Verizon: U.S. Constitution Allows Data Throttling

[exfileme]

Verizon is putting up a good fight in regards to net neutrality rules, claiming a violation of its First Amendment and Fifth Amendment rights.

Verizon: U.S. Constitution Allows Data Throttling : Read more

 

[classzero]

Verizon are a bunch of @$$40735! I hope their evil empire falls in my lifetime!

 

[Antimatter79]

The US Constitution also allows subscription cancelling.

 

[freggo]

What's next, they regulate that we can call Mom Anytime, but if we call our married lover we may either have to wait 20 minutes to be connected or accept a lowering of the voice quality to that of a muffled grunt ?

Screw Verizon. I left them years ago after getting screwed on basically every monthly bill. Even if the next Winder Olympics are taking place in Hell I'll not go back to them !

 

[jhansonxi]

I don't think the Tea Party or OWS is going to be rushing to their cause but some of the established political puppets may.

 

[Guest]

Verizon is a content provider, not a content creator. There is no violation of their right to free speech since they dont speak or produce anything. If anything, they are trying to limit other's free speech by allowing content providers to pay a premium to censor their competition. Someone posts a news article Fox News doesnt like? They can pay $100,000 to have your article snuffed out by killing bandwidth to your site. Apple gets caught in more lies and manipulation with their products? Simply pay to have all offending websites put to rest.

 

[d_kuhn]

BIG Stretch there Verizon. A Newspaper editor is directly controlling the content of his paper... you're not making editorial judgements but rather deciding what the delivery prioirty is. If someone wants the Sunday paper then they have to wait because it's 3 times bigger than the rest of the people who only want a daily. You want to be able to send paperboys to people who pay extra FIRST, setting up a class system to extract profit. There is no speech involved since you specifically DON'T edit and can't be held responsible for content.

 

[Guest]

If this goes to the supreme court it going to be decided by the same people that believe money = speech. Is it such a stretch to believe that they would also rule that a corporation ability to limit content they find objectionable (or in the case of Verizon more likely companies that don't give them money) on a network they own also falls under speech?

It complete BS but I would not say they have no chance to win this case when considering the only 9 people that get any say in the matter.

 

[zak_mckraken]

That's the biggest load of crap I've heard in a while! I don't know if I should laugh or cry. Comparing themselves to a news editor is hallucinating. They don't edit anything, they're the medium! They are in fact the printers, the bottom workers who have no say whatsoever in what they are printing!

 

[Guest]

"for use by others without compensation"

Funny, I thought I PAID for internet service. Somebody's been ripping me off!

 

[shadowkazama]

How are they not being compensated? Others can use their network, they can use other companies networks.

A new editor has a say in what is printed from start to finish. If the paper was a free forum for anyone to post one, they would have very few customers if they picked and chose what to let others read.

If AT&T hadn't pissed me off already when it cam to our cell phone, then I would leave Verizon in a second too, because of these statements.

 

[panders4]

This is why I will never buy any kind of service from Verizon.

 

[eddieroolz]

I'm not an expert on American constitution but that's a rather bold claim Verizon is making here.

 

[houghe9]

i may be wrong here but these communication companies are subsidized by the government and the american people. if that is the case and they have used taxpayer dollars to help them build it dont all of us own the lines? verizon should have to pay the taxpayer for using our transmission lines. i understand google pays for thier bandwidth and i pay for my monthly internet service but i want to charge verizon a toll to use taxpayer transmission lines. if they dont like it they can just not provide service on our lines and we can get someone in there who will. i am sure there are a lot of companies that would love to provide service on our already existing last miles and our infrastructure.

 

[shin0bi272]

constitution... verizon keeps using that word... I do no think it means what you think it means.

The constitution is there to limit the government's power not a phone companies.

 

[msgun98]

Stupid metaphor... they aren't like editors of a paper, they are more like the print shop choosing to not print the paper because it says something bad about what they like.

 

[killerclick]

If this goes to the Supreme Court, they'll just rule in favor of the big corporation, like they did in Citizens United.

And the problem might not be in Verizon or SCOTUS, it may be in the US Constitution. I'll never understand why Americans are so obsessed with their constitution. It's not a perfect document, that's why there were 27 amendments so far. If it's found that the US Constitution allows some crazy, unreasonable things, simply change it, to hell with the slave-owning Founding Fathers.

 

[lamorpa]

Sure. Let 'em. Then break up the monopoly. U.S. policy allows for that too.

 

[jimmysmitty]

[citation][nom]killerclick[/nom]If this goes to the Supreme Court, they'll just rule in favor of the big corporation, like they did in Citizens United.And the problem might not be in Verizon or SCOTUS, it may be in the US Constitution. I'll never understand why Americans are so obsessed with their constitution. It's not a perfect document, that's why there were 27 amendments so far. If it's found that the US Constitution allows some crazy, unreasonable things, simply change it, to hell with the slave-owning Founding Fathers.[/citation]

You are right, its not perfect. That is why there are the Amendments, to allow it to evolve and better the rights to the people.

But the reason we are "obsessed" with it is because it is what defined us and still defines us as a nation for the people, one of the first ones. While that is not always true it still holds our rights, some that most other countries, even ones like the UK, do not grant.

I disagree with Verizon as has been said before, they are a content provider not creator and it needs to be fair to everyone, not just a small amount of people. Everyone who is paying Verizon should get the same treatment, be it the low speed DSL or 3G people to the top end FiOS and 4G people.

Thats how it is supposed to work in America, equality for all not just some.

 

[spookyman]

Remember..

The SCOTUS declared corporations to be people too.