Net neutrality
I had totally forgotten to blog about the issue of 'net neutrality, and then I read an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle today from Stanford University law professor and EFF boardmember Lawrence Lessig. Apparently, Congress will vote today on a 'net neutrality bill, and they could vote to either keep the Internet free, or create a "premium" tier of Internet, the content of which will be pay-only. Lessig explains:
Now Congress faces a legislative decision. Will we reinstate net neutrality and keep the Internet free? Or will we let it die at the hands of network owners itching to become content gatekeepers? The implications of permanently losing network neutrality could not be more serious. The legislation, backed by companies such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast, would allow the firms to create different tiers of online service. They would be able to sell access to the express lane to deep-pocketed corporations and relegate everyone else to the digital equivalent of a winding dirt road. Worse still, these gatekeepers would determine who gets premium treatment and who doesn't.
As Lessig points out, practically everyone is against the idea of a two-tiered Internet -- except ISPs like Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast. In a world of net neutrality, phone and cable companies lose, since they don't get the opportunity to charge for what they determine is "premium" content.
If you'd like to read the legislation, it is available via THOMAS, the federal legislation database. It is called H.R. 5252, the "Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006."
As an aside, I didn't know that bills were now available in XML. Awesome! Internal references are hyperlinks, so if some text refers to some other part of the bill, you can click on the link and go to that reference.
Comments
Yeah ... they lost. Fuckin Latourette voted for the tiers, predictably. Asshat.
Posted by: Wolf | June 10, 2006 4:46 PM
"The owners of the Internet's wires"? Those wires belong to the Internet now?
Look, it's not that I disagree strongly with Lessig's point, or yours. I don't want to see a two-tiered Net. As you point out, just about nobody, except those who stand to materially profit (i.e., telecom companies), wants to see that. But the TONE of this op-ed ... the shrill tone ....
Why not complain that some newspapers -- I hear tell this is going on, although I can't prove it yet -- are reserving the front page for their own proprietary content, and forcing all the open-source, submitted, people's writing into a section they call "Op-ed"? Why not complain that the networks choose to broadcast hour upon hour of "Survivor" and "Deal or No Deal," while struggling yet genuine small-timers are exiled to the relative obscurity of cable access?
No, that would expose the ridiculous attitude that underpins this argument. Fact of the matter is, freedom of press is guaranteed only to those who own one; and the owners of communications media should, by capitalist and libertarian principles, be given the right to manage those properties as they see fit, including favorable treatment for proprietary content.
THAT BEING SAID, I can see an argument on your (our) side that accomplishes the objective of a relatively free Internet without turning this into a yay-communism rally.
The model is broadcast (radio, TV). Long ago, we ruled that the airwaves belong to the people, and are only on loan to FCC licenseholders, who are supposed to consider the public interest in what they do. So make the same argument about the Internet, and about those wires.
Those wires belong to Verizon, and SBC, etc., but they (or their copper predecessors) were put there by Ma Bell, a government-sanctioned monopoly. We've already decided that although Verizon may own the lines, it can't bar Company X from competing with it to provide service. By analogy, they can't bar ISP competition; stretch it a bit further, and you might have the logical basis of a ban on Internet tiering.
That's the rational way to make this case. Don't give me this emotional "the Internet was born free, don't let Evil Corporate America take it over, abajo Franco, etc." claptrap.
Nice to see the blog still running. Nice to see 500.
Posted by: mb | June 14, 2006 7:06 PM