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Net Neutrality 5-17-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Pro-Internet Democracy Blogs Run Ads for Corporate Takeover of Net: Another Example of Why BuzzFlash Won’t Accept Advertising
[via Truth Dig ]

The ad in question leads to an Orwellian flash that tries to convince the viewers that the government is trying to “interfere” with the Internet and that this will destroy it, which is exactly what the people behind the ads are trying to do. . . . (See http://www.dontregulate.org/)

If you watch the ad, you find it is sponsored by a coalition misleadingly called “Hands Off the Internet”.If you look at the members of “Hands Off the Internet,” they are the very Telecom companies who have given large donations to members of Congress to pass legislation — now having cleared a House Committee — to allow them to squeeze democracy out of the Internet in order to increase their profits. Members of the cynically named “Hands Off the Internet” coalition include AT&T, BellSouth and Cingular, along with some “front” organizations that again employ the Bush tactic of sounding like they are on your side when they are trying to get away with grand larceny (see
http://www.handsoff.org/hoti_docs/aboutus/members.shtml). As many on the Net have noted with contempt, the group is masterminded by former Clinton Press Secretary Mike McCurry.

A BuzzFlash reader pointed out this entire scam to us and how he had tried to get the progressive sites to have the ad removed on their sites, but to no avail.
The ad is part of a package offered by a company known as BlogAds. (See this url if you want to know which liberal blog sites financially benefit from BlogAds: http://www.blogads.com/advertise/liberal_blog_advertising

Proposed Rule Changes Would Tangle the Web

Many people believe the Internet’s decentralized structure guarantees that no company or oligopoly could control it. Internet censorship – whether by corporate or state interests – simply sounds impossible. Yet not only is it theoretically possible, but the history of telecommunications regulation tells us it is probable. By the time the telecoms start changing what you see on your screen, it will be too late to complain.

PDF Panel On Net Neutrality
[via The Original Blog]

Like it or not, the Internet is not a public entity. It is not a company for which others provide service and it is not a public good. It is a nebulous arrangement of interconnections between private networks. If the net neutrality guys would like the government to compensate the private companies that have invested hundreds of billions to make it work, and declare those pipes a public good, that’s fine. The tab will be staggering.

That will do wonders for the deficit and guarantee great service. After all, the government does everything really well, right?

If, instead, you want a competitive environment, then you keep what you have. Existing competition has moved us this far, so why not let it continue? Some suggest the answer is because there are only two competitors – cable and telcos. That ignores the possibility that the DBS guys will ever develop the technology to compete. That ignores the possibility that governments will provide wi-fi as a public good, and it ignores the possibility that Google or someone else will provide wi-max to compete with the cable and telco guys?

It also assumes that two competitors is somehow inadequate for real competition. Honestly, I think a football field would get crowded with four teams.

. . . Cable faces different competition on the programming side. They face competition from satellite and now telcos on video. They face competition for phone service from wireless, VoIP, and the telcos. They face competition for data services from telcos, cities increasingly providing wi-fi, PC by satellite (which admittedly is inferior currently, but that will change shortly), etc.

Competition works. But you have to let it. For Congress to act now, absent an actual threat, would be the height of folly.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 5-15-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Peter Svennson, Hack AP Reporter, Screws Up Net Neutrality Story by Mark Stoller

The public deserves real discourse about this issue. People care about the internet. We should have a real conversation about the public policy implications of what we do with this platform upon which millions rely. And if we decide to hand it over to the telcos, so be it. But the press delivered first apathy, and then warmed over spin and lies. That’s not democracy. That’s not journalism. It’s stenography.

I wanted to believe that the press were working the public’s interest. I really did. I no longer believe this, because of writers like Peter Svennson.

Telecoms Create Front Site to Combat Net Neutrality

Basically, what follows is my analysis of a little site called “dontregulate.org”. They seem inocuous. They’ve got ads going through blogads.org, which, MLW, Booman, and other lefty sites, including ActForLove, use to get ads based upon their sites. Now, they’ve got this fascinating flash video to start the site, and from there, it just turns into arguments against net neutrality, looking all like it’s a regular internet site that regular people put up, with regular drawings and Flash movies…

For more info, SaveTheInternet has also made it the big lie of the week

Soon, The New Design Won’t Matter

But, in a couple of months time, it’s likely that all TechCrunch will have to do is pi** off a large Telco or two (or a congressman in a back pocket) and, ‘voila’, you and I won’t be able to visit them anymore, anyway.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 5-14-06

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Net Neutrality Links

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

World of Ends: What the Internet Is and How to Stop Mistaking It for Something Else by Doc Searls and David Weinberger

Other mistakes we insist on making over and over. For example, thinking that:

…the Web, like television, is a way to hold eyeballs still while advertisers spray them with messages.
…the Net is something that telcos and cable companies should filter, control and otherwise “improve.”
… it’s a bad thing for users to communicate between different kinds of instant messaging systems on the Net.
…the Net suffers from a lack of regulation to protect industries that feel threatened by it.
When it comes to the Net, a lot of us suffer from Repetitive Mistake Syndrome. This is especially true for magazine and newspaper publishing, broadcasting, cable television, the record industry, the movie industry, and the telephone industry, to name just six.

Thanks to the enormous influence of those industries in Washington, Repetitive Mistake Syndrome also afflicts lawmakers, regulators and even the courts.

Telcos Seek to Deceive Bloggers with Cartoon

Coming to a blog near you is a telecom-sponsored advertisement dressed up as an underground cartoon. It’s the latest in the ongoing campaign by large phone companies to pull the wool over the eyes of the American public.

The cartoon is a product of a front group funded by AT&T and BellSouth. The group, Hands Off the Internet, is headed by Mike McCurry, the former Clinton Press Secretary who has been widely discredited for selling out his integrity to become the telephone industry’s spokesmodel.

McCurry’s group is now attempting to buy its way into the blogosphere, spending tens of thousands of dollars on a misinformation campaign against network neutrality — the principle that keeps the Internet free and open to all.

Hands Off the Internet

Hands Off The Internet is a nationwide coalition of Internet users united together in the belief that the Net’s phenomenal growth over the past decade stems from the ability of entrepreneurs to expand consumer choices and opportunities without worrying about government regulation. We believe consumers across America see the results of this “hands off” approach – through such benefits as expanded distance education opportunities, improved access and speed to almost any information, on-line commerce, and an easier and inexpensive way to communicate with family and colleagues.

[All links today via The Advice Library]

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 5-13-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Well since Net Neutrality didn’t pass….

On one hand I agree with the philosophy of the free market. I think it is one of the things that makes this country great.

On the other hand nothing gives a free market a black eye like an out of control monopoly.

And that is what we are up against here. It isn’t that one company has a monopoly. It is that there is an effective monopoly at the county and city market levels.

CIO MAGAZINE The Net Neutrality Debate: You Pay, You Play? BY BEN WORTHEN

Last April, Cisco Systems published a white paper explaining how the companies that own the phone lines and cables that connect homes and businesses to the Internet—the proverbial last mile—could use new routing technology to boost revenue. The technology would allow telephone and cable companies to establish priority lanes . . . and then charge the Googles, Yahoos and Amazons of the world for access to these highway toll roads. Cisco’s paper predicted that this new strategy would allow broadband service providers to create new revenue-sharing business models with any company that sells content online.

The plan had only one problem: It was illegal.

The telecommunications laws that have governed the Internet since its inception require network owners to treat all traffic the same. The laws date to the 1930s and were put in place to force telephone companies to prevent a scenario where one company could refuse to carry calls placed by a rival’s customer. The Internet was designed with the same principle in mind. . . . it was the only thing standing between the telecommunications companies and a vast new revenue stream.

Since then, a Supreme Court ruling and a series of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decisions have eliminated this barrier, prompting Congress to rewrite the nation’s telecommunications laws. The new bill, which could be finalized as early as the summer, will in all likelihood officially eliminate net neutrality as the legal principle that governs the Internet. “If net neutrality goes away, it will fundamentally change everything about the Internet,” says James Hilton, associate provost for Academic IT Works of the University of Michigan.

The impact of these changes on CIOs and their companies will be profound. The telecommunications and cable companies argue that allowing them to govern their networks as they see fit gives them a financial incentive to innovate at the core of the network, and develop new technologies that could guarantee things that CIOs want, like security and better quality of service. Proponents of net neutrality counter that the principle is the reason that the Internet and the corresponding online ecosystem have developed into the commercial and cultural phenomenon they are today. . . .

The new Internet will certainly make telecommunications decisions more strategic. CIOs will not only need to worry about how much bandwidth to buy, but which lane they want their traffic to travel in. And tiered service is just the beginning. Telecommunications companies will be able to rearchitect their networks however they see fit. Over time, the new architectures and the services that network owners deliver will result in complicated payer/payee relationships between companies and telecommunications companies. And if a telecommunications company decides it wants to introduce a new Internet standard, CIOs may be forced to rearchitect their company’s systems.

. . . For all the talk about equal access and treating all data the same, the net neutrality debate is just window dressing for a less gentlemanly argument over who gets to profit in the online economy. More bluntly, Steve Effros, former president of the Cable Television Association, says, “This is about who pays.”

Big Lie of the Week

Here’s a quick guide to help you cut through the industry spin:

The big telecom companies say: “Is the Internet in Danger? Does the Internet need saving? It keeps getting faster. We keep getting more choices.” . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 5-12-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

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

Ask A Ninja: Special Delivery 4 “Net Neutrality”
[via Advice Library]

Watch the video. Then click the links.

Full text of COPE Act

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 run applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement.

. . . to connect their choice of legal devices that do not harm the network.

. . . to competition among network providers, application and service providers, and content providers.

I want my MTV (mobile TV), but not from AT&T

I’m sure AT&T doesn’t really care what I want. Actually, why not broaden that to wireless data carriers in general. Earlier this week it was T-Mobile essentially banning VoIP and IM on their HSDPA network, likely indicating they will be happy to provide you those services in the future at a premium. Today it’s AT&T announcing a deal with MobiTV to provide wireless television at AT&T hotspots for $11.99 a month.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality: Red Bank TV

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Who Says Blogs Aren’t Useful?

Tom has lived in Red Bank, New Jersey, since he bought a home there six years ago. He’s not an activist. In fact, he says he has no political affiliation at all. Tom’s just a guy like us, who works with and uses technology. He also cares about negotiations between the town of Red Bank, New Jersey, and Verizon Communications.

So he made a blog.

Why Tom Made the Blog

Tom made the Red Bank TV Blog because he believes that as part of the cable franchise agreement with the town of Red Bank, Verizon Communications should make three promises:

  • Promise to provide A la carte cable service to Red Bank residents
  • Promise not to object to a Red Bank Municipal WiFi network
  • Promise to keep the internet a level playing field by upholding the tenets of Net Neutrality

Tom’s blog got my attention. I bet it got Verizon’s attention too. I hope this article helps it get the attention of Doc Searls, Jeff Pulver, Om Malik, and many others who want to know what local folks are doing. Tom’s blog is a great example of someone following through on what he believes.

Blogs used well are transparent to the purpose they are used for. No one will be wrapping fish in Tom’s blog tomorrow, or the next day for that matter. There’s so much to talk about in what Tom is doing.

I bet if you have a question about how it’s going, Tom will see it and answer it here.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related NET NEUTRALITY PAGE