Net Neutrality
Will the April 6th 2010 ruling in Comcast’s favour and against the FCC change the landscape?
What is net neutrality?
A principle for user access networks that prevents providers of internet access from restricting content or sites.
Net neutrality is good because...
- Users have access to all content on an equal footing no matter who their broadband provider is.
- Innovation is possible, ie youtube.
- If freedom of application is determined by the providers who polices their decision making? A short step to more sinister censorship?
- ISP's might be tempted to discriminate in order to offer their own inferior products.
Net neutrality is bad because...
- Some sites and applications consume more bandwidth than others and seriously degrade network performance to the detriment of users.
- Investment in network is deferred as the financial returns on providing the service are depressed by the obligation to allow access to all content and servers.
Why has this subject raised its head again?
In 2008 the FCC had admonished Comcast for blocking BitTorrent P2P file sharing traffic. Comcast took the case to the court of appeals in Washington and won on April 6th 2010. The court ruled that the FCC does not have the legal authority to enforce net neutrality. This is the first case to test the FCCs authority to protect network neutrality. Net neutrality is an extremely emotive subject not least because of the vociferous and often highly opinionated voice of the digital community.
Does this mean that the ISPs and cable operators can or will now abandon these principles and discrimate against the traffic they don't like?
Probably not. Comcast has commented that they are in favour of the principle of network neutrality and it is likely that the FCC's authority will be changed to allow them to rule on this issue.
The bottom line for Apollo?
For those telcos providing service direct to consumers this is of course deeply relevant. They could, were neutrality abandoned, become more profitable. On the face of it good news for Apollo as some of them are our end customers and some of the larget buyers of network. If they were more profitable they'd be able to pay for quality network and invest in additional network that they currently can't justify.
Bandwidth hungry applications such as file sharing, gaming and youtube might be discriminated against by the ISPs, there are some clear losers.
On the other hand we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that the ISPs would be making more money largely because they were able to manage with lower speed networks if their customers were prevented from gorging on p2p etc. Not such good news for providers of network such as Apollo.
The FCC will now decide whether it will ask Congress for authority to regulate the Internet as a common carrier, as Net Neutrality proponents have suggested, or move to reclassify the internet as a telecommunications service, under which it already has detailed authority to govern. The FCC overstepped its boundaries in the Comcast issue, and does not have a clear legislative definition of its authority in this highly sensitive area.
Comcast must feel that while it may have won this battle, it may lose the war if and when the FCC is granted the authority by Congress to regulate on this matter.
From Apollo's point of view, we're neutral on neutrality.