Net Neutrality: What Steve Wozniak Thinks (video) & FCC Meets May 18

Here’s what Steve Wozniak thinks of the net neutrality battle

Video above published Apr 30, 2017: There have only been two occasions when Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak felt he needed to fly to Washington, DC for an important ruling and they both involved decisions on net neutrality. If you're not familiar with the concept — net neutrality is the idea that all information moving across the internet should be treated equally. On the other hand, internet service providers like Verizon and AT&T believe that if a video streaming site wants to ensure speedy delivery of their content, they should have to pay more for access to a high-speed internet fast lane. We spoke with Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak to find out why he believes net neutrality is so important. Following is a transcript of the video.

I twice in my life flew to Washington, DC to be at a meeting where an important decision was coming down and it was two rulings on net neutrality, and I was present in the audience. And that probably says enough about my own feelings. I'm also one of the founders of the EFF. And I always favor those who don't have money, the people who are attending our comic-con, I favor them over the people who have money and power and wealth.Like big companies — be it Google, be it even Apple, I always favor the small one and net neutrality kind of ensures the big guys will have a route in. Look who our President is going to look to for advice and the advice he's going to get is “let us rule, let us rule the internet and let us have lower taxes” and that just fights against the little guy.

May 18, 2017 Open Commission Meeting | Federal Communications Commission | fcc.gov:
10:30 am - 12:30 pm EDT, Room TW-C305, 445 12th Street S.W., Washington, DC.
Watch the LIVE Video.

FCC Meeting Agenda Item 6: "Restoring Internet Freedom: The Commission will consider a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would propose to restore the Internet to a light-touch regulatory framework by classifying broadband Internet access service as an information service and by seeking comment on the existing rules governing Internet service providers' practices. (WC Docket No. 17-108)."

Current FCC Chairman: Ajit Pai serves with Commissioner Mignon Clyburn and Commissioner Michael O'Rielly. There are two vacancies on the FCC, who will be appointed by President Trump and confirmed by the United States Senate for five-year terms. The U.S. President also designates one of the commissioners to serve as chairman (in this case President Trump has already so designated Ajit Pai).

Complete agenda (pdf)

Public Notice: Sunshine Period in the Restoring Internet Freedom Proceeding Begins

Circulation Document (pdf)

To file a comment go to: https://dearfcc.org/  (Note: dearFCC.org will hold your comments, and submit them when the record opens.)

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Former GNSO Chair Jonathan Robinson Interview from ICANN54 (video)

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An ICANN interview of Jonathan Robinson at ICANN 54 in Dublin. Robinson is now former Chair of ICANN's GNSO Council--note: GNSO failed to elect a Chair to replace Robinson at ICANN 54, so the GNSO's Vice Chairs are presently doing the Chair's duties--

No candidate achieved threshold for GNSO Council Chair - new election will take place no sooner than 30 days from today #ICANN #ICANN54

— GNSO (@ICANN_GNSO) October 21, 2015

Transcript of video above:
I'm here at the ICANN 54 meeting in Dublin with Jonathan Robinson the Chair of the GNSO Council. Jonathan ... your time will come to an end in Dublin, what are you thoughts of the GNSO and the state its in at the moment? I think we're in a good state in many ways. I mean we we've done a lot of work to make sure that things operate smoothly and that we work in an effective way and that that goes through many different layers, that's in terms of the personal relationships with, between the councillors through to our understanding of each other's constituencies and stakeholder groups, knowledge of processes and procedures, effective working with staff, so feels to me that we're in pretty good shape and I feel proud to be handing over the chair of a critical organ in the ICANN infrastructure to a successor Chair, so I think we're in good shape. Over the past three years changes have taken place ... I think the overarching theme we tried to put in place at three years ago was to look at a process of continuous improvement and in doing so we looked at a number of different areas it was was in terms of the underlying processes what we with within the operating procedures of the way in which the council manages the policy, how we could do any of those things more efficiently and more effectively. For example when we now do the preparation of an issue report with a draft charter in there that the council is not obliged to accept that has the opportunity to accept if the council accepts that we end up with a more efficient start to the PDP process ...  we've concentrated on a number of different areas we concentrate on where we can improve those processes and we can get greater throughput. We've concentrated on how we might best rely on the staff that support the council and staff were able to take on significant amount of work provided we trust and had an effective working relationship with the staff . We need to have good interpersonal relationships between those Councillors because we're often dealing with quite contentious matters and so one of the things we've done is concentrate on making sure when we know and understand one another from both a constituency and stakeholder group level. We try to understand the way in which the different groups work, in which they come to decisions in which in which they empower the councillors to work, but also we spent some time out of council meetings getting to know one another in making sure we know and understand each other as individuals. What are your thoughts for the incoming Chair? I feel like I'm handing over something in good shape, but that doesn't mean there isn't lots of work to be done. And I think one of the one of the key areas that might help will be to start to think of the work of the Council as being managed and handled by not only the Chair alone, but the Vice Chairs and a competent policy staff. So I think the critical thing to do, because one of the key challenges is dealing with a high and increasing volume of work is to pull together with the Vice Chairs and support staff and see that as the team through which that increased throughput is generated. Thank you very much for your time and good luck for the future. Thank you very much.

GNSO - Generic Names Supporting Organization: http://gnso.icann.org/en/
GNSO Wiki: https://community.icann.org/category/gnso
On Twitter: @ICANN_GNSO

About the GNSO | Generic Names Supporting Organization: "The Generic Names Supporting Organization fashions (and over time, recommends changes to) policies for generic Top-Level Domains (e.g., .com, .org, .biz). The GNSO strives to keep gTLDs operating in a fair, orderly fashion across one global Internet, while promoting innovation and competition. Sample GNSO issues: When you register a domain name, what services must the registrar provide? If you forget to renew your domain name, and it expires, can you get it back? What happens if someone registers a domain name that is confusingly similar to yours? Resources posted here will help you learn more about the GNSO and its policy development process."

The GNSO is comprised of Stakeholder Groups--"constituency" is a technical term referring to a group of Internet users united around a particular common interest or perspective, formally recognized by the GNSO Council.

• Commercial Stakeholder Group
• Commercial Business Users
• Intellectual Property
• Internet Service Providers
• Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group
• Non-Commercial Users
• Not-for-Profit Operational Concerns

• Registrars Stakeholder Group
• Registries Stakeholder Group

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DISCLAIMER

FCC Net Neutrality, Open Internet Rules In Effect, DC Court Denies Stay

DC Circuit refused to grant a stay to the telecom industry over new net neutrality rules that forbid throttling, paid prioritization or blocking certain websites, or from giving “fast lane” treatment to preferred websites--

“This is a huge victory for Internet consumers and innovators! Starting Friday, there will be a referee on the field to keep the Internet fast, fair and open. Blocking, throttling, pay-for-priority fast lanes and other efforts to come between consumers and the Internet are now things of the past. The rules also give broadband providers the certainty and economic incentive to build fast and competitive broadband networks.”--FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler

The DC Circuit Court of Appeals handed a victory--see Order below--to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Thursday by refusing to grant a request by the telecom industry to suspend net neutrality rules that went into effect Friday. The "Open Internet" rules, passed by the FCC in February, have been challenged in Federal Court by AT&T, Comcast and Verizon, and other internet service providers (ISPs). A full hearing on the issue is scheduled for later this year.

more information:
Open Internet | FCC.gov: The FCC’s rules protecting an Open Internet are now in effect.
June 11, 2015 - Statement Commissioner Rosenworcel Statement on DC Circuit Decision
June 11, 2015 - Statement Comm O'Rielly DC Circuit Decision to Deny Stay of Net Neutrality Order
June 11, 2015 - Statement Cmmr Clyburn Stmt on DC Circuit Denial of Petition to Stay OI Order
June 11, 2015 - Statement Comm Pai Stmt on DC Circuit Decision to Review Internet Regs Promptly
June 11, 2015 - Statement Chairman's Statement on Court Denying Stay of FCC Open Internet Rules


Order Denying Stay[1]

more on Domain Mondo:

• Net Neutrality Victory, FCC Protects Innovators and Consumers
• FCC Net Neutrality Hearing and Order For An Open Internet (video)
• Senate Committee Hearing on FCC, Open Internet Order

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