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Net Neutrality 6-28-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’ve added these links to the Net Neutrality Page today.

The pretense of knowledge by Patrick Ross

We are only beginning to understand on how subtle a communication system the functioning of an advanced industrial society is based — a communications system which we call the market and which turns out to be a more efficient mechanism for digesting dispersed information than any that man has deliberately designed.

When F.A. Hayek spoke these words more than thirty years ago in accepting the Nobel Prize for Economics, he was referring to the market as a communications system, a reflection of the increasing role of information as a driver of the economy. But these words also speak to the global communications system we call the Internet or cyberspace. While the individual elements of the Internet are designed by man, its growth and evolution has been almost organic, not unlike the development of the market Hayek described. Hayek devoted his career to championing markets over government planning, and his 1974 speech in Stockholm was no exception. His words ring true today as we hear of plans to impose limitations on this modern communications system, this market if you will, by the government in the form of network neutrality regulations.

Net Neutrality: The Mainstream’s still unconscious

The newspaper of record in our nation’s capital, The Washington Post, correctly observes that the rhetoric around net neutrality “has concealed more than it has illuminated.” However the reporter, Jeffrey Birnbaum, parrots elements of the carrier’s arguments in his column, “No Neutral Ground in This Internet Battle.” He fails to provide both sides of the argument in full, suggesting repeatedly that the carriers’ are the aggreived parties.

Let’s begin with his definition of net neutrality:

Net neutrality, which is shorthand for network neutrality, is one of two possible answers to the following legislative question: Should cable and telephone companies be allowed to charge add-on fees to others for access to their networks.

Under a net-neutral system, the answer would be “no.” If net neutrality were to lose, the answer would be “yes.”

A very different definition of net neutrality than mine: . . .

State governments push for Net neutrality laws

As a U.S. Senate panel prepares for a vote on Net neutrality legislation this week, state attorneys general in New York and California are joining Internet companies in saying that network operators must not be permitted to prioritize certain broadband content and services.

In a letter sent Friday to the leaders of the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, urged the adoption of a proposal called the Internet Freedom Preservation Act. This is the first time that state officials have entered the Net neutrality debate.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

The Mic is ON. It’s Thassos Island, Greece!

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It’s Like Open Mike Only Different

Here’s how it works.

The rules are simple — be nice.

It’s like any rambling conversation. Don’t try to read it all. Jump in whenever you get here. . . . Just go to the end and start talking. EVERYONE is WELCOME.

Some things we might talk about could include

  • our favorite words.
  • whether anyone’s putting email on their blog(s).
  • whether you’ll ever do a podcast.
  • what your biggest blogging problem is.
  • why Liz had to find her own photograph.

AND THE EVER POPULAR,

What are the code-writing donkey and the drinking moose doing tonight?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
The Mic in ON in Tuscany!
The Mic Is on in New York City!

Open Mic Tonight 7pm Chicago Time

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Tuesday Open Comment Night

Personal Branding logo

YES, the mike will be open again tonight. So start collecting your thoughts. Remember, you get to bring what you want to talk about.

The rules are simple — be nice.

We met lots of new friends last week as we always do. If you missed it, stop by this week, and we’ll meet you.

Some things we might talk about could include

  • our favorite words.
  • whether anyone’s putting email on their blog(s).
  • whether you’ll ever do a podcast.
  • what your biggest blogging problem is.
  • why Liz had to find her own photograph.

AND THE EVER POPULAR,

What are the code-writing donkey and the drinking moose doing tonight?

It’s like any rambling conversation. Don’t try to read it all. Jump in whenever you get here. Just go to the end and start talking. EVERYONE is WELCOME.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
The Mic in ON in Tuscany!

Net Neutrality 6-27-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’ve added these links to the Net Neutrality Page today.

How can we keep the Bells from committing net-neutricide?

How do you detect when the Bells are committing neutricide? It can’t be as simple as measuring throughput. There’s a host in China that I can’t reach from my ISP in London because of an incorrectly configured router at Sprint. That’s stupid and painful, but it’s not the same thing as anti-neutral. Distinguishing stupidity from malice from outside is going to be very hard.

One thing we don’t want is something like the SEC’s anti-insider-trading rules. Network neutrality rules won’t have much practical use if the only way to get them enforced is to convince a bureaucrat at the FCC to raid AT&T’s sales office, seize its files, and investigate your suspicions of wrongdoing. . .

Hyperbolic neutrality nonsense

Netflix founder Reed Hastings wants to move his company’s video distribution system off the postal system and onto the Internet, where it would become a major consumer of bandwidth. He’s worried about traffic-sensitive pricing, so he invokes the all-singing, all-dancing Wonder Principle, “net neutrality”, on the opinion pages of America’s most credulous newspaper:

Today, forces are at work to stake out future control of Web site traffic and eliminate the Internet’s longstanding openness. . . .

. . . While I can sympathize with Mr. Hastings’ desire to have Fedex service for the price of a first class stamp, I’d rather not be the one to pay the difference.

EXCLUSIVE: AT&T CEO’s political donations to net neutrality opponents

As AT&T continues its battles with net neutrality proponents on Capitol Hill this week, I thought it would be interesting to see where AT&T CEO Ed Whitacre has been spending his own money this campaign and election cycle.

I went to Opensecrets.org, and checked under “Whitacre.” . . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 6-26-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’ve added these links to the Net Neutrality Page today.

A Simple Net Neutrality Message: It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It

I’m very much an ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ guy.

The Web ain’t broke, not one bit. In fact, it’s thriving, growing by leaps and bounds, producing more cool innovations in a day than you could try out in a year. And the Net has been neutral since its beginnings. . . .

Are You Among The Seven Million?

“Privacy advocates slammed AT&T on Thursday for declaring that it owned its Internet and video customers’ account information and could hand the data over to law enforcement if needed.”

Owned!!! That’s right – owned!!!

Think about this – read this – see this – hear this – know this;

“In the policy update, which applied to AT&T’s more than 7 million Internet and video customers, the company said it could collect usage information from subscribers, including the Web pages they view, the programs they record, and the games they play.”

After they’ve collected that information, they OWN it! They own your information, about you!

And they do wonderful things with the information they own about you;

They Share It

On Monopoly (and a little bit of net neutrality)

The irony is that the people arguing that, say, the government should breakup monopolies in the name of innovation tend to be plagued by a lack of imagination. They couldn’t imagine that anything beyond the desktop OS would matter in computing. If they had seen a future whereby the web might supersede the desktop, they might not have worried. On a personal note, I wouldn’t argue that I have any foresight whatsoever, but hindsight works just fine. Simply looking at history should be enough to realize that one company can’t dominate and seek rents on a market for too long. Simply the act of exploiting a dominant position prompts more effort and energy in the direction of beating it.

And on that note, let me segue into the current arguments about net neutrality, and why I suspect that legislating the principle would be a bad idea. If the telcos really do try to stifle what happens on the internet, there will be a lot of effort put forth to try and circumvent their grip. . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Introducing Manage to Change

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SOB Hall of Famer: Manage to Change by Ann Michael

“Manage to Change” provides a forum to discuss how change impacts people and businesses. By sharing observations and asking questions, we try to develop strategies for anticipating change, viewing it positively, adapting, and even changing the rules of the game as often as possible.

To some degree the focus is on information management: What will happen in the world of content creation, marketing, distribution/delivery, and the
business models of media and publishing, as technology advances and consumer demands change?

Notes from Liz: Ann Michael thinks of change in context. Change to her is part of a process.Ann approaches her life and her work with determination, energy, and constant attention to what might move things forward in a positive, supportive fashion. Read her comments, on this blog or the many blogs that Ann visits, and you’ll know that Ann likes to laugh and likes to study business — how it works and how people think. She is an intringuing and powerful combination of likeability, laughter, and downright competence. Read her blog and you will see what I mean.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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