OT: "network neutrality" and the internet

[Kenneth Brody]

Quoting Bill Campbell (Wed, 26 Apr 2006 10:41:11 -0700):

> On Wed, Apr 26, 2006, Kenneth Brody wrote:
> >There are bills up for vote in the U.S. Congress concerning what is
> >known as "network neutrality" on the internet.  Basically, "network
> >neutrality" means that all network traffic is treated equally.  You
[...]
[...]
> My server, my rules.

But doesn't "common carrier" status mean you have to follow some
additional, "special" rules?

> How would the thieves at the National Joke Factory (one of Will
> Rogers' terms for the U.S. house and Senate) deal with qualtity
> of service issues (giving different priorties to packets based on
> the service -- voice over IP has higher priority than file
> transfers)?

How would your regular phone service deal with different priorities
if AT&T could give their traffic higher priority than MCI's calls?

[...]
> >Note, however, that most "internet petitions", like the one in the
> >sample e-mail on snopes, are toothless.  Of course, that doesn't mean
> >you can't use other methods to let your congressmen know your stand
> >on the issue, whichever side that may be.
>
> Getting the congress critters to actually read the bills they
> vote on would be a miracle, much less expecting them understand
> the issues in the bills.

True.  A lot of these things are passed as a rubber-stamp vote for
a bill that some subcommittee sent along.

--
KenBrody at BestWeb dot net        spamtrap: <g8ymh8uf001 at sneakemail.com>
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