Karl Bode 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: NPR Gives Up On News Comments; After All, Who Cares What Your Customers Have To Say?

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 01 Sep, 2017 @ 11:25am

    Re: That Study Still Doesn't Say What You Think It Does...

    Well shit, you're right. I've misinterpreted that study as being directly applicable to news comments specifically and will stop over-stating its import since it was talking about Facebook comments specifically. Thank you, news story commenter helpfully pointing out my error in a news story comment section. :)

    The relevant part, I thought, was the part where they studied seventy different political posts and found a 17% decrease in "incivility" and a 15% spike in people using evidence in their posts -- simply by having somebody from the outlet show up.

    But I appreciate the correction, thanks.

  • On the post: Telecom Industry Feebly Tries To Deflate Net Neutrality Protest With Its Own, Lame 'Unlock The Net' Think Tank Campaign

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 11 Jul, 2017 @ 07:14am

    Re:

    There's certainly plenty of good think tanks. And Copia is an effort to bring a little bit of sanity and more honest discourse to a think tank segment that has, over the years, simply mutated into a way for giant legacy companies to farm bogus science justifying anti-competitive (or anti-environment, etc.) positions.

    I'm not saying all think tanks are bad. I will say a huge portion of them are total shit, though.

  • On the post: Telecom Industry Feebly Tries To Deflate Net Neutrality Protest With Its Own, Lame 'Unlock The Net' Think Tank Campaign

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 11 Jul, 2017 @ 07:12am

    Re:

    This "bias" claim makes no coherent sense. Comcast is rated, consistently, as one of the worst companies in ANY INDUSTRY IN AMERICA when it comes to customer service and support. Worse than the IRS.

    Polls indicate the majority of consumers do support net neutrality protections. And surveys indicate they do realize Comcast is an anti-competitive ass. So I really have no idea what you're on about here.

    Interesting you'd dismiss an entire post because I stated an obvious fact at the end though.

  • On the post: Facebook, Google Wake Up From Their Coma On The Subject, Join Wednesday's Massive Net Neutrality Protest

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 10 Jul, 2017 @ 11:41am

    Re:

    Yeah the fact they didn't reach out directly to FTTF suggests they may have just been bullshitting news outlets to avoid being singled out as apathetic (if not outright hostile) to the concept. We'll see Wednesday, I guess.

  • On the post: Facebook, Google Wake Up From Their Coma On The Subject, Join Wednesday's Massive Net Neutrality Protest

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 10 Jul, 2017 @ 11:40am

    Re:

    He's clearly trying to make inroads in flyover country for one reason or another, possibly political. But so few people can actually tell you what net neutrality even is, I doubt it's much of an impediment to whatever his ambitions are.

    And it's not like they admit they oppose net neutrality. Most of the time they claim to support it while actively undermining it, something people not in tune to the recent "Free Basics" shit show over in India probably aren't aware of.

  • On the post: Comcast, Charter May Soon Get Even Larger With Joint Acquisition Of Sprint

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 29 Jun, 2017 @ 11:23am

    According to the American Customer Satisfaction Index, the IRS has had consistently better customer satisfaction ratings that Charter for much of the last decade, which should tell you pretty much everything you need to know about the cable industry.

  • On the post: Cable Industry Quietly Shelves Its Bogus Plan To Make Cable Boxes Cheaper, More Competitive

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 27 Jun, 2017 @ 08:36am

    Re: Re: "the industry makes $21 million annually in rental fees" -- From 100 or so million subscribers, you're hot on 20 CENTS a year?

    Yep, typo. Fixed, thanks. Should be $21 billion.

  • On the post: Cable Industry Quietly Shelves Its Bogus Plan To Make Cable Boxes Cheaper, More Competitive

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 27 Jun, 2017 @ 08:36am

    Re:

    This narrative that "blind deregulation magically fixes everything" (including established predatory monopolies) is already shallow and simplistic to begin with, but when people try to apply it to the telecom sector it's just a red flag that they don't know how this particular sector works, or its history.

  • On the post: It's Time For The FCC To Actually Listen: The Vast Majority Of FCC Commenters Support Net Neutrality

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 17 May, 2017 @ 07:04am

    Re: Or what?

    Yes it's clear we don't currently believe in accountability. Pai does clearly have grander political ambitions, and with both privacy and net neutrality not being as partisan as he thinks in his own head, it's possible accountability lies in wait for him somewhere down the road.

    "The guy that killed net neutrality" -- when net neutrality has pretty broad, bipartisan support -- isn't going to be a good look longer term.

  • On the post: The FCC Spent Last Week Trying To Make Net Neutrality Supporters Seem Unreasonable, Racist & Unhinged

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 15 May, 2017 @ 11:42am

    Re: What monopolies?

    "What does Net Neutrality have to do with the cable monopolies?"

    Cable's growing monopoly over the last mile means less competition. Less competition means more attempts to creatively abuse this lack of competition, which is what net neutrality infractions are.

    "Those are driven by local governments and deals between cable companies, none of this will change."

    Most local franchises are now state level franchises. And blindly deregulating a captive, uncompetitive market doesn't magically fix any of this. Sensible, reasonable government policies to improve competition do. But because the local, state, and federal government is blindly loyal to campaign contributions to a grotesque degree, you're right in the fact that change doesn't happen until other problems are fixed.

    "It seems to be the case that Title II creates more monopolies by making it harder for new ISPs to compete with established ISPs who already have the market locked down."

    Says who? I've written about this industry for 20 years and see nothing to support that.

    "Since they all must offer the exact same service under Net Neutrality where is the competition besides speed/price?"

    Who says they have to offer the exact same service? This also isn't supported. There's a million ways to compete when the playing field is even.

    "New ISPs will not have this luxury and must develop their infrastructure under far more strict rules."

    The rules don't restrict upstart ISPs in the slightest. And as we note about three times a week, the idea that Title II stifled investment is an unsupported canard. That's a load of nonsense being pushed by telecom sector folks that want zero accountability as they abuse captive markets.

  • On the post: Comcast Paid Civil Rights Groups To Support Killing Broadband Privacy Rules

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 05 Apr, 2017 @ 08:33am

    Re: Grassroots donors should complain

    A lot of the groups really are little more than a PO box and a handful of telecom sector sycophants happily regurgitating nonsense, with few genuine funders or constituents to annoy.

  • On the post: Trump's Internet Brigades Shocked To Realize The Government Just Sold Them Out On Privacy

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 30 Mar, 2017 @ 11:36am

    InfoWars

    I'll note that Infowars insists this entire privacy fracas is "fake news" and the fault of Google:

    https://www.infowars.com/google-soros-behind-fake-news-on-internet-privacy/

    Ignoring that Google actually opposed the rules because, like ISPs, they didn't like that consumers had to OPT IN to let companies track and sell private financial data and browsing history.

    The corresponding Google letter to the FCC opposing their privacy rules:

    https://ecfsapi.fcc.gov/file/100319291940/2016-10-03%20Google%20Letter%20(WC%2016-106).pdf

  • On the post: Consumer Broadband Privacy Protections Are Dead

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 28 Mar, 2017 @ 04:11pm

    Re: Re: That didn't take long...

    Yep. I mean, they were modifying user data packets to track people around the internet for TWO YEARS before security researchers even noticed. It took another six months and an FCC fine to get them to even provide opt out tools.

    And that was WITH inconsistent regulatory privacy oversight. Imagine what happens now.

  • On the post: Consumer Broadband Privacy Protections Are Dead

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 28 Mar, 2017 @ 04:10pm

    Re: Modify cookies

    Not enough. Verizon's Unique Identifier Header actively modifies the packet to make cookies irrelevant. In the deep packet inspection age, cookies are kind of a relic.

  • On the post: Senator Thune Begins Pushing A 'Net Neutrality' Bill That's Likely To Kill Net Neutrality

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 07 Mar, 2017 @ 09:06am

    Re: Table

    Noted and corrected, thanks. That's amazing I've always assumed to table meant the exact opposite of what it means in the Senate. Appreciate the correction.

  • On the post: FCC Boss Falsely Claims His Attacks On Net Neutrality Have Already Made The Wireless Sector More Competitive

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 01 Mar, 2017 @ 07:52am

    Re: conflating different types

    Wireless wasn't included in the 2010 rules, but was included in 2015's do-over.

    They have long included wireless (capped, expensive) and satellite (capped, expensive) as examples of the incredible wave of competition in the sector, ignoring, intentionally, the high price of both.

  • On the post: Happy New Year From Comcast: Usage Caps, Rate Hikes, And More Sneaky Fees In 2017

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 15 Dec, 2016 @ 09:48am

    Re: FCC is a toothless watchdog

    "FCC has done nothing to indicate it actually is a consumer watchdog."

    Right, except for net neutrality. Or the new privacy rules that force transparency and working opt out tools. Or its attempts to stop Comcast from using state laws to hamstring competitors. Or its efforts to ensure a functional shift from copper to IP without screwing people on legacy systems. Or the constant effort by Wheeler to highlight the lack of competition above 25 Mbps. Or....

    You folks insisting this latest FCC suffered from the faults of past iterations are simply seeing what you want to see.

  • On the post: Happy New Year From Comcast: Usage Caps, Rate Hikes, And More Sneaky Fees In 2017

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 15 Dec, 2016 @ 09:45am

    Re: Re: Re: Comcast Billing

    "boycotting businesses and a free market principle"

    That requires having alternatives to choose from. That's kind of hard when you have people who profess to adore "free markets" letting AT&T, Verizon and Charter write state laws protecting their legacy fiefdoms from competition.

    In fact I'd bet 90% of the folks I see going on about "free markets" when talking about telecom work tirelessly to ensure the exact opposite.

  • On the post: T-Mobile Applauds Likely Death Of Net Neutrality Under Trump

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 07 Dec, 2016 @ 07:02am

    Re: "gutting the FCC as a consumer watchdog"

    They've made it pretty clear that's about all they want it to do moving forward.

  • On the post: Trump Appoints Third Anti-Net Neutrality Advisor To Telecom Transition Team

    Karl Bode ( profile ), 01 Dec, 2016 @ 11:52am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Finally!

    "I might be wrong but it smacks of "this wouldn't be happening if Hillary got in" articles despite the fact that it totally would."

    Yeah, you're wrong.

    I wrote that article too. I don't like her policy positions and didn't vote for her. Because somebody is pointing out the dumb things Donald is doing does not automatically mean they support Hillary.

    Binary thinking is the enemy, kids.

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