Rulings point to less open future for Internet

[ananda]

The latest SCOTUS ruling on cable and broadband internet access really hurt! I was so hoping that cable companies would have to share their lines so that faster broadband internet service would become more affordable and available. Now it appears that corporations will get control of the lines and more is at stake than just affordable access.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/3245478

SAN JOSE, CALIF. - A pair of Supreme Court rulings this week is stoking fears that the Internet is becoming an ever-more-centralized platform for entrenched corporate interests — the antithesis of the digital commons envisioned by technophiles and civil libertarians.
But others predict that innovation will actually be encouraged by the rulings, because they create a framework of sorts for how to build businesses in the digital age.

The immediate impact of Monday's decisions against broadband provider Brand X Internet and file-sharing companies Grokster and StreamCast Networks will be to discourage entrepreneurs from creating products that compete against telecommunications conglomerates and Hollywood, said Brand X President Jim Pickrell.

...

The American Civil Liberties Union argues that the rulings portend a worst-case scenario in which oligopolistic broadband giants control Web sites, e-mail and Internet telephone services.
That could turn the Internet into the opposite of what it is today: an inexpensive forum for public expression easily accessible to independent voices — from bloggers to unaffiliated political candidates.

"No one should think that the free Internet that we currently enjoy is somehow immune from change or guaranteed to stay free," ACLU attorney Chris Hansen said.

[LightningFlash]

1. Their time is over....

The internet can never be completely censored or anything else, this is just another crazily desperate bill to fill the pockets of some greedy corporations.

It's no skin off the river. There's thousands of lawyers everywhere with everybody and their mother having the power to fight, old SCOTUS members are gettin' old. ;)

[Ezlivin]

2. Perhaps Broadband over Power (BPL) will help

The electric companies are eager to get their slice of the telecommunications pie and they may have a good way: http://www.commweb.com/howto/164300852

Other than BPL, there's also satellite broadband as well: http://www.satsig.net/ivsat.htm

With the rise of P2P networks, perhaps some entrepreneur will come up with a way of using multiple POTS lines to gain broadband speeds?