Why Are The Democrats Waffling On Net Neutrality?
The Dems just hammered out the final draft of the official party platform they're sending to Denver for ratification, and it seems they're trying to say: We support net neutrality, but don't quote us on that.
The actual text (see below, under "A Connected America") of the proposed Democrats' technology policy is pretty vague:
We will protect the Internet’s traditional openness to innovation and creativity and ensure that it remains a dynamic platform for free speech, innovation, and creativity.
We're pretty sure we're supposed to infer that protecting "the Internet's traditional openness" is code for support of net neutrality. So why not just say so?
The same sentence, almost word-for-word, can be found on presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama's website:
Obama will protect the Internet’s traditional openness to innovation and creativity and ensure that it remains a platform for free speech and innovation that will benefit consumers and our democracy.
However, here's the disconnect between Obama and the rest of his party -- Obama also adds the following sentences, notably absent from the new proposed party platform:
Barack Obama strongly supports the principle of network neutrality to preserve the benefits of open competition on the Internet... Because most Americans only have a choice of only one or two broadband carriers, carriers are tempted to impose a toll charge on content and services, discriminating against websites that are unwilling to pay for equal treatment.
On the other side of the aisle, the Republican National Committee hasn't yet finalized a draft platform for the GOP. But the Republicans' own presumptive nominee comes out strong against the idea on JohnMcCain.com:
John McCain does not believe in prescriptive regulation like “net-neutrality,” but rather he believes that an open marketplace with a variety of consumer choices is the best deterrent against unfair practices.
The debate over "net neutrality" revolves over whether ISPs should be able to prioritize certain types of Internet traffic to Web surfers, for example by disrupting P2P file-sharing programs, or perhaps someday offering business partners priority access to their pipes, for a fee. We know which side Obama and McCain are on. What about the Democratic party?
See Also:
Comcast, Slapped By FCC, Expands Testing New Tech To Slow Down Your Internet
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No one's saying it's an issue of war or peace. But the way we use the Internet to get content, and every business involved in that process will evolve one way if the government supports net neutrality, and a very different way if it doesn't.
There's nothing "neutral" about gigantically profitable companies (GOOG, YHOO, MSFT, etc.) FORCING other (less profitable) companies to do whatever the fuck they want, no matter how much if might screw them, forever.
The abolition of a government-fixed-price telecom system is what gave RISE to the Internet, and the reinstatement of same is what will put a stop to innovation. Any idiot knows that government price-fixing is the way you destroy any industry and foster its stagnation.
The incredible thing is that the so-called visionaries in SV don't have a problem fucking over the physical network providers for short term gain. They know any NN-like bill would effectively halt all investment in bandwidth, but they don't give a shit because the next couple of quarters look ok right now.
Perhaps the demos know that for every VC sitting next to you at a $5k/plate dinner there are thousands of hard-hat wearing guys that work days and nights in ditches and up poles to build and maintain a thing that most of us white-collar types have never actually touched (physically): the Internet.
SI
we do not agree. The Internet was made possible because we were able to acquire access to neutral pipes of specified bandwidth from which to build the ARPANET and later use radio and satellite to build a packet radio and packet satellite network. From these we fashioned TCP/IP to interconnect them. The Internet grew through the use of dedicated, neutral resources provided by common carriers (note that this is the crucial element in the growth of the network - access to resources whose use was NOT controlled by the common carrier providers). When the network became available to the public in 1989 (and more generally by 1994 with the launch of the WWW and Netscape Communications), users had a choice of literally thousands of dial-up Internet Access Providers (or Internet Service Providers). They could readily switch from one to another simply by dialing different telephone numbers. Then came broadband access and the choices dwindled to zero, one, or two. Competition has not been very effective nor has there been a significant move to offer additional facilities-based choices. The broadband carriers are increasingly vocal about wanting to extract revenues from applications on the Internet and not shy about arguing that they own and therefore should control the use of these resources. This is not the Internet my colleagues and I designed and built. It is more like the television cable subscription model and it does not bode will for freedom of choice, freedom of access to information, freedom to speak, and freedom to innovate.
http://www.american.com/archive/2008/may-june-magazine-contents/avoiding-a-tech-train-wreck
There are some mid-ranges between full regulation and full laissez faire that would go a long way toward solving any problems, working largely off 19th century common law doctrines on common carriers, which were quite sensible. But one does not want to adopt all the insanities associated with the term "common carrier" as it has come to be used in the regulatory world.
An interesting question is the applicability of these old common law principles to Google, which has far more market power than any telecom company, and a far more ravenous appetite for the creations of others.
Does a "neutral" network mean that network operators can do nothing to manage their networks? Can they prioritize latency-sensitive applications? Even Network Neutrality proponents don't agree fully on those questions.
As Mr. Cerf said on the Google Public Policy blog, "So the real question for today's broadband networks is not whether they need to be managed, but rather how." Yet, would all NN advocates agree? Heck no!
Mr. Cerf's recent comments suggest that we may finally be ready to move beyond the demonization stages of this argument and into the phase of practical solutions. Perhaps dropping the term Network Neutrality altogether might be another step in the right direction.
http://blog.actonline.org/2008/08/have-the-adults.html
***
But hey, while we're here, let me do a quick check of my broadband options: let's see, there's cable, dsl, satellite, microwave, wi-fi, dial-up (slow, but still works) and about a dozen other alternatives that haven't been launched yet because the evil cable companies are keeping their product too cheap.
Obviously they are doing this to foster world domination. Obviously.
Couldn't be because they know they live in a free (for now) market wherein raising prices will create structural alternatives to their product.
But you make a good point: cable totally limited our choices for TV back in the 80s, so we sure as hell should stop them before they screw up the Internet too.
***
Mark: there's no way they'll drop the term "Net Neutrality". It's the ONLY reason 99 out of 100 people support the thing (the last 1% being GOOG stockholders). "'Net Neutrality'? Well of course I'm for that!". Most people you talk to assume that they are working to remove special laws that protect cable companies (and I'd be all for that), but in fact its just more regulation that doesn't solve anybody's problems and only helps a few greedy, short-sighted government-schmoozing scumbags in Mountain View.
SI
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