Give me Net Neutrality, Or Give Me Death - January 12, 2010

Interesting article this past week published in the National Journal describing how the debate around Net Neutrality has escalated into a "free speech" debate with each side citing 1st Amendment grounds as to why Net Neutrality (NetNet) rules should or should not be enacted. In particular, while one side is citing NetNet as required to *protect* 1st Amendment speech of individual users...the other side is saying that implementing this rule could in fact, infringe upon the free speech of content providers, ISPs, and portals. As summed up by National Cable & Telecommunications Association President Kyle McSlarrow:

Strict new FCC regulations might infringe on the ability of content providers to speak "how" they wish by preventing them from paying for better service; might prevent innovations by ISPs that would better facilitate free speech; could amount to "forced" speech; and might impact the delivery of high-bandwidth services such as video programming by laying a path toward government regulation of bandwidth use.
For the uninitiated, NetNet is a proposal by the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that seeks to add certain principles to the regulation of US Internet Service Providers (ISPs) ensuring that all traffic sent over an ISPs "pipes" be treated equally. In effect, it would stop an ISP from stopping or preferring one type of traffic (e.g. Voice over IP) except in very specific circumstances.

On one side of the debate, proponents of the FCC's proposed NetNet rules believe they are necessary in order to preserve the free speech of individuals and keep ISPs from regulating, controlling, or preferring certain content over other content. In effect, this side believes that institutionalizing the open Internet is a cornerstone for the future success of the global network. It should be noted that the biggest proponents of NetNet are the large application and portal providers (e.g. Google, Yahoo, etc.) who say they are acting on behalf of the consumer. That is probably true, however, these are also multi-billion dollar companies with significant revenue and profit at stake.

On the other side of the debate, opponents of NetNet believe that the current Internet model works fine, and that the imposition of these proposed new rules is not only unnecessary, but also will restrict the future growth and development of the Internet. On the first point...they are probably right (the Internet works pretty well), though on the second, that is debatable. It should also be noted that the opponents of NetNet are the large Internet Carriers (who provide the backbone for the Internet), Cable Companies, and the large phone companies (e.g. Verizon, AT&T). Again, all companies with multi-billions of dollars at stake.

As for whether or not NetNet is a 1st Amendment argument, no one really knows. Critical to this question is whether or not a company even has 1st Amendment rights (or if these are only vested in individuals). Also, there are a lot of old court cases that seem to argue both sides of this question. None the less, it is clear that NetNet issues are going to be a source of major debate in 2010 and a topic of significant interest and debate.

LINK: National Journal: Net Neutrality Fight Turns To First Amendment

LINK: Wikipedia: Net Neutrality