The end of the Internet as we know it? Court weakens Net Neutrality

The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that the FCC overstepped its bounds in telling Comcast it could not regulate bandwidth use.

Check out Davey D’s analysis.

Just getting word about the FCC being defeated in court against Comcast over the issue of Net Neutrality. The courts ruled that the FCC has no authority to enforce Net Neutrality principles. This now opens the doors for any of the large telecoms like AT&T and Verizon who have spent millions of dollars lobbying politicians, paying off traditional Civil Rights groups for their silence or advocacy and hand picking ‘pundits to murky the issue by setting up all sorts of distracting debates, to start regulating content. In short, the doors are now open for these telecoms to create toll lanes on the web where the more you pay the faster and more accessible your website, home page etc, to the masses. Here’s the actual decision http://pacer.cadc.uscourts.gov/common/opinions/201004/08-1291-1238302.pdf

The Internet was attractive to so many of us because it leveled the playing field. It allowed the little guy with a good idea to have voice right alongside the mediocre, slow-moving big guy with lot so f money. The net allowed a lot of folks to come up. The principles around Net Neutrality allowed a small outfit like Pandora to smash on the staleness of a Clear Channel. It allowed scores of Indy artists who we got to enjoy at last week’s Paid Dues concert in LA to be just as relevant and accessible as the corporate backed auto-tune drones that made so many of us thankful we could escape via the internet.

Read more here!

Posted by:

The Editor

Escaping Facebook Just Became That Much Harder

It’s amazing how much our generation is addicted to Facebook–so much so that we are driving up the rate of internet usage in cell phones. A new study by CCS Insight has found that a third of 16-36 year olds access Facebook through their cell phones on a regular basis. It’s more popular than MySpace, Bebo, and Twitter combined. And the number of users is only going up; by the end of the year it’s predicted that almost 45% of youth will be accessing the net from their cells.

So not only is the stalker in all of us exponentially increased by having Facebook available at all times in our back pocket, but our addiction is lining the pockets of cell phone companies as well–accessing internet each month costs an average of $30 more than just a phone plan.

Find out more about our all-consuming drive for 24/7 technological access at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8149652.stm.

Posted by:

Yolanda Clatworthy

The X Fact(her): It’s a C-O-N-spiracy

Perhaps I’m not surfing the dark corners of the Internet closely enough but I haven’t come across any amazing conspiracy theories in a while. I’m sure paranoid people are still out there telling anyone who will listen that Prez Obama is the Anti-Christ (why the first black President has to the be the devil, I don’t know), the government flushed drugs into the hood (are they still doing it? If so why wouldn’t they make weed legal so that they can make more money off of it?) and America, Mexico, and Canada are looking to become a unified state (with all the drug wars going on in Mexico. . . I’ll pass).

I’m sure there are more than enough conspiracies out there regarding our government to scare the crap out of even the biggest critics. Thanks to Youtube.com I did some research and was able to find some for your viewing pleasure. For the record, I’m not stating that these are real or truth (nor is 99problems.org!) but they do make you think and can be amusing. Here are some of the best ones I’ve found:

… Continue Reading

Posted by:

Chloe