[bitJericho]

Much more effective would be for operators to ban ISPs. Imagine the internet telling specific users that they have to get off comcast or whatever in order to use their service for a particular day out of every month. Do it maddox style with a nice middle finger. Make users want to switch instead of just pretend like there's no alternatives.

[fooqux]

>Much more effective would be for operators to ban ISPs.

I heartily disagree with this approach. Not only does it harken back to the days of Prodigy, AOL, CompuServe and the like where each service had its own content, but it's very anti-internet.

>Make users want to switch

That's great if there are alternatives to switch to.

Yes, I could technically switch to dialup. It is technically internet. It's not going to allow me to do any work or any of my hobbies, however. So I don't consider it a valid option.

Yes, I could also try out some kind of dish provider. If I wanted to chop down some trees. Besides, those also don't work for me (almost no upload bandwidth, and horrible latency issues).

>instead of just pretend like there's no alternatives.

I live in an area where Comcast literally is my only option for high-speed internet. I'm not pretending.

[runako]

> I live in an area where Comcast literally is my only option for high-speed internet. I'm not pretending.

IIRC most of the country lives in areas where there are only 1 or 2 broadband options. The non-cable operator is likely to be a Baby Bell that's also spent heavily to lobby the FCC to kill net neutrality and so wouldn't be an effective protest switch.

[filmgirlcw]

Yes, this is true. The worst part is that most of the baby bell solutions are slow-ass DSL.

For instance, in most of Metro-Atlanta, you can get Comcast or AT&T UVerse (AT&T being the name of what was a Baby Bell, Cingular). UVerse is simply slow-as-shit DSL and is awful. (Fun fact: AT&T tried to sell and promote UVerse as Fiber in the mid-2000s. My parents have fiber in their home but no way to get a fiber provider -- AT&T was over-selling them on a "fiber" solution that was literally just copper DSL wires. The whole telecom industry is full of crooks).

In New York City, you basically have one provider. If you're very lucky and live in an area Verizon (another former baby bell) also services, you can get Fiber -- and that's awesome -- but the zoning for this stuff is often street by street. The building across the street from my apartment can get Verizon. My building can't -- for whatever reason. Verizon did tell me they could probably rig me access if I could get them access to the basement -- but I'm not the building owner and I don't have time to deal with what happens when the line gets cut accidentally.

I'm very fortunate that my Internet/TV provider is relatively sane (Cablevision) -- if I lived three blocks further away, I'd be stuck in TWC hell.

What most consumers also don't know is that in many areas, the cable provider can be chosen by the property management company (if you're in an apartment complex) or the condo association. So what happens is that operators will "bid" on that area - and the lowest bid wins. The problem is, even if you live in a Comcast or Verizon or whatever area, you still can't get that service. You're required to be with whoever your property management or co-op board chose. I actually didn't buy a condo that was in a great location and had a great floorplan because of their choice of ISP/cable provider.

The whole system is fucked. It really is. And the net neutrality and fast-lane aspects are only a small part of a much more broken and corrupt system.

That said, just because we can't fix the whole system -- and we can't -- doesn't mean we can't put pressure on companies to not fuck customers over even more, by making access-agreements for content. The system is already not in our favor -- no reason to make it even worse.

[bitJericho]

> I heartily disagree with this approach. Not only does it harken back to the days of Prodigy, AOL, CompuServe and the like where each service had its own content, but it's very anti-internet.

Anti-internet to ban an ISP that is trying to decimate the internet? How does that logically make any sense?

[fooqux]

Lets say each website / server admin blacklisted various ISPs from their servers because they did something the admin didn't like. Maybe they noticed throttling to/from their site, or spam, or just had such a bad experience once as their customer that they now considered that ISP to be "bad for the internet".

What would we end up with? Most of the internet not working for anybody. Friends sending you links that you can't get to because you're on different ISPs. Needing to buy service at more than one ISP to "provide coverage". If it happened on a large enough scale, it would unravel what we know as the internet.

This is what I mean when I say it's a bad idea.

[bitJericho]

I'm talking about a protest movement, not a permanent solution.

[jarrett]

> Make users want to switch instead of just pretend like there's no alternatives.

I absolutely want to switch and will as soon as an alternative is available. In my entire life, I've never lived in a place that had anything other than Comcast. And I've always lived in relatively dense areas.

[bitJericho]

The alternatives are to go without and enjoy the fresh air, pay up for the data cap and live with the low bandwidth (it sucks but it's not as sucky as Comcast), setup a mesh network, lobby your local government, move.

Let me guess, if you all were naturalists, you would all live in the heart of New York and complain to your neighbors (but not your city) all day about the lack of green.

[colechristensen]

Where I live I have three choices, 1.5 mbit DSL, whatever small number of GB/mo I can get for $50 on 4G, or Comcast.

There's no pretending, there are no alternatives.

ISP access has weight when I'm considering moving which is sad.

[yaur]

T-Mobile is selling unlimited data plans for $80/month.

[colechristensen]

>UNLIMITED 4G LTE data (includes up to 5 GB of Smartphone Mobile HotSpot (SMH) service)

Not unlimited. Unlimited for 'phone usage' but not for legitimate usage outside your phone.

[CocaKoala]

I take this to mean that you're setting up your own ISP which is going to service my area and provide better rates, faster connections, and better service than Comcast, so that I have an alternative for internet?

That's great, I'm really excited to hear that! Let me know what number I can call to sign up!

[bitJericho]

Why should a competitor charge better rates and have faster connections in order for it to be an alternative? Are you looking for the cheapest provider or the most ethical?

[CocaKoala]

Well, I don't feel like getting to choose between two terrible options is really that much better than being stuck with one terrible option.

[bitJericho]

So you see no/little difference between an unethical ISP that's cheaper than a more expensive ethical one? I'm not sure what you think this debate is about.

[CocaKoala]

I'd love to support a more ethical ISP, but as a practical matter, internet is already expensive and spending more for the same or less isn't really a workable option. Downgrading my connection is also not a great option; if I'm forced to choose between a fast expensive connection and a cheap slow connection, then yeah; it's great that Net Neutrality is a thing, but now I'm stuck in the shitty situation I was trying to prevent anyways.

[bitJericho]

When money's the deciding factor, decisions are easy. There's more to life than money sometimes, though.

I could shop at Walmart and have an extra 20 bucks for my internet bill. Instead, I choose the slower internet with the ethical provider so that I can shop not at Walmart.

Not to say I'm perfect by any means, but this is just an example of the decisions I try to make every day. These decisions are hard sometimes.