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re: Have we discussed Daily Stormer and Stormfront getting banned from the internet?

Posted on 9/3/17 at 11:55 am to
Posted by AUstar
Member since Dec 2012
17098 posts
Posted on 9/3/17 at 11:55 am to
quote:

Should AT&T be able to drop phone service to groups they don't agree with? What about Entergy? What about water and sewage?


Phone, power, and sewage are considered utilities. The Internet is not considered a utility, although there has been a push for a number of years to get it classified as such. The FCC declared broadband as a utility in 2014, but their ruling was a paper tiger that allowed the telcos wiggle room. Now Trump's FCC is trying to undo that ruling completely.

Why net neutrality is even controversial is beyond me. The only losers are the fat cat CEO's and share holders who wont be able to shake down companies like Netflix just because they can anymore. It will be a major win for consumers like you and me and it will be a big win for smaller content creators.

As for freedom of speech, we will see more of these issues of censorship until common carrier status is put in place. For instance, no one boycotts AT&T for giving David Duke telephone service and no one boycotts the Louisiana power company for giving him electricity. Why, then, should we boycott Cloudflare or whomever for giving people like him websites or blogs?

Now, certainly AT&T would disconnect his phone service if they could, but they can't. Why? Because they cannot discriminate with their service since they are officially a common carrier according to the FCC. Phone service is considered a utility and these companies cannot, by law, discriminate. They must serve anyone and everyone who wants their service.

If common carrier status was made law on the Internet, then cloudflare would have to give him a website which would be a win-win for everyone. ANTIFA can have their websites talking about how white people suck and David Duke and Andrew Anglin could have their websites talking about how awesome us white people are. It would protect the Internet hosting sites legally as well since they cannot (by law) be held responsible for content posted by users. Just as AT&T cannot be held responsible for a murder for hire plot planned on their phone lines.
Posted by Tiguar
Montana
Member since Mar 2012
33131 posts
Posted on 9/3/17 at 11:58 am to
Good post.
Posted by el Gaucho
He/They
Member since Dec 2010
53459 posts
Posted on 9/3/17 at 12:03 pm to
If the Internet was a utility would we have to give it to poor people for free?
Posted by Bjorn Cyborg
Member since Sep 2016
27287 posts
Posted on 9/3/17 at 12:24 pm to
Cell phone service is not yet considered a utility. I don't see anyone protesting their phones be cut off.
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