EU Parliament votes to protect "net neutrality"
- Thread starter SuicidalSteve
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TyrantGuardian
Member
At least EU does some things right. Once in a blue moon.
Succinct Verbosity
Member
Man, I can't wait until the UK pulls out of this authoritarian mess!
You forgot the sarcasm tags...
But this is awesome news. Was afraid they were going to do the original text which left a lot of room. But parliament made great additions...
CyclopsRock
Member
This seems slightly odd to me? Everything I've heard suggests that the US telecoms market is stuffed with various local monopolies, where as the UK has a really competitive market for this kind of stuff (from mobile phones to internet access). Not everywhere of course, but for most people there's a pretty good choice, and that's lead us to have pretty good speeds, pretty cheap pricing and, for me at least, I've never had a data cap or throttling (that I've been aware of).
That said, my girlfriend lives in Spain and pays a lot more for a much worse service, so maybe what I describe is a UK thing rather than a European thing.
You forgot the sarcasm tags...
But this is awesome news. Was afraid they were going to do the original text which left a lot of room. But parliament made great additions...
The EU gets a lot of stick, but they get things right from time to time.
The UK landline/broadband market is reasonably competitive because the government regulates pretty heavily the prices which BT Openreach resells access to the national phone infrastructure. Plus Virgin Media having it's own independent cable network in some pretty large markets helps.
Succinct Verbosity
Member
I don't think they mean an internally competative market, but one that ensures that the EU's market is able to keep up with the United States and, mostly, Asia. It seems like he is talking about global competitiveness.
CyclopsRock
Member
Aye, though the former is a sort of natural result of BT being a nationalised industry for so long. It's the weird situation wherein BT itself, when nationalised, was horribly uncompetitive (it just had no competition) but now the infrastructure being in the hands of, effectively via the regulation, the government is allowing the private sector to leverage that competitively.
frankie_baby
Member
however when BT was a monopoly in the 80s they offered to fibre-optic the whole country, the government (thatcher) said no, most people still cant get get fibre now
Huw_Dawson
Member
[citation needed]
Great news for 500 million people in the EU. Of course, UKIP didn't vote on this, I guess they don't really care about net neutrality and don't mind UK residents to get shafted abroad or something.
They brought up this vote in the TV debate last night, funnily enough. You'd be surprised how much good policy comes out of the EU Parliament, but most people don't hear about it as it's the kind of policy news channels don't care about.
QuicheFontaine
Member
I think the UKIP thought process is along the lines of "Mainland Europe, why on earth would you go there?"
yeah, we can't wait either
jk
16*
*in some countries
truly the land of the free
but I wish it wasn't *cough*
ComputerMKII
Banned
Net neutrality would force ISPs not to filter anything.
I would argue that ISPs should be able to filter whatever the fuck they want, but in the current context the effects would be interesting: filtering P2P or censoring websites would be legally impossible.
But I suppose that, for this experts' committee, net neutrality will mean that ISPs can't filter anything unless the government tells them to. All the cons without the pros.
It's a stupid idea and I don't see how preventing people/companies to make voluntary contracts with each other helps freedom in any way.
I would argue that ISPs should be able to filter whatever the fuck they want, but in the current context the effects would be interesting: filtering P2P or censoring websites would be legally impossible.
But I suppose that, for this experts' committee, net neutrality will mean that ISPs can't filter anything unless the government tells them to. All the cons without the pros.
It's a stupid idea and I don't see how preventing people/companies to make voluntary contracts with each other helps freedom in any way.
anonymous_abc
Member
Say what?
Do you understand what net neutrality is and why it is important?
It's got nothing to do with taking away freedom from our much loved corporations and governments....
SJRB
Gold Member
Exactly.
You need to read up on a few things if you seriously believe ISPs should be allowed to filter any content they desire.
Nicktendo86
Member
So does this stop my ISP from fucking throttling YouTube?
If you look at the European market as a whole, the different regulation in each country makes it difficult to invest in the sector, and the often hefty roaming charges when you are abroad means any cross-border services are dead in the water. Most people don't use mobile internet when they are abroad in another EU country because they assume it's going to cost them a fortune, so attempting to create services such as, for example, interactive travel guide apps become almost pointless because very few people will use them when they travel unless they have access to Wifi.
NekoFever
Member
Yes. They're allowed to generally limit speeds during periods of network congestion, but they can't selectively throttle individual websites and services.
Nicktendo86
Member
Right I am jumping aboard the EU gravy train! Seriously though, this is very good.
anonymous_abc
Member
Nicktendo86
Member
lol. To be fair our goverment should have done something like this years ago, rather than pissing about with poxy porn filters. Why not look out for the consumer? Rhetorical question, I know they don't give a fuck.
CyclopsRock
Member
I wonder how the roaming changes will work? Will it come out of your normal contract, or pay local non-contract rates? For example, if I have an unlimited 4G contract and go to France, can I just utterly rinse Orange.fr's 4G whilst I'm there? I can't imagine that'll be the case. I wonder!
Don't know, but I can't shake the feeling the ISP will try to screw us using another scheme.
D
Deleted member 13876
Unconfirmed Member
The Belgian telecom market is an oligopolic mess.
glaringradio
Member
Ending roaming is excellent news, however I can see some of the service providers getting mega salty over this.
It's great that Three have already started to end roaming charges themselves with their Feel At Home service. Recently had to go down to Dublin on business, felt great not having to worry about sending texts/browsing on my phone, whilst my co-worker had to spend the entire day with his personal phone in plane mode, only able to rely on his terrible business phone.
It's great that Three have already started to end roaming charges themselves with their Feel At Home service. Recently had to go down to Dublin on business, felt great not having to worry about sending texts/browsing on my phone, whilst my co-worker had to spend the entire day with his personal phone in plane mode, only able to rely on his terrible business phone.
Don't you know "freedom" in America only applies to corporations?
Omegasquash
Member
Freedom isn't free...naw there's a hefty fuckin' fee, you have to pay for it in which case that'll be a $1.05 and look at this sponsored content first.
marvelharvey
Member
A broken clock etc etc...
UKIP voted *against* the recent legislation to mandate all phones use the same charging port... so I'll have to agree with you on that one
Right now at T-Mobile and/or Orange Poland you can buy 'roaming' service where you get billed at amount of local call. It doesn't count towards your minutes.
KillerMan91
Member
EU does many things right. Media just doesn't cover those extensively because they can't sell papers with them.
Read about EU legislation being passed > extrapolate into the most extreme possiblity > crazy headline like EU MANDATES ALL BANANAS MUST BE NO WIDER THAN 2.674CM > profit
No chance. Like healthcare, the internet will be fucked for generations to come. There's too much money involved for the government to do the progressive thing.
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