Joe Rogan Talks To FCC Commissioner About Net Neutrality

And we're live. Welcome aboard, Jessica Rosenworsal. Did I do it? You did. I was so nervous about that. And Eddie Wong, of course, has been on the podcast many times. Number one podcast in the world. Oh, thank you. Jerry. What's up, brother? How are you? I'm chilling, man. I'm good. I just, you know, I wanted to introduce you to the homie, the Commissioner from the FCC, Jessica Rosenworsal, because things are bad for the Internet right now. Well, you are very concerned, and a lot of people are, about net neutrality. And we all have some questions about it, and we're excited to talk to you about it. So maybe we could illuminate some of the issues and give us an understanding or try to help us understand. What's at stake here, and why are people so concerned? Well, I think people are concerned because the future of the Internet is the future of everything. I mean, every aspect of our lives is now touched by that connectivity. And it's a funny thing, but the agency where I work in Washington, the Federal Communications Commission, has enormous power and control over our Internet experience. And for decades, we've had these policies that have been all about Internet openness. And what that means is you can go where you want, do what you want online, and your broadband provider can't get in the way or prevent you from looking at some websites or looking at some videos or setting up some businesses. But that changed last month in Washington when the FCC, over my objections, voted to end net neutrality. And as a result, all of our broadband providers now have the legal right to block websites, to throttle content, and to set up sweetheart paid-for-prioritization deals. And over the long haul, that could really change the Internet and the Web as we know it. Now, one of the arguments, pro net neutrality, one of the arguments for people that were excited about this being signed, they were saying that net neutrality was really only over the last couple of years. And before the last couple of years, net neutrality as we know it, the last couple of years, everything was fine. And that it will continue to be fine, and that people are just panicked. And there was that really bizarre video that one dude made where he was saying, these are all the things you're going to be able to do. You work with that cat? I do. Odd shit. Odd shit pie. Yeah, he seems like an odd fellow. Yeah. Yeah, well, he's a smart guy. He's a seasoned lawyer. I think it's fair to say he and I see the world a little differently. Yeah, so he sees this through the eyes of big business, right? He thinks that this is the free market, let the market decide, and that's what the argument, I mean, I've even heard, Mark Cuban was arguing against it. So I was like, wow, this is stunning. Yeah, you know, for me, the net neutrality thing is huge, because when I was in law school, I read this one book called Fighting for Air, and it documented like the Telecommunications Act of 97. It's like boring stuff, right? Don't go read the Telecommunications Act of 97. But like radio mattered to me. I remember like growing up with the radio, like I remember, they would actually break records on the radio back in the day. Like Funk Flex still does it on Hot 97, he'll break records. He broke my boy, old Drew's record the other day. But like recently, it's like Clear Channel, iHeartRadio, they own all the radio stations, and it really sterilized content, and they play the same songs every hour in every city, almost around the world. And I, when I read that book and I went to law school, I realized, like, yo, it was because of the deregulation of radio that allowed for all these local independent radio stations in every city that were repping local culture and state culture that kind of eroded that means of communication. And I was like, this happens to every single industry we have, whether it's radio, television, but now it's coming for the internet, and by deregulating it, you're gonna gut it again. And, you know, like, when technology started popping and podcasts came around, I mean, that's what enabled JRE, and that's why my first place to go is like, I'ma come see Joe. Because you were one of the innovators with this new technology. Well, thanks. But I think what people are super concerned about is things getting blocked, right? Right. That's like one of the first ones. Yes. Is that something that we legitimately have to worry about? This is a good question. Here's what I know. Right now, your broadband provider has the technical ability to block content and websites. It's got the business incentive to block or slow access to some websites if they don't have a special commercial relationship with them. And now the FCC just gave them the legal green right. Just go ahead. And so I feel over time, this is something we need to be concerned about. This open platform that was full of independent voices. Now you've got this new gatekeeper, your broadband provider. They've got a lot more power than what they used to. How close was the vote? It was 3-2. And what's the argument for this? Well, that's fair. I think there's an argument that you want government out of the way. Deregulation is going to lead to more competition. And we'll have a flourishing of new ideas and content if we just move government out of the way. And even if you're sympathetic to that argument, here's where I think it breaks down. According to the FCC's own data, half of the households in this country don't have a choice of broadband provider. I'm familiar with this. I'm one of them. I only have one provider that serves my house. So the thing is, if your broadband provider started blocking your content or throttling your access to some video, in a competitive market you'd pick up. You'd take your business somewhere else. But about half of our households don't even have that opportunity. So to me, the idea that the competitive market will prevent this behavior just doesn't fly. Yeah, that doesn't seem to make sense. And that's an issue in my neighborhood as well. And a lot of other people I know as well. I mean, I think they make deals where only one company, whether it's Verizon or whatever, has an area. Yeah, they monopolize the areas. They limit the opportunities and choices. And when they say deregulation, it just – any time they deregulate things and say, hey, we're going to leave it to the market and have competition, I think it's impossible to have that when you have a country with such an inequality – income inequality gap, right? That's the problem is that, all right, let's all go compete. Jill, you're not going to start a Verizon. I'm not going to start a Verizon. You know what I mean? Like, we can't compete with these dudes. And even Comcast can't even compete with Verizon. Like, you know, these dudes are all getting smashed. So there is not actual competition. I think deregulation works when you have multiple players and options and that the market actually can come into play. But with the economy so top-heavy right now, I don't think there is a possibility of competition. Yeah, I mean, listen, competition is the best regulator we know, right? We want there to be these markets where consumers have lots and lots of choices. But if competition isn't existing, you need a little oversight to make sure that every consumer gets a fair shot. Well, it seems like that's where the real argument lies, that if there are monopolies, and there seem to be in certain areas with – in regards to what kind of Internet access you can get, that if you don't have regulation then, then what is going to protect the consumer? What is going to protect free speech? What is going to protect – say if you are on Verizon and your system is on Verizon, what if you decide to make a podcast that criticizes Verizon? And everybody says, you know, hey, Eddie Wong has got a podcast criticizing us. I want to shut that down. And they can just – I would have been shut down a long time ago. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we are not saying that they would do that, but they could. Yeah. And that's what is scary. That's not good. And you know, so much of our speech these days, it doesn't take place in public places. It takes place on these private platforms. Right. So they have a lot of power. And we have to think about that as a country and a democracy. How much openness do we want? And then how do we create a framework in Washington that supports that openness? And that's really, to me, what Net Neutrality was about. The other question I have is, right, let's say, you know, let's say a service provider buys Hulu, right? Or they buy or they create their own streaming platform called like Zulu, right? So they start Zulu. They could start to charge Netflix more money for using their service. They could charge Hulu more money. They could charge, you know, Beats more money, whatever, so that they have an advantage for their own streaming services. And in that way, they can culturally control content. And you know, you're so right. And what happens is you as a consumer, you just get online and you might not even notice, right? You might not even notice they're taking you to the video content that they have a special pay for relationship with. I think, though, the biggest harm is to entrepreneurship. Yes. Right now, look, you have a good idea. You got a business, a service. You can go online and you can almost instantly have global reach. That's amazing. But now you're going to have to figure out is your broadband provider instead going to shuffle off all your traffic to someone else who's paying them on the side? Are you going to have a fair shot to show your wares and your ideas to the world? It's harder because I start thinking like a bad one percenter dude. And I'm like, all right, if there's no net neutrality and I'm the only person that can service Calabasas, California, Woodland Hills, California. Well, I'm going to charge all the other streaming providers more money to use this. And I'm going to create a competitor in every single one of these sectors. So you can have an advantage if you have your show with me. And if you're on the other one, I'm going to disadvantage you. I'm going to tax you basically. So right now, these are concerns and there's nothing that's actually happening yet. This ruling was just passed. That's right. Are there any plans in place for things that we should be concerned with? And is there anything that we can do about this current ruling? Yes, there's loads because I'm not giving up in the fight for net neutrality. And I don't want you to either. We got a few different pathways ahead. First, in Congress right now, they are trying to get rid of what just happened at the FCC. They're trying to use this law called the Congressional Review Act that in effect just undud everything that the FCC just did. So it's a way to wipe out what just happened. And while the odds are long, there's more than 40 United States senators who have sponsored that law. And in the House side, there's more than 80 members of the House of Representatives. So there's momentum growing in Congress to take a look at this issue and maybe fix what the FCC did. And if you're sitting out there and thinking they're not listening to you, what you should do is something totally old-fashioned. You should pick up the phone, call your members of Congress and your representatives, and let them know you care about this issue. Because that still today is one of the most powerful ways of conveying your opinion to those who represent you. When is the vote happening on that? It is not yet scheduled. I think it's going to happen first in the United States Senate and later in the House. I also think we are going to have litigation. We've already got a few states attorneys general who want to sue to overturn this. We've got some big companies, some public interest groups. So I think it's fair to say we're going to court. And then we're also seeing activity in state houses. And that we've seen net neutrality legislation introduced in Nebraska, Nevada, Washington State, Massachusetts, California, lots of places. And I'm not sure how that all comes together legally, but what you see is this momentum growing. People are not happy with what Washington just did. The thing that I'm worried about with the state's laws, right? So just to lay it out for the listeners, right? The people will, the government will pass the federal law, but then states have their own rights to regulate certain things. Let's say we use marijuana laws as an example, because recently a lot of states passed legal marijuana laws, right? But then Trump gave people the power to enforce federal laws about marijuana more stringently, right? He was telling the federal government, hey, enforce our federal marijuana laws. Well, it's really Jeff Sessions, right? Yeah, his goon. Yeah, his goon is doing that. But so how would federalism work if states started to pass their own net neutrality laws versus the FCC commission ruling? Yeah, those are hard questions. I mean, they go right to the Constitution. What's interstate? What's within the state's authority? But I'm just standing back and seeing really just a lot of energy on this issue. There's nothing else that I've worked on in Washington where this immediately, state houses decided to put pen to paper and introduce legislation. And I think that that momentum is what's really exciting here.