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Comment by malchow | Hacker News Reader

He spoke for an extended period, and this was one argument among many. Arguably, when Pai was speaking about Twitter, he was talking not about the net neutrality issue, but about threats to free speech on the web. (That is, he was making a response to arguments from net-neutrality advocates that net-neut enables a freer and more open forum for political debate on the web.)

To be honest, if I look back at my last 20 years on the internet, I have seen more colorable censorship from the Reddits/Googles/Twitters of the world than from the various satellite cos, ISPs, telcos, quagmiric microwave relay companies, and mobile phone networks I've used to get on the internet.

Disclosure: I am on bd of Lincoln Network, which put together the event in D.C. where Pai spoke.

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I expect that if I send a letter to the editor of my newspaper, that they are free to edit out any cursing before putting it in their newspaper.

I don't expect (or want) the post office to open my letter, read it, and decide to charge an increased fee because I mention it.

I don't expect (or want) the post office to open the reply letter, and add an advertisement for the new government owned camping that just opened.

This is precisely what rubs me the wrong way about the current pitches for net neutrality and why you won't see the right budge anytime soon. NN is being painted as a censorship issue by the biggest censorship-happy organizations in SV. To date, the only threats to consumers have come in the form of possible throttling and not outright blocking of certain speech. The only precedent I know of regarding censorship of the net has been at the hands of Twitter, Google and Youtube, Reddit, and Facebook, who are happily deleting all the political content they feel like at the moment whether it's illegal activity being discussed or not.

As my peer below stated, Comcast was caught disrupting P2P traffic which I hope gets addressed, but that's not how NN it's being sold and sensationalized today.

Edit: Clarifications

Except each of those companies has competition. Voat and Gab, among others, were born out of the idea that Reddit and Twitter were being unfair. And one had the ability to join one of those alternative platforms, even while still remaining a user of the original, without friction, largely because of having a neutral net. If we get ISPs offering "social media packages", what do you think the odds that Voat, Gab, or even Mastodon will be included?

If you believe that what Reddit and Twitter are doing is wrong, then why on earth would a reasonable solution be to extend the ability to do more of that to actors that one cannot reasonably avoid? I have a grand total of 1 ISP to choose from. The vast, vast majority of Americans have 1 or 2 to choose from. If NN is revoked, and Cox (my ISP) decides they're going to act like Twitter, then I have exactly no recourse. Why do you believe that is the way to go?

I whole-heartedly agree that ISP's shouldn't be outright blocking anything. I'm Pro-Net Neutrality Net-whatever to keep the pipes open and unfettered by greedy corporations.

I'm just pointing out the sheer hypocrisy of the recent campaigns talking about censorship as a possibility when the right has been getting attacked/censored by every big SV company in recent years. Now they're crying about possibility when they're engaged in the very act themselves. I guess they're right, they would know, so yeah i'm pro-NN.

I disagree. If I unleash a horde of spambots on this site, posting spam, and they get removed, am I being censored? If I constantly use slurs and other insults at other users, and I get my account banned because of it, am I being censored?

Yes, in both cases.

Censorship is a problem in certain cases (government, especially viewpoint-based censorship, for instance), but not in all cases.

The example given by Pai was a terrible one. Marsha Blackburn wasn't blocked from advertising a conservative message; she was blocked from committing dangerously unscrupulous libel. Her ad was demonstrably untrue, and was likely to cause some lunatic to hurt someone.

It's true that Rep Blackburn has the right to express her opinion, but libel has always been an exception to freedom of speech in this country. Twitter is under no obligation to accept money in order to help someone spread libel.

"To be honest, if I look back at my last 20 years on the internet, I have seen more colorable censorship from the Reddits/Googles/Twitters of the world than from the various satellite cos, ISPs, telcos, quagmiric microwave relay companies, and mobile phone networks I've used to get on the internet."

Which is due to Net Neutrality!

Take away Net Neutrality, and the ISPs etc. can also get in on the censorship game.

That's exactly because people have treated the net like a common carrier. If the net is not a common carrier, you should expect to start seeing more censorship.

And there have been problems with ISPs - Comcast silently disrupting P2P connections, etc.

> I have seen more colorable censorship from the Reddits/Googles/Twitters of the world than from the various satellite cos, ISPs, telcos

As it should be! People have the freedom to use bandwidth to go to any site they like to.

Hypocrisy of the highest order. "We like the free market, except when we do not agree with it."

> People have the freedom to use bandwidth to go to any site they like to.

Especially if they are already paying for it monthly.

Google/Twitter/Etc can all at least say "you are not paying for this just mooching off of our infrastructure, don't whine when we delete your post".

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