Technology
This is the official technology community of Lemmy.ml for all news related to creation and use of technology, and to facilitate civil, meaningful discussion around it.
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In short, the Administrative Procedure Act. It sets out the procedures that have to be followed before policy decisions get made. If the FCC doesn't follow the APA's procedures exactly, that gives the industry grounds to sue. Even if the industry eventually looses, it would still mean a stay on the new policies during which they would continue to exploit consumers.
The APA isn't a bad thing, since it forces federal agencies to be deliberate in making policy decisions that could have far reaching consequences. That said, it does make the government even slower to react to situations that often change quickly. But it has tripped up this administration and previous administrations when they have tried to make hasty decisions, including Trump with his "Muslim ban".
Question, what the fuck was the "Muslim ban" I've never heard of this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13769
It was never law, which is why it was so easily reversed.
Isn't there still a vacancy on the FCC? Wouldn't that also affect any new designations?
Yes, there is. At present, most actions that are taken by the board are consensus actions that won't hit a Democrat-Republican deadlock. Once a chairperson is confirmed, they can start tackling the more contentious stuff that will have 3-2 decisions. Biden's previous nominee was scuttled after some attention to some mildly spicy tweets that were critical of Fox. He nominated a replacement a month ago and her nomination will likely go smoother.
I wish informative answers like yours would get the upvotes they deserve. You have my upvote.
Well they did essentially just type it but I agree with the sentiment
Thanks! And it is getting upvotes, with you being the first. After all, I only wrote it a few minutes ago.
I'm not scrubbing my account on Reddit partially because some of the comments are like the one above. Sure, much of what I wrote is of limited value. But if there is a historian going back through Internet history and using a language processing model to analyze comments, I think my voice is worth leaving there.
Indeed, I've been very ambivalent about the idea of everyone deleting all their histories to hurt reddit.
Sure, it hurts reddit in the short-term, but in the long-term it is hurting overall internet history.
Honestly, I don't think it does much of anything to Reddit, short or long term. It does far more to destroy Internet history.
Is this where the last Net Neutrality request for comments window failed miserably? Like, the FCC did the process, but they let it be provably sabotaged by the industry and went ahead anyways...
Part of the reason they "went ahead anyways" was painfully obviously because of the FCC chair at the time, Ajit Pai, who had previously been Associate General Counsel at Verizon. They even made a "comedy" video of him being asked to be a toady by Verizon.
This is because in the US, for it to be considered bribery or quid-pro-quo, you basically have to write a check and in the notes section put "This is a Bribe" otherwise it's just considered "business" and it's totally okay for you to make "comedy" videos mocking the people wanting an end to corruption.
No. That saga was the reverse happening. The Obama administration had already gone through the whole procedure to implement net neutrality rules. Ajit Pai under the Trump administration then came in and started the procedure anew to reverse net neutrality. In that sense it "succeeded" in that Pai's rules were put into place. There was a legal challenge on the basis of the FCC not considering certain factors. This is where being thorough is incredibly important. If even a single spot is missed, implementation can be drawn out even further.
I want to point out that Pai did not “come in” during the Trump admin. He killed net neutrality during it, sure, but he was appointed by Obama and held the office long before Trump showed up. It’s really disingenuous to try and portray it as a result of one republican president, it was a team effort.
Democrats nearly always choosing Republicans for non-elected offices so they "don't look partisan." Republicans always choosing Republicans for non-elected positions because they don't actually give a shit about looking partisan.
This is part of why the FBI has always been run by Republicans. Not once have we had a Democrat in charge of the FBI.
At least the FCC has a slightly better track record. Wheeler was a good FCC chairman.
The country would be a lot better off if the Democrats abandoned their devotion to "bipartisanship". It's a one way street that seems to only exist as a convenient roadblock to implementing any kind of positive reforms.
Just ask Merrick Garland.