Net Neutrality Out the Window Background Cheering From the Koch Brothers (Again)

Always in the shadows with devious plans and tons of dough 

(Koch Is It)

Did the Koch's Paid for Ajit Pai's Long Term Parking

First is this background update: FCC kills net neutrality: Call it FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s dream sheet and truckload of BS these two sources:

         

FCC biggest Net Neutrality whoppers.

FCC overturns Net Neutrality rules.

What is Net Neutrality? A short definition: Net neutrality is the idea that all traffic on the Internet should be treated equally.

That means in simple language that your broadband provider (ISP), which controls your access to the Internet, can't block or slow down the services or applications you use over the Web with price avenues and such to show favoritism to those with more money than say average Americans who want the same access.

That means whether it's a cable company or telephone service, they can’t create as I said, “price lanes” or the so-called “fast lanes that force content companies like Netflix to pay an additional fee to deliver their content to customers faster” fees that get passed along to you for the same service you enjoyed at a lower agreed upon price – that is until now.

Even though most people agree with the basic premise of Net neutrality, the FCC's rules have become a lightning rod for controversy and now more so since the canned the rules so to speak.

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Now to the main article – a super rundown about this very serious topic that impacts us all and that is Internet access and growing costs vs. common sense and FCC new rules that says “no more rules” from Wired.com here, in part:

Many who are fed up with federal apathy and sick of being held back by lousy Internet access controlled by local cable monopolies, scrappy cities around the country are working hard to find ways to get cheap, world-class fiber-optic connectivity.

It’s always been an uphill climb, as the “incumbents” — giant carriers like Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T — are constantly working behind the scenes to block competition.

(Recently, Comcast spent nearly $1 million opposing a municipal-fiber vote in Fort Collins, CO. The company did not prevail however – the good news part).

Now there’s an additional obstacle: Powerful right-wing billionaires have joined the fight against municipal fiber efforts, using their deep pockets to fund efforts to block even the most commonsense of plans.

Bad news for Internet access — the Koch brothers are fighting low-cost open fiber nets.

Look what happened in Louisville, KY, city of about 750,000 and the largest in KY. Earlier this year, the city noticed that the state was funding a “middle mile” fiber network designed to connect the state’s 120 counties and provide cheaper connectivity for municipal buildings — Kentucky Wired. As part of the project, Louisville — also known as Jefferson County — would be able to run 100 miles of fiber alongside the state network for just the cost of materials.

That seemed like a great deal to Louisville. The city estimated that if it installed fiber for city use from scratch, it would cost $15 million. With the Kentucky Wired offer, the same project would cost just $5.4 million — with half of that amount dedicated to placing fiber nodes in West Louisville, a struggling, and de facto segregated area of concentrated poverty, poor health outcomes, and general economic distress. Then what happened?

Now the rest of the story as the late Paul Harvey used to say.

Continue the story at the link – it is long and detailed, but a serious issue.

Here is the down and dirty highlight as it were: Louisville city officials found out that someone or somebody had stepped in quash the deal as it were and the city's eminently sensible plan was in trouble.

Then they also found out that the Washington, DC-based Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) had been posting frequently on social media opposing the Louisville fiber plan. (One sample TPA Tweet: “Google suspended its fiber efforts in many cities due to cost - now wants Louisville taxpayers to foot the $5.4M bill.")  

(I Note: The Louisville plan had nothing to do with Google). 

That is when they also learned who had joined the forces determined to block Louisville from spending a dime on fiber for the city's use: Charles and David Koch.  One city official said: “It's widely known that the TPA receives a lot of funding from the Koch brothers.” 

(I add: So, do the math). 

My 2 cents: So, what is the bottom line? Well, as usual “the bottom line” slick marketing, driven by big money to make more one and at the same time say “This is good for and will benefit all consumers.” What a crock of BS.

This story exposes the daily on-going crap. And, now the FCC just put gasoline on that fire to put it out – yeah, right.

Stay tuned, and thanks for stopping by.