Net Neutrality Links
I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.
Is Net Neutrality A Myth? [via Light Within]
The advocates of net neutrality have, at first blush, one overwhelming argument in their favor. The Internet was designed to be a dumb network, with all the brains and innovation residing at the ends of the system. As such, all bits of data traveling over the Internet would be treated equally. This “end-to-end” design principle is the essence of network neutrality and, the proponents of mandated net neutrality argue, must be maintained to secure the Internet as we know it.
This essential characteristic, it is argued, precludes the owners of the Internet’s “pipes” from engineering any intelligence into the network’s architecture–and thus any differential pricing–since all the intelligence must reside at the edges. Proponents of mandated net neutrality managed to force the adoption of some net neutrality provisions into the recent merger agreement between AT&T (nyse: T – news – people ) and Bell South.
But in ” The Myth of Network Neutrality and What We Should Do About It,” Robert Hahn and Robert Litan of the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies argue that, contrary to the claims of regulated neutrality proponents, “all bits of information are not treated equally from an economic standpoint.” They argue that “the Internet is not end-to-end now and was never designed to be strictly neutral.”
How can this be? The engineering architects of the Internet drafted the technical rules in informal papers called Requests for Comment. The early drafters of the Net’s architecture, according to Hahn and Litan, “recognized the need to offer priority to some packets over others.”
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE
email for liz strauss:
dear ms. strauss,
i have a question. it probably reflects my naivete about bloggers and what they do.
you cited my work on net neutrality (above). my question is why this issue is such a big deal for bloggers. is it that they care a lot about the underlying architecture of the internet; or that they care about the pricing structure; or something else?
thanks much.
bob hahn
Hi Bob!
Thanks for asking. I’m sure there are bloggers with other reasons, but the ones that I know care a lot about innovation and the ability to create and form new ideas and new conversatios without the frustrating problems that are caused by packet discrimination.
When the “routers” in the center control the traffic beyond what is required for engineering and move into economic reasons for moving data then the Internet in essence suffers the problems of any big corporation. The guy in the “entry level job” in this case, the guy with the computer at the edges needs the space and the bandwidth to innovate, because the folks in the “big offices” have too much at stake to do so.