"So websites can put anything they like in the terms of service and people are legally obligated to follow them?"
Umm, no.
T&C must be legal and proper, generally the public cannot be forced to waive their rights to get service.
However, that said, a website is a private company, and they do have the rights to set (within the law) the rule by which they offer service. Facebook is well within their rights to say "you may not share your password in any manner" and yes, to some extent they can specify how you can connect to their service (web browser, app, etc).
I often find that you feel that the courts applying the law is troubling. These two cases are both perfect examples of why that law fits almost exactly.
Facebook v. Power is incredibly simple: Given that they had already received a cease and desist, any action beyond that is (a) a violation of that C&D, and (b) unauthorized access to their system. While it may not be a hack in the sense of forcing a password or other, they did access the system and retrieve information that they were specifically C&D'ed from doing. Seems pretty clear.
The Nosal case is even easier: There is no reason for the guy to share the password from his previous job with anyone except with bad intentions. In sharing the password and having someone else enter the system for him, he effectively entered into a conspiracy to illegally access the system. Nosal himself didn't do the work, but made the most significant contribution to someone illegally accessing the system.
What is troubling to me is that you seem not to be able to understand the difference from voluntary and involuntary actions. In both of these cases, we are well beyond a simple violation of a terms of service, in each case the defendants made voluntary actions that ended up in unauthorized access. Each of them had to do something well beyond just violating terms of service to get there. Nosal had to intentionally give out a password to his ex-employer's system, and Power had to willfully ignore a C&D.
Simply put, neither of these would have been good cases to take to SCOTUS, because both of them are clearly in the wrong, and the statute in plain text covers it.
Karl, you once again manage to take an angle that goes completely against the Techdirt universe. It's shocking that Mike hasn't taken you out behind the virtual woodshed to put you out of your mistery, except of course you know the secret 10 self-links per story rule.
Seriously though...
Mergers (no matter the industry) almost always lead to job losses. Mergers generally work financially because there are duplication in the efforts of the companies when they are apart that would be eliminated when they are together. That means everything from facilities and product lines to staff and benefits. It's the very nature of the game.
Further, mergers are generally the end result of an open business market. Monopoly or near monopoly players are generally considered the natural result of competition. When a company can no longer easily grow by taking market share from competitors at a reasonable price, it may be more financially sound to take over the competitor.
Finally, consider this: Who pays for the current jobs? Consumers. If you keep a bunch of people working that are effectively redundant, someone has to pay for them. Your cell phone bill pays for them, plain and simple. Competition has it's benefits (naturally) but massive duplication of effort comes at a cost as well.
Mergers are unavoidable - regulation unnaturally may keep them from happening, but it's not natural.
Why not write some positive stuff? Look for upstart companies offering new products in the communication market. They are the future competitors and future monopoly players.
If the third party doctrine is "broken" by this law, it creates a situation where lawyers could argue in court that the doctrine is no longer universal, and thus should not apply. It's literally a foot in the door thing.
Moreover, if these laws were to pass (unlikely) and the language not be challenged, then Wyden would likely be out there stuffing amendments into every other piece of legislation to accomplish the same end goal.
Basically, he knows nobody in congress would pass a straight law that killed the third party doctrine. So instead, he's going to try to do it piecemeal. Typical congress critter.
Mr Wyden, the master of writing innocuous looking laws that actually have a bigger purpose.
The bigger purpose here is to break the warrant-less access to third party business records. Once an exception is created, the exception will be expanded to "everything regulated by the government" including the FCC, which would mean cell phone records.
He's pretty sneaky - but he's hitting something that likely doesn't have the support to go through. Nobody needs to pass this legislation to get re-elected.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
"Boston happened. Charlie Hebdo happened."
You still seem to be thinking that CCTV cameras are some how able to read minds. They are not.
Boston is a good example. The guys did everything about right. They came to a very public event, blended in with tens of thousands of other people, and "forgot' a backpack with the bomb in it in an area where there were plenty of other backpacks. How the hell do you expect CCTV to magically pick that out?
Charlie Hebdo is the same thing. Two men walk into a building, nothing surprising - people enter the same building over and over all day long. They happened to have concealed weapons, and shot the place up and killed 12 people. CCTV cannot read their minds.
"Then again, you consider LOVEINT to be reasonable."
Stop lying.
I consider it unreasonable, but not unexpected. Police officers are humans, we all make mistakes and perhaps take advantage of things we shouldn't. It is human nature. Dealing with it strongly is key to reminding others that it's not acceptable.
So yeah, quit lying. You are a sorry troll trying to drag the discussion far away from my original point, that CCTV was never intended as a magic wand to read people's minds and stop crimes before they happen, they are there to document when happened, and perhaps to discourage people from committing crimes (at least not directly in front of the camera).
Re: Re: Re: Re: Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
" it is also a fact that you will be an apologist for any decision that authority makes while shilling for a level surveillance and inspection that would put Minority Report to shame."
No it's not a fact. It's your opinion, and it's not true.
"Do you actually want the surveillance to prevent the crimes you claim you want to avoid, or are you just going to defend to death the acts of authority even when they fuck up? "
Those aren't two valid options. Rather, it shows your own mistaken take on what surveillance video does.
CCTV doesn't magically prevent crime. It doesn't have a special system that allows it to know when a criminal act is about to happen and stop it. It sees, and records, in the same manner that you or I might looking out our window.
CCTV does discourage open criminal activities. This is a known fact. Some will say it only displaces crime to non-observed areas, but that is pretty much the same result as having a police officer standing in the same location. We all know the effects already.
What CCTV can do is help authorities to piece together a crime, and to know more about when happened at a scene. It doesn't magically solve crimes, but it can contribute to an understanding of what happened. You know, where did a criminal come from, where did they leave through, were they perhaps caught on camera driving a car, riding a bike, or taking a taxi? Additional knowledge can help the police in moving forward with a case.
"the likeliest result they get out of it is fuck all?"
That isn't the likeliest result. That is your opinion overshadowing reality.
First off, not all of the speech occurred or originated from California alone. Leigh is in Canada. Mike travels the world, and some or all of the posts in question could have been made from any of those places. Did Mike make all of the statements (and all of the comments later added) solely from a single location?
Techdirt also uses Cloudflare. The actual location of the servers or their appearance may be in question as well. Last I remember, they were not in California. For reference, Floor64 is hosted by Databank (formerly C7), in Salt Lake City if I am right. So then the question is WHICH anti-slapp law you want to use.
At this point, the law is incredibly vague on where computer speech actually occurs - does it occur the the speaker, the publishing location, or where that publication appears for the end user? In this case, there are three different outcomes depending on where the speech occurred. Throwing in the idea that Leigh wasn't even in Canada, and you have a much more interesting question.
Like I said, I have a feeling that the answer may be "you should have filed a venue change first". Accepting the venue may in fact be also accepting the rules in play.
Your Anti-SLAPP thing will likely fail, as you are in the wrong jurisdiction. My guess is the judge will tell you that you should have filed for a change of venue to California (where, in theory, the publishing occurred). The state has no anti-SLAPP laws, so your appeal will likely be denied.
On the other side, it's also likely his appeal will be denied. However, his one out in all of this is that the appeals court could rule that the judge dismissed on what should have been presented as evidence at trial, and the decision may have been too quick.
I don't think he has much of a hope, it's very small. You have more change with your anti-SLAPP, and that looks like a "wrong courtroom, sonny!" sort of a thing.
You don't think? Let's put together what Karl linked to in the first paragraph to see:
rubber stamp regulators lack of competition arbitrary and unnecessary usage caps and overage fees hamstrung streaming competitors.
When you filter out everything else, it's clear Karl has an agenda and he's pushing it without mercy. Every story he writes has a similar grouping of terms, trying to SEO his comments to be the only ones you see if you search Google for certain phrases.
Everything he writes is to support this basic concept. Cutting out everything except the quotes in each case proves it.
I read the headline / title and shook my head. Then I read the story and, once I stopped laugh, figured I better add a comment.
The conclusion is not supported in any way, because the two items are not directly connected. The lack of, or the existance of, CCTV does not stop a single person from committing a crime. This is especially true in the case of a well planned, well executed (sorry, bad word, but it's the right word) criminal act. People like that PLAN for the existence of CCTV.
In this case (as an example) the guy brought 10 ordinary rolling suitcases to his room over a period of time. He didn't carry in 10 gun cases or a box marked "explosives and guns in here". He did it stealthily and in a manner specifically intended to not arouse suspicion.
CCTV, police officers, or even the Amazing Kreskin can't deal with someone working in this manner. It's not even a question of surveillance via CCTV that matters.
So there is no way to draw the conclusion you are suggesting. CCTV was a null on this particular case (although I am sure plenty of hotel footage will come out with him in the elevator taking stuff up to the room, etc). You can not say that surveillance filed because in this case, there was nothing to watch. You may as well blame the maker of his shirt or cell phone.
Now, if you were looking for a better conclusion, you could consider that a lack of surveillance and record keeping of guns is an issue. Had each firearm required registration at the point of sale, someone might have noticed that the guy purchased a virtual arsenal of guns in the last 6 months.
So if anything, more record keeping (ie more surveillance of gun sales and sale of "accessories") might have prevented this - or at least made it significantly harder.
So in conclusion, not only do I think you got it wrong, you actually may have pointed exactly the wrong way.
"You expect communications technology to only be a continuation of the old."
I do not. As I said "Long term, those players could also be looking at the alternatives, such as longer distance wi-fi or other alternatives, especially related to the last mile. ". The game changer for the ISPs will be anything that changes the last mile.
"Can't you imagine an advanced technology being created that makes all minor advances in the old obsolete."
I can easily imagine it. I can also imagine that it's not going to magically roll out next week and be widely adopted the week after. So for the purposes of Wall Street short and medium term business, it looks like ISPs are going to go up at least in that time frame.
However, Wall Street works mostly on the short and medium term, and not very often on the long term. So they are looking at the mid-near term (say the next 5 to 10 years) and they see the incumbent players probably doing pretty well.
Google Fiber has already had almost a decade to try to get over the hump, and they have essentially given up. Unless there are major technology advancements that roll out very quickly, the mid-near term is good for existing players and not for anyone else.
Long term, those players could also be looking at the alternatives, such as longer distance wi-fi or other alternatives, especially related to the last mile.
In wireless, 5G is coming, but not much before 2020 or 2021, and "full" roll out might not come for 5 years or more after that. Limitation in available bandwidth means that in many cases it won't replace wire line internet.
As I said, the conclusion is that short to mid term, existing players are fine and likely to get a boost. Long term is less certain, but Wall Street will be onto the "Uber for Prostitution" or whatever by then.
"And yet, when there is a noticeable majority of people who want net neutrality, you agree with Ajit Pai when he claims that nobody wants it."
Liar (and troll)
I don't agree with Ajit at all. I just think that net neutrality as created was just a "chairman's rule set" and the next chairman can well remove it. If you want net neutrality, have congress write it into law.
I don't think the FCC has the mandate to enforce it.
So when only 2 members of congress write an amicus brief, I think it's misleading to say "members of congress" when it's just two congress critters, and not the whole congress (very different).
I can understand that you are trying to support a "all ISPs are criminals" narrative, but the WSJ report doesn't seem to hit any of the points you are suggesting.
They got to their conclusion based on the OTHER argument you keep pounding on, the "cord cutters". Cord cutters never really cut the cord, they just buy MORE other cords and in other manners. The basis of their cord cutting is buying MORE internet, more speed, more bandwidth, more...
For an ISP, when people buy more, they make more. When demand is high, prices generally go up. The time required for competition to arrive is such that supply and demand aren't kept in equilibreium at the low price point you wish, and instead the ISPs are able to offer higher speed / higher bandwidth packages are a higher price - and people are taking them.
This is doubly so with cord cutters. As they cut the cord and "save" on cable, they then have extra money by which to buy a better internet connection (and they need it, streaming isn't low speed work!). So in the end, as people cut the cord, they buy more and better (read more expensive) internet service and there is the result the WSJ is reporting.
The funny part is for the cable companies, it's not such a bad thing either. Even as you shriek on about cord cutting, they continue to add new internet subscribers and charge more for them - and it costs them less to do. A huge percentage of the money received for cable goes to paying for programming. Internet? Not so much, the cost of connectivity (especially in higher ratio systems) isn't as signficant. So bottom line, the cable companies are actually keeping more income to themselves.
So yeah, the WSJ is looking at all of this and seeing longer term profits. This is especially true because the costs and time required for competition to roll out is such that it's unlikely that any of these companies will see meaningful competition in the short to medium term, which is where investors generally work these days.
Basically, you missed a good story, too busy trying to build a narrative and not long enough actually thinking it through!
Story title is somewhat misleading. While these two are members of congress, they don't represent all of congress. Title would have been better as "Two Congresspeople:".
The title as given suggests all of congress agrees, which is not the case.
Interestingly, I see no restictions on signing up. Yet, a sweepstakes with such a prize made available in the province of Quebec would require a lottery permit (and would be subject to strict verification). There are plenty of other places with similar issues.
That and, of course, who wants to sign up for more spam? When you consider the millions of possibly entries versus the value of the prize, the reward is far out weighed by the costs.
On the post: Supreme Court Leaves Troubling CFAA Rulings In Place: Sharing Passwords Can Be Criminal Hacking
Re: Re: Troubling?
Umm, no.
T&C must be legal and proper, generally the public cannot be forced to waive their rights to get service.
However, that said, a website is a private company, and they do have the rights to set (within the law) the rule by which they offer service. Facebook is well within their rights to say "you may not share your password in any manner" and yes, to some extent they can specify how you can connect to their service (web browser, app, etc).
The rest of your post is nonsense.
On the post: Supreme Court Leaves Troubling CFAA Rulings In Place: Sharing Passwords Can Be Criminal Hacking
Re: Re: Troubling?
On the post: Supreme Court Leaves Troubling CFAA Rulings In Place: Sharing Passwords Can Be Criminal Hacking
Troubling?
Facebook v. Power is incredibly simple: Given that they had already received a cease and desist, any action beyond that is (a) a violation of that C&D, and (b) unauthorized access to their system. While it may not be a hack in the sense of forcing a password or other, they did access the system and retrieve information that they were specifically C&D'ed from doing. Seems pretty clear.
The Nosal case is even easier: There is no reason for the guy to share the password from his previous job with anyone except with bad intentions. In sharing the password and having someone else enter the system for him, he effectively entered into a conspiracy to illegally access the system. Nosal himself didn't do the work, but made the most significant contribution to someone illegally accessing the system.
What is troubling to me is that you seem not to be able to understand the difference from voluntary and involuntary actions. In both of these cases, we are well beyond a simple violation of a terms of service, in each case the defendants made voluntary actions that ended up in unauthorized access. Each of them had to do something well beyond just violating terms of service to get there. Nosal had to intentionally give out a password to his ex-employer's system, and Power had to willfully ignore a C&D.
Simply put, neither of these would have been good cases to take to SCOTUS, because both of them are clearly in the wrong, and the statute in plain text covers it.
On the post: Analysts Predict Sprint, T-Mobile Merger Will Be A Massive Job Killer
Job Losses? Think of all the buggy whip makers!
Seriously though...
Mergers (no matter the industry) almost always lead to job losses. Mergers generally work financially because there are duplication in the efforts of the companies when they are apart that would be eliminated when they are together. That means everything from facilities and product lines to staff and benefits. It's the very nature of the game.
Further, mergers are generally the end result of an open business market. Monopoly or near monopoly players are generally considered the natural result of competition. When a company can no longer easily grow by taking market share from competitors at a reasonable price, it may be more financially sound to take over the competitor.
Finally, consider this: Who pays for the current jobs? Consumers. If you keep a bunch of people working that are effectively redundant, someone has to pay for them. Your cell phone bill pays for them, plain and simple. Competition has it's benefits (naturally) but massive duplication of effort comes at a cost as well.
Mergers are unavoidable - regulation unnaturally may keep them from happening, but it's not natural.
Why not write some positive stuff? Look for upstart companies offering new products in the communication market. They are the future competitors and future monopoly players.
On the post: Three Energy Bills Look To Increase Fourth Amendment Protections For Americans
Re: Re:
If the third party doctrine is "broken" by this law, it creates a situation where lawyers could argue in court that the doctrine is no longer universal, and thus should not apply. It's literally a foot in the door thing.
Moreover, if these laws were to pass (unlikely) and the language not be challenged, then Wyden would likely be out there stuffing amendments into every other piece of legislation to accomplish the same end goal.
Basically, he knows nobody in congress would pass a straight law that killed the third party doctrine. So instead, he's going to try to do it piecemeal. Typical congress critter.
On the post: Three Energy Bills Look To Increase Fourth Amendment Protections For Americans
The bigger purpose here is to break the warrant-less access to third party business records. Once an exception is created, the exception will be expanded to "everything regulated by the government" including the FCC, which would mean cell phone records.
He's pretty sneaky - but he's hitting something that likely doesn't have the support to go through. Nobody needs to pass this legislation to get re-elected.
On the post: The Vegas Shooting Makes It Clear More Surveillance Isn't The Answer
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
You still seem to be thinking that CCTV cameras are some how able to read minds. They are not.
Boston is a good example. The guys did everything about right. They came to a very public event, blended in with tens of thousands of other people, and "forgot' a backpack with the bomb in it in an area where there were plenty of other backpacks. How the hell do you expect CCTV to magically pick that out?
Charlie Hebdo is the same thing. Two men walk into a building, nothing surprising - people enter the same building over and over all day long. They happened to have concealed weapons, and shot the place up and killed 12 people. CCTV cannot read their minds.
"Then again, you consider LOVEINT to be reasonable."
Stop lying.
I consider it unreasonable, but not unexpected. Police officers are humans, we all make mistakes and perhaps take advantage of things we shouldn't. It is human nature. Dealing with it strongly is key to reminding others that it's not acceptable.
So yeah, quit lying. You are a sorry troll trying to drag the discussion far away from my original point, that CCTV was never intended as a magic wand to read people's minds and stop crimes before they happen, they are there to document when happened, and perhaps to discourage people from committing crimes (at least not directly in front of the camera).
On the post: The Vegas Shooting Makes It Clear More Surveillance Isn't The Answer
Re: Re: Re: Re: Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
No it's not a fact. It's your opinion, and it's not true.
"Do you actually want the surveillance to prevent the crimes you claim you want to avoid, or are you just going to defend to death the acts of authority even when they fuck up? "
Those aren't two valid options. Rather, it shows your own mistaken take on what surveillance video does.
CCTV doesn't magically prevent crime. It doesn't have a special system that allows it to know when a criminal act is about to happen and stop it. It sees, and records, in the same manner that you or I might looking out our window.
CCTV does discourage open criminal activities. This is a known fact. Some will say it only displaces crime to non-observed areas, but that is pretty much the same result as having a police officer standing in the same location. We all know the effects already.
What CCTV can do is help authorities to piece together a crime, and to know more about when happened at a scene. It doesn't magically solve crimes, but it can contribute to an understanding of what happened. You know, where did a criminal come from, where did they leave through, were they perhaps caught on camera driving a car, riding a bike, or taking a taxi? Additional knowledge can help the police in moving forward with a case.
"the likeliest result they get out of it is fuck all?"
That isn't the likeliest result. That is your opinion overshadowing reality.
Is it perfect? Nope.
Neither are humans.
On the post: The Latest On Shiva Ayyadurai's Failed Libel Suit Against Techdirt
Re: Re: My opinion
First off, not all of the speech occurred or originated from California alone. Leigh is in Canada. Mike travels the world, and some or all of the posts in question could have been made from any of those places. Did Mike make all of the statements (and all of the comments later added) solely from a single location?
Techdirt also uses Cloudflare. The actual location of the servers or their appearance may be in question as well. Last I remember, they were not in California. For reference, Floor64 is hosted by Databank (formerly C7), in Salt Lake City if I am right. So then the question is WHICH anti-slapp law you want to use.
At this point, the law is incredibly vague on where computer speech actually occurs - does it occur the the speaker, the publishing location, or where that publication appears for the end user? In this case, there are three different outcomes depending on where the speech occurred. Throwing in the idea that Leigh wasn't even in Canada, and you have a much more interesting question.
Like I said, I have a feeling that the answer may be "you should have filed a venue change first". Accepting the venue may in fact be also accepting the rules in play.
On the post: The Latest On Shiva Ayyadurai's Failed Libel Suit Against Techdirt
My opinion
Your Anti-SLAPP thing will likely fail, as you are in the wrong jurisdiction. My guess is the judge will tell you that you should have filed for a change of venue to California (where, in theory, the publishing occurred). The state has no anti-SLAPP laws, so your appeal will likely be denied.
On the other side, it's also likely his appeal will be denied. However, his one out in all of this is that the appeals court could rule that the judge dismissed on what should have been presented as evidence at trial, and the decision may have been too quick.
I don't think he has much of a hope, it's very small. You have more change with your anti-SLAPP, and that looks like a "wrong courtroom, sonny!" sort of a thing.
On the post: The Vegas Shooting Makes It Clear More Surveillance Isn't The Answer
Re: Re: Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
On the post: Wall Street Predicts Apathetic Regulators And Limited Competition Will Let Comcast Double Broadband Prices
Re: Re: Narrative
rubber stamp regulators lack of competition arbitrary and unnecessary usage caps and overage fees hamstrung streaming competitors.
When you filter out everything else, it's clear Karl has an agenda and he's pushing it without mercy. Every story he writes has a similar grouping of terms, trying to SEO his comments to be the only ones you see if you search Google for certain phrases.
Everything he writes is to support this basic concept. Cutting out everything except the quotes in each case proves it.
On the post: The Vegas Shooting Makes It Clear More Surveillance Isn't The Answer
Drawing a conclusion without conclusive evidence
The conclusion is not supported in any way, because the two items are not directly connected. The lack of, or the existance of, CCTV does not stop a single person from committing a crime. This is especially true in the case of a well planned, well executed (sorry, bad word, but it's the right word) criminal act. People like that PLAN for the existence of CCTV.
In this case (as an example) the guy brought 10 ordinary rolling suitcases to his room over a period of time. He didn't carry in 10 gun cases or a box marked "explosives and guns in here". He did it stealthily and in a manner specifically intended to not arouse suspicion.
CCTV, police officers, or even the Amazing Kreskin can't deal with someone working in this manner. It's not even a question of surveillance via CCTV that matters.
So there is no way to draw the conclusion you are suggesting. CCTV was a null on this particular case (although I am sure plenty of hotel footage will come out with him in the elevator taking stuff up to the room, etc). You can not say that surveillance filed because in this case, there was nothing to watch. You may as well blame the maker of his shirt or cell phone.
Now, if you were looking for a better conclusion, you could consider that a lack of surveillance and record keeping of guns is an issue. Had each firearm required registration at the point of sale, someone might have noticed that the guy purchased a virtual arsenal of guns in the last 6 months.
So if anything, more record keeping (ie more surveillance of gun sales and sale of "accessories") might have prevented this - or at least made it significantly harder.
So in conclusion, not only do I think you got it wrong, you actually may have pointed exactly the wrong way.
On the post: Wall Street Predicts Apathetic Regulators And Limited Competition Will Let Comcast Double Broadband Prices
Re: Re: Re: Re: Narrative
I do not. As I said "Long term, those players could also be looking at the alternatives, such as longer distance wi-fi or other alternatives, especially related to the last mile. ". The game changer for the ISPs will be anything that changes the last mile.
"Can't you imagine an advanced technology being created that makes all minor advances in the old obsolete."
I can easily imagine it. I can also imagine that it's not going to magically roll out next week and be widely adopted the week after. So for the purposes of Wall Street short and medium term business, it looks like ISPs are going to go up at least in that time frame.
No facepalms. Just reality.
On the post: Members Of Congress: Court Was Wrong To Say That Posting The Law Is Copyright Infringement
Re: Re: Re: Re:
You aren't a very good troll.
On the post: Wall Street Predicts Apathetic Regulators And Limited Competition Will Let Comcast Double Broadband Prices
Re: Re: Narrative
However, Wall Street works mostly on the short and medium term, and not very often on the long term. So they are looking at the mid-near term (say the next 5 to 10 years) and they see the incumbent players probably doing pretty well.
Google Fiber has already had almost a decade to try to get over the hump, and they have essentially given up. Unless there are major technology advancements that roll out very quickly, the mid-near term is good for existing players and not for anyone else.
Long term, those players could also be looking at the alternatives, such as longer distance wi-fi or other alternatives, especially related to the last mile.
In wireless, 5G is coming, but not much before 2020 or 2021, and "full" roll out might not come for 5 years or more after that. Limitation in available bandwidth means that in many cases it won't replace wire line internet.
As I said, the conclusion is that short to mid term, existing players are fine and likely to get a boost. Long term is less certain, but Wall Street will be onto the "Uber for Prostitution" or whatever by then.
On the post: Members Of Congress: Court Was Wrong To Say That Posting The Law Is Copyright Infringement
Re: Re:
Liar (and troll)
I don't agree with Ajit at all. I just think that net neutrality as created was just a "chairman's rule set" and the next chairman can well remove it. If you want net neutrality, have congress write it into law.
I don't think the FCC has the mandate to enforce it.
So when only 2 members of congress write an amicus brief, I think it's misleading to say "members of congress" when it's just two congress critters, and not the whole congress (very different).
On the post: Wall Street Predicts Apathetic Regulators And Limited Competition Will Let Comcast Double Broadband Prices
Narrative
They got to their conclusion based on the OTHER argument you keep pounding on, the "cord cutters". Cord cutters never really cut the cord, they just buy MORE other cords and in other manners. The basis of their cord cutting is buying MORE internet, more speed, more bandwidth, more...
For an ISP, when people buy more, they make more. When demand is high, prices generally go up. The time required for competition to arrive is such that supply and demand aren't kept in equilibreium at the low price point you wish, and instead the ISPs are able to offer higher speed / higher bandwidth packages are a higher price - and people are taking them.
This is doubly so with cord cutters. As they cut the cord and "save" on cable, they then have extra money by which to buy a better internet connection (and they need it, streaming isn't low speed work!). So in the end, as people cut the cord, they buy more and better (read more expensive) internet service and there is the result the WSJ is reporting.
The funny part is for the cable companies, it's not such a bad thing either. Even as you shriek on about cord cutting, they continue to add new internet subscribers and charge more for them - and it costs them less to do. A huge percentage of the money received for cable goes to paying for programming. Internet? Not so much, the cost of connectivity (especially in higher ratio systems) isn't as signficant. So bottom line, the cable companies are actually keeping more income to themselves.
So yeah, the WSJ is looking at all of this and seeing longer term profits. This is especially true because the costs and time required for competition to roll out is such that it's unlikely that any of these companies will see meaningful competition in the short to medium term, which is where investors generally work these days.
Basically, you missed a good story, too busy trying to build a narrative and not long enough actually thinking it through!
On the post: Members Of Congress: Court Was Wrong To Say That Posting The Law Is Copyright Infringement
The title as given suggests all of congress agrees, which is not the case.
On the post: Daily Deal: The New Google Pixel & Friends Giveaway
That and, of course, who wants to sign up for more spam? When you consider the millions of possibly entries versus the value of the prize, the reward is far out weighed by the costs.
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