Bottom line, is that net neutrality is about having an accurate picture of the internet, and not a picture that Comcast (or whoever) decides I get. THAT, as well as maintaining user privacy, is the goal here.
EDIT:
I should also add that ISPs have throttled upload-heavy traffic WITHOUT inspecting the packets for a long time, so even if you didn't inspect packets, the issue of net neutrality persists.
Different things.
Again, I'm for net neutrality, but you do it a disservice with that argument.
Whereas I have just as much right to my bandwidth (the bandwidth that I paid for) as they have for theirs, which protocol is being used is irrelevant.
And you can't compare spam to torrents, spam is illegal, torrents are - surprise - not.
So, ISPs will have to rely on statistical modeling to determine how much they can oversell, not on throttling.
But anyway, your argument hinges on the supposition that ISPs guarantee your bandwidth all the time. In fact, most of them do not. If you are buying a strict guaranteed bandwidth, do tell me why it is that the ISPs don't actually say that themselves?
Hence the argument that throttling your traffic betters other customers.
Copyright infringement is illegal. Torrent files are not (they don't contain copyrighted information, they contain hashes).
Downloading a copyrighted work using any mechanism, including bittorrent is illegal in many places, but not everywhere.
> But anyway, your argument hinges on the supposition that ISPs guarantee your bandwidth all the time.
No, they have a best effort obligation to deliver what they'e sold. The fact that most of them don't make that effort does not mean they're in the clear.
> If you are buying a strict guaranteed bandwidth, do tell me why it is that the ISPs don't actually say that themselves?
Because it is to their advantage.
Well, Jacques, once again, that's actually precisely their argument: that they are "making their best effort" to preserve the user experience. You say they're not providing what you pay for and tell them why, and then they spin around and tell you that they are providing exactly that, because they are doing what you don't like.
And on top of that, they're not promising what you tell them you were sold: there is no bandwidth guarantee. It's like if you showed up to someone's house and bought a stereo, and then after you paid, loudly proclaimed that you actually bought their wife. Saying doesn't make it so, and since this is not a promise they have actually given you, it's a bit unfair to expect that they be held to it.
Remember, though before you head down that hole, that I'm not supporting them. I love net neutrality. It think it's great. I'm just saying that your buying bandwidth is not a good basis for argument of the position you elected.
>> If you are buying a strict guaranteed bandwidth, do tell me why it is that the ISPs don't actually say that themselves? > Because it is to their advantage. You're right. It's to their advantage not to sell that guarantee. That would be insane.
De-prioritizing (what a word anyway) is not what it is all about it is about limiting. Prioritizing all the traffic is like selecting a volunteer by having someone step backwards.
ISPs sell bandwidth, so bandwidth is what they should deliver. They don't sell quality of service, at least, I've yet to see an ISP that offered me 250K down for torrents, 32K for voice and 128K for web traffic as a single package. They'll sell me 1, 4, 8, 10 or even 20 Mbps down and 2 Mbps up for X credits per time unit. So that's what I expect to receive.
And once they start doing deep packet inspection where does it end? Some websites have a deal with the ISP to prioritize their traffic at the expense of others?