Anna Gomez confirmation means “FCC can act swiftly to restore net neutrality.”

    • anon232@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Rules for social media lol. What do you expect the government to do? How would they even enforce these rules? Social media sites would simply host in other countries outside of the USA to bypass regulations.

      Instead of trying to regulate websites, how about we create better privacy protections for our citizens, eh?

      • TheBeege@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I don’t think you put much thought into this, friend. Many social media companies are incorporated in the US to make use of US ad revenue sources. Where the servers are hosted doesn’t matter. The legal corporate entity is the important bit.

        And as mentioned in the other comment, privacy protections would operate the same way, seeing as they are literally rules for social media, among other sites.

        But yes, privacy protections would be great. Let’s do that

        • anon232@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Even if that’s true I wouldn’t put it past the companies to find ways to circumvent regulations, and I think trying to advocate for regulating them sets a precedent against the free and open internet that websites are under government control, which shouldn’t be the case. Imagine if government started requiring government ID’s to access all websites (including Lemmy, which is a social network).

          • Spost@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            1 year ago

            It’s true that companies will probably try to find ways to circumvent any rules placed on them, but I don’t think that’s a good reason to not make the legislation.

            If regulating social media is an infringement on the free and open internet, does that same logic apply to everything else we regulate? Government mandated ID checking would certainly be bad, but is it a terrible infringement on the internet to say, for instance, “hey, you can’t advertise to children in these ways”?

      • GodlessCommie@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        They have zero interests in providing privacy protections. KOSA is a prime example, bi partisan internet censorship

  • Wahots@pawb.social
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    1 year ago

    I hope they clap the cheeks of the lobbies and finalize net neutrality rules with no take-backsies. Then focus on actually improving the internet after that. Just…please get shit done. Quickly.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    1 year ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Biden tried again in May with the nomination of Gomez, a State Department digital policy official who was previously deputy assistant secretary at the US National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) from 2009 to 2023.

    “If confirmed, she would give the Democrats a majority at the FCC that would enable them to impose a radical left-wing agenda, including investment-killing and job-killing so-called net neutrality rules, otherwise known as Obamacare for the Internet,” Cruz said.

    The Republican yes votes came from Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mike Rounds of South Dakota, and Todd Young of Indiana.

    Annoyed at how many vote no on a candidate as qualified and non-controversial as this," commented Harold Feld, senior VP and consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge.

    Media advocacy group Free Press said the “unprecedented 32-month delay” that deadlocked the FCC "was the result of concerted efforts by the phone, cable, and broadcast lobbies to hamstring the agency that oversees their businesses.

    Gomez’s confirmation restores the agency’s full complement of commissioners and provides a tie-breaking vote on issues related to diversifying media ownership, promoting broadband affordability and protecting the rights of Internet users."


    The original article contains 556 words, the summary contains 196 words. Saved 65%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • elscallr@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I hope they don’t fuck this up. It’d be really easy for these incompetent bastards to do something stupid like “all internet traffic must be given the same priority.”

    Traffic shaping is important. Certain packets, like those for real time transmission, have to be given priority (think packets for game movement or phone calls or video conferencing) whereas things that can be downloaded or buffered into larger packets (streaming video, file downloads) the packets can be transmitted with lower priority.

    The important part of this is the shaping doesn’t happen on a per origin basis, but shaping for purpose is critical. I’m hoping any regulation isn’t the nonsense that was spelled out previously, it’d be a disaster because it’s like the dumb asses didn’t bother to consult actual network engineers before drafting the proposals.

    I hope they do it right if they’re gonna do it.

    • Black AOC@lemmygrad.ml
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      1 year ago

      It’s never gonna happen, lmao. It’ll be just like Obama’s ‘priorities’ with the Freedom of Choice act. A hundred days’ll pass from the dems having initiative in the FCC, and suddenly, Net Neutrality will ‘no longer be a priority’ for that body.

      • theyoyomaster@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I wish either side would actually follow through on one of their good promises instead of just the shitty ones.

  • lud@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I am not American but does this mean that the Ali guy will be gone?

  • pastabatman@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    “If confirmed, she would give the Democrats a majority at the FCC that would enable them to impose a radical left-wing agenda, including investment-killing and job-killing so-called net neutrality rules, otherwise known as Obamacare for the Internet” Cruz said.

    What

  • cyd@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Here’s a contrarian hot take. The net neutrality fight is one of those uniquely American issues that simply should not matter, like school shooter drills, complicated tax filings, and tipping. The Wikipedia page on net neutrality in the United States is about as long as War and Peace, yet in most other countries “net neutrality” is not even enshrined as a distinct legal concept and they do just fine.

    In the US, net neutrality has not been a general requirement for ISPs since the issue first surfaced over a decade ago, and efforts to enshrine net neutrality into federal law have failed. The dystopia of a balkanized Internet floated by net neutrality campaigners (e.g. ISPs charging people extra to access Netflix) has not come to pass. Yet it’s a live issue because (i) Americans are paranoid about corporations screwing them over, (ii) American corporations have a long history of screwing them over, and (iii) Americans of all camps love waging long and complicated legal battles against each other.

    What’s really needed is not net neutrality, but a more competitive ISP market. What the net neutrality fears are really about is ISPs having power over consumers. If only one ISP serves your area, they can screw you over by forcing you to shell out more money to access Netflix or whatever. But government efforts are ultimately better spent increasing market competitiveness, such as setting up “shared fiber” requirements. If there are a bunch of ISPs all competing against each other, “net neutrality” will fall naturally into place simply because none of them want to piss off their customers.