Comcast hints at plan for paid fast lanes after net neutrality repeal

[Jimbo101]

ARS Technica

For years, Comcast has been promising that it won't violate the principles of net neutrality, regardless of whether the government imposes any net neutrality rules. That meant that Comcast wouldn't block or throttle lawful Internet traffic and that it wouldn't create fast lanes in order to collect tolls from Web companies that want priority access over the Comcast network.

This was one of the ways in which Comcast argued that the Federal Communications Commission should not reclassify broadband providers as common carriers, a designation that forces ISPs to treat customers fairly in other ways. The Title II common carrier classification that makes net neutrality rules enforceable isn't necessary because ISPs won't violate net neutrality principles anyway, Comcast and other ISPs have claimed.

But with Republican Ajit Pai now in charge at the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast's stance has changed. While the company still says it won't block or throttle Internet content, it has dropped its promise about not instituting paid prioritization.

Instead, Comcast now vaguely says that it won't "discriminate against lawful content" or impose "anti-competitive paid prioritization." The change in wording suggests that Comcast may offer paid fast lanes to websites or other online services, such as video streaming providers, after Pai's FCC eliminates the net neutrality rules next month.

[Eliot Rosewater]

1. Works the same way making a benefit "income based" ultimately turns them into welfare.

This way you start off not throttling any website, but eventually of course you do little else.

But hey, people couldnt "trust" the alternative.

[Wellstone ruled]

2. Now you understand why Comcast

Media(NBC/MSNBC)kissed Trump's ass with Free Election Promotion. Done saying I told you so.

[hunter]

3. Hurting Comcast is easy. Don't buy their shit.

I quit them a long time ago.

[shanti]

4. That doesn't help

us without an option = monopoly. Comcast sucks mightily

[hunter]

5. I'd rather suffer dial-up than Comcast.

Fortunately I've got a medium speed DSL from an independent internet service provider.

[dixiegrrrrl]

6. We have Frontier dsl..slow as hell on a good day,frozen on a typical one.

But guess what?
If I go to Amazon, instant connection. Blink of an eye. Day or night, or weekend, doesn't matter.
Seriously, been tracking it for months now.