Re: Who has the potential to make things worse?"
- From: presidentbyamendment <rick_hohensee@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 3 Nov 2009 06:04:15 -0800 (PST)
On Nov 3, 8:32 am, "Dionysus" <no.surren...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
FROM WSJ
HEAD: Will the Internet Survive Its 40th?
SUB-HEAD: The net neutrality battle pits broadband builders against content
providers
By L. GORDON CROVITZ
The Internet recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of its founding, just
in time to be welcomed in Washington by opposing political visions of its
future. One is reflected in a proposal called the Internet Freedom
Preservation Act, which would empower regulators to micromanage the Web. The
alternative, the Internet Freedom Act of 2009, would keep regulators away..
As their similar names suggest, these laws, sponsored respectively by Rep..
Edward Markey (D., Mass.) and Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.), are both
ostensibly intended to keep the Internet open. The two sides disagree about
whether the way to do this is via firmer control or by keeping regulators
away.
Into this divide has marched the Federal Communications Commission (FCC),
which under the banner of "net neutrality" proposes an expansion of its
powers over the Web. The agency argues it needs to control broadband
Internet providers to make sure they don't discriminate in favor of or
against any particular content, application or device. FCC Chairman Julius
Genachowski acknowledges that his agency operates in an "uncertain legal
framework" that makes it unclear what power it has to set rules on the Web.
Despite this uncertainty, he wants his agency to "evaluate violations of the
nondiscrimination principle as they arise, on a case-by-case basis."
One way to look at the battle over net neutrality is simply as one set of
companies against another. There are the network owners and administrators,
who want to continue to control access rules, pricing and traffic management
on their networks. Then there are content companies and other users of the
network, who want regulators to ensure easy access for them.
The corporate dividing lines are growing hazier. Microsoft and Yahoo
recently dropped out of a net-neutrality lobbying group. Google, which has
in the past supported some definition of net neutrality, is now not so sure
about the wisdom of giving regulators broad authority. "It is possible for
the government to screw the Internet up big time," Google Chief Executive
Eric Schmidt recently told the Washington Post.
Even the FCC proposal yields on many once-sacred net-neutrality precepts.
Its rules would be subject to "reasonable network management," so that
providers could treat bandwidth-hogging content such as video differently
from simple email. Providers would be able to respond to increasing demand
by rationing services through premium-pricing models.
The uncertainty over how to ensure an open Web is the latest example of how
technology is moving so quickly that our regulatory institutions can't keep
up. A new book, "The Laws of Disruption" by technology consultant Larry
Downes, explains this gap with a powerful idea: "Technology changes
exponentially, but social, economic and legal systems change incrementally."
We're used to ever-increasing computing power and endless innovation online,
but politicians and regulators are left trying to manage technologies beyond
their control or understanding.
"The mistake regulators and those who enable them continue to make is trying
to micromanage individual technologies or applications," Mr. Downes writes.
"The bottom line is simple. Encouraging infrastructure is good;
micromanaging it is bad."
Why do emotions run so high on what is in essence a technical debate about
how to run a network? Mr. Downes told me last week that "consumers have been
done a great disservice by corporate interests on both sides of this fight,
who have reduced a complicated business and technical problem into a sound
bite. They've been told that net neutrality is nothing more and nothing less
than a fight for the soul of the Internet."
His view is that "U.S. consumers have plenty of reasons to be suspicious of
both the FCC and the communications industry." His advice: "Consumers should
ask themselves which of these powerful interests is more likely in the end
to abuse its power. Who, in other words, has the greater potential to make
things worse for everyone?"
His answer seems sensible: "Absent any evidence of serious market failure
yet, I'd much rather deal with the devil I know than a resurgent FCC."
The best defense against access providers' acting unreasonably is more
competition. The alternative would treat the modern network of the Web as if
it were the 19th-century network of railroads, with the FCC as a modern-day
version of the Interstate Commerce Commission, which set rail rules and
tariffs, slowing innovation in transportation until the agency was abolished
in 1995 as a bureaucratic anachronism.
In highly regulated industries, regulations become barriers to entry. It's
costly for new competitors to comply with the rules, which are designed for
incumbents. As the U.S. falls further behind in broadband, we need more
innovation and more competition, not a cozy, regulated cartel.
Technology may be changing faster than we can keep track, but we are well
acquainted with the frailties and foibles of human institutions in
Washington. Sometimes it's wiser for mortals to stand aside and leave
technology to advance at its own pace. After its first 40 years delivering
freedom and abundance, the Web has earned the benefit of the doubt.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SOME COMMENTS FROM THE SITE
The success of the Internet is that it stayed one step ahead of the
political crowd. It was always slightly out of control from a content point
of view, but self controlled technically. What good is a politician without
control? These people are proposing a solution in search of a problem. They
can't even agree on what 'net neutrality' is.
``````````````````````````
Exactly. It is so infuriating that the people who go to the best schools and
become successes in the private sector still can't see that the enemy of a
free market (and a free people, in general) is not a corporation, which must
live and die by the value it gives to its consumers, but the government,
which is not constrained by the evil "profit motive" and is motivated by the
virtuous paradigm of "fairness".
The fools at Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo must now realize what can of worms
they opened up when they went begging to the government to regulate
broadband providers so that they can foist their content costs upon them. In
their folly, these three tech giants have unleashed the Devil upon the last
bastion of free market economics and capitalism. And it is even worse now
because the Obama Administration cannot help itself in trying to regulate
private consumer behavior. Now all Americans get to pay for the folly of
these three selfish companies (and let's not forget Mozilla, with its sorry
op-ed last week).
````````````````````
Thanks, Google, for taking the tech industry towards the same
anti-competitive status as most other 'old' industries. Eric Schmidt next to
Obama was a scary sight, b/c it was the tech industry finally making its bed
with the state. Microsoft and others are finally getting it, let's hope its
not too late.
***************
This needs repeating: "The best defense against access providers' acting
unreasonably is more competition. The alternative would treat the modern
network of the Web as if it were the 19th-century network of railroads, with
the FCC as a modern-day version of the Interstate Commerce Commission, which
set rail rules and tariffs, slowing innovation in transportation until the
agency was abolished in 1995 as a bureaucratic anachronism."
More competition, and less ham-handed regulatory "stiflement," is always
preferred.
"Free-market capitalism is a network of free and voluntary exchanges in
which producers work, produce, and exchange their products for the products
of others through prices voluntarily arrived at." -- Murray N. Rothbard
"It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or
the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least
blind references to freedom of speech or press serves as a distraction from
the critical examination of other communication policies. "--Mark Lloyd, FCC
Diversity Czar Appointed by Obama
Dionysus
We need name neutrality, but I'm not going to explain it until I'm
President.
Emails from Stallman give me the skanes.
Rick Hohensee
presidentbyamendment.com
.
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