Net neutrality

Overheard: net neutrality

In print and TV, we see a range of models for divvying up the cost of getting content to the audience—from paid infomercials to ad-supported programming to premium channels—and it’s never quite clear why the same shouldn’t pertain to online. Julian Sanchez, Is government regulation needed to ensure net neutrality

Because President-elect Obama is in favor of net neutrality, it’ll be interesting to see who he picks for the FCC and whether Obama will endorse Senator Byron Dorgan’s net neutrality bill.

The controversy that surrounds net neutrality laws reminds me a little of what happened with the Equal Rights Amendment back when I was in college.  The question then was “Do we really need an equal rights ammendment to the constitution or does the Bill of Rights already provide the legislation we need?

It’ll be interesting to see whether the “new” FCC thinks they can govern effectively with the legislation they already have on the books.

Overheard: Verizon using stance towards net neutrality as a gorilla marketing message

“Verizon is kinda sorta using their total lack of filtering as an underground marketing thing already, which is especially effective when coupled with FiOS’s insane speeds.” Matt Buchanan, Will Your ISP F You In the A? Bandwidth Hogs Beware

Interesting post by Matt Muchanan over at Gizmodo about ISP bandwidth management practices.  Can it be true that everyone but Verizon admitted they were managing bandwith? 

 ”We don’t manage our network by throttling, slowing or curbing service, either on DSL or FiOS.” In reference to content filtering, we weren’t given a new statement, but referred to earlier remarks by public affairs VP Tom Tauke that it is “reluctant to get into the business of examining content that flows across our networks,” the most pro-active stance against content filtering. However, it’s still no fan of the government stepping in: “These are decisions best made by network engineers and operators—not policymakers.”

Managing bandwidth has a new name, btw.  “Filtering” is out.   So is “throttling,” ”capping,” and “curbing.” 

The new name? ”Traffic shaping techniques.” Hats off to whoever thought that one up.

Video: Vint Cerf talks about Net neutrality

Net neutrality is the principle that data packets on the Internet should be moved impartially, without regard to content, destination or source.