>>> Not concerned yet? Well consider this - suppose your web page was
>>> hosted on a particular ISP, and suddenly one of the large ISPs took a
>>> notion to start blocking access to web sites hosted on selected
>>> competitive ISPs. Of course, their solution would be to open an
>>> account with them and move your web site to their servers. Now what
>>> happens when two or more ISPs do this? Pretty soon the entire
>>> Internet as we know it falls apart, and I don't think I'm being overly
>>> dramatic in saying that - I have seen just too many examples of
>>> corporate greed destroying the good things of life to think that it
>>> could not happen that way.
>> Most ISPs of reasonable size have figured out that it's not worth it
>> to block or deny peering with other providers of reasonable size (of
>> course there may be quibbling at the margins). The result of blocking
>> is too much grief with customers, who don't care that much about the
>> underlying transporter of bits. Blocking = less bits = less money, in
>> the general sense. In the 21st century, it's been legal issues that
>> have resulted in "stupid acts of site blocking" moreso than anything:
> That's what gets me. Last I remember, to qualify as a common carrier, an
> ISP isn't allowed to exact any sort of traffic control beyond what is
> necessary to maintain the stability of the network. Anything more and it
> could be seen as having the ability to control its content, and would be
> vicariously liable for crimes committed over its infrastructure and > services.
> Isn't that still the case?
Yep, and by those rules Cox shouldn't be considered a common carrier any longer. They actually teach parents how to implement filters on web sites, etc. via Cox provided servers.
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I can tell you that Southwestern Bell has always claimed 'common carrier status' on their DSL service as a way to avoid any/all spam filtering on user's mailboxes. They won't even sort perceived spam into a separate spam box as CableOne does. It just all goes into your mailbox -- all several hundred pieces of it daily. How you want to sort it is your business. Just call this one of my several minor complaints with SBC, which is why I dumped them out of my house totally. PAT]