail carriers to subsidize the cost of shipping for Amazon purchases

Two things:

1) Net neutrality is about not slowing down transit of all other packages (that don't get paid extra for)

2) Your comparison is flawed. Comcast isn't the mail carrier, Comcast is the (only) road. If Amazon makes a deal with a CDN (if they didn't have their own) or any other middle-man service on the net, that isn't an issue, nor related to net neutrality at all.

(1) Sure. Pay more for mail and it goes faster. Amazon helps gets that increase in speed subsidized.

(2) Generally incorrect.

1) First off, the comparison like I said is flawed, but just to play ball: Other peoples mail doesn't get slowed by you paying for premium shipping.

2) Do you care to expand on that with reasoning or logic?

(1) They most certainly are slowed down. Mail services have limited bandwidth (e.g. Christmas), and higher priority package can and do displace low priority ones.

(2) Usually ISPs don't have a monopoly.

1) Which is either where the comparison gets accurate to bandwidth without net neutrality, or breaks as a comparison with net neutrality, because then it's FIFO regardless of which service/delivery network.

2) When you say usually, do you mean globally or in the US where we're discussing net neutrality? Because there most certainly usually is a local monopoly.

There most certainly is not.

100% of all developed US census blocks have at least two broadband providers.

https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-344499A1.p...

> There most certainly is not.

> 100% of all developed US census blocks have at least two broadband providers.

That's false going by your own source. Broadband requires 25Mbps/3Mbps [1] (even if I personally think even that's low), and 58% percent of developed census blocks lack choice there, of which 21% can't even get it.

The truth remains that if you want broadband, you're in a majority of cases locked to a local monopoly. This is what net neutrality fixes. Until local monopolies can be dealt with at least.

[1] https://www.fcc.gov/reports-research/reports/broadband-progr...

Hm, looks like the definition of high speed internet changed in 2015. (Since we need all that bandwidth to download crap ads.)

In any case, most census districts with high-speed internet have multiple providers.

> In any case, most census districts with high-speed internet have multiple providers.

Nice cherry picking. So screw those other 37% that live under ISP monopolies?

Are you still denying that local monopolies is a real problem?

They should have updated the speeds considered "broadband" but by definition, you'll always have a portion of the population lagging behind any standard that's defined as "what 80% of the population had access to"

Avoided the question.

> to use an example another commenter made -- an appliance manufacturer contracting with electrical utilities to subsidize the cost of electricity used by their appliances

Is that something you are claiming currently occurs, or something you think should be allowed to occur? IANAL, but I do work in the energy/electricity sector, and that sounds illegal. Utility regulations tend to be fairly strict.

> I don't see how Netflix paying Comcast to zero-rate Netflix traffic is fundamentally different from Amazon contracting with mail carriers to subsidize the cost of shipping for Amazon purchases, or even -- to use an example another commenter made -- an appliance manufacturer contracting with electrical utilities to subsidize the cost of electricity used by their appliances.

Strawman argument because zero-rating != net neutrality.

Amazon does NOT pay for prioritization, they get volume discounts... meaning they pay less to get their package "into the pipe" but the pipeline treats all packages equally. That is what net neutrality looks like - all content is treated equally in the pipe. The relevant example would be if Newegg packages were put on the broken slow trucks, or shoved in a pile until all the Amazo npackages have been delivered. This is obviously unacceptable and does not happen.

I'd love to hear more about your appliance manufacturer example because that sounds very unusual. However, again, that's fair because there's no issue of prioritization. Every appliance gets equal access, and brownouts impact all appliances equally. Electric non-neutrality would be: Chromebooks don't charge during a power outage, but Apple laptops do because they paid the electricity company extra. Also obviously unacceptable.

> I don't think there's anything wrong with an ISP prioritizing certain kinds of traffic over others, so long as it does not have an anti-competitive effect. > I've heard people argue that zero-rating makes it harder for smaller content providers to compete, since they won't have the resources to subsidize their customers' traffic. As I said in another comment, that's just the nature of business.

A practice that makes it harder for smaller content providers is also known as an anti-competitive practice.

> As I said in another comment, that's just the nature of business. Being big affords you certain advantages, like economies of scale. This makes it easier to compete on price. Smaller companies have to compete in other ways.

True free markets don't have an entry fee, consumers are the only ones to decide who is competitive. For all it's imperfections, the internet is the freest market we have - any idea or product can enter the market, and every consumer has equal unrestricted access to the domain it's located at.

> In my view, the real problem with the telecom industry in the United States is a lack of competition [0], a problem caused at least in part by municipal [1] and state [2] governments. With more competition, net neutrality would be a non-issue.

This is definitely a contributing factor, net neutrality would be a suicidal proposal if we had competitive ISPs. That says something about the idea.

It's a nice hypothetical, but we must regulate based on reality, with the intent of creating freer markets.

And the reality is these FCC rollbacks are ment to further undermine competition. The big ISPs don't want to keep investing in network growth and competing on service, they want to auction access to a fixed-capacity network. Remember the good ol' days of Ma Bell and those lovely long-distance fees? I thought we killed the beast but Frankenstein's monster is back.

> they get volume discounts... meaning they pay less to get their package "into the pipe" but the pipeline treats all packages equally.

If Amazon paid the same price as everyone else to get their packages into the pipeline, they would send fewer of them, and more delivery resources would be available for everyone else, would there not? It's not just the speed of the trucks, but their size and who's available to load, unload and deliver.

> If Amazon paid the same price as everyone else to get their packages into the pipeline, they would send fewer of them, and more delivery resources would be available for everyone else, would there not? It's not just the speed of the trucks, but their size and who's available to load, unload and deliver.

They only send packages that people order. I'm not sure I see your point.

Roads can get congested with 100% Ford cars, but the road isn't discriminating against any other brand of car.

Amazon would either have to eat that cost or pass it on to their customers. There's only so much money, therefore fewer packages would be ordered from Amazon or they would be less profitable/competitive.

If the roads were congested with Fords because Fords got on the roads for 1/3 the price, then the outcome would be the same as if there was discrimination. Assuming the physical traits of the package are compatible, the pipe doesn't/can't discriminate. The operators do: government requirements, tolls, fares, delivery charges, etc.

> If the roads were congested with Fords because Fords got on the roads for 1/3 the price, then the outcome would be the same as if there was discrimination.

Of course. But there is no such brand.

Toll roads are actually a fairly good analogy for (non)net neutrality, since roads are also local monopolies.

If toll income goes back into building more roads, it's a win for consumers and businesses using the roads, but if it's for-profit or is diverted elsewhere (other state departments), then you don't want to develop more roads, because you'll force more people (and businesses) into using toll roads.

This is what local ISP monopolies want, and no consumer or other business wins. At best; Amazon in your analogy keeps status quo by paying a protection fee.

I'm fine with you arguing that net neutrality MIGHT be unnecessary if there were no ISP monopolies, but that isn't the reality, nor would it be easy to both keep enough ISPs on the market to weed out misuse, or as a consumer switch between these.

In the reality we live in now, net neutrality is VASTLY superior the alternative.

A for-profit toll road is only bad because it's a natural monopoly. Competitors can't (cost-effectively) stack (or tunnel) their roads.

Good thing that the subject of debate here is something very tiny and very light. Older wired technology requires right-of-way and permits. That scheme is effectively a natural monopoly, assuming there's only one provider. That doesn't necessarily mean the next time the ISP digs up their lines to replace them that competitors shouldn't be able to bury their wires at the same time as long as the cost was shared, even though the monopoly will fight like hell to prevent it, but local laws like that should be written in order to promote competition.

Newer wireless technology is much less cost/regulation prohibitive, and not much slower. This forces the incumbents to compete and provide a valuable service.

If local ISPs use their government-sanctioned monopoly to exhort consumers or the business who cater to them, let's crack down on that. That's a specific abuse that harms specific customers.

In the case where a local ISP wants to finance an expansion or upgrade of the network with prioritized service for select customers, while not degrading what existing customers are paying for, I don't see the harm in that, especially in competitive markets, in which case the only reason for the upgrade is because the market, not a group of bureaucrats, demands it.

> Good thing that the subject of debate here is something very tiny and very light. Older wired technology requires right-of-way and permits. That scheme is effectively a natural monopoly, assuming there's only one provider. That doesn't necessarily mean the next time the ISP digs up their lines to replace them that competitors shouldn't be able to bury their wires at the same time as long as the cost was shared, even though the monopoly will fight like hell to prevent it, but local laws like that should be written in order to promote competition.

Yes, local laws like that should be written differently, but they're not, because they're lobbied (by the local ISP) not to.

> Newer wireless technology is much less cost/regulation prohibitive, and not much slower. This forces the incumbents to compete and provide a valuable service.

One might hope, but I'm not holding my breath for wireless ever competing with wired internet, on speed in relation to (no) caps.

> If local ISPs use their government-sanctioned monopoly to exhort consumers or the business who cater to them, let's crack down on that. That's a specific abuse that harms specific customers.

Yes, we should, but again, this isn't the case.

> In the case where a local ISP wants to finance an expansion or upgrade of the network with prioritized service for select customers, while not degrading what existing customers are paying for, I don't see the harm in that, especially in competitive markets, in which case the only reason for the upgrade is because the market, not a group of bureaucrats, demands it.

Again, it's a well sounding hypothetical, the only problem being it's never happened, nor do I expect it to ever do, because it will either degrade existing customers through stagnation (not following bandwidth inflation) or purposefully to push as many as possible to more expensive service.

In a non-proven utopia, net neutrality is unnecessary, which I agreed with earlier, but again, we're not there, and we disagree about us ever getting there.

> If Amazon paid the same price as everyone else to get their packages into the pipeline, they would send fewer of them, and more delivery resources would be available for everyone else, would there not?

No. High volume allows the shipper to operate at a higher scale, with lower costs, and they pass along some of the savings in the form of a volume discount to Amazon.

I think you're missing the part about scale. Amazon is not taking away resources, their volume creates capacity and lowers prices.

Let's say UPS has 1 truck profitably serving a neighborhood route before Amazon comes along, delivering K packages per day operating at $N/day. The current businesses customers pay $M per package, that's the average delivery cost factoring for fluctuating actual delivery costs (operating costs are mostly fixed, a day with fewer deliveries is less profitable than many deliveries).

Now Amazon enters the scene and doubles the package volume. What happens? Assuming the first truck was well utilized, UPS will buy a second truck and split the route in half. Operating costs per house goes down because the routes are shorter, the distribution hub services more trucks, and maintenance operates at a higher scale.

Every previous business customer will pay $M or less - pick up costs are the same, but delivery from the UPS hub to the customer is lower due to volume. Amazon will pay even less because they get a volume discount from UPS; that discount reflects lower pickup costs for UPS, receiving a full truck load of packages from one Amazon distribution center costs less than picking up packages from multiple small businesses. Plus other factors like Amazon's ability to pre-sort within their warehouse on behalf of UPS.

At no point are small businesses competing with Amazon for delivery. The delivery company needs to grow, so they do grow, and as a result everyone from consumers to small businesses to massive corporations benefits.

The issue is that teleconglomerations do not want to grow. They have accrued tremendous organizational and technical debt which requires significant investment to overcome - generating large profits long-term, but only after a couple years of poor profits / shareholder dividends.

That's why we're seeing this "net neutrality issue". To be blunt, it's a fucking idiotic excuse for badly managed uncompetitive companies to sit on their laurels of regional monopolization. They're so short sighted that they can't fix their internal problems, and their size enables them to squash disruption, so their strategy is to use lobbying in order to slow down the growth of the internet (and our nation) to match their inefficiencies by charging both ends of the connection.

To tie it back to your example - this is like UPS not buying a new truck because they only have one parking space, then forcing Amazon and small businesses to bid for limited delivery capacity and charging customers based on where their package shipped from... all because their management takes 8 years to fund, design, approve, and construct a new parking space.

There is no excuse for this behavior. It's utterly absurd from any political/economic stance.

There's also no excuse for this red-herring. "At the 10Mbps/1Mbps threshold—which captures slower DSL technology in addition to cable and fiber—about 90 percent of census blocks have at least two providers."[1]

UPS only buys the new truck because they have to in order to stay in business, just like competitive ISPs adding value to their service. Amazon would have to pay for prioritization if UPS suddenly became the only game in town, if it wanted to maintain the same delivery speed and prioritization were available. I was just challenging your assertion about the original UPS-Amazon comparison and that it's only "fundamentally different" in the absence of competition, which is a problem, but not one affecting all Americans.

[1] https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/08/us-br...

I think that this comment is basically right about the economics of the situation, but because it focuses on economics it misjudges the ideal role of the Internet in society by considering it (only) as an aggregate of capital, i.e. an economic tool. Economic tools in this case work for the benefit of individuals on an individual self-interested basis.

However, the Internet also acts as a medium for communication and socializing, which has benefits to society which cannot be explained by direct benefits to individuals from their self-interested exploitation of the medium. As an example, consider a case where a person reads a moral argument online and chooses to act less selfishly than they would have otherwise. This has a negative direct effect on the individual's actual life, but the outcome of many such events is a net positive for society. So too is it a social benefit if, for example, people in an economically undeveloped city learn about the effects of wood fires on air quality and switch to electric or gas cooking. And these are not services that any individual pays for.

As such it is important that the Internet is regulated to ensure, among various other goals, that as many people may be socially connected via the network as is possible. However, the ongoing centralization of the network has resulted in the perception among many people that online social activity is becoming increasingly confined to fora in which self-expression is either officially restricted or may cause the poster to be targeted for harassment. In reality, this is a result of the fact that some people just don't get along, and you've either got to keep them on lockdown or separate them, cynical as it sounds. As such, the claim that, for example, big companies having an advantage is "just how business works" must be evaluated in light of the effects it's having on our social environment (which we depend on). In practice, some groups of dissatisfied people (of varying political views but we all know who I'm really concerned about) have started to avoid the mainstream altogether, and because small companies are at a "just business" disadvantage, people unsatisfied with mainstream Western online media often turn to media sources owned by countries such as Russia or Qatar, or subsidized by billionaires with questionable motives, and so forth. It stands to reason that encouraging the network to grow in a way that supports "grassroots" alternatives to social media may limit the ability of unscrupulous actors with capital to influence politics.

It's always been my understanding that limiting group size reduces conflict and so if net neutrality gives smaller companies an "unfair" advantage and leads to lower economic growth, I think it would still be a good thing. But primarily, I want to emphasize that the Internet is not just a service provided to individuals.