What Do We Actually Know?

We know the plan as written will not be released until after the vote. It’s an Obama transparency thing.

We know these are the people that will be voting: FCC Commissioners.

Tom Wheeler| Chairman – Obama appointee – Worked in Obama election efforts and gathered US$500,000 for the campaigns. (Reference)

Mignon Clyburn | Commissioner – Obama appointee – Daughter of U.S. Representative Jim Clyburn (D), she served 11 years as the Democrat representative of South Carolina’s 6th congressional district. (Reference)

Jessica Rosenworcel | Commissioner – Obama appointee – She served as Senior Communications Counsel under the leadership of Senator John D. Rockefeller IV (D–WV) and previously under the leadership of Senator Daniel K. Inouye (D–HI). (Reference)

Ajit Pai | Commissioner – Obama appointee – (for the Republican slot in the commission) An attorney working in the private and public sectors. (Reference)

Michael O’Rielly | Commissioner – Obama appointee – (for the Republican slot in the commission) He served as a Policy Advisor in the Office of the Senate Republican Whip, led by U.S. Senator John Cornyn,  previously worked for the Republican Policy Committee in the U.S. Senate as a Policy Analyst for Banking, Technology, Transportation, Trade, and Commerce, and began his career as a Legislative Assistant to U.S. Congressman Tom Bliley  (Reference)

I believe we can expect a 3 to 2 vote in favor of the Whitehouse policy.

Also, did you notice the Republican members have weaker ties to the GOP while the Democrat members have strong connections to the Democrat Party? This is a common thing with Presidential appointees/nominees regardless of party. It almost always colors decisions made by such commissions.

We know that Whitehouse influence has consistently been to move more control to the central Federal bureaucracy. The Whitehouse has consistently sided with big business (cronies) and not middle class citizens (I know that opinion is debatable – but I consistently win that debate. You’re welcome to challenge it.) That suggests we probably are not going to like this plan. But, I have little doubt we are going to be stuck with it.

What It Means

We are past the point where we can shape this policy. The true nature of what Net Neutrality would be in the USA has never been revealed. All the media and hype has mostly been opinion and supposition about what it would be and what the various parties involved had as agendas.

There were some smart tag lines and buzz phrases. But, the overall goal of those in the debate was to divide low information and high information voters and paralyze public opinion while avoiding factual debate. It has worked. Like the ACA there are going to be no facts to point to until after the plan is adopted.

Small businesses common to Second Life will likely feel the new taxes. Linden Lab is likely to see new taxes. All the SL users in the USA can expect Internet costs to go up. Overseas users, I suspect will feel the change the least but until we know the changes that is just my speculation.

The free market would likely have avoided raising costs and from competition likely driven them down. At least that thinking is consistent with history. Give it a year for the taxes to appear. The 20+ new taxes in the ACA were passed in 2010 and we are only starting to see those taxes this tax season, after the important elections.

Historically any service or commodity controlled by the government has lost quality, cost more, opened the door to cronyism-corruption, and become scarce. I don’t expect government’s coming control to improve freedom of the net, or reduce its costs.

The goal of progressives is seen in Chris Matthew’s wanting someone to rule this country:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwhKcQELQqg

I don’t know how much more un-American Chris’ thinking can get. Americans are supposed to rule their government.

Net Neutrality sounded good to many. But, no one really could look under the hood and few looked to see what was coming. In the next week or two we will start to find out how we are to be ruled on the Internet…