No Net Brutality is a Student Project

May 13, 2010

It turns out that No Net Brutality, mentioned here yesterday, was actually the work of six students for entry into a competition and ended up costing a grand total of $173.95 to produce.

It didn’t even win the competition.

Think Progress had claimed that the No Net Brutality was an astroturf movement backed by the telecom industry. A CNET article blows up those claims and includes a quote from David MacLean, one of the six students involved in the project, who said, “The Think Progress article is hilarious.

MacLean added, “We've had a really good laugh in the last day over this. This is one of the funniest things I've ever seen.”

Kristin McMurray, another student who contributed to No Net Brutality, explained further, “We have not had any contact with any telecom company during this campaign. The only funding we received was the $100 given to us by Atlas.”

No Net Brutality did disclose the $100 Atlas donation on its site.

The project came in third in the competition, finishing behind a project that supported education reform in Poland and another that dealt with sales tax rates in Washington D.C.

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Comments

Re: No Net Brutality is a Student Project

Submitted by thefremen on Thu, 05/13/2010 - 18:43.

Apparently you're a student project if you say you're a student project. Taliban? student project. Catholic Church? Student Project. Darma initiative? student project.

Re: No Net Brutality is a Student Project

Submitted by Austin_Lewis on Thu, 05/13/2010 - 09:59.

Think Progress making shit up? No way. I don't believe it.

It's so odd that a group involved in so much astroturfing feels it can label others for it.

Re: No Net Brutality is a Student Project

Submitted by Tenmar on Thu, 05/13/2010 - 13:25.

Except there is a problem here. The one American involved isn't a student and the contest is actually sponsered and run by a think tank.

http://stopthecap.com/2010/05/11/telescam-exposed-who-really-runs-nonetbrutality-com/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=TeleScam+Exposed:+Who+Really+Runs+NoNetBrutality.com%3F

http://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinmcmurray

So they aren't "students" in the traditional sense at all, unless you count being a student meaning competing in a competition for Atlas Network. Whose website is down I might add and when it was accessible it was an empty shell website with no pictures or anything.

Also if you look at their facebook page and the "student" website they have proven that they don't understand what net neutrality really is. Hell I'm a conservative and something smells rotten here because they started as an advocacy group then stated that this is a student project and now have gone back to being an advocacy group. So the question here is this website nothing more than a farce? Do the people really stand behind it despite being nothing more than a think tank project? Should this type of project be taken seriously considering how they didn't even define net neutrality even on their facts page?

Also normally school projects even for business don't have their students post their work online as it is meant to be just be graded.

Poll

Shout box

Andrew Eisen: Well, the Xbox One reveal certainly had an interesting affect on the big 3's stock prices. https://twitter.com/AndrewEisen/status/33705126448977100805/21/2013 - 10:45pm

PHX Corp: http://kotaku.com/so-the-xbox-one-reveal-screwed-up-a-lot-of-peoples-kin-509179256 So The Xbox One Reveal Screwed With Some People's Kinects05/21/2013 - 10:36pm

Zen: On a funny side note...both of my boys have already voted NOT to get the Xbox One as soon as they found out Minecraft won't transfer lol. Some people have priorities damnit! ;)05/21/2013 - 9:27pm

Andrew Eisen: Here's the full quote on EA making Wii U games according to Neogaf: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=56112105/21/2013 - 8:19pm

Andrew Eisen: Xbox One may not be always on but that doesn't mean you can use it without an internet connection. http://kotaku.com/xbox-one-does-require-internet-connection-cant-play-o-50916410905/21/2013 - 7:39pm

Andrew Eisen: Polygon says EA's CFO says it is developing games for Wii U but doesn't provide that quote. http://www.polygon.com/2013/5/21/4351844/ea-developing-wii-u-games05/21/2013 - 7:11pm

Andrew Eisen: Well, I was right. Both Sony and Microsoft's consoles will be out by the year's end and both will be significantly more powerful than the current gen.05/21/2013 - 5:06pm

james_fudge: thnx05/21/2013 - 4:47pm

Zen: Just to let ya know...you called it the "Xbox 260" in the backwards compatibility article lol.05/21/2013 - 4:26pm

Zen: @PHX Awesome, I will hit those up after class tonight. Going back to college finally! :) My kids have had a blast telling ME to do my homework now lol.05/21/2013 - 4:19pm

PHX Corp: @Zen I sent you a friend request on both PSN and XBL, just a heads up05/21/2013 - 4:16pm

Zen: I noticed it with the football players when EA showed off Madden as well.05/21/2013 - 4:11pm

Zen: Is it just me or is call of duty hitting the "uncanny valley" with their nicely modeled faces and dead looking eyes? I found it distracting and seemed actually "less" real to me lol.05/21/2013 - 4:10pm

james_fudge: it sounds like if you have an HD reciever you'll be able to use it with a pass-through cable... not 100 percent sure yet05/21/2013 - 2:41pm

james_fudge: happening now http://majornelson.com/2013/05/21/xbox-one-architecture-panel/05/21/2013 - 2:20pm

E. Zachary Knight: Some reading material for Microsoft on its used games blocks. That will hurt the console more than helping. http://ezknight.net/?page_id=20505/21/2013 - 2:18pm

james_fudge: yeah good luck with over the air TV05/21/2013 - 2:12pm

E. Zachary Knight: But what if I want to only watch over the air tv? I don't subscribe to pay tv. I never will. If that is a requirement, then MS wasted 45 minutes telling me how great TV will be.05/21/2013 - 2:08pm

james_fudge: EZK it will depend on your provider, just like HBO Go i'd imagine.05/21/2013 - 2:05pm

PHX Corp: @IanC there's also a chance that those titles might be Xbox one exclusive, but it's too early to tell afaik05/21/2013 - 2:03pm

All shouts

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