Douglas McClendon, Innovator Kansas City, Kansas 66103 (detailed address on request) Phone: (785) 979 - 7723 E-Mail: dmc@cloudsession.com DRAFT October 1st, 2012 A.D. DRAFT Kansas Office of the Attorney General 120 SW 10th Street, Suite 430 Topeka, KS 66612 - 1597 Phone: (800) 432 - 2310 Fax: (785) 291 - 3699 Dear Attorney General, Re: My Form 2000F complaint to the FCC about Google Fiber's terms (ref#12-C00422224) Table of Contents I. The short story - Complaint to the FCC, and their referral to the Attorney General (p.2) II. The motivation - Why being allowed to host servers on the internet is important (p.3) III. The legal basis of my complaint - 'Net Neutrality' / FCC-10-201 / 'Right To Serve' (p.5) IV. Some expected and possible counter-arguments and my responces (p.7) V. More detailed explanations including likely and possible real world scenarios(p.x) VI. Personal considerations - Why I care as much as I do(p.x) VII. Concluding remarks(p.x) Appendix A: The FCC's official response including the entire original 2000F complaint(p.x) Appendix B: The FCC's 2010 10-201 Report and Order Preserving the Open Internet ( detached: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-10-201A1_Rcd.pdf ) Endnotes / References p.1 I: The short story - Complaint to the FCC, and their referral to the Attorney General Hello, my name is Douglas McClendon. I was born in Lawrence, and currently reside in Kansas City, Kansas. I have recently been directed to your office by the Federal Communications Commission after I registered with them the following form 2000F - 'Network Neutrality'1 - complaint against Google's new fiber internet service to the Kansas City area - --- begin FCC complaint reference #12-C00422224 --- Google's current Terms Of Service[1] for their fixed broadband internet service being deployed initially here in Kansas City, Kansas, contain this text- "You agree not to misuse the Services. This includes but is not limited to using the Services for purposes that are illegal, are improper, infringe the rights of others, or adversely impact others’ enjoyment of the Services. A list of examples of prohibited activities appears here. " where 'here' is a hyperlink[2] to a page including this text- "Unless you have a written agreement with Google Fiber permitting you do so, you should not host any type of server using your Google Fiber connection" In my professional opinion as a graduate in Computer Engineering from the University of Kansas (and incidentally brother of a google VP) I believe these terms of service are in violation of FCC-10-201. [1] http://fiber.google.com/legal/terms.html [2] support.google.com/fiber/bin/answer.pyhl=en&answer=2659981&topic=2440874&ctx=topic --- end FCC complaint reference #12-C00422224 --- Note that the online form 2000F also including selecting Google as the target of the complaint, and fixed broadband blocking (as opposed to transparency or discrimination) as the alleged rule violation. The FCC responded (see appendix A) rather tersely that - " The matter you have outlined in your correspondence does not come under the jurisdiction of the FCC. Included below is contact information for an agency that may be of more assistance (Kansas Office of the Attorney General) " That response I take one of two ways. Perhaps a bit more likely, it is just a form letter response they give to 90+% of complainants. Or alternately I would hope that it means that they didn't find my complaint to be so baseless as to bother giving me a sentence or two of education as to why. Operating under the assumption that there is a legal basis for this complaint, which may be under your jursidiction instead of the FCC's, I hereby officially submit the same complaint for your consideration and subsequent action or feedback. I'll also add justification and commentary here that I wasn't able to fit within the limits of the online 2000F form. p.2 II: The motivation - Why being allowed to host servers on the internet is important Perhaps the centrally amazing aspect of the internet, described in technical terms, is that it was designed to allow each device connected to it, to dispatch a connection initiation request to any other device on the internet, and then upon that device's discretion(/decision/programming), engage in further two-way communication. The traditional terminology for this arrangement in computer science is 'a client/server communication session'. The 'client' being the device that sends the first connection initiation request. The 'server' being the device that listens for such requests, and responds to those it wishes to. The most typical example is a 'web server' sending 'web pages' to 'client personal computers' that have requested those pages. Google, Amazon, and other large (and many small) corporations have made countless billions of dollars in the business of operating servers connected to the internet. Wikimedia/pedia as well as countless educational institutions and even individuals have contributed to the mass of life enhancing content available to all of us on the internet by hosting their own servers. All of these servers provide innovative services to countless clients such as every webpage viewing internet user. The concept of 'Network Neutrality'2, embodied as the 2010 'FCC-10-201 Report and Order Preserving The Open Internet'(see appendix B), is meant to protect innovators who serve their community from being held hostage to the quasi-monopolies that control the actual transmission lines of the internet. Google in fact has been a vocal advocate of 'Net Neutrality' because they rightfully fear that without such ground rules, the networks that they and their client users purchase service from would start to 'gouge' them, due to the fact that without the networks as a whole, Google could not offer innovative services to the internet at large. It is only with the deepest sadness that I assert that Google itself has fallen victim to the temptation to leverage its control over the new parts of the internet that it is laying down in Kansas City, to 'gouge' potential innovators, by forcing them to pay more for the 'general purpose technology'3 of internet access, than those customers that are only consuming existing cloud services, instead of trying to provide innovative new ones. Note of course the prior statement will only become true when Google offers a more expensive 'business class' service. Currently Google has no public offer of internet service to Kansas City that includes no prohibition4 against hosting servers. But in a sense, this is even worse as far as damaging the economic possibilities of innovative new uses of the gigabit fiberoptic internet infrastructure they are deploying. The most damning single piece of evidence of Google acting hypocritically on this issue of Network Neutrality, is the following quote from Google's Chief Internet Evangelist, Vint Cerf. He happens to be widely credited as being one of two 'fathers of the internet' (the other isn't Al Gore), due to his work on the original “Internet Protocol”, known as IP, or more specifically IPv4 and IPv6 representing the two deployed versions that comprise what we know of as 'The Internet'. On Google's IPv6 web page5, Mr. Cerf writes- " At Google we believe IPv6 is essential to the continued health and growth of the Internet and that by allowing all devices to talk to each other directly, IPv6 enables new innovative services. " p.3 The technical topic of IPv6 is also perhaps crucially important to this issue, because with Google's groundbreaking deployment of the IPv6 upgrade to residential end users over the aging IPv4 protocol, Google is actually one of the first ISPs to not be in the position to have a valid excuse for disallowing all end users to host servers. Namely there is one crucial resource needed to host a server that the internet at large can communicate with. That is an IP(v4 or v6) address. IPv4 addresses are legitimately a scarcity, and ISPs are reasonable in disallowing serving if it saves them money that they don't need to spend on scarce IPv4 addresses for all end users. However IPv6 is a revolutionary technology upgrade that does away with the scarcity of IP address issue. Now, there is no reason whatsoever that each and every person on the planet cannot have 64 or more permanent IPv6 addresses, and use them to establish personal lifelong presences on the information superhighway using their 5-10 year old dusty PC as a server, hosted against their residential broadband internet access. But Google Fiber's current Terms of Service prohibit hosting any kind of server. Thus blocking the vast field of innovation that Vint Cerf was referring to when he said that IPv6 will enable new innovative services by allowing all devices to talk directly to one another. In Google's view of the lowest- cost-tier residential world, all the devices in your home will be able to talk with all devices on the internet, but only through a third party with an actually 'neutral' IPv6 connection to the internet that allows devices to act both as a client and a server. I strongly urge you, in pursuing this matter, to ask Vint Cerf if he believes that Google Fiber's "no server hosting of any kind allowed" terms of service are consistent with that(his) vision of internet innovation via IPv6, or the vision laid out in paragraph 13 of FCC-10-201. If he will go on record to that effect, I will be satisfied that I have misunderstood this highly nuanced and technical issue. p.4 III: The legal basis of my complaint - 'Net Neutrality' / FCC-10-201 / 'Right To Serve' First, please when reading the original complaint also focus on the last sentence of paragraph 133 of FCC's 10-201 Report and Order Preserving the Open Internet. I feel it is likely to be a cornerstone of any legal basis of my argument. Here it is verbatim - " Because Internet openness enables widespread innovation and allows all end users and edge providers (rather than just the significantly smaller number of broadband providers) to create and determine the success or failure of content, applications, services, and devices, it maximizes commercial and non-commercial innovations that address key national challenges- including improvements in health care, education, and energy efficiency that benefit our economy and civic life. " This is the key because it establishes a legal definition of the internet where all end users are able to innovate by providing services, commercial and non-commercial to the internet at large. For succintness, I'll henceforth refer to this legal theory or interpretation as the "Right To Serve" (information/data/speech via your fixed broadband internet service connection). The rest of paragraph 133 is also well worth considering, along with all the legaleze of the entire Report and Order itself. As a graduate in Computer Engineering from the University of Kansas, I assert that being 'prohibited from hosting any kind of server' on my fixed broadband connection, absolutely blocks my ability as an end-user of the internet to provide countless lawful commercial and non- commercial services to the community at large. I hope such blocking is currently a crime. If it is not yet, my opinion is that it should be, due to how general purpose communication infrastructures such as the internet, the traditional telephone system, and the interstate highway systems, should not be able to hold their commercial or non-commercial end users hostage to their natural and unavoidable business quest for maximal profits regardless of social impact. I know some disagree with this. I was a devout fan of Ayn Rand and a card carrying libertarian for many years of my young adulthood. More recently I have come to believe that there are some general purpose commodity technologies that society can manage better than the businesses. I shudder to think of the prospect of BP or Shell acquiring I-70. Likewise, without enforced regulation (such as the existing language and spirit of FCC-10-201/NetNeutrality), I feel that allowing members of the $100Billion/year6 cloud services industry to control their competitors access to the portions of the information superhighway that they build and control is a serious threat to our economic and communication freedoms. After much peer debate, much of it more emotional than educational, on the Kansas Unix and Linux Users Association discussion forum7, one theory explaining the above FCC reaction comes to mind. It may be simply that my complaint about a line in Google's Terms of Service for it's Google Fiber ISP to Kansas City does not fall under the FCC's jurisdiction because perhaps their jurisdiction only applies to what is happening 'on the wires/airwaves' as opposed to in the legaleze portions of terms of service documents. And as such, the line I am complaining about is not actually legally enforceable8 because if it was enforced, then such enforcement would immediately fall under FCC jurisdiction. p.5 I cannot really afford a lawyer to tell me their reaction to that analysis, so I would more than appreciate any response from your office to provide me guidance. I feel I may have some basis for a lawsuit against Google, in that by having such anti-competitive - but legally unenforceable - language in their terms, they are materially damaging my business's ability to secure investment funding for business models that depend on the 'right to serve'. Again for emphasis, 'right to serve' being the notion that Google, nor any ISP is legally allowed to prevent or block clients on the internet from utilizing servers hosted in my residence connected to my fixed broadband internet connection(as per FCC-10-201 spirit and letter of paragraph 13). My argument that this behavior is anti-competitive, in a particularly large scale way, is based on the unavoidable conflict of interest I see when a company that has historically made vast amounts of revenue through profitably hosting and running servers on the internet, becomes an ISP with an effective monopoly on the transmission lines of the internet. Note of course Google hardly has a national monopoly on residential internet service provisioning. But one could fairly easily argue that they are about to within the borders of Kansas City, given the magnitude of the difference in cost per megabit of service between them and their nearest competitor. 100 to 1 is the difference they have been advertising. By blocking internet end users from being able to host innovative servers on their residential fixed broadband connections, Google is getting to play a kind of protectionism game with its non-ISP businesses that make money providing 'cloud' services on the internet, that they are prohibiting residential users from providing each other with over the 'general purpose technology' (again, see 10-201-p13) of the internet. p.6 IV: Some expected and possible counter-arguments and my responses There are many counter-arguments that opponents of the 'Right To Serve' will offer to defend the commonplace existence of such anti server hosting language in residential fixed broadband internet service providers. I've already alluded to the IPv4 address scarcity excuse as being temporarily valid, though inapplicable to this first residential broadband ISP offering me IPv6 service for the first time to my home. Please note that I have spent the last couple months debating this issue with the most relevantly educated individuals, both on highly reputable public technical discussion forums, as well as privately with effectively the highest levels of Google's leadership if the Slashdot leak8 is to be believed. The most common counter-arguments I've heard while debating this issue fall into these categories- security and service quality concerns, legal interpretation, and economic issues. I'll explain and reply to each of these chosen top 10 in brief detail one by one- 1. security: no safety of the old IPv4 NAT (p.8) 2. quality: impacting other's service, saturating the network (p.9) 3. security: new modes of non-snoopable communication (p.10) 4. security: zombie/hacked home servers, DDoS attacks (p.11) 5. quality: spam enablement (p.1) 6. legal: residential serving over fixed broadband is not the intended scope of 10-201 (p.1) 7. legal: businesses/ISPs get to choose their target markets (consumer vs business) (p.1) 8. legal: long established residential ISP terms of service language and practice (p.1) 9. legal: 10-201 is not enforceable here by FCC due to 'limited ancillary jurisdiction' (p.1) 10. economic: protecting Google's potential cloud profits (don't bite the hand...) (p.1) p.7 Counter-argument #1 -- security : no safety of the old IPv4 NAT My paraphrasing of the counter-argument: Unless we block all serving by filtering all incoming IPv6 connection requests, countless mediocrely secure home PCs will be vulnerable to compromise by criminal hackers that are currently thwarted by the innaccessibility of average PCs behind typical IPv4 NAT routers. My response: That security benefit was at best an accident, and at worst an excuse for poor security implementations. But the short answer is that I would be more than happy if ISPs chose to default filter all incoming IPv6 connection request traffic, as long as users were guaranteed the freedom to opt-in to unfiltered service with a kind of 'developer switch' of some sort. Similar in nature to the developer switch users of some Google associated hardware projects are familiar with for allowing more advanced and customized usage of their technology. Personally I would like to see a long term solution that involves a fully user controllable firewall as part of all standard broadband internet service. One that is easily resettable to some sane set of defaults. I think it would be sane for those defaults to include filtering IPv6 incoming connection request traffic, at least for the first few years of IPv6 seeing real ubiquitous deployment. However I also anticipate that after a few years of innovation, that such defaults would evolve to take advantage of impressive and safe new services. p.8 Counter-argument #2 -- quality : impacting other's service, saturating the network My paraphrasing of the counter-argument: If residential end users are allowed to host servers, they would hog the network resources and ruin the quality of network service for their neighbors. My response: All I want from ISPs is a fair share of network resources. And by fair, I mean that I want my usage of the traffic to be balanced with others, but most certainly in an application and service agnostic way. My upstream traffic as a web or game server should be treated no differently than each of my neighbors total upstream traffic, that may include more video uploads to Youtube, or live video streams to Skype or GoogleHangouts. The essence of the spirit and motivation for Network Neutrality rules, at least as far as I understand the issue, is entirely about not letting networks give advantage or preference to any particular destination or type of application or service, so as not to make the network operator the chooser of winning and losing applications, services, and destinations on the internet. By disallowing hosting servers in their Terms of Service, Google Fiber is getting to choose all residentially hosted innovative business's servers and services as losers, instead of treating their upstream and downstream network traffic on equal terms with their neighbors. The network due to existing protocols and implementations, is already designed to do exactly this. I admit, there may be some highly nuanced highly technical issues relating to this, but on the surface it seems if Google allows any of its endpoint customers on this gigabit fiberoptic network to host servers, then it means they must have a working solution9 to prevent any single endpoint from disproportionately degrading service for neighbor endpoints. The solution no doubt involves things like the open source 'tc/Traffic Control' software available for linux10 routers and servers, or some functional equivalent. p.9 Counter-argument #3 -- security : new modes of non-snoopable communication My paraphrasing of the counter-argument: If residential end users are allowed to host servers, then just as Vint Cerf predicted/designed, their audio and video communication devices (e.g. iPads and laptops) will talk directly to one another instead of through intermediary 3rd party corporate servers such as those of Skype or GoogleHangouts. Then, because of that direct communication, terrorists will be able to evade government eavesdropping through the use of, for example, an ssh encrypted gstreamer open source two-way audio/video communication channel. My response: Clearly the FBI is scared11 of such things. I feel too old at the age of thirty-seven to try fighting that with as much energy as it deserves to be fought. In my perhaps not humble enough opinion, I assert that this is a case of the cops/investigators being cheap, rushing for the privacy and security degrading shortcut to make their jobs easier, at the expense of the liberty, freedom, and innovations of the people. But if back-doors become mandated for internet communications software, then so be it. I am an independent businessperson, trying to feed and shelter myself, and need to know the ground rules for the internet so that I can plan the rest of my life's innovations accordingly. Both of these issues - residential serving and government mandated back doors - are really big deals, that either way will create a substantially different internet of the mid-term future. The kind of difference that if anticpated correctly or incorrectly, may make one's carreer able or not to support a family. I personally hope that neither residential serving, nor secure encrypted internet phone calls help terrorists cause mass death and evil. But actually using that debatably paranoid fear as justification for denying the 'right to serve'... well, if that's the bottom line, it's not one I can fight with anything other than hopefully inspiring fiction stories. Personally I wish all communication between any two humans with equal inalienable God given rights on this planet was considered sacred. But wishes aren't horses now are they... Digressing... please consider carefully the theoretical possibility that were this counter-argument to sway law and policy, we may be making a vast security problem a bit easier to deal with, at the expense of preventing the economic benefits of a new 'web-3.0' industry, starting in Kansas City! However, by all means, get the input from the smartest and most reputable computer networking and law enforcement professionals you know, to make a properly balanced decision on this kind of issue. Another way to look at it is this- the system/server administrators of the internet have been using the backdoor-free ssh tool for encrypted communications of all sorts throughout the entire history of the modern internet. This tool is thought to provide government resistant encryption, able to wrap/tunnel pretty much any internet communication software. If such un-backdoored internet communication tools are really such a national security threat, then I think we would have had them mandatorily backdoored long ago. What this tells me is that society is resilient enough to withstand the generalized threat of terrorists conspiring with encrypted communications. At least to the level that it should be clear that the benefits of allowing secure communications for everyone far outweigh the reality that amongst everyone, are many with very bad intentions. Some liberties and privacies are worth significant prices and risks. p.10 Counter-argument #4 -- security: zombie/hacked home servers, DDoS attacks My paraphrasing of the counter-argument: If My response: Clearly p.11 V: More detailed explanations including likely and possible real world scenarios First, ... 5) rambling about why it matters - net neutrality in general - inherited info superhighway from DARPA, hardly a private sector thing - basically modern version of ma-bell, where the phone calls happen - compare to use of white house urging google to use ToS to censor free speech - TOS is the government internet kill switch against freedom of speech - example business models - gaming servers (citing taskforce) - cite my own late teenage doom days at compcenter at KU - note even satanic imagery, how it hardly kept me an atheist, but rather led to a mature christianity able to cope with exposure to the free speech of others. - etc bizmod etc - fears - biting the hand that feeds - hackerzombienet - default filter on, developer switch - disruptive economic influence - p2p services damaging established centralized cloudservice providers(utube) - so what, the newspapers had to suffer with IPv4, let utube suffer with v6 ..... egbizmod: telemedicine, e.g. psych treatment to p/schizo who don't trust 3rd party middlemen in their videoconferencing apps. ..... ..... egbizmod: house the homeless as per ..... ..... egbizmod: security cameras, e.g. boardwalk, stalker-threat, (offencbackups) ..... ..... egbizmod: pokerth, alternate ranking system, shared open source code ..... ..... egbizmod: neil stephenson style metaverse based on quake3 open source code ..... egbizmod: (pizza) oven designed to recycle waste heat from server(s) monetized by new Amzn p.12 ..... p.13 VI: Personal considerations - Why I care as much as I do First, ... 6) personal considerations - brother - my own business intents - desire to provide for those I love - not wanting a handout, just a level playing field on the new frontier p.14 VII: Concluding remarks First, ... 7) conclusion - briefly, the vcerf device interconnectedness innovation vision - also the broadcasting/hearable vision - and the economic vision, end on the free speech vision. Sincerely, Douglas McClendon p.15 Appendix A: The FCC's Official Response ... p.16 Appendix B: The FCC's 2010 10-201 Report and Order Preserving the Open Internet ( detached: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-10-201A1_Rcd.pdf ) sha512sum: db5e3bd9f5cf3837d153928e2f3b9c6b00c2d6777f39bf30d3ea5442e033f312... ...28bcab9b4d89219c322c56490913d9abb6ab5ff2080232e4f2f4eadc14bdee6f p.17 END DRAFT / BEGIN not yet associated references followed by endnotes ..... topic: ars: netflix unhappy about managed services exception topic: dmc's justification for bringing 'anti-competitive' terminology into it topic: ars: since taxpayer money goes to the network, open-access rules important topic: ars: repub 2k5 FCC policy defending right to services of consumers choice topic: ars: FCC legal just/basis point- Sec706 of Telecom Act: (enc adv tech) topic: eg of google forcing ISP customers to partner with them in biz endeavors topic: kcstar, most-generic bizdev 'frontier' hype topic: topeka's business interest in gfiber topic: Lawrencian notes biz adv for relocaters to KC due to gfiber topic: google touting the potential for innovation as initial intent (&Milo) topic: google touting the potential for innovation as initial intent (&Gaming) topic: IPv6 - google advertises it to townhall as part of gfiber topic: IPv6 -- vint cerf, father(1of2) of internet, Googler topic: google touting: amazing new services and job opportunities topic: IPv6 - google adoption status - cusp of inet r/evolution topic: google does not believe (harsh slashdot no motive but money is exp) topic: Vint Cerf - bio / google title topic: amazon product advertising api (monetizing a website) topic: google's youtube censoring artistic speech to local governments topic: facetime net neutrality issue (wireless, but within scope) topic: leak: really no glawyer smart enough to satisfy page/mylo... ..... topic: Vint Cerf's net neutrality testimony to congress ... Prepared Statement of Vinton G. Cerf Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist Google Inc. U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation Hearing on “Network Neutrality” February 7, 2006 ... Allowing broadband carriers to discriminate in favor of certain kinds of services, and to potentially interfere with others, would take control away from the end users of the Internet, and place it in the hands of those who own the network. ... http://commerce.senate.gov/pdf/cerf-020706.pdf sha512sum: 99aca96e9d93e8eb81ece9eb8e69909d4882cf8e46084a5f25ef9585b2876b5 abc5806562b576b3fbb5af8c8fb4462c125837b51a1473043774baa3bfb656ead ..... ..... topic: ars: netflix unhappy about managed services exception ... Did the FCC just bless a capped, two-tier Internet? by Nate Anderson -- Dec 3 2010, 7:35am CST ... Imagine that you are Netflix boss Reed Hastings. You're busy trying to eat the cable companies' collective lunch by offering on-demand Internet streaming video; sure, you're not there yet, but it's clear this model has a bright future… except for one little worry. The cable companies and telcos you rely on to deliver your bits also compete with you, offering profitable video services of their own that don't come through "the Internet" but are increasingly based on IP and use the exact same pipe. Should those companies be allowed to offer managed quality of service enhanced video streams over a segregated section of the last-mile Internet pipe to directly compete with your own best-effort Internet offering? And how could this possibly be a fair fight? We don't need to imagine Hastings worrying about this scenario, though, since Netflix has made its concerns clear in writing. Back in January, the company warned the FCC about letting "managed services" swallow up the open Internet. "The fact that network operators control the delivery pipes and generate significant revenue from content that travels over those pipes provides both the means and motive for discriminating against new ventures that might threaten revenue sources of the network operators," Netflix warned. These developments "exacerbate the growing concern that [video providers] will use their control over programming networks to stifle competition, including the growing competition from online video providers like Netflix." Therefore, according to Netflix, the FCC should apply its open Internet principles to "managed services," too, possibly by requiring that such services could never consume more than a set fraction of the Internet pipe, reserving the rest for the "open Internet." ... http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/12/did-the-fcc-just-bless-a-capped-two-tier-internet/ ..... ..... topic: dmc's justification for bringing 'anti-competitive' terminology into it ... idea: by willfully avoiding the 'busines tier' market...(as currently till who knows, 5 or 10 years down the road), thwarting that much potential business p.18 development in KC. i.e. anticompetitive. (and of course how clear the net neutrality terms become the instant such a business tier is offerred) ..... ..... topic: ars: since taxpayer money goes to the network, open-access rules important ... How Kansas City taxpayers support Google Fiber by Timothy B. Lee -- Sept 7 2012, 7:00am CDT ... If a city is going to spend public funds on a new broadband network, it has an obligation to ensure that taxpayers are getting a good deal for their money. That might mean insisting on conditions, such as build-out requirements or open-access rules, that will avoid the need for yet another taxpayer- subsidized network to be constructed in the future. ... http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/09/how-kansas-city-taxpayers-support-google-fiber/ ..... ..... topic: ars: repub 2k5 FCC policy defending right to services of consumers choice ... AT&T, have you no shame? by Nate Anderson -- Aug 23 2012, 4:06pm CDT ... One of the ironies of FCC rulemaking is that, under Republican leadership generally hostile to the idea of legally enforced net neutrality, the FCC actually passed a 2005 "policy statement" (PDF) outlining four freedoms all Internet users could expect. Number three read: To encourage broadband deployment and preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet, consumers are entitled to run applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement. ... http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/08/att-have-you-no-shame/ ..... ..... topic: ars: FCC legal just/basis point- Sec706 of Telecom Act: (enc adv tech) ... FCC defends its "trojan horse" approach to net neutrality by Timothy B. Lee -- Sept 13 2012, 7:00am CDT ... But the FCC points to several different provisions of telecommunications law that it says justify its regulations. The centerpiece of its argument is Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act, which instructs the FCC to "encourage the deployment" of "advanced telecommunications capability." ... http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/09/fcc-defends-its-trojan-horse-approach-to-net-neutrality/ ..... ..... topic: eg of google forcing ISP customers to partner with them in biz endeavors ... Google lays out schedule for neighborhoods By MIKE HENDRICKS and SANGEETA SHASTRY The Kansas City Star -- 2012/09/14 ... Nearby, Italian restaurant Cupini’s was considering ways to put Fiber to use — once businesses are included. Live cooking demonstrations could benefit from faster speeds, said owner Eddie Cupini. So would a Google Hangout video chat that would let people call in for recipe advice from the chefs. “We’ll be able to communicate with a broader group of customers and people from all over the world, maybe,” Cupini said. The restaurant, partnering with Google, already has two laptops set up so customers can see the ultra-fast speeds in action. ... http://www.kansascity.com/2012/09/14/3813594/google-lays-out-schedule-for-hooking.html#storylink=misearch ..... ..... topic: kcstar, most-generic bizdev 'frontier' hype ... Google this: Can KC cash in on high-tech ambitions? By YAEL T. ABOUHALKAH The Kansas City Star -- 2012/09/12 Is Kansas City going to be the city Version 2.0 of Seattle, Austin or Boston, attracting gobs of young people eager to live an urban lifestyle in or near a hip downtown while creating lots of cool high-tech companies? Maybe. And maybe not. ... http://www.kansascity.com/2012/09/12/3811710/google-this-can-kc-cash-in-on.html#storylink=misearch ..... ..... topic: 'Wicked' broadband already in Lawrence p.19 ... Parts of Lawrence already have super-fast Internet By Chad Lawhorn (LJWorld) -- July 27, 2012 ... The latest twist in the dealing with the company is its new name. Montgomery said the company dissolved the not-for-profit Lawrence Freenet organization last month. All future marketing will be done under the Wicked Broadband name, which is owned by Community Wireless Corp., a for- profit corporation that holds many of the agreements with the city. ... http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2012/jul/27/parts-lawrence-already-have-super-fast-internet/ ..... ..... topic: topeka's business interest in gfiber ... Topeka renames itself to ‘Google’ in an effort to lure tech company’s fiber optic plan By Associated Press -- March 2, 2010, 10:06 a.m. ... Topeka — Topeka's mayor says the city shall temporarily be referred to as "Google, Kansas — the capital city of fiber optics," in an effort to persuade the Internet giant to test an ultra-fast connection in the state capital. ... http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2010/mar/02/topeka-renames-itself-google-effort-lure-tech-comp/ ..... ..... topic: Lawrencian notes biz adv for relocaters to KC due to gfiber (and good bg on milo medin and patrick pichette talking with brownback) ... Google picks Kansas City, Kan., for high-speed fiber network project By Chad Lawhorn & Melissa Treolo -- March 30, 2011, 11:35 a.m ... Beth Johnson, director of economic development for the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce, said the project was great news for Kansas, and said it could boost Kansas City, Kan., when companies are trying to decide where to locate within the region. ... http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2011/mar/30/google-choses-kansas-city-kan-high-speed-fiber-net/ ..... ..... topic: google touting the potential for innovation as initial intent (&Milo) ... Google to offer KC ultra-fast Internet for $70/mo. By Maria Fisher and Peter Svensson, Associated Press -- July 26, 2012, 10:25 a.m. ... Google is hoping that the network could help the development of other advanced applications that can take advantage of the high speeds. It's also hoping to spur phone and cable companies into upgrading their own networks. "Access speeds have simply not kept pace with the phenomenal increases in computing power and storage capacity that's spurred innovation over the last decade," Milo Medin, Google's vice president of Access Services, said in a blog post. ... http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2012/jul/26/google-set-announce-kc-plans/ ..... ..... topic: google touting the potential for innovation as initial intent (&Gaming) ... TO: Mayor Sly James and the City Council of Kansas City, Mo. Mayor/CEO Joe Reardon and Commissioners of the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kan., Residents of Kansas City, Mo., and Kansas City, Kan. FROM: Mayors’ Bistate Innovation Team RE: Playing to Win: A playbook for capitalizing on ultra-high-speed fiber in Kansas City, Kansas, and Kansas City, Missouri DATE: May 22, 2012 ... PLAY: SUPPORT ONLINE GAMING DEVELOPMENT Companies that create digital games are often at the cutting edge of information technology and new applications. Gamers tend to make some of the best digital designers and programmers with hyper-developed spatial and analytical skills. ... MBIT recommends enabling and encouraging the development of gaming technology businesses. Game developers will be attracted to the availability of reasonably priced high-speed fiber, the presence of creative talent in the community, and community commitment to provide business support p.20 services. Action Steps: Consider the location and growth of gaming technology businesses as a local economic development strategy. Work with area educational institutions to ensure that high school and college curriculum supports building a workforce with information technology skills to develop games for the commercial marketplace. ... playing_to_win.pdf ..... ..... topic: IPv6 - google advertises it to townhall as part of gfiber ... Answers to your Town Hall Questions - Part 1 June 10, 2011 ... Q: Will you be supporting IPv6? A: Yes, we plan to make our network IPv6 ready. To learn more about IPv6, check out this page. ... google fiber blog http://googlefiberblog.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2012-04-01T00:02:00-07:00&max-results=10&start=20&by-date=false page is link to http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/ (see next) ..... ..... topic: IPv6 -- vint cerf, father(1of2) of internet, Googler ... Thank You God ... At Google we believe IPv6 is essential to the continued health and growth of the Internet and that by allowing all devices to talk to each other directly, IPv6 enables new innovative services. ... http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/ ..... ..... topic: google touting: amazing new services and job opportunities ... Super fast fiber for Kansas City Google Official Blog -- July 26, 2012 ... It’s easy to forget how revolutionary high-speed Internet access was in the 1990s. Not only did broadband kill the screeching sound of dial-up, it also spurred innovation, helping to create amazing new services as well as new job opportunities for many thousands of Americans. ... http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/super-fast-fiber-for-kansas-city.html ..... ..... topic: IPv6 - google adoption status - cusp of inet r/evolution ... google's adoption stats ... < 0.2% till 1/1/11, but 0.4% at 1/1/12, and already > 0.8% as of today ... http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html ..... ..... topic: google does not believe (harsh slashdot no motive but money is exp) ... slashdot comment from Bob9113 hours after I fb post the VCerf Google Believes... ... Google Does Not Believe (Score:5, Insightful) by Bob9113 (14996) on Tuesday September 18, @03:44PM (#41378269) Homepage So does Google now believe that there's a genuine 'risk of disclosing a user's real identity'? Or is this just a case of Google's left hand not knowing what its right hand is patenting? Google does not believe. They do not believe in protecting anonymity, nor in advancing reliable identities. Google wants money and power. There was a time when it was reasonable to think that Google believed in things, that they wanted to do good, but those times are gone. Google wants to make money on anonymity because they want to make money, not because they believe free speech depends on anonymity. They want to make money on reliable identities because they want to make money, not because they believe identities should be reliable. They want to make money on being the only one who knows the real identities because they want to make money, not because they believe one company should be the sole authenticator. Most sufficiently large corporations have no beliefs. "I want as much stuff as I can get" is not a belief. Beliefs are things for which you are willing to p.21 make deep sacrifices. When a company sees that the patent system is broken and its public response is that they need to get more aggressive about patents, it is a clear statement that they lack motives outside of acquisitiveness and will-to-power. Avarice is not a belief, it is our default state when we choose not to elevate ourselves above the animals. Google does not believe. ... http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3126853&cid=41378269 ..... ..... topic: Vint Cerf - bio / google title ... ... Cerf has worked for Google as a Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist since September 2005[3]. ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vint_Cerf ..... ..... topic: amazon product advertising api (monetizing a website) ... ... Product Advertising API The Product Advertising API provides programmatic access to Amazon’s product selection and discovery functionality so that developers like you can advertise Amazon products to monetize your website. ... https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/advertising/api/detail/main.html ..... ..... topic: google's youtube censoring artistic speech to local governments ... ... Google Blocks 'Innocence of Muslim' Video In Indonesia and India Posted by samzenpus on Monday September 17, @05:02AM from the not-in-my-country dept. hypnosec writes "Google has blocked the anti-Islamic video, which was posted on YouTube, in Indonesia as well as India. YouTube has already denied a complete removal of the clip 'Innocence of Muslims' that mocks Islam and Prophet Mohammed. The video has led to protests and violence across the Arab world. The foreign ministry spokesperson of Indonesia and India have confirmed that Google has blocked access to the video. Indonesia has also asked RIM to filter the video on its smartphones." ... http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/09/17/0324213/google-blocks-innocence-of-muslim-video-in-indonesia-and-india? utm_source=commentcnt&utm_medium=feed#comments ..... ..... topic: facetime net neutrality issue (wireless, but within scope) ... Net Neutrality Groups Challenge AT&T FaceTime Blocking by David Kravets -- 09.18.12 5:03 PM ... Online rights groups said Tuesday they are asking the Federal Communications Commission to weigh in on the matter. By rule, Public Knowledge, Free Press and the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute can file their net neutrality complaint with the FCC in 10 days because the clock started ticking when the groups notified the nation’s second-largest carrier of their intent Tuesday. ... http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/09/factime-fcc-flap/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+ %28Wired%3A+Top+Stories%29 ..... p.22 1 topic: 'Network Neutrality' 101, it becomes a law and/or enforceable FCC rule ... "It's here: FCC adopts net neutrality (lite)" by Matthew Lasar -- Dec 21 2010, 12:05pm CST ... "Today for the first time the FCC is adopting rules to preserve basic Internet values," declared FCC Chair Julius Genachowski, who called the Order "a strong sensible non-ideological framework that protects Internet freedom." The regulations ban content blocking and require transparency from ISPs. They also require network management and packet discrimination to be "reasonable," but they exempt wireless broadband from all but the transparency and blocking rules. ... http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/12/its-here-fcc-adopts-net-neutrality-lite ..... 2 topic: FCC-10-201 Report and Order Preserving the Open Internet - Paragraph 1 (see appendix B for the entirety) ... Today the Commission takes an important step to preserve the Internet as an open platform for innovation, investment, job creation, economic growth, competition, and free expression. To provide greater clarity and certainty regarding the continued freedom and openness of the Internet, we adopt three basic rules that are grounded in broadly accepted Internet norms, as well as our own prior decisions: i. Transparency. Fixed and mobile broadband providers must disclose the network management practices, performance characteristics, and terms and conditions of their broadband services; ii. No blocking. Fixed broadband providers may not block lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices; mobile broadband providers may not block lawful websites, or block applications that compete with their voice or video telephony services; iii. No unreasonable discrimination. Fixed broadband providers may not unreasonably discriminate in transmitting lawful network traffic. We believe these rules, applied with the complementary principle of reasonable network management, will empower and protect consumers and innovators while helping ensure that the Internet continues to flourish, with robust private investment and rapid innovation at both the core and the edge of the network. This is consistent with the National Broadband Plan goal of broadband access that is ubiquitous and fast, promoting the global competitiveness of the United States.(1) ..... 3 topic: FCC-10-201 Paragraph 13 ... (Under Section Heading:) The Internet’s Openness Promotes Innovation, Investment, Competition, Free Expression, and Other National Broadband Goals 13. Like electricity and the computer, the Internet is a "general purpose technology" that enables new methods of production that have a major impact on the entire economy.(12) The Internet’s founders intentionally built a network that is open, in the sense that it has no gatekeepers limiting innovation and communication through the network.(13) Accordingly, the Internet enables an end user to access the content and applications of her choice, without requiring permission from broadband providers. This architecture enables innovators to create and offer new applications and services without needing approval from any controlling entity, be it a network provider, equipment manufacturer, industry body, or government agency.(14) End users benefit because the Internet’s openness allows new technologies to be developed and distributed by a broad range of sources, not just by the companies that operate the network. For example, Sir Tim Berners-Lee was able to invent the World Wide Web nearly two decades after engineers developed the Internet’s original protocols, without needing changes to those protocols or any approval from network operators.(15) Startups and small businesses benefit because the Internet’s openness enables anyone connected to the network to reach and do business with anyone else, (16) allowing even the smallest and most remotely located businesses to access national and global markets, and contribute to the economy through e- commerce(17) and online advertising.(18) Because Internet openness enables widespread innovation and allows all end users and edge providers (rather than just the significantly smaller number of broadband providers) to create and determine the success or failure of content, applications, services, and devices, it maximizes commercial and non-commercial innovations that address key national challenges -- including improvements in health care, education, and energy efficiency that benefit our economy and civic life.(19) ...... 4 topic: the heart of the complaint, the offending language in Google Fiber's Terms of Service ( http://fiber.google.com/legal/terms.html ) ... “ You agree not to misuse the Services. This includes but is not limited to using the Services for purposes that are illegal, are improper, infringe the rights of others, or adversely impact others’ enjoyment of the Services. A list of examples of prohibited activities appears here. " “ 'here' is a hyperlink ( http://support.google.com/fiber/bin/answer.pyhl=en&answer=2659981&topic=2440874&ctx=topic ) to a page including this text- " Unless you have a written agreement with Google Fiber permitting you do so, you should not host any type of server using your Google Fiber connection " ... [1] http://fiber.google.com/legal/terms.html [2] support.google.com/fiber/bin/answer.pyhl=en&answer=2659981&topic=2440874&ctx=topic ...... 5 topic: Vint Cerf speaking on behalf of Google's official IPv6 website - “devices talking directly to one another” ... Note: Vint Cerf is a VP and Chief Internet Evangelist at Google, and one of two 'fathers of the internet' due to involvement with development of (TCP/)IP ... At Google we believe IPv6 is essential to the continued health and growth of the Internet and that by allowing all devices to talk to each other directly, IPv6 enables new innovative services. ... http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/ ...... 6 topic: gartner cloud services market analysis (100B/year wwide growing fast) ... Gartner Says Worldwide Cloud Services Market to Surpass $109 Billion in 2012 STAMFORD, Conn., September 18, 2012— ... The public cloud services market is forecast to grow 19.6 percent in 2012 to total $109 billion worldwide, according to Gartner, Inc. Business process services (also known as business process as a service, or BPaaS) represent the largest segment, accounting for about 77 percent of the total market, while infrastructure as a service (IaaS) is the fastest-growing segment of the public cloud services market and is expected to grow 45.4 percent in 2012. "The cloud services market is clearly a high-growth sector within the overall IT marketplace," said Ed Anderson, research director at Gartner. "The key to taking advantage of this growth will be understanding the nuances of the opportunity within service segments and geographic regions, and then prioritizing investments in line with the opportunities." ... http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=2163616 ..... 7 topic: the 'Right To Serve' debate on the Kansas Unix and Linux Users Association discussion forum ... - (initial thread, 57 posts, 15 authors) - https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/kulua-l/LxsOtdglNM0 - (2nd part, 44 posts, 17 authors) - https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/kulua-l/FA99TCnn3DQ - (3rd part, inadvertently broken from original thread - 23 posts, 10 authors) - https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/kulua-l/d6B_LfAvyYQ ...... 8 topic: alleged anonymous leak - Google C.E.O. and C.F.O. claim no intent to enforce 'no servers' clause ( 'barring large scale datacenter style abuse'') ... Re:EVIL: No Server Hosting Allowed (Score:5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 10, @11:46AM (#41288357) ... Posting anonymously for reasons that will be obvious. Larry Page is really annoyed by the "no servers" clause. In an internal weekly all-hands meeting he repeatedly needled Patrick Pichette about the limitation, and pointedly reminded him that the only reason Google was able to get off the ground was because Page and Brin could use Stanford's high-speed Internet connection for free. Page wants to see great garage startups being enabled by cheap access to truly high-speed Internet. Pichette defended it saying they had no intention of trying to enforce it in general, but that it had to be there in case of serious abuse, like someone setting up a large-scale data center. I don't think anyone really has to worry about running servers on their residential Google Fiber, as long as they're not doing anything crazy. Then again it's always possible that Page will change his mind or that the lawyers will take over the company, and the ToS is what it is. If I had Google Fiber I'd run my home server just as I do on my Comcast connection, but I'd also be prepared to look for other options if my provider complained. ... http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3106555&cid=41288357 ..... 9 topic: topic: self-throttling a server or network's traffic - Linux Advanced Routing & Traffic Control Howto ... ... Linux Advanced Routing & Traffic Control Howto by Bert Hubert and others http://repo.or.cz/r/lartc.git:2012/09/30 ... 15.1. Running multiple sites with different SLAs You can do this in several ways. Apache has some support for this with a module, but we'll show how Linux can do this for you, and do so for other services as well. These commands are stolen from a presentation by Jamal Hadi that's referenced below. Let's say we have two customers, with http, ftp and streaming audio, and we want to sell them a limited amount of bandwidth. We do so on the server itself. Customer A should have at most 2 megabits, customer B has paid for 5 megabits. We separate our customers by creating virtual IP addresses on our server. # ip address add 188.177.166.1 dev eth0 # ip address add 188.177.166.2 dev eth0 It is up to you to attach the different servers to the right IP address. All popular daemons have support for this. We first attach a CBQ qdisc to eth0: ........... ... http://www.lartc.org/lartc.html ...... 10 topic: good citizen established best practices for networking - Linux Advanced Routing & Traffic Control Howto ... NOTE: I(dmc) do not pretend to completely grasp all nuance of all relevant technical issues. For example, if there is some issue related to this quote that requires conformance on the part of software to be a good citizen on the internet as far as bandwidth sharing goes, then I'm all for that being a requirement in the Terms of Service of ISPs. However, one would hope that any such ubiquitously good citizen practice would make it somehow into the default layers of the dominant OSs, e.g. windows and linux, such that application/user level code need not concern itself with such detail directly. (fail-safe/gracefully). I would currently guess that such exists in any defaults I would personally ever use for any application/service software I may innovatively develop. Or perhaps once or twice I might accidentally do the wrong thing, see my ISP virtually disconnect me from the network, but with a process in place for me to fix my mistake and be reconnected without being considered a criminal at any point in the process. That sounds like reasonable network management to me, but YMMV, $0.02, etc... ... Linux Advanced Routing & Traffic Control Howto by Bert Hubert and others http://repo.or.cz/r/lartc.git:2012/09/30 ... RED isn't a cure-all for this, applications which inappropriately fail to implement exponential backoff still get an unfair share of the bandwidth, however, with RED they do not cause as much harm to the throughput and latency of other connections. ... http://www.lartc.org/lartc.html ...... 11 topic: FBI scared of non-ubiquitous (and backdoored) communication technologies ... FBI renews broad Internet surveillance push by Declan McCullagh -- September 22, 2012 7:00 AM PDT ... In May, CNET disclosed that the FBI is asking Internet companies not to oppose a proposed law that would require firms, including Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google, to build in back doors for government surveillance. The bureau's draft proposal would require that social-networking Web sites and providers of VoIP, instant messaging, and Web e-mail alter their code to ensure their products are wiretap-friendly. ... http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57518265-38/fbi-renews-broad-internet-surveillance-push .....