The FCC's plan to end net neutrality is here, and the fight is going to get ugly

This week, the FCC, America's telecom regulator, announced its intention to bring about the end of net neutrality in an official sense, removing the Title II classification that has been bestowed upon the Internet and its service providers since the decision was made in 2015 to do so.

In a speech, Ajit Pai, a former FCC Commissioner under Chairman Tom Wheeler and, under President Trump, Chairman of a tonally different regulator, laid his plan to claw back the consumer protections enabled by Title II. In short, net neutrality prevents Internet service providers from differentiating the type of traffic going across its pipes, both wired and wireless, abrogating the use of "fast lanes" for content providers that choose to pay for it.

In his speech, Pai said that Title II classification was put forth as a way for the FCC at the time to assert power and prove its independence, and that it has hurt innovation and, in turn, consumers. "So what happened after the Commission adopted Title II? Sure enough, infrastructure investment declined. Among our nation's 12 largest Internet service providers, domestic broadband capital expenditures decreased by 5.6% percent, or $3.6 billion, between 2014 and 2016, the first two years of the Title II era. This decline is extremely unusual. It is the first time that such investment has declined outside of a recession in the Internet era," he said.

Removing Title II classification from Internet traffic will have the following advantages, according to Pai:

  • It will bring high-speed Internet access to more Americans
  • It will create jobs
  • It will boost competition
  • It is the best path toward protecting Americans' online privacy

ISPs have put up roadblocks for consumers when given the opportunity.

But opponents of the repeal say that there is no reason to remove the classification, and that competition amongst the U.S. service providers has thrived since the change. The FCC claims that it should not be able to "micromanage" the Internet and has come out against forcing service providers to stop zero-rating programs like T-Mobile Binge On or AT&T's Sponsored Data, which it says promotes a healthy marketplace and provides greater choice to consumers.

In an interview with Reason.com, a libertarian resource, Pai said that "we were not living in a digital dystopia in the years leading up to 2015. By contrast, actually, the commercialization of the internet in the 1990s up to 2015 represented I think the ... one of the most incredible free market innovations in history. With light touch regulation, broadband providers spent 1.5 trillion dollars on infrastructure. Companies like Google and Facebook and Netflix became household names precisely because we didn't have the government micromanaging how the internet would operate. That Clinton-era framework is something I think served us well and going forward I hope it continues to serve us well."

"These rules, Title II rules were designed to regulate Ma Bell, and the promise with Ma Bell, the deal with the government was, we'll give you a monopoly as long as you give universal service to the country. As a result, for decades, we didn't see innovation in the network we didn't see innovation in phones and it's when you have a competitive marketplace and you let go of that impulse to regulate everything preemptively, that you finally get to see more of a competitive environment."

But ISPs have put up roadblocks for consumers when given the opportunity. One only needs to look at the lawsuits levelled at AT&T and Verizon around their old unlimited plans, which were silently throttled after a particular data cap was hit. These days, those unlimited plans make it very clear when throttling will come into effect. On the broadband side, Verizon was sued by the City of New York for not following through with its contractual commitment to provide Fios access to all New Yorkers.

It's no surprise that the big U.S. carriers support the decision to remove Title II classification.

Pai says that he isn't opposed to net neutrality itself, just a heavy regulatory hand overseeing internet service providers that could limit customer choice and, in turn, competition. He thinks that Title I classification, which was established for broadband providers in the Clinton era, is the right compromise, and that under his proposal he would encourage, but not force, ISPs to follow net neutrality rules by codifying them in their terms of service — which could be easily changed, even retroactively, without informing consumers. It's no surprise that U.S. ISPs are already coming out in support of such a change.

Verizon issued a statement saying that, while it supports net neutrality, "[it] also supports Chairman Pai's proposal to roll back Title II utility regulation on broadband. Title II (or public utility regulation) is the wrong way to ensure net neutrality; it undermines investment, reduces jobs and stifles innovative new services. And by locking in current practices and players, it actually discourages the increased competition consumers are demanding."

Sprint said something similar:

"Sprint has always supported an open internet and will continue to do so. We recognize that our customers demand access to the content, applications, and devices of their choice and as a competitive wireless carrier, we always strive to meet our customers' needs."Chairman Pai's proposed rulemaking provides an opportunity for all stakeholders to share their views and work with the FCC to remove uncertainties and refine the rules that protect and ensure an open internet. Sprint believes that competition provides the best protection to consumers. Promoting robust competition and ensuring consumers have real choice among competing internet providers is the best way for the FCC to achieve its open internet objectives. Sprint looks forward to working with the FCC, consumers, and content providers towards that end."

T-Mobile and AT&T haven't yet issued comments, but have both previously come out in support of the reclassification. A group of companies, including Facebook and Google, oppose the change, and have previously filed briefs with the FCC to that effect.

The next step for Pai is to publish the full proposal and then put the Commission itself to a vote on May 18th. If approved, the FCC will open the proposal up to public debate before codification later in the year.

Daniel Bader

Daniel Bader was a former Android Central Editor-in-Chief and Executive Editor for iMore and Windows Central. 

100 Comments
  • Here we go. Chicken Little, the sky is falling 3 2 1 go!
  • If you'd like to spend extra money on sub par service, feel free to send me $200 per month. I'll hook you up with a premium tin can and string.
  • Like I said , chicken little, not going to happen. By definition net neutrality is anti competitive. If everything has to be the same why try and offer different services.
  • So you are ok with your ISP providing you slower speeds for certain content generated by companies that are wiling to play ball with said ISP?
  • That's too much of a mental leap. Markets will take care of themselves. Markets will take care of themselves. Markets will take care of themselves. Markets will take care of themselves. 2008
  • What market? Ignoring cellular for the moment, people need to stop acting like high speed providers are like chocolate bars at a candy store. In most places, even big cities, the choice is limited to either the cable guy or the phone guy. That's not a market.
    And yeah, I get it...These guys foot the bill for infrastructure, and something new and amazing, like Google Fiber will come along to compete. So how many new jobs and new pipes will Spectrum lay when everyone ditches them when costs are too high?
    I don't believe in Federal oversight either...Think it's an excuse for companies to charge more to be compliant. But there has to be some form of consumer protection because the business is unique and doesn't really fit the an open market model. When can ditch net neutrality when I have the option to choose from 4 or more different high speed providers.
  • Thank you! For so-called broadband, I have exactly one option: AT&T U-verse (with a max 21 down). People claiming that the market will self correct or competition will keep things fair don't seem to understand that in many places in the country, there's already a de facto monopoly in place. If there aren't rules defining what the ISPs can or can't do, there really is no protection for the consumers.
  • You call him a chicken, I call you an ostrich, time will tell which is true. The idea that "the free market" can regulate itself is a nice one. But it's also nonsense. The free market doesn't really exist in this case, the market is carved up and shared out in meetings, not by consumer choice. Do you really think a world where you pay one fee for access to YouTube and another for Netflix, one fee for Amazon and you can't have access to newegg because Amazon have an exclusivity deal with your ISP is a good thing? Yeah, I know, "chicken little"...
  • Why didn't all this happen before the Obama administration? What? Preemptive strike? In all honestly what's wrong with paying extra for superior service or speed, or content?
  • It did, but if you didn't have Verizon FiOS and were being throttled down to 1Mbps or less when accessing YouTube or Netflix, you probably just shrugged your shoulders. If I'm paying for internet service, I expect equal treatment of internet traffic for that service, not slow and fast lanes. Yeah, I can access Android Central at the full 150Mbps where the pages load in seconds and immediately stop, but I stream videos too. Everyone does. I'm not paying extra to get full speed for video services I already pay for. Sorry, your argument is completely anti-consumer.
  • As if the previous administration excuses this. Absurd. The whole idea of the invisible hand taking care of things is as stupid as Reaganomics.
  • You need to learn the definition of words. If you can say something as asinine as "by definition net neutrality is anti-competitive" you either don't know what "net neutrality" is or don't know what "anti-competitive" means.
  • #facts
  • No, it's a made up term. Only self righteous buerucats might think they know.
  • I think those "supplements" alex jones is selling you might be affecting your brain
  • You don't have to agree with everything tiny hand's administration does. It would be refreshing for one you drones to think for themselves.
  • Sigh. As a supporter of neither party, I get irked by the constant hyper partisan mud slinging and name calling. Can't we debate a subject on its merits or lack thereof for once?
  • Looks like this month's check from Verizon cleared.
  • Cleared for the last three or four presidents also. Crony capitalism loves both parties.
  • Apparently not, since the last administration implemented this protection. And scheduled to implement pro-consumer privacy protections, until it was shut down entirely by the Republican party.
  • Actually Reason.com is a libertarian website, one that I frequent regularly. Do not confuse them as conservative. Yes, when it comes to free markets, but they disagree with concervatives quite often. however with this they are on the same page.
  • Shocker, both libertarians and conservatives are anti-consumer.
  • Looks like just you and me
  • Yes, this misstatement needs to be acknowledged and corrected.
  • You beat me to it
  • Hey Erik, my mistake. Poor choice of words.
  • Saying libertarians aren't conservative is like saying protestants aren't Christians, disagreeing on a few things doesn't mean you aren't one.
  • Agreed, he's being assinine at best.
  • I have given you a hard time sometimes Daniel with these kind of articles. This is fair and well​ balanced. Kudos.
  • Lol here goes Tom again
  • Tom is good, he is respectful and very knowledgeable. Yes, we disagree most of the time, but like I said he will not insult, just sticks to his opinions. Misguided as they are. Haha
  • Yep, here I go, not wanting to be a corporate puppet
  • I guess this gentleman never hear that correlation does not imply causation. "Title II passed and subsequently infrastructure investment went down. Since they occurred in relative proximity to one another, they must be related". That's sound decision making right there. I also like the benefits. Very well articulated. ****
    It will bring high-speed Internet access to more Americans
    It will create jobs
    It will boost competition
    It is the best path toward protecting Americans' online privacy
    **** It doesn't get better than this. I especially like point 1 and point 2. Obvious reasoning is obvious. I mean even Verizon support the change. Just look at how well they articulated their support, offering sound circular logic. ****
    it undermines investment, reduces jobs and stifles innovative new services.
    **** It's settled then. Where do we sign up?
  • Seems like assumptions most Americans will make. America, land of the ill-informed.
  • If you believe any of that, I'm sorry to say that you're simply delusional.
  • Trump Administration: -Tax cuts for the rich
    -Roll back healthcare for the working class (proposed)
    -End Net Neutrality
    -Accomplish nothing else in first 100 days I hope Trump supporters are extremely happy. This is what they wanted when they voted for that moronic Cheeto manchild.
  • Lol
  • Until people understand this tribe mentality gets you / us nowhere. Thinks will never change. Under Obama 8 years the top one percent made out like bandits. Government got bigger both parties are the problem. Nether side are blameless. The only thing government likes is more government. The vast majority in house and Senate cares about them. If you honestly think they care about their constituents I have beach front property in Arizona to sell you. The health care bill that Democrats passed was not really about Healthcare but more about making government bigger and more people to be dependent on government. But hey I know I know it's never (your party fault ) it's always the other party fault........
  • Yeah, god forbid poor people and those with preexisting conditions were allowed to get medical insurance. How dare they!!!111ELEVENS
  • You absolutely have never worked in Healthcare, and certainly not in Massachusetts. The so called impoverished uninsured have always received free Healthcare. And housing food phones bus passes limo rides to and from medical apps. Now it's just a way of life
  • Oh yea I mean before the health care bill people where dying on the street. The body's where like everywhere
  • To be fair, they were coughing real hard.
  • I know it's not 100% of the case in every corner of the country, but pre-existing clauses pretty much died out the mid to late 2000s... Though that was probably due to state laws more so than greedy insurance companies suddenly feeling ashamed.
    But take it from me, a guy whose worked in healthcare finance for 15+ years, the only people who actually benefitted from the AHCA are providers and insurance companies. I've been in actual meetings with doctors who were surprised at how much the AHCA added to their bottom line.
    And remember this thing called 'HMOs'? They didn't use to have deductibles, just copays. Now everyone has deductibles. The idea was if you had to pay out of pocket, you'd shop around better for the lower prices. Except, most insurance companies don't give you the freedom to shop around like that. If your insurer only covers x-rays at a particular provider, then what real choice do you have? And it did nothing for stifling rising costs. In fact, deductibles discourage people from getting healthcare. Combine that with tripled premiums, the insurance companies are robbing everyone blind.
    And the god awful uninsured heathens? They made up about 1 to 4% of a providers' business, or 'payer mix' as we call it. So the idea that some poor schmoe who didn't pay their bill was the single handed reason for high costs was utter bull.
    So what we have now is people paying out higher premiums, getting less service, insurance paying out less, and cost still rising.
    And I'm no conservative... I proudly voted for Obama twice, but the AHCA was one policy I could not get behind.
  • @retinella - that sounds great until middle-class America is priced out of health insurance coverage due to skyrocketing rates. And that is definitely happening. So all the poor people are getting cheap coverage, while the middle class are getting screwed cost-wise.
  • Pre existing equates to a dummy who didn't want to get insurance before getting sick. Snowflakes need to get a job and get out of mommy's basement
  • When will people stop using the "well Obama did it" excuse? As if this **** show is justified because your consuming of spin from pundits. To what end?
  • Is that you Bernie.. Where's my free everything?
  • Where is it? People voted against it
  • Bernie's missing a great opportunity in Venezuela right now!!!! They just need free everything!!!
    He should go and see if he can further help their situation. I have a friend there that is very hungry.
  • Nothing's free my dear, although I recommend hearing about allocation.
  • Hope you Obama Care supporters are happy, because my insurance premiums have doubled, the deductible has tripled, and maximum out of pocket has also tripled since Obama Care was implemented. I really love seeing the extra $10000 a year being taken from my earnings just to have the pleasure of paying over $8000 just to break even. Pre Obama Care meningitis treatment that included a team of doctors and a month long rehab stay cost me less than a post Obama Care belly button hernia outpatient treatment.
  • I'm actually quite happy with it, and have great coverage. It's looking better than the non resolution the other side has brought to the table too...
  • Not a Trump supporter , but your talking points are old.
  • How? All of those are still relevant.
  • No, just liberal democrat jibberish. Been hearing the same thing for 30 years. Have read the same talking points for over 100 years. In old books of course. I'm not that old.
  • Yep been the same talking points since Carter. Yea I am that old
  • This is all Al Gores fault for inventing the internet. Damn him!
  • You should go on Twitter and whine about it like your POTUS, or I should say the Cheeto-colored man-baby.
  • He is orange, I do not disagree
  • I wish he would stay off of Twitter. It's childish and unproductive.
  • Funny someone who has never won the most important election on Earth is giving productivity pointers to someone who has... Really activates the almonds, eh?
  • So, I can't have a opinion because I do not hold elected Office? How ansine is that thought process?
  • So what you said is an opinion and therefore valid. But what I said is an opinion and therefore asinine because it isn't your opinion? I simply wanted to unpack the thought process of one who forms the opinion that they have enough altitude to give pointers about something they have never done to someone who has done said thing. It'd be like me giving Bill Gates pointers on founding a billion dollar software company.
  • What would Bill Gates facial expressions be if you gave him advice?
  • Climactic? Contorted in ecstasy? Drawn blank in euphoria?
  • The chairman is former Verizon executive. Totally unexpected call!
  • He always has that **** eating grin
  • The FCC chairman was Verizon's Legal Counselor - shocker !
    Fcu k him , f cuk Verizon and all corporate shills going through revolving door between govt and their Sugar Daddies!
    And as for Trump - more days pass by more he reveals who he is. Not that it was a secret , but just more apparent to those who were fooled by some of his "many, many" talking points and promises.
    Speaking of internet - whatever happened with his take on Assange??
    He is either a complete incompetent wreck or one of the most corrupt people our public had seen. Or both.
  • You surprised? Trump turned into a politician. This is what Washington does to you. I can name maybe five guys in Congress who stick to their core beliefs. They are all bought one way or another .
  • This isn't what Washington did to him, Trump was always like this, it was obvious throughout the campaign!
  • Yep. You had to be blind and deaf not to see it.
  • Republicans never met a company they won't favor over consumers.
  • The lying about T-Mobile really got out of control, and they haven't backed down in the slightest, I just got an email stating "T-Mobile used its Binge On service to slow down YouTube download speeds.", which is a straight out lie, they didn't slow down anything, they gave you unlimited video at unlimited speed, but at a lower resolution, which is what I watch video at anyway because 720p is only consistent on wifi for me. The people fighting for keeping the rules, which they should, really don't win people over by bold-faced lying about what the company is doing.
  • I don't know what email you're referring to, but a lower resolution means a lower number of bits per second in-transit, which is how we measure Internet speed. "slowing down YouTube" may be a weird way to phrase it (maybe even misleading to some?), but I don't think it's technically wrong.
  • So Donnie has gutted the rules governing what ISPs can do with your private info and now gonna gut net neutrality. So I'll soon be paying for garbage service and my ISP will sell my data to highest bidder. Lovely.
  • And El Chapo is gonna pay for the wall. Dont get shy around freedom, its amazing.
  • I am always amazed about people commenting paragraphs in favor of companies and policies that work directly against their own best interest. Always in favor of the big company.... Giving sh$#&ts about the smaller company or the consumer
  • Uhm... I'm thinking of it like this, if they go through with this plan then it's the same as saying big box stores now own the roads that their stores are adjacent to and they can put in gates leading to all other businesses. We all know the smaller business can't pay for better rights and no-one is going to want to wait to get to them. Say goodbye to Netflix Hulu and Amazon video as all isp's want you to pay-per-view and not use those other services so they will restrict those to snuff them out.
  • I work for an ISP. I have a great deal of experience working on the core network. But, I think there are some items here that should be known from a technical perspective. Service providers negotiate deals with very large content providers for a good reason. Huge amounts of traffic are Netflix and YouTube (Amazon and Akamai are also big). It makes far more sense not to have this traffic go across peering locations with other service providers. It makes far more sense to connect directly to these content providers. But, this does require dedicated ports on expensive gear in prime locations. There are real costs associated with doing this. The content providers want this too because they won't be going over already busy traffic locations (such as a peering location between Verizon and AT&T). QoS (which people who a for net neutrality don't want) would be a possible solution, but not optimal. So there is payment for getting dedicated ports for big pipes. Inside the network, there isn't QoS on internet traffic after that (where I work). Most interpretations of Net Neutrality also don't take into account that business need QoS across VPN traffic between sites for Voice, Video, and other traffic that is sensitive to jitter/latency. I am talking corporations having phone calls with each other, not content providers. But the traffic will go over the same physical cable but with a different logical pipe. Should this be illegal to do? Certain types of traffic wouldn't work without proper QoS. The final point I would make is that the example of throttling data after a certain data limit on unlimited service or the Verizon deal in New York on items that Net Neutrality would fix. The ToS updates were enough for Verizon and AT&T to keep throttling going. And Verizon not building out New York has nothing to do with Net Neutrality. But, providers aren't innocent either. They have limited customers before on sharing file and hosting their own servers on non business accounts. I think that this is a bad idea and can be handled with simple regulations and not the entirety of Net Neutrality.
  • I work for an ISP as well and we set up local caches of Netflix, YouTube, and other services to keep local copies of programming so that we only have to get one copy of "Luke Cage" or "Keyboard Cat" from the provider and then not do it again. The QoS with content providers goes up, our bandwidth usage goes down. Everyone walks away happy.
  • Content providers don't want this. It means your ISP picks who wins and who loses. As a user, if I pay $50 a month for 100mbps, I don't want you picking what goes at 100 and what goes at 10. Sure, you'll say "We'll just pick what can go over 100mbps", but no, that's not the case. Basically, if this was the case 10-12 years ago, Netflix would still be mailing DVD's since they couldn't pay for peering. They had people ready to put the boxes in at Comcast's locations, and Comcast denied since they wanted more money. What's to stop Comcast from saying "No, you can't do that at all, people should use Xfinity garbage streams!"? When I buy a car, the car company doesn't decide where I go, nor how fast I get there. Basically, you seem to be saying that being an ISP is hard. That's the point. But when cities want to do their own, and manage to get around ISP's blocking them, they don't need to do any of this garbage. So it seems to me that ISP's don't have to, just the current, poorly strung together networks do. ISP's got tax rebates to string up good connections, but they pocketed them and did the minimal amount needed. The US has the slowest internet in the developed world, and other countries don't need do this (except maybe Canada and the UK).
  • They do and they don't. They want their service to work well. Peering is a great way to make sure that happens. It is a direct connection into their network. Paying $50 a month for 100 Mbps doesn't get 100 Mbps to everything. There will be congestion in places. If every Netflix subscriber tried to watch as many movies as their accounts allowed all at once, there would be problems. And there are Netflix competitors that are smaller and are surviving. But Netflix and YouTube together are routinely more than 50% of the traffic on the network. The small guys don't put a dent in that. They aren't to the point where they need peering.
    On the Comcast issue, it depends on who you believe. From what I can tell, Netflix didn't want to use 3rd party CDNs anymore. They decided that a lower cost method would be to use transit providers with settlement free agreements with other networks. The problem became that the link between these providers (mainly Cogent) and Comcast became saturated. Cogent was expecting Comcast to just add more links (this is a significant cost to Comcast and possibly Cogent). You could easily make the case that Netflix own business decision led to this. The theory that Comcast was throttling for their own service is incorrect. The links in the transit network were full. Netflix just tried to do things cheaper and found it that it did have problems. Net Neutrality would not have fixed this issue. Unless your idea of Net Neutrality is that one company should be able to send another company has much traffic as it wants and require the company to provide an infinite amount of bandwidth to it.
    The car analogy really doesn't fit. This scenario is more like the roads are full of traffic, why can't I drive the speed limit?
    On cities doing their own broadband, it is more complicated than you think. They have to connect with others at peering points are probably piggy backing mostly on tier 1 networks. The CDN agreements are there. Because a gov't entity does it doesn't mean that the same problems don't exist.
    On the tax money given to ISPs through most likely through CAF and CAF2, that money is mainly for connecting rural areas. Connecting rural areas is difficult simply because long distance transmissions in the last mile compared to more densely populated areas. It is a lost easier to connect people in a small area like South Korea. South Korea is about the size of Indiana with the combined population of Texas and Florida. That is a lot easier problem to solve than spreading them out like into Texas and Florida. And here are some countries with slower average internet than the United States according to Akamai.
    Singapore, Ireland, Canada, Germany, Austria, Israel, Portugal, Poland, Spain, Taiwan, and France. (Q3 2015 rankings). The numbers have likely moved in a year in and half, but still, we aren't near as bad as you suggest.
  • Anyone else notice 'innovation' has quickly become the corporate euphemism of choice for anti-consumer BS?
  • I've noticed. This flowery language covers a LOT of anti-consumer manure.
  • I certain that AC bitched about Net Neutrality (and were against it and called it a whole bunch of bad words) a few years back.. back when the ISPs were against it.
  • So I guess many here love to put corporations in their drivers seat. Not sure of the IQs of the people here but corporations exist to drive profit to their few powerful shareholders at the expense of the customers. I have a hard time believing that entities like Verizon will work in MY best interest once the reigns are cut loose.
    If you think this is good for the consumer I have a bridge to sell you all.
  • But corporations are people too.
  • One corporation must provide better services than another corporation in order to retain said customers and make said profit, thus maximizing service to customers. Would you rather the government own everything, like in Venezuela, where they currently don't have paper to wipe their butts with and are eating flamingos?
  • I'll see your dramatic and ill conceived comparison to Venezuela and raise it by the idiocy that is the free hand running rampant or Reaganomics.
  • It's like everyone forgot how Verizon and Comcast ran a shake down on Netflix to "improve network traffic" and then even after Netflix paid their protection money, Verizon kept throttling Netflix traffic: https://www.extremetech.com/computing/186576-verizon-caught-throttling-n...
  • This.
    "regulate everything preemptively" Ajit trying to rewrite history.
  • Classifying ISPs as a Title II Common Carrier was RE-regulation. The FCC under George W Bush De-regulated ISPs and removed the Title II designation. Putting them back under this was only done after almost 10 years of seeing the effects it had on new businesses like Netflix and how they could be held hostage by an ISP being a jerk. So, we're going to dereuglate them again??? Really?? This is just a naked "hand big businesses money" move as anything else we've seen the FCC do under this new leadership. I swear I'm in a constant Deja Vu state here.
  • Wait until Brown & Crouppen hears about this.
  • There is no entity in human history more capable of screwing up the simplest and smartest of ideas, than government. Thus, I want as little government control as possible. I have yet to hear of an idea in my lifetime that I thought to myself, "hey, you know what would make this even better? If a bunch of out of touch people inside the DC beltway start messing with it." This story should qualify it's description of the FCC as "America's telecom regulator." It should read America's UN-ELECTED telecom regulator as the FCC is yet another bloated government organization full of un-elected bureaucrats who rule by regulation without accountability. If you dislike the FCC's new plan, I have no sympathy for you. You whine and complain begging for some type of government control without ever giving thought to what happens to government control when it's not "your guy" in charge. That's why the solution is never government. But please, cell phone operating system website, continue on spewing politics. There are some incapable of reasoning who need their political #takes and taught what to think by an android site.
  • Yep, the government can solve everyone's problems and do it for less!
  • Yes, we need to just get rid of all government, I mean who would better serve the common man and their interest than corporations and businesses? Nothing says good for the citizen like legislation focused and crafted with profit margins and share holders as priority!
  • That actually would be pretty great! Then the Comcast's, Verizon's and At&T's of the world would not be able to drown startup ISPs in expensive and time consuming legal battles or lobby government bodies to enact anti-competitive regulations and monopolize regions. Companies would absolutely be forced to compete then and if consumers don't like a specific company's ethics and switch, there is no more government to bail out that bad company either!
  • History has proven this over and over again, yet no one ever seems to take notice
  • I had Comcast years ago cripple my upload speed so bad Xbox live didn't work while the Xbox was the only device on the network. Then customer service told me my Xbox wasn't powerful enough to handle the games I was playing. Rumor was they were doing it to people they didn't approve the internet usage habits of.
  • Comcast is the worst. They are also penalizing customers like me who don't want their overpriced HD cable package and went with Sony Vue by adding data caps! So the money I save on Vue is now going to buy a larger data cap. Disgusting.