FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski announced that the FCC will be taking steps to turn the four open Internet principles into law. In October, the FCC will issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to begin the process.
The four principles are outlined in a 2005 Internet Policy Statement:
- To encourage broadband deployment and preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet, consumers are entitled to access the lawful Internet content of their choice.
- To encourage broadband deployment and preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet, consumers are entitled to run applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement.
- To encourage broadband deployment and preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet, consumers are entitled to connect their choice of legal devices that do not harm the network.
- To encourage broadband deployment and preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet, consumers are entitled to competition among network providers, application and service providers, and content providers.
Chairman Genachowski proposed the addition of two new principles:
- ISPs cannot discriminate against particiular content or applications; and
- ISPs must disclose their network management practices, that is, they have to tell customers if they are throttling P2P traffic, engaging in deep packet inspection, and so on.
The NPRM will ask the public for comments on the proposed rules, among other things, whether they should be applied to cellular networks. One of the biggest problems today is that cellular networks are struggling to keep up with data traffic. Operators such as AT&T argue that unless they can discriminate against applications that use up too much bandwidth, their networks will simply fail. Cellular operators also love their exclusivity agreements and their usual practice of castrating devices they offer to customers (in the past they’ve turned off the Bluetooth and WiFi functions in cell phones).
My take on this:
Because so much is at stake and the carriers and cable companies own Washington, their vast army of lobbyists plus the money that they throw at election campaigns will result in a law that is so watered down, it’s ineffective. There will be some kind of legislation, so that both Democrats and Republicans can go out to the people during the next round of elections, and say they are champions of progress and net neutrality. This is the game in Washington.
Note to software/hardware developers and entrepreneurs:
Your job is to get around these big elephants on the road. Think of what Skype has achieved. Skype got around the long-distance calling mafia. You need to develop applications that do what Skype has done. Do not wait for politicians.
Any thoughts about the FCC’s net neutrality push? Please post them below.
Your right about the lobbyists. Here they come: “Republicans in Congress and at FCC Move To Block FCC Net Cop Initiative” (see: http://benton.org/node/28069). They will always be a problem, but even the FCC can’t deny the past results of the cable/telco biopolies. In fact, they got an earful in the FCC workshops which can be found in transcript and video at http://www.broadband.gov/workshops.html.
These workshops were really pretty amazing and I suggest a review of at least your selected topic of interest. They covered topics from the US now 19th in the world in the deployment of broadband to wireless machine to machine applications being deployed globally with the US lagging far behind. Both the public and private sector panelist put the FCC on notice stating the dismal status of US broadband networks and the importance of these networks in job creation and global competitiveness.
I actually think it is a great time for new competitive investment in regional broadband networks. When in the past did you get free right-of-way, federal grants, state and local communication assets all thrown in the pot just to stimulate the building of a municipal or county broadband network? When have you ever seen the potential of more applications? We have been given our opportunity to step around the big elephants. It is time just to do it.
The success of the internet is due to the lack of regulations and government interference; this bill would be a step backwards. More Red Tape more opportunities for abuse and corruption.