Net Neutrality

This Thursday (December 14th), the FCC will be voting on the repeal of Net Neutrality. It is expected to be repealed in a 3 to 2 vote.

At the risk of sounding dramatic, I feel like we're all about to witness a crime take place.

The Internet was created by the federal government with our tax dollars and we as a country have contributed much to developing its infrastructure. During the early years of the Internet, there was a large number of dial-up Internet Service Providers, for example my first ISP was fast.net. As speed demands increased and traditional telephone lines were no longer sufficient, home service became dependent on a smaller collective of cable and fiber providers.

Through years of mergers and consolidations, the majority of that cable and fiber is now owned by Verizon, Comcast and AT&T, some call it an oligarchy.

The Internet itself is made up of many computers and connections from many companies and individuals but Verizon, Comcast and AT&T control the "last mile" to our homes, which puts them in a unique position of power and control over what we have access to.

In the years leading up to 2015, this oligarchy became increasingly bold with their abuse of this power. The Internet was rescued in 2015 with the passing of Net Neutrality, which states all Internet traffic must be treated equally. This means your service provider isn't allowed to speed up, slow down or straight up block Internet traffic based on their preferences. For example, you can stream a movie from Netflix or Amazon just as well as you can stream a movie from Verizon or Comcast On Demand. Same goes for watching a movie on Newgrounds.

This is all about to be undone. Some (shady?) people will claim Net Neutrality is a case over government overreach and repealing it will make the Internet "more free." This is simply not how the Internet works. The Internet will be more profitable for Verizon, Comcast and AT&T, while being much, much, much less free for everyone else who has a stake in its future.

The founders and early pioneers of the Internet agree.

Read my previous post about how NG was impacted before Net Neutrality.

Here's a link to join the online protest and contact your representative in Congress.

It would have been great if I never had to make a post like this again after 2015 but the ISP lobby spends a FORTUNE to make this a continued battle. We all need to vote for representatives who don't play into their hands. Hold your representatives accountable.

Finally, some good news...

Art View and Audio Listen Page Updates!

We released updates to the Art view and Audio listen pages!

1) Pages are much more mobile friendly.

2) You can now listen to suggested audio in-page by clicking the thumbnails of the suggested entries.

3) Trophy art has been updated (higher resolution for mobile screens).

4) Author credits have replaced the heart with a more clear "Follow" button. Hearts will continue to be used to add content to your favorites, follow buttons will be used to follow artists.

We have more changes to come in terms of mobile usability, such as adjustments to font sizes and button spacing in various areas. Voting and review updates will happen once our remaining content pages (games and animation) have moved to the new layout.

Also note, the top banner ad on these pages has been replaced with a Supporter promo. If NG keeps gaining supporters, we can eventually ditch third party ads and develop a new rev share system based on supporter revenue.

Robot Day

For the past few years we've celebrated Robot Day on July 10th but this year it was cancelled it due to lack of interest. @EiGiBeast asked about reviving it and we ended up celebrating it on Sunday! It was mostly an art and audio affair, although @KungFuSpaceBarbarian released a special Crypt Shyfter:

• Unpublished Submission

Here are some more highlights!

• 

  'Aero-Kwerk-B'

  by Butzbo

  Illustration

  1,792 Views

  (Everyone)

• 

  Iori Licea - The Robot Lab [NG Robot Day 2017]

  by iorilicea

  Created by Iori Licea. For the Newgrounds' Robot Day 2017.

  Song

  Dance

  2,612 Views

  PLAY
• 

  Happy Robot Day

  by TheShadling

  Illustration

  56,127 Views

  (Ages 13+)

• 

  Botscrap Hyperdrome

  by vezanmatics

  Make way for the scrappy champs!

  Loop

  Industrial

  3,729 Views

  PLAY
• 

  MindChamber_RD2017

  by MindChamber

  Illustration

  3,165 Views

  (Everyone)

• 

  Hip-Sci-Hop-Fi

  by LexRodent

  The Underground Collective Volume II : Sounds of the Future

  Song

  Techno

  4,698 Views

  PLAY
• 

  Fallen

  by Flowers10

  Illustration

  2,484 Views

  (Everyone)

• 

  Robot Christmas!

  by bluelephan2

  Happy Robot Day!

  Loop

  Video Game

  3,011 Views

  PLAY
• 

  Cogito ergo Sum

  by Saminat

  Fine Art

  2,725 Views

  (Ages 13+)

• 

  ROBOT DEPLOY!

  by demon1000

  My Track For ROBOT DAY 2017

  Song

  Industrial

  3,506 Views

  PLAY
• 

  Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite Final Boss

  by ScepterDPinoy

  Pixel Art

  2,677 Views

  (Everyone)

Thank you everone who came out to revive Robot Day, it's cool to see the community step up like that.

I do hope we have a much bigger turnout for Pixel Day!

Pixel Day is a celebration of the 8 and 16-bit era, with pixel art, games, animation and chiptunes.

This is a great opportunity for pixel artists from all over the web to dip their toes into NG and I could see a lot of Pico-8 devs turning out if word spreads in that community. Pico-8 is a fantasy console for making and sharing tiny games. Learn more about it here!

If you know anyone who works in pixels or chiptunes, be sure they know Pixel Day is January 23rd on NG!

Next up: The long-teased new user pages and new site header! Some advanced warning, we're gonna try a version of the header shared previously without the tank logo. I know this will upset some people but I really want to give it a shot. These layout updates are a constant evolution and we will be exploring different ideas as we move ahead in 2018.

Thanks for the shout-out! Saw lots of cool art for Robot Day, glad I got to be a part of it.

Unfortunately we're stuck with Toomey who doesn't give two hoots about net neutrality. His office is virtually unreachable and his canned email responses (which typically arrive about a month after initial contact) rehash some bullshit that Verizon or Comcast probably wrote for him. Free and open internet blah blah I actually just got paid by these companies to put my stamp of approval on repealing it, I have no idea what net neutrality actually is but those guys said free and open internet about 60 times and slipped me a 50 during our meeting so I'll go with whatever they say.

At least Senator Casey has his head on straight, he seems like a real stand-up guy.

We'll keep fighting the good fight! I'm always down to help Newgrounds in any way I can.

Really love how Darnell and Nene are back as the voting icons, that was awesome to see. It goes a long way in giving each of the portals their own personality; I know mobile needs will probably prevent anything like the different color themes and wallpapers for each of the portals like in the 2012 design, but the icons are great to have. Will also give the tank-less header a fair chance.

At 12/12/17 12:58 PM, LDAF wrote: Really love how Darnell and Nene are back as the voting icons, that was awesome to see. It goes a long way in giving each of the portals their own personality; I know mobile needs will probably prevent anything like the different color themes and wallpapers for each of the portals like in the 2012 design, but the icons are great to have. Will also give the tank-less header a fair chance.

Oh man I feel horrible saying it but the face voting is set to go away when the vote merge happens, since people will be able to give half stars in their vote. :(

Ahh, politics have been annoying lately. Actually, pretty much always, but my safe spots are being attacked now! What am I gonna do if they go down!?

Oh yeah, and goodbye dreams of having your own website if this crap gets through, DoubleDenial.

Robot Day was a great turn out this year. Many great flashes to check out.

Why aren't you guys calling?! Call the Congress!

Pixel day should have a large turn out. Everybody loves those sweet retro pixels being mixed with new ideas.

slick pages good stuff!

I completely forgot about Pico-8 lol, I've had it installed for over a year and still haven't made a game with it yet. I suppose Pixel Day would be a good excuse to do so!

Wait, so we can't see how many plays and downloads a track has anymore?

At 12/12/17 02:44 PM, SvDMIssion2 wrote: Wait, so we can't see how many plays and downloads a track has anymore?

That's an accidental omission, was meant to be in the info box, along with genre. Will be getting fixed!

Im digging the cleanliness of the layout. I like how much more prominent following users is.

Im wondering if moving the nene / darnel rating system under the submission might be better? Particularly for audio submissions.
Normal user eye scanning is typically left to right, up to down, seems stressful to have the user interact with the main content rail and then travel back left and up, to vote? I could see myself listening to audio and wanting the rating of it to be near enough to quickly react to it.

also first post

Love the new UI for art pages! Been anxious to see the change.

And as for Net Neutrality, we do still have two more days. Not all hope is lost yet.

At 12/12/17 02:31 PM, ninjamuffin99 wrote:
I completely forgot about Pico-8 lol, I've had it installed for over a year and still haven't made a game with it yet. I suppose Pixel Day would be a good excuse to do so!

Brake out Pico-8 and get to work. We all want to see what you can come up with for Pixel Day.

I look forward to more Newgrounds in 2018! Please dear Newgrounds-Team, after whatever may come, take a well earned holyday rest with our big thanks!

PS: Good decision with the supporter banner! May I suggest a lighter background color?
PPS: Good decision with the tank logo!

At 12/12/17 03:14 PM, Luis wrote: Im wondering if moving the nene / darnel rating system under the submission might be better? Particularly for audio submissions.
Normal user eye scanning is typically left to right, up to down, seems stressful to have the user interact with the main content rail and then travel back left and up, to vote? I could see myself listening to audio and wanting the rating of it to be near enough to quickly react to it.

This part is still up in the air but there's gonna be a big change when we merge voting, to just have a single point of voting on the page that also works as your review score. The new vote bar is based on the review star bar, where you can give half stars and placement has been intended to be under the content. Still gotta really finalize how the experience works out.

At 12/12/17 04:19 PM, Manderby wrote: PS: Good decision with the supporter banner! May I suggest a lighter background color?

Which background color are you referring to - the site skin art or the background color in the supporter banner at the top of pages?

Thanks for the Shout-out Tom! And i am getting slightly Concerned with the Net Neutrality Problem...I just hope everything plays outs smoothly...or we are all going to Suffer from this...

At 12/12/17 04:36 PM, TomFulp wrote: Which background color are you referring to - the site skin art or the background color in the supporter banner at the top of pages?

The banner background.

We are all doomed! Ajit Pai won't care how much people don't like it! As long as he and Verizon wins money he won't care!

Why do I feel that we could possibly lose this year's battle? I mean, a lot of bad things happened this year. Fidget spinners, Donald Trump, Jake Paul, economical crashes in other places and most of all, it was just a terrible year for us (and me for personal reasons.) I don't wanna sound like a wet blanket, just "venting"

From a member and contributor since 2003 and fan of the site since inception (I was maybe 9-10 at the time).

Thank you for continuing to work on this amazing project of yours and tending to the community within.

Kindest Regards
Flashburn

At 12/12/17 07:13 PM, RealFaction wrote: I hope Pixel Day is an even bigger turn out too! I'm trying to think of how i can market it better, im doing a podcast soon with that mentioned, I've been thinking of doing some sort of promo thing, not sure yet.

Pixel Day seems to get bigger every year. Good luck on trying to market it to new people.

At 12/12/17 02:53 PM, TomFulp wrote:

At 12/12/17 02:44 PM, SvDMIssion2 wrote: Wait, so we can't see how many plays and downloads a track has anymore?

That's an accidental omission, was meant to be in the info box, along with genre. Will be getting fixed!

Thanks for addressing this issue. I was about to ask about that

Lots of nice and nifty updates here hope it all pans out for the best

~X~

At 12/12/17 06:00 PM, HaVoCOFFICIAL wrote: Why do I feel that we could possibly lose this year's battle? I mean, a lot of bad things happened this year. Fidget spinners, Donald Trump, Jake Paul, economical crashes in other places and most of all, it was just a terrible year for us (and me for personal reasons.) I don't wanna sound like a wet blanket, just "venting"

2017 is gonna go down in history as a dark year for America.

I do think Newgrounds will keep on rolling with or without Net Neutrality but I expect it to be more of a struggle. I never really expect the total nightmare scenarios but I do expect things to gradually get worse.

I also worry a lot that the general public is becoming apathetic to the web because most of their Internet experience is with apps and those apps are owned by a small handful of companies that will pay what they need to pay.

Going back to my previous post, when Netflix was getting throttled in 2013, the public wasn't up in arms against the ISPs, they just complained about slow Netflix buffering. I fear that's how it will go down in this next round; people will just complain about slow web services and not ask WHY.

At 12/12/17 07:18 PM, Flashburn wrote: From a member and contributor since 2003 and fan of the site since inception (I was maybe 9-10 at the time).

Thank you for continuing to work on this amazing project of yours and tending to the community within.

Kindest Regards
Flashburn

Thank you, especially for making a post about it! Saw your last post was after the 2012 redesign and gotta say it's much appreciated to know you've been liking the ongoing progress. I wish more people would pop up like that to weigh in and let us know they're still out there!

That explain all the sudden werid things that happend when I checked my phone, I thought the website was broken or something!

At 12/12/17 12:37 PM, TomFulp wrote: This Thursday (December 14th), the FCC will be voting on the repeal of Net Neutrality. It is expected to be repealed in a 3 to 2 vote.

For some reason the possibility that this could happen just didn't seem possible. :| Suppose I've just seen that Battle The Net banner on so many sites this time that I thought the outcome was obvious, but seems they're just not listening on the right ear.... dark day ahead... hope these expectations are as misleading as the industry's false promises of great freedom and profitability for all!

At 12/12/17 01:46 PM, TomFulp wrote: Oh man I feel horrible saying it but the face voting is set to go away when the vote merge happens, since people will be able to give half stars in their vote. :(

Aw man... was happy to see those again too. Not possible to just highlight half of each numerical icon as you hover over it? Though hmm, mobile.. seems like the bane of all artful design sometimes. Those icons: so much personality though.

Digging the changes so far otherwise! Simple and smooth. Just the review button there that feels a bit small and hidden away without the text beside it. Requires more precision to click quickly. Wonder if less people might spontaneously write something without the visual textual invite too.

Happy Belated Robot Day! :) Didn't get time to doodle like I hoped, but good to see some people did! If it's still here next year...

I think the most depressing part about the whole Net Neutrality thing is that even if by some miracle the repeal doesn't go through tomorrow, this issue is just gonna come up next year.

ISPs are going to continue trying to get their way forever, and only one of two things will stop them for good:
1: They get their way and no longer need to try.
2: Repealing net neutrality somehow becomes less profitable for ISPs than keeping it.

It started with SOPA in 2011 and it'll just keep going until finally the people get so exhausted they no longer have the will to take action.