Ask HN: Why is net neutrality a big deal now?

3 points·ateesdalejr··4 comments

Net neutrality has only been in effect for 2 years or so. The internet was perfectly fine in the many years before it was implemented, what's the big deal with it being gone now? It doesn't seem like it changed much in the time it's been here.

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Something went wrong around 2005-2008 where ISPs became no longer content with the voluntary net neutrality that they practiced for the previous 15 years. Maybe the mythical "exaflood" (traffic demand growth exceeding Moore's Law) actually happened and thus ISPs "needed" to either reduce demand (blocking) or increase revenue (double-charging) to maintain expected profit margins. Maybe mergers between ISPs and content creators motivated ISPs to think more strategically. Maybe greybeard engineers retired and were replaced with suits.

> Net neutrality has only been in effect for 2 years or so.

For 11 years, starting 12 years ago; the Open Internet Policy Statement which guided case-by-case action was adopted in 2005, but the case-by-case approach was struck down by the courts in 2010.

Title I-based neutrality regulations were adopted in 2010 and struck down by the courts in 2014.

Title II-based neutrality regulations were adopted in 2015, and repealed just now.

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

The problem is not NOW. They ruined the ecosystem what we've build for decades.

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