Discussion Forums > Politics
If net neutrality fails, this is what you should expect...
lx4:
I dont have more then a very basic understanding of the concept of net neutrality. But it would seem to me that as long as no broadband supplier have a government granted monopoly, competition of the threat of possible competition would stop something like this from happening.
If there is a sizable amount of people who doesnt like this business model (which there surely would be) this would create a large the demand for an alternative. It shouldn't take long for a competitor to try to capitalize on this demand and offer an unrestricted service.
relic2279:
Good competition just not possible in the US.
Most cities have 2, or just 1 ISP. So the local market is either a duopoly or a monopoly. Right now I use Time Warner cable. My only other option is Verizon DSL. Even if someone wanted to say, start their own ISP, invest tons of money laying the fiber, one of their big business competitors will just buy them.
There is almost no competition in the ISP market. At least here in the US anyways.
Aesthesis:
Scary stuff, but practically impossible. It obviously makes no sense in the world of business; turning a free market as large as the internet into a subscription service would instantly kill off most of the new websites and businesses purely because they're not famous enough to be put into one of these packages. I mean, who's gonna go trawling through the millions of websites on the internet deciding which youtube clones to put into the package and which ones not to? How will the providers know what websites are delivering what services? If they miss a website then some small store's web shop won't get clients any more. Even if they automate the process somehow, we're looking at a huge loss of market and commerce which wouldn't go undisputed.
lx4:
--- Quote from: relic2279 on October 28, 2009, 05:02:01 PM ---Good competition just not possible in the US.
Most cities have 2, or just 1 ISP. So the local market is either a duopoly or a monopoly. Right now I use Time Warner cable. My only other option is Verizon DSL. Even if someone wanted to say, start their own ISP, invest tons of money laying the fiber, one of their big business competitors will just buy them.
There is almost no competition in the ISP market. At least here in the US anyways.
--- End quote ---
The situation is very different where I live, we have over a dozen service providers. Which is great since they not only compete on price but issues such as how well they protect their customers privacy when faced with threats from anti-piracy organization.
So there certainly is room for competition in the business. Especially today when you can deliver broadband (or broadband like) services through fiber, cable, phone lines (ADSL) and the 3G cell phone net. Especially so called wireless broadband seem to be taking over much of the market here.
The lack of competition in the US is probably because its a bit behind when it comes to broadband. Going back 5 or 10 years we didnt have more then two or three providers to choose from. Once a business has proved to profitable competitors are sure to pop up to get a piece of the action. Thats about as close to a law as you get in economics.
Capping downloads, restricting speed for some sites etc might all be tools used to bring down the cost for consumers. It is not necessarily right to deprive them of the option just because its not something we would like to purchase.
relic2279:
--- Quote from: Aesthesis on October 28, 2009, 05:43:03 PM ---Scary stuff, but practically impossible. It obviously makes no sense in the world of business; turning a free market as large as the internet into a subscription service would instantly kill off most of the new websites and businesses purely because they're not famous enough to be put into one of these packages.
--- End quote ---
I think you misunderstand, you'll still have access to joeblow.com in this hypothetical situation, it's just the larger websites that people visit and suck up bandwidth, like youtube etc will cost extra. Basically, the large websites become premium sites.
--- Quote from: lx4 on October 28, 2009, 05:47:53 PM --- Once a business has proved to profitable competitors are sure to pop up to get a piece of the action. Thats about as close to a law as you get in economics.
--- End quote ---
It's actually been proven the opposite in the US economy. Competition is strong when a market is young. As the market matures, large corporations buy up their smaller competition, leading to less competition. This is true in almost every business market. We DID use to have 5 or 6 local ISP's here in my hometown available in the 90's. Most were dialup. The got bought out, and switched to cable/DSL.
Now the entry costs to get in the market are almost cost prohibitive. Laying fiber for an entire city isn't cheap.
--- Quote ---Capping downloads, restricting speed for some sites etc might all be tools used to bring down the cost for consumers. It is not necessarily right to deprive them of the option just because its not something we would like to purchase.
--- End quote ---
I guess our opinions differ. My opinion is that the internet is becoming a near utility in our daily lives, like the telephone, water, transportation and should be regulated as such.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version