Coyote Blog

26 Comments

1. Matthew Slyfield:

   From the linked article: "Do you think Democrats will be in the White House forever until the end of time, God help us?"

   Yes, that is exactly what they think.

   March 5, 2015, 12:19 pm

2. joe:

   I had a problem with Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction - that was just UGLY.

   March 5, 2015, 1:48 pm

3. Another_Brian:

   This line,

   "Forget about the fact that an agency responsible for handing out millions of dollars in fines for expression it deems inappropriate is now knighting itself as the Protectors of Free Expression."

   made me think of George Carlin's "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television".

   March 5, 2015, 2:18 pm

4. Craig:

   "Interntet" sounds very Orwellian.

   March 5, 2015, 6:39 pm

5. Nimrod:

   It's extremely appropriate that these regulations have been supported by all these idiots in the Year of the Sheep.

   In Hong Kong, the chief executive has outright told everyone to act like sheep. In the US, people will act like sheep even without being told to, especially on Reddit.

   How convenient!

   March 6, 2015, 2:19 am

6. Nehemiah:

   And why wouldn't they think that? I am willing to take odds that this president will not leave office peacefully. I see civil unrest leading up to the Nov 2016 elections. So much unrest that elections will be suspended for public safety reasons. He knows many will give up liberty for safety any time and the media will play along.

   March 6, 2015, 8:50 am

7. Zachriel:

   The problem of net neutrality had a simple solution, but it was overturned by the courts. Republicans in Congress could have supported a minimalist fix, but refused to consider it. That left the government with the blunt tool of the existing law.

   March 6, 2015, 8:54 am

8. ErikTheRed:

   The sad thing for these tools supporting net neutering (nice term) is that it does away with some of the very crude throttling already done by ISPs to control things like bittorrent use. Bittorrent is a great way to mass-distribute information on the net and has plenty of legitimate uses, but if it's abused (which, let's be honest, is 99.99% of the time it's used) it hammers the absolute crap out of local and backbone links. ISPs deal with this in some legitimate ways like throttling (deprioritizing bittorrent packets so that they're first to drop when congestion occurs) and some not-so-legitimate ways (injecting connection reset packets to disrupt sessions). If you have to suddenly start treating your teenage neighbor's 8,000 pr0n torrent seeds as "equal traffic" then you either have to expand capacity by orders of magnitude to deal with it, driving up costs for everyone, or you have to introduce metered pricing, which everybody hates and which offers about a million more times the potential for pricing abuse than all of the stupid "fast lane" worries that the fucktards who masturbate to net neutrality are faintingly fretting over.

   March 6, 2015, 9:31 am

9. JW:

   The simple solution like leave the Internet alone? Let it keep doing what's it's been doing for over 20 ridiculously and wildly successful years without the FCC's ham fists? That kind of solution?

   Oh, you want a BIG solution, the kind that only a bought and sold bureaucracy can provide? One that will lock in the status quo in favor of upstarts or new ideas? Congrats. You're going to get it, good and hard. Unfortunately, so will the part of the population that can think.

   March 6, 2015, 9:44 pm

10. Zachriel:

    JW: The simple solution like leave the Internet alone?

    Net neutrality has been the natural condition of the Internet, but that is now under threat from large concerns who can throttle new competition. The idea is that all packets requested by users should be treated equally, whether from Netflix or from StartupFlix, whether from YouTube or NewbyTube.

    March 7, 2015, 9:24 am

11. Roy:

    Everything Matt Walsh says can be said in about three to four paragraphs, but he goes on and on and on. I quit reading him because it got way to tedious.

    March 7, 2015, 10:03 am

12. Jess1:

    Your initial premise remains incorrect. "Spam" is lower priority than say, voip for good reason. To assert that all has equal value is just silly in the extreme.

    March 7, 2015, 12:27 pm

13. Zachriel:

    Try to read more carefully. Spam is not content requested by users.

    March 8, 2015, 6:36 am

14. Matthew Slyfield:

    Except, that isn't what they believe. They believe that the Democrats will hold the White House in perpetuity even without Obama trying to hold on to power after his second term expires.

    March 8, 2015, 9:11 am

15. Nehemiah:

    Do you really think Obama cares about the Democrats? He put himself on the 2014 ballot and the dem's got creamed.

    March 8, 2015, 9:38 am

16. Jess1:

    I clearly referenced your first sentence. Do try to read more carefully.

    March 8, 2015, 11:07 am

17. JW:

    "Net neutrality has been the natural condition of the Internet"

    It's not, and never has been, but don't let that stop you from from believing that.

    You're deluded if you think this is "neutral" in any way. Putting the state in control is anything but neutral.

    "but that is now under threat from large concerns who can throttle new competition."

    You're absolutely correct, but for all of the wrong reasons. Netflix, or any other large content provider, can throttle every newcomer with regulatory barriers to entry, now that they have the incumbent advantage locked in and the pols in their pocket.

    They couldn't throttle them before, but, boy howdy, can they ever now. Good work from the FUCK COMCAST team. You've managed to fuck everyone.

    March 8, 2015, 2:27 pm

18. Matthew Slyfield:

    What I think is whether Obama cares about the Democrats or not is irrelevant to what the rank and file membership of the Democratic Party believes about whether or not the Democratic Party will continue to hold the White House in perpetuity and why or why not they will do so.

    March 8, 2015, 6:47 pm

19. Zachriel:

    JW: They couldn't throttle them before, but, boy howdy, can they ever now.

    That's obviously false, as it was throttling that created the impetus for regulation.

    March 9, 2015, 6:59 am

20. Zachriel:

    Jess1: I clearly referenced your first sentence.

    Z: Net neutrality has been the natural condition of the Internet, but that is now under threat from large concerns who can throttle new competition. The idea is that all packets requested by users should be treated equally, whether from Netflix or from StartupFlix, whether from YouTube or NewbyTube.

    March 9, 2015, 7:01 am

21. JW:

    "Metaphor: a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, especially something abstract."

    Incumbent companies could use the state to throttle new competitors before? Do tell how could they do that.

    March 9, 2015, 7:36 am

22. JW:

    "Do try to read more carefully."

    All Zach can do is to parrot talking points. He's like some kind of poorly informed Turing Test.

    March 9, 2015, 7:38 am

23. Jess1:

    Looks as if JW is correct. Bizarre post there, Zach.

    March 10, 2015, 5:29 am

24. Goober:

    Yes, Zack, now try to understand...

    the FCC has the ability to regulate the net.

    Do you honestly think that some big, existing company isn't going to use that newfound ability to talk the FCC into keeping some up-and-comer from being able to enter the market?

    If so, can you cite one regulatory law in existence that has not been used in this way in the past?

    The answer, in case you're wondering, is that no, no, you can't.

    These types of laws are awesome for existing big players. It guarantees that they can use the government to ensure that no new businesses or innovators can come unseat them.

    Ma Bell? Or are you too young to know what that is?

    March 12, 2015, 6:56 pm

25. Goober:

    That's what they were saying about Bush, too, but it miraculously didn't happen.

    Obama is a flawed man, but there is no way that he is stupid enough to try something like this.

    Be sure to recycle that tinfoil hat when you're done with it, mkay?

    March 12, 2015, 6:58 pm

26. Nehemiah:

    I'd tell you that I'll check in with you in the fall of 2016, but that may not be possible. By the the FCC will have the Internet wrapped up. So much for open dissent.

    Couple more cop killings, a couple of cops reacting badly and we'll have Ferguson in every large city. Why we won't be able to insure free and open elections in all that chaos. Better to suspend the elections until Marshall Law restores order. 2020 still waiting.................................

    The question isn't whether Obama tries to stay in office. It is whether Congress would continue to fund the executive branch.. They don't want to be accused of "shutting down" the government after all.

    You know it's not paranoia if someone is really out to get you. I'll keep the tinfoil hat handy for the time being.

    March 13, 2015, 2:47 am