Right, but what we're worrying about is an ISP blocking, say, all torrent traffic. Hey, it's obviously 'unlawful' right? We will see. Overall, I am very optimistic about this announcement.
They might - some already do (block or throttle torrent traffic, that is).
The difference is that right now if your ISP blocks torrent traffic you have literally no recourse besides going to a competitor (if one exists, which odds are one does not). You are after all not legally entitled to torrent traffic.
The change here is that if an ISP unilaterally starts blocking torrent traffic, you (or more likely, the EFF or similar org) can sue to have torrent traffic declared lawful, after which the ISP is legally bound to open the traffic.
The trick here isn't that ISP shitty behavior will be impossible under the new rules, but rather that there will be more power to the citizenry to combat many categories such shitty behavior.
Depends on how it's worded. If blocking lawful traffic is banned, then blocking a whole protocol that you don't know the contents of is unlawful. There might have to be some clarification around intent, but there are certainly many laws for which "I didn't think I was breaking the law" is an invalid defense.
> I know that, and you know that. I'm not so sure about Comcat or Commissioner Wheeler.
Since FCC action against Comcast for blocking Bittorrent -- including the idea that Bittorrent, whatever unlawful content might be distributed by that means, was itself not unlawful and that Bittorrent traffic included lawful content -- was one of the starting points of net neutrality regulation at the FCC, I'm pretty sure that Wheeler, the FCC in general, and Comcast are all aware of that.
> Right, but what we're worrying about is an ISP blocking, say, all torrent traffic.
You do know that that's one of the earliest things the FCC addressed in the "net neutrality" / "open internet" space, even before the first attempt to adopt generally-applicable rules rather than case-by-case enforcement of net neutrality principles?
