[governance] [Fwd: The Not-So-Neutral Net]
parminder
parminder at itforchange.net
Mon Jan 31 06:06:31 EST 2011
Louis Pouzin (well) wrote:
> Parminder,
>
> Quite clearly MetroPCS is testing FCC muscles. Hopefully US consumers
> should react and test MetroPCS muscles.
Hi Louis
>
> Is MetroPCS (or AT&T, or Verizon, etc ..) operating in India ? Is
> India gov supporting NN ? If so the Indian telecom authority could
> rule that telecom operators in India may not discriminate services
> offered to Indian consumers, or else they would not be allowed to
> offer international services in India.
These companies do not operate in India, but things are bad over here,
especially over the last few months. Net neutrality is being violated
wholesale on wireless networks. No one is noticing much less
complaining. One top telecom rather pointedly calls it 'pay per site'
tariff plan. see http://www.tatadocomo.com/pay-per-site.aspx . There is
no CS constituency addressing the issue.
>
> Then work out a similar rule within the BRIC group.
I really hope they could recognise how absence of global net neutrality
framework is going to work to their massive disadvantage vis vis the
Northern countries so solidly dominating the Internet content and
applications space. With the unprecedented economy of scale in digital
arena that leads to monopolies in most areas, abandoning net neutrality
means that late starters have little chance. Various trade agreements
like WTO, and cultural protection related measures which were a major
global governance issues have simply no meaning in the new digital
paradigm. Hope developing countries wake up before it is too late.
Global civil society, or at least civil society that from developing
country, should be helping frame this key issue for developing countries
but there is not much evidence of it
Parminder
>
> fwiw
> - - -
>
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 6:02 AM, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net
> <mailto:parminder at itforchange.net>> wrote:
>
> quote from the article below
>
> We're already seeing what a world without real Net Neutrality will
> look like. Just weeks after the FCC's vote, MetroPCS, the nation's
> fifth-largest wireless carrier, announced new plans that would
> block popular applications like Skype and Netflix while favoring
> YouTube
> <http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/01/metropcs-net-neutrality/>.
> This is particularly egregious because MetroPCS serves a
> lower-income audience that is increasingly moving toward the
> mobile Web as their only way to get online.
> (quote ends)
>
> Highlights the development aspect of non NN wireless Internet,
> when mobile internet is likely to be the main way to access
> Internet in the poorer areas of the world. And the anti NN rules
> ensure that it is the content and applications from the North that
> consumers in the South remain hooked to and dependent on. A wholly
> new and very potent North-South dependency paradigm is now being
> built over the non NN architect of mobile Internet, and I hope
> progressive global civil society takes notice and has something to
> say on this. If this is not an issue that IGF should take up in
> its plenary, than i dont think it is doing much of any worth.
> Parminder
>
> http://www.truth-out.org/the-not-so-neutral-net67276
>
>
> The Not-So-Neutral Net
>
> Monday 24 January 2011
>
> by: Jenn Ettinger | *YES! Magazine | News Analysis*
> <http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/the-not-so-neutral-net>
>
> /*The FCC's new rules on Net Neutrality open the Internet to
> corporate discrimination. But it's not too late to preserve
> Internet freedom.*/
>
> The Internet was created as an "open" or "neutral" platform, and
> net neutrality is the principle that ensures that Internet
> providers can't interfere with a user's ability to access any
> content on the Web, whether it's a community blog, a YouTube
> video, or a major news site. It's essentially the First Amendment
> of the Internet.
>
> In late December, the Federal Communications Commission enacted
> new rules on net neutrality—rules that are supposed to protect
> Internet users from discrimination and to prevent Internet
> providers like AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon from acting as
> gatekeepers on the Web.
>
> But the FCC missed the mark, and its rules not only fail to
> protect Internet users, but bolster the big phone and cable
> companies' ability to carve up the Internet among themselves. As
> Net Neutrality champion Senator Al Franken said, the rules are
> "simply inadequate to protect consumers or preserve the free and
> open Internet." The limited protections leave the door open for
> the phone and cable companies to favor their own content or
> applications.
>
> During the presidential campaign, Barack Obama came out strongly
> in favor of net neutrality, saying he would "take a back seat to
> no one" on the issue. But in the end, Obama's FCC chairman, Julius
> Genachowski, failed to deliver on the president's promise, instead
> issuing ambiguous rules riddled with loopholes that corporate
> lobbyists will easily undermine.
>
> Over the past several years, the phone and cable companies have
> flooded Washington with millions of dollars and hundreds of
> lobbyists to buy support in Congress and put pressure on the FCC.
> Public interest groups and a few lawmakers have tried to fight
> back, and more than two million people have urged the FCC to adopt
> strong net neutrality rules, but Chairman Genachowski ultimately
> caved to industry demands and turned a deaf ear to the public. What
>
> *Went Wrong: Real vs. Fake Net Neutrality*
>
> At its core, real net neutrality is a clear rule of
> non-discrimination that governs all Internet providers. It means
> that your provider can't slow down your service in order to speed
> up someone else's. It means that your provider can't exploit legal
> loopholes to slow down your access to Netflix while speeding up
> Hulu because it happens to own Hulu. It means that there's one
> Internet, whether you access it from your home computer or your
> mobile phone.
>
> But the rules that the FCC passed in December are vague and weak.
> The limited protections that were placed on wired connections, the
> kind you access through your home computer, leave the door open
> for the phone and cable companies to develop fast and slow lanes
> on the Web and to favor their own content or applications.
>
> Worse, the rules also explicitly allow wireless carriers—mobile
> phone companies like AT&T and Verizon—to block applications for
> any reason and to degrade and de-prioritize websites you access
> using your cell phone or a device like an iPad. That means these
> companies could block something like the music service Pandora,
> while offering unlimited access to its own preferred applications,
> like VCast.
>
> Better Than Facebook?Better Than Facebook Photo courtesy of On the
> Commons
>
> Fed up with Facebook's commercialism, four NYU students have
> created an open source, peer-to-peer alternative: Diaspora.
>
> We're already seeing what a world without real Net Neutrality will
> look like. Just weeks after the FCC's vote, MetroPCS, the nation's
> fifth-largest wireless carrier, announced new plans that would
> block popular applications like Skype and Netflix while favoring
> YouTube
> <http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/01/metropcs-net-neutrality/>.
> This is particularly egregious because MetroPCS serves a
> lower-income audience that is increasingly moving toward the
> mobile Web as their only way to get online.
>
> Some companies are already marketing "deep packet inspection"
> technology that would allow carriers to nickel-and-dime you by
> charging you every time you visit Facebook or try to stream a
> Vimeo video. If MetroPCS gets away with its scheme—which appears
> to violate even the FCC's weak rules—you can bet that AT&T and
> Verizon will waste no time in unveiling their own plans, which
> would mean higher bills and fewer choices on the mobile Web.
>
> Lastly, the FCC's short-sighted action failed to contend with a
> series of drastic deregulatory decisions made during the Bush
> administration that severely hamstrung the FCC's ability to
> oversee the phone and cable companies. By failing to restore the
> agency's authority over broadband, the FCC risks seeing even these
> rules tossed out in court.
>
> The FCC rules were designed to appease the phone and cable
> companies—but even that didn't work. Verizon has already filed
> suit against the agency, showing that these gatekeepers will
> settle for nothing less than total deregulation and a toothless
> FCC. Undoing the Damage The FCC still has the opportunity to put
> in place a solid framework that would put the public interest
> above the profit motive of the phone and cable companies that it
> is supposed to regulate.
>
> *Undoing the Damage*
>
> The FCC's new rules are certainly a setback in the quest to
> protect the Web as an open platform and an integral piece of our
> communications infrastructure and our democracy. In the absence of
> clear FCC authority and oversight of the Internet and a strong Net
> Neutrality framework that protects your right to go wherever you
> want, whenever you want online, AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are
> free to interfere with your Internet experience.
>
> The FCC still has the opportunity to put in place a solid
> framework that would put the public interest above the profit
> motive of the phone and cable companies that it is supposed to
> regulate. And the FCC should take immediate steps to close the
> loopholes it created, to strengthen its rules, and to include
> wireless protections. The fight is far from over. We can work to
> change the rules, demand better oversight and consumer protections
> and make sure that the big companies can't pad their bottom lines
> on the backs of their customers.
>
> /Jenn Ettinger author photoJenn Ettinger wrote this article for
> YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses
> powerful ideas with practical actions. Jenn is media coordinator
> for Free Press, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working to
> reform the media.
> /
>
>
> --
>
> *Krittika Vishwanath*
> Research Associate
> IT for Change
> In special consultative status with the United Nations ECOSOC
> www.ITforChange.net <http://www.ITforChange.net>
> Skype id: krittika85
> Tel:+91-80-2665 4134, 2653 6890. Fax:+91-80-4146 1055
> Mobile: +91 9945267341
>
> Read our Teacher's Communities of Learning project's blogs, lesson
> plans and discussions here:
> http://bangalore.karnatakaeducation.org.in/
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> PK
>
>
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--
PK
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