I'm all for network neutrality as a CONCEPT. As someone who has been running servers for decades I don't see how Washington can make a LAW requiring network neutrality that doesn't blow up in our faces.

An ISP gets hundreds of thousands of connection attempts from known email spammers every day. The volume of other attacks can be measured in how many hit you per minute. You absolutely MUST block and prioritize traffic based on its origin in order to have any hope of running a usable network. If Washington says you can't block or slow traffic based on the source and other attributes, email pretty much stops working. Worms will spread much faster. It becomes illegal to protect yourself or your customers from even the simplest of DOS attacks. In general, things would just get real nasty real fast. I'd need to see a proposal that looks like it might possibly work before I could support a law on the issue.

Though I know what some of the unintended consequences would be, there are always others that we don't foresee - every law causes some problem, so we should be careful about passing new federal laws.

Secondly, what is the motivation for this? We're afraid of something that COULD happen. We come up with hypothetical scenarios, but none of this is real - it hasn't happened. If it does happen, do we not already have laws about "unfair competition", "tortious interference", etc? Doesn't it make more sense to be alert, be watchful for any real problems, and see if our existing laws about unfair competition and such work as needed?

Why such a rush to pass laws that we know will cause problems, to stop a possible problem that doesn't yet exist?

Clearly you haven't followed ANY of the relevant discussion. We're not putting back 98% of the features that are being removed. Not. Going. To. Happen.

Security for BSD is more important than support for FIPS or HP. If you want HP support, use OpenSSL or gnuTLS. LibreSSL will be simple and clean - screw features.

A suggestion - get a clue what you're talking about before arguing about it. The discussion is on the list. Read it - or stfu when people who HAVE read it ate talking.

> I'm not sure that Dice and the ACLU work together.

I guess was was unclear. I was saying the ACLU (inc.) is people working together toward common goals, the FSF is people working together, Dice is a group of people working together.

> Personally, I don't think any corporation should be able to talk politics. Dice, ACLU, GE, BSA, FSF, Labor union, trade union, etc.
> . . .

> So, me, I want that whole group to go stone cold silent.

That's very interesting, refreshingly clear and intellectually honest. The old analogy is that it's unfair that some people can see and some people are blind, and the left's solution is to remove everyone's eyes. You're unusual in how clear and honest you are that you do in fact want to do essentially that. Thanks.

  > People, no.

Just no GROUP protests, right? YOU can express your opinion and I can express mine, but if you and I get together and make video, that should be illegal. Interesting, truly.

I really appreciate your viewpoint, and how you state it clearly, boldly, without pretending that the implications are anything but what they are. That takes courage.

I agree quality code is important. I'm glad software architecture is now recognized as an engineering discipline, so you can choose to have a qualified Professional Engineer lead or review a software project.

All of which is largely a separate issue from the observation that with enough people looking at a problem, the solution will be shallow - obvious to someone.

Yep. Just like the last mile for cell phones is a natural monopoly - why have duplicate towers serving the same area?

I'm glad I get unlimited everything for $30 from Boost Mobile, with no contract, because Washington bureaucrats decreed that was the proper monthly rate. Oh, that wasn't decreed by government? You say that government decreed that my 64k landline, running on copper that's been there for 30 years, must cost MORE than my 4G wireless service? Well that's kinda stupid.

> If the FCC had decided to treat the net like a phone, we would have massive competition, lower prices, and better service.

Yep, common carrier phone systems (landlines) have so much competition, and service has improved so much in the last 100 years. I want some of what you're smoking.

The FEC's position in CU was that because the people of Dice and the ACLU work together as a corporation, they can't talk about political issues. Had the FEC won, Dice couldn't run this story without FEC approval because Dice is corporation, they spend money running the site, and it touches on a political issue.

It IS unfortunate that with free speech, some people and organizations can get a bigger megaphone than others. Is silencing everyone really the solution? The CU ruling is what allows the ACLU and the FSF to continue to comment on political issues. Do you really want to silence them, in order to silence those who disagree with them?

I propose an alternative. I propose that ACLU Inc be allowed to make their case publicly, the BSA can make theirs, and the FSF can say what they want to say. Then, you and I, the voters, can decide who we agree with after hearing them.

Sure, they can support a position that a candidate supports. Alternatively, they can oppose a policy that a candidate supports. For example, under the Citizens United ruling, Dice can run stories supporting net neutrality. Had the ruling gone the other way, the FEC (via Mcain-Feingold) or FCC (through the fairness doctrine) could prevent publication of these stories because it's Dice spending money in support of a political position.

Could Dice also say "Obama sucks", and do it shortly before the election? Sure, and maybe that's imperfect, but it's a heck of a lot better than the alternative. The alternative, argued in Citizen's, was to say that because Dice and the ACLU are both incorporated, neither may talk about political issues.

> 3. LibreSSL gains feature parity with OpenSSL

The LibreSSL team has deleted tens of thousands of lines of code from OpenSSL, saying that one of their key goals is to remove as many features as possible. Their reasoning is that simple is more secure, that features which don't exist can't have bugs.

That principle is correct, unless either:
a) It's a feature people need, in which case each code-monkey will scratch out their own homebrew version.

or

b) It's a security feature, a chunk of code designed to make things more secure.

Right or wrong, it appears unlikely that LibreSSL will ever get anywhere near feature parity with OpenSSL. They would consider it a failure if they did that.

That would at least be logically consistent - the FCC would, legally, gain vast new powers by treating ISPs as monopoly common carriers. I think at this time, at this point in the development of the internet, it would be a huge mistake. It would essentially outlaw any significant advancement. For example, Google fiber would be illegal in about six different ways under common carrier rules. Maybe in another 30 years there won't be any new innovations taking place and common carrier regulation will make sense for the internet.

Personally, I'd like to see competition. I'd like to be able to tell my ISP that I'll switch to their competitor if they do X. To me, the franchise laws that make competition illegal are a key part of the problem.

> Nothing is wrong with it when you put it that way, but that's not the way it is. The problem is that PACs are about donations

FYI, the #1 rule of PAC Club is that they can't donate to candidates. The #2 rule is that they can't coordinate with any candidate's campaign.

What they CAN do, and what the Citizen's United case sought to outlaw, is the kind of thing Michael Moore's organization did - make a political statement separate and apart from any candidate. I happen to think Michael Moore is disgusting, and he's admitted that his movies are full of lies, but I think it's pretty clear that he and his friends have the right to get together and make stupid movies. Citizen's United made movies too, with a political point just like Michael Moore's movies. The FEC sought to prevent them from making these movies. This is a plain violation of the first amendment. It has little or nothing to do with political donations - they were making movies. The FEC said that's illegal because they spent some money making the movies, and under their rules it was illegal to spend any money exercising your first amendment rights.

Does NTIA have Constitutional authority to pass laws? Did they pass a law giving the FCC the authority to pass laws? If not, the ruling of the court is (obviously) correct.

The question before the court was a fourth grade civics quiz question:

True or false: the executive branch is empowered the make new laws.
True
False

The correct answer is "false".

Note again, this has nothing to do with whether any particular law labeled "net neutrality" might be good or bad. The court just ruled what everyone already knows - Congress makes new laws, not the FCC.

It occurs to me that logically, it's also possible that they do not actually believe it's bad for people to work together to effect change. It's possible that they are trying to mislead people, saying they believe that when they really don't. So the three possible options are:

1. They've chosen to do wrong, to do what they believe is evil.

2. They've utterly failed to think about what they actually believe.

3. They are trying to mislead people about what they actually believe.

I don't know which of the three is true about these people, but basic logic shows it must be one of the three.

In a way, I see that point. On the other hand, pick one:

A) Banding together to exercise your free speech rights through an organization is something you should do.

B) Banding together to exercise your free speech rights through an organization is so bad that it should be illegal.

You can't believe both A and B. If you believe it's bad thing, in fact so bad that it's worth violating other people's first amendment rights over, yet you do it anyway, you've chosen to do evil. So they've either chosen to do evil, or they simply haven't thought things through. Their thinking process ends at their own four-word slogan.

I wouldn't even look to the court. The court merely read the law, which very plainly states that the FCC may not do what they tried to do. In essence, the law says:

The FCC must regulate common carriers according to a, b, and c.
The FCC may not regulate b or c in regard to anyone other than common carriers.

The FCC wanted to do B without C, so they claimed "ISPs are not common carriers, so we don't have to do C. ISPs are common carriers, so we're going to do B". That's ridiculous, you can't say they ARE common carriers and NOT common carriers at the same time. Therefore, the FCC can't make up net neutrality laws.

If and when we end up needing a net neutrality law, Congress will need to pass one. That should be pretty clear to anyone who has passed fourth grade civics, so I really don't see why the FCC tried to make up the law themselves in the first place. Any half-competent court would strike them down.