Virgin destroys Internet (must see)
Wow… just… wow.
Personally, I say that talk/action like this is preposterous and needs to stopped before it can spread. The people need to realize that there are waaaay more of them than the ruling big businesses. But from what I've experienced, humans in general (myself included), are too willing the let the world pass by and let someone else try to fix things up. We need to rise up as one and 'fight the man'. But no one will, neutrality will disappear and no one will remember what it was like when they could browse freely. Pretty soon Earth will become something out of George Orwell's 1984. God I hope I'm wrong, I really like having relatively free will.
Then again, I consider myself a pessimist. I tend to look at the darker side of things. Who knows, maybe the world is in great shape and the future is really looking up for us normal guys.
Who thinks they could manage to get other ISPs to follow?
Well since every company wants to make as much money as humanly possible, if they manage to do it then I'd say many, many others will follow them unfortunately. I don't really know quite what to say about this though except fuck them hard! I'm shocked about the audacity that someone actually dared to say this openly and to then really trying to implement it as well.
This is a terrible situation and it really needs to be stopped if at all possible, but really, what can we do? If the guy wants to do it for the money he will do it and wont give a damn about what people think, especially if people will pay them(which a nice few people will probably most likely do).
As long as they make a profit they are happy and don't give a damn about the people…
MartialArtFreak wrote: We cannot let this happen.
We must Unite as one in This fight for our Freedom.
This might be the end of the internet as we know it, Maybe I overreact.. But this will grow, and in the end, HBH will be denied access.. and even if it does manage to get through, it will be with a connection so slow as fuck.
So Dear Hackers.. Dear Friends..
We must stop this, before it stops us!
Fritzo
As stated in the movie "Hackers", "Hackers of the world untie…Hack the Planet!!!"
I saw right on and the malicious sides of you on here should seep out.
Hell yeah Fritzo
heck, this issue has been going on for a while. I wrote a paper about this for school once and the teacher said it's too slanderous.
but, honestly, protesting can sometimes get us nowhere. How many countries support Microsoft's OOXML? how many countries censor web content? how many companies prefer to sue it's competitors? how many kids got sued by the media industry just for downloading a few tracks?
the trouble is that, companies place themselves above their customers. You have to remember that while most of us are aware of it (I've known about it for two years now) the general public just don't give a damn fuck about it.
all they care is to be able to read e-mail, check some websites, download some stuff, etc. they're pretty happy with it. If we can convince these people that our basic rights on the internet are under threat, then they will try to convince others to take action.
and don't worry about the CEO saying that net neutrality being "a bunch of bollocks"
he's a CEO, he's a big bollock-head in his own way.
Damn… this is definitely a way to squash the whole constitutional rights idea :@. You're all right though, the problem is that the ISP's are power-hungry, money-loving, greedy bastards they try to milk their customers for all they're worth.
There are four things that can happen at this point though… 1) The idea eventually dies out, and nothing will need to be done. 2) Other ISP's will recognize that they are illegally taking our rights to the freedoms we deserve. 3) They all switch over to the whole you have no rights things, and someone sues them and the Supreme court deems it illegal in all factors. 4) They all take over, and no one has the balls to speak up, and we lose all the rights and ability to work on the internet.
I personally would quit buying the internet if the last two happened, but i really don't think that it will last long. People REALLY like their freedoms, and if you take them away, they'll start realizing that they're being limited. Because once someone has power, they usually never use it in the right way. They become corrupt and hungry for more power. Soon they try to abuse that power, and freedom fighters rise up and kick them out of power…
well first things first. there is no such things as rights. if you had rights then they couldn't be taken away from you. they're more like privileges than anything else. you don't have a right to the Internet because if you did you wouldn't have to pay for it through an ISP. you wouldn't have to buy a computer to access it with. if it were a right all this would be given to you.
As far as what they're doing i can see the tactics behind it. maybe the are trying to create a sorta monopoly with the other companies. maybe they all got together and said lets all do this and I'll be the first to announce it. i know that's illegal in the US but i don't know about countries over in Europe. This is very affective at making money and very hard to prove.
I think a drop of they're service would work. refusing to use them and moving on to another ISP.
you also have to look at it from the websites stand point of defense. how could they help stop this. lets say Google pays virgin so they get what they need but then all the ISP do this. Google would then have to pay all those other companies to. that would be spending more money than making. eventually all those sites would rebel and refuse to pay. In conclusion if the sites skips the payment step and goes straight to refusal to pay then the ISP would be losing money from both the sites and its customers.
this is just my opinion on the subject and please excuse any spelling errors, i typed this is in a rush.
most likely this would happen in a cycle, first virgin starts, then other companies follow. after a short amount of time some companies will start advertising their new idea of having complete or nearly complete freedom on the internet, but for a slightly higher price. then, most other companies will follow. to gain more customers companies will start reducing prices back to normal, while advertising that they have lower prices than anyone else.
we see similar things happening all the time with cell phones, internet, and tv. unfortunately this isnt actually in violation of our rights, we have the right to set up our own ISP's without restrictions. they dont set up rules against going to those sites, they just set up restrictions on them if you decide to use their company. on top of that, if there is ever a problem they can hide behind the statement that these sites may have the potential to be harmful to their company and customers. rules and rights are easily bent
Mr_Cheese wrote: all it does is control **speed **of information, not access. it is quite logical. companies who are popular use more bandwidth, thus they pay more for quicker access. such as BBC's iPlayer and youtube. I sure as hell don't agree with it, but it does make sense from an ISP point of view.
yeah, but think about it, they control the speed. could they not make the speed so low that you time out before being able to access the site? It makes sense to the point of making money, and i understand that, but it also could be used against people. I'd have no problem as long as it was equal, and well regulated, otherwise, you and i both know that it wouldn't stop at that.
or, you call it the patriot act and then no one notices. :right:
I completely agree with you on this stance though… The government has a little bit too much power sometimes. I wouldn't be surprised if that happened.
Virgin is a fine example of the negative effects of a capitalist society. Internet should not be restricted… I think we all saw what's been happening in China, and personally, I think their government's ideas are totally shit. Good idea, actually, but poorly executed and in the wrong ways.
No one owns the internet; it should always be free for anyone. Opinions are solely owned by their producers; I have a right to say what I think. "It is better to think wrongly than to not think at all."
The most important thing right now is to get this news out to the general public and present it in a way they will understand. Whether it be marches or anything else, we now have a need to show what is happening. Only though mass cooperation can we stop this.
ISPs are becoming too massive, almost monopolistic. I am OK with their money-lust as long as my rights are not interfered with. I don't mind paying if I can exercise my rights.
What say you? Does anyone have any ideas as to what we should do? We must stand strong. Stand together as one.
You may stop some of your customers…
BUT YOU CAN'T STOP US ALL
We Are One.
I say let them control the internet. Why? Because there are enough technical lawsuits and other ways to make them rot and burn if they try it and there's lawyers that'll shoot at them. Trillions of dollars to be made, it's like beating a pin~ata if anything, see how long we can beat it before the goodies come out.
I believe Mr. Obama mentioned something about Net Neutrality and being for it so at least there's one good thing he's done.
The EU also suggested that it's countries should make a new law that makes it easier for companies to access ISP records. They practically only need to have a log that shows that a certain copyrighted file was downloaded/uploaded from that IP address. As you know it doesn't have to be the owner of the IP address that is the one who downloaded/uploaded the file. There may be several computers connected behind a router or someone may have hacked the network. But the companies don't bother, as we've seen in for example Denmark.
A music company accused a family with two small children for having uploaded thousands of songs. The company wanted a ridiculous amount of money from them. They claimed to be innocent and the company has now dropped the charges. Many others just paid to get it out of the world. But they "blackmail" the ones they accuse, practically saying; pay us our money, or there will be a trial which you will lose and you have pay for the trial.
Since it goes under private law you don't have the same protection as you would if you for example would steal a car, where you at least have the right to a lawyer and don't have to pay for the entire process.
Another law that now exists in Sweden (against the will of the people) is FRA which gives the government right to monitor all traffic that crosses the Swedish border, which is almost all traffic. They say it's to give advantages against terrorism etc. But really, how many terrorists would send open mails about what they're going to bomb?
Guess we're all going towards a more controlled and censored world…
Individual attacks on an ISP's property would never be seen as a sign of resistance , only as a single act of vandalism . However, a mass coordinated countrywide assault on a single ISP's property would definitely be seen as a personal attack on the company itself.
Attractive as this might seem , the only result would be loads of really pissed off neighborhoods with no internet , and a knee jerk media response , and remember these companies own the media , they will quickly demonize all parties involved , and this can only serve to turn the public against the very cause you want them to support .
The same thing would happen with a mass DDoS attack , they will spin it to prove that a multi tiered internet is the only way forward to prevent these kind of attacks through the prioritization of traffic , and this is the only way to resolve it etc .
In the 1980's , here in the UK , before most of HBH were even born , we took to the streets and rioted at the drop of a hat , although it was great at the time , in the end all it brought us , were more laws and restrictions on our every day freedoms , more restrictions on our rights to assemble in public and protest , and a greater presence of CCTV cameras in out towns and cities to identify culprits in case of a repeat in the future .
Spyware was right pointing out this issue as a "must see" thread , I must have missed this first time round , but this is something we should all be worried about , and something we should all be educating others about , in the hope someone will come up with an innovative way to resist these assaults on the freedom of the internet as we know it .
What people don't see here is , they are trying to steal something away from us through legislation , before we even knew we had it , and ultimately this will affect every single one of us , without exception .
EDIT: Guys referring to the group in the IPOWER video that the OP linked to. http://stopvirgin.movielol.org/
I really like these guys, I've been listening to them for almost a year now. I really respect that they have used their popularity and fan base to help raise awareness to something that could change the world forever. The internet is a resource that until now, has been relatively unregulated and free in the context of content and accessibility. In a world where national security keeps closing in on our other freedoms, and the media is so biased, the internet is one of the peoples most important resources of information in a world of controlled media.
I love their faith in the power of the people. It's our world, we defined it, and we will keep it free. They believe that. I have trouble doing the same. It seems to me people are more concerned with who won the football game or what time the next WoW raid is.:P
If anything is going to happen it's going to have to be from somebody with a lot of influence like these guys, so once again respect to them and their ideal is a voice of sanity in a world of unconscious intoxication.
ThorsDecree wrote: Virgin is a fine example of the negative effects of a capitalist society. Internet should not be restricted… I think we all saw what's been happening in China, and personally, I think their government's ideas are totally shit. Good idea, actually, but poorly executed and in the wrong ways.
Just wanted to question a few things. In a capitalist society, everyone has equal opportunity to succeed. That doesn't mean that by any means everything is equal(which it never should be), it simply means that i think you have this the wrong way around.
In a more socialistic society our internet would be regulated in this way in order to limit our capabilities for communication and resources of information. This will give the websites backed by the controlling forces an advantage, and taking away the opportunity for other sources of information to survive. Eventually eliminating opinion on the internet and turning into another controlled medium of information that the controlling party will regulate as it sees fit.
And as you can tell from what I said above. China, has the right idea if your a true idealist. But if your a true idealist you will understand that the idea will never, ever work in a complex society. Its not human nature.
From reading those articles google has lost a lot of respect and im truly surprised that they would make the moves they seem to be making. :( They were the one power that didn't need to base their success off of something like that, they were kinda like the structure of the force opposing the abolition of net neutrality. Perhaps they were only the lesser of two evils.
The articles Manual_ was referring to were from a post I deleted , which said : In classic Forrest Gump terms ….. Google says www.google.com/help/netneutrality.html , as Google does online.wsj.com/article/SB122929270127905065.html ……ah but wait , that's two different things entirely . Yup , monkey say , monkey don't . A few years down the line when a company desires a new shift in accepted policy , they'll be whining about internet royalties and digital media rights , and network priority , like all the fucking rest . Saying one thing in public , and doing another in private behind the scenes , just like always .
I help admin an ISP and we don't regulate our direct customers. We also provide fiber bandwidth to large apartment complexes. Some complexes are cheap and want too little bandwidth due to money. In these cases we to shape bandwidth to allow all users the same share. We have also used Packeteer Packet Shapers to prioritize bandwidth. This is to protect the needs of the many. Comcast and Virgin are just advertising one thing and then giving limits on how much you can use or telling you what you can use.
Content on the internet has quadrupled in the past three years due to video downloads and the large download sizes. MP3 sharing is still at a very popular pace. Hell, a poor dial-up user today has to download virus definition files that exceed 30MB. It keeps getting larger because there are more virus' – WOW 1MB takes a while on a dial-up.
The way I see it, if I buy 10Mb pipe from someone, they have no need to even ask me what I will do with it, much less tell me I cannot do something with it.
PLP
For anyone interested in signing the petition or helping in a number of other ways you can learn a bit about how here.