California Shakes Off ISP Lobbyists, Embraces Real Net Neutrality
from the fat-lady-singing dept
Despite a rocky start, California has shaken off the lobbying influence of Comcast, AT&T and Verizon and passed meaningful net neutrality protections for the state's broadband residents. California's SB822, which pretty closely mirrors the FCC's discarded 2015 rules, almost had its most important parts stripped away courtesy of some early committee gamesmanship by AT&T. When that failed, ISP-connected lobbying and influence orgs tried to scare voters away from the effort by making misleading robocalls to state senior citizens insisting the bill would dramatically raise their phone bills.
Given the continued, overwhelming and bipartisan support for net neutrality, those efforts didn't work. SB822, which the EFF has called the "gold standard" for state-level rules, passed the California Assembly last Thursday, then managed to nab the necessary votes in the State Senate last Friday. It's now headed to the desk of California Governor Jerry Brown for signing:
61 out of 80 Assemblymembers - all 55 Democrats and 6 Republicans - voted for our #NetNeutrality bill. It’s great to see some bipartisanship on such an important issue. Thank you to the members from both parties who voted in favor. pic.twitter.com/Pq009bOJ5L
— Scott Wiener (@Scott_Wiener) August 30, 2018
Like most protections, the rules simply prevent ISPs from using their broadband monopolies to unfairly throttle, block, or censor competing content and services. Unlike weaker bills (like those being proposed by ISPs), the bill also takes aim at all of the creative anti-competitive efforts ISPs have been engaged in in recent years, from anti-competitive abuse of usage caps and overage fees (zero rating), to the anti-competitive abuse of interconnection points with transit operators and content companies.
With SB822's passage, the entire west coast is now covered with net neutrality rules thanks to laws passed in Oregon and Washington State; certainly not the end game most ISPs envisioned after spending millions to lobby the federal government.
You'll likely now hear ISPs, ISP lobbyists, and their literal armies of think tankers, payrolled academics, consultants and others whine incessantly for weeks about the unfairness of having to deal with numerous, discordant state-level protections. Of course none of these folks will acknowledge that's the telecom industry's fault, since this wouldn't be happening if they hadn't waged endless war on modest (by international standards), popular, and cohesive federal rules. Whatever your thoughts on net neutrality, this move was a reflection of what the public wanted (aka, Democracy).
ISPs will now shift their attention to slowing the spread of state laws, likely by suing individual states. They'll likely lean heavily on the "pre-emption" language Ajit Pai's FCC included in its net neutrality repeal at the behest of Comcast and Verizon, though early efforts by ISPs to use this language to dodge state oversight for terrible service haven't gone particularly well. Other lawyers have noted that when the FCC neutered its Title II authority under the Telecom Act at the behest of telecom monopolies, it also ironically eroded any authority to tell states what to do. Whoops.
The goal still needs to be to improve competition in the broadband space, since net neutrality violations are just a symptom of limited competition and a broken market. But until somebody in government grows a spine and is willing to stand up to deep-pocketed campaign contributors like Charter, AT&T, Verizon, CenturyLink and Comcast, net neutrality rules are the next best thing. Meanwhile, there's still a chance to restore the FCC's 2015 rules courtesy of the looming lawsuits headed the FCC direction; suits that will highlight the laundry list of bizarre and shady FCC behavior that accompanied the repeal.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: broadband, california, competition, net neutrality, states rights
Companies: at&t, comcast, verizon
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
The fake is the more honest of the two!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
I'd ask to take a look at it, but I don't want to disturb its state by observing it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Zero Rating
/s for those who don't know better
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
So not only does the public have to pay in order to defend themselves at the state level but they will also be indirectly funding the ISPs in their silly quest for world domination. Getting rich playing both sides against the middle, and this is what some consider to be a good economic environment.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
How are they going to feel when it, in the end, fails?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward
So not only does the public have to pay in order to defend themselves at the state level but they will also be indirectly funding the ISPs in their silly quest for world domination. Getting rich playing both sides against the middle, and this is what some consider to be a good economic environment
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Anonymous Coward
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
TheyDidItToThemSelves
ISP's also wouldn't be facing this problem if they hadn't consolidated/merged local competitors out of business and drawn regional anti-compete maps between other ISP's.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
There's a reason why broadband deployment is especially lagging in rural America (even more then the rest of the country). It's simply not profitable for the ISP's, not even if they're guaranteed a monopoly. It's too much land to build infrastructure and not enough people on that land to pay for it.
While many people (especially politicians) love to brag about how awesome the free market is, the ISP market is frankly an area where the free market doesn't work for this reason. This is why the utility classification, and a tax/subsidies system was created for water/electricity/landline phones. Prior to it many of these services (especially landline phones) simply weren't available in rural America because there was no money in it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
Agreed, and therefore the ISPs should not be fighting efforts by the rural munies to start their own.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
Because the only thing worse than not making money?
Someone else making it instead.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
The Rural Electrification Act used federal funds to build the infrastructure, which was then handed to member-owned co-ops to maintain. Many of these still exist today, 80-years later.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: TheyDidItToThemSelves
First, define "decent". Something like a 50Mbps network would be an upgrade over much of what's available in many places.
Second, regarding money: While small municipal governments may not individually have the money, if it goes the co-operative route, there's the possibility of multiple communities banding together, and/or public/private partnership, since local businesses need internet access, too.
And as for why the telcos oppose this sort of thing, it seems obvious, to me. If small rural communities were to start deploying their own networks and charging co-op rates for the service, it would reveal the actual price structure that the big ISPs use.
If what the big ISP provides nearby is $100/mo. for advertised 100Mbps that's actually 75 on a very good day, the $30/mo. the (fictional) co-op charges for a solid 50Mbps hook-up is going to make the ISP look like it's ripping off its customers.
Repeat in rural communities across America, and the look for the ISPs could become very bad indeed. Also, the fact that I made the numbers in my example up doesn't invalidate the concept, so please don't even try.
I'd use actual numbers, but those are oddly hard to come by, and who do we have to thank for that?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Competition: Not Even Once.
Similar to what Killercool noted they fight those because at some point they might roll out to those areas, and if they do they don't want any actual competition to prevent them from setting 'my prices or no internet' rates.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Competition: Not Even Once.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Federal preemption
Of course the big ISPs have created their own problem, and federal rules that preempt state regulations will now take much longer to implement, and be subject to much stronger court challenges.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Federal preemption
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Federal preemption
That's...not how it works.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
That's...not how it works.
- Really? How does it work then?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
Wha..?
That's exactly how it works.
If a power is not held by the federal government (like a federal regulatory agency declaring that they do not have regulatory power over a whole market), it is up to the states whether or not they legislate it themselves. Those laws can be unconstitutional, but that's a whole different issue.
It's the 10th Amendment, man. It's literally in the Constitution.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
See when the Federal Government does something, which may be a really bad idea, there's no fleeing from it. Is a Local or State Government des something bad, you can free out of the town or State. Good Idea's that work out will get copied by other states, Bad Idea's don't get copied and it's just the local or state government that suffers.
So the Federal Regulations get removed. Which is seems may have been a good thing as this allows the States to put in their own rules if they want. These Cable companies may have been a little short sited and screwed themselves far worse then they could have ever imagined. May have been better off leaving things as they were.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
Isn't that exactly how it developed? Companies supplied all kinds of frequencies and eventually selected 60 Hz without goverment forcing them. Actually, government regulations said they had to supply 25 Hz power to those who wanted it—the Niagara Falls 25 Hz grid wasn't gone till 2009! (Railways are still weird.)
History elsewhere is similar. Most non-Japanese countries settled on a single standard, typically the same one as neighboring countries, with laws/treaties not playing a huge role.
More to the point, standards don't have to come from a higher level of government. A bunch of states use California's air quality rules, rather than follow the Clean Air Act. It wouldn't be crazy to do similarly for Net Neutrality, were there significant disagreement about the rules—i.e., not mainly huge ISPs objecting.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Federal preemption
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Federal preemption
This is, as a note, why our regular anti-regulation commenters are off base in discussions with net neutrality. They widely comment on how the current anti competitive regulators are our just desserts, but when pressed, most admit that we need some sort of legal system and we need laws, they just don't like un-elected 'regulators' doing that job. But the goal here isn't regulation. Its legislation. It is using elected officials to craft bad laws. Because in the end, bad regulations and bad laws can and will happen. That is the point of the first amendment and the variety of lawmaking mechanisms we have - so the people can hold their representatives to account. We do not assume that every regulation or law will be gold. We do not take laws and regulations at face value. We, in the end, are skeptical, and voice our opposition to the bad, and our support of the good.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Continental Congress...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I wonder...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I wonder...
No, because a "municipality" is an agency of the state government. The state either authorizes (or does not authorize) its own agency to perform actions. A state may not be able to regulate an industry, but that has nothing to do with whether it chooses to create/coopt its own agency to compete in that industry.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Reasons
Why not all of them? What is the decent to this??
How about IMPROVEMENTS to the system?
This is very basic stuff, and gives the Gov. Reps NO UNDERSTANDING of what is going to be REQUIRED, in the near future.
History:
When the Major internet hit came around, Portland Or. has a coverage rate of 6%...They figured that AT MOST, 6% of the people would ever use the phone system..When the net hit, they had to increase this to 80+%.. it took them 6-12 months to get most of it up and running again.
PS... this was when 56k modems were being used..NOW we are 200 times faster and STILL get internet stutters.
WHO would like to play a Video game at 56k??
You cant even Watch HD youtube with Less then 10mbps.
With all the devices used in Many households, for games, Video, Movies, email, TEACHING, NEWS, and all the things in 1 house..
A family of 4, will take up Enough bandwidth of 200mbps PLUS, very easily..and if there is a TOP CAP for the amounts of data..They will blow that in 2 weeks..EASILY..
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
All this groaning just for a pretty standard Net Neutrality law?
The shitstorm would be epic
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: All this groaning just for a pretty standard Net Neutrality law?
is OWNERSHIP..
Who owns the Lines and equipment..
If, no one does, then ANYONE can connect and send service..
Real question is What did they get when they BOUGHT the service...?? I dont think they OWN the telephone poles, or most of the underground installations(if run on Sewers and public systems)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Just wait until banks are held to the standards of dealing honestly, responsibly and accurately.
This is just the minor leagues.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]