Net Neutrality - Should we be concerned?

We take for granted the concept of Internet neutrality, the idea that your broadband connection will wing you to any Web site at a pace limited only by the speed of the network. I can only imagine the tangled mess the Web would be if every site had to cut a deal with all the different broadband providers. Yet the current system in which you get whatever information you want as fast as your connection can deliver it is under attack on several fronts.

In our current system, end-users pay for Internet service, and Web sites pay for Web hosting and incoming connections (but not for delivering data). This system has worked so far, but in recent months, executives of several large telco ISPs have suggested that companies delivering information over the telco infrastructure—say Google—should pay for that privilege. And if the information being delivered is bandwidth-consuming video clips and phone calls, they should pay even more.

What's behind this strategy? The phone companies are worried that Voice over IP services such as Skype and Vonage threaten their businesses. And in the long run, video over IP could threaten cable TV providers as well.

In most cases, I agree with the free-market argument, which says companies should make deals that are in their best interest and then let consumers choose the services they want. Internet access is different, though, because your choice of broadband providers is often very limited. In most markets, broadband service is either a monopoly or a duopoly. Your options are your phone or cable company, which use lines and rights-of-way granted to them as monopolies. These companies have argued strongly that they shouldn't be required to make their infrastructures available to competing providers.

I argue just as strongly that Internet lines should remain open to all data, and that data should be allowed to travel as fast as the connection speed permits. The alternative that some of the telcos are suggesting is untenable. In their scenario, I would get to some Web sites quickly and to others slowly—depending on which ones my ISP has brokered a deal with.

The good news is that so far, the Net has for the most part remained open and neutral. But concerns about ISPs changing the playing field prompted Congress to hold hearings on the topic in February. It also spurred some senators to talk about introducing legislation to preserve the Net's neutrality. The big ISPs will fight any such legislation. If you care about an open Internet, let your Congresspeople know.—

Telcos in the US and other countries are reluctant to have their bandwidth encroached on by traffic from which they earn no revenue, and have been challenged over similar alleged incidents of VoIP blocking. Blocking VoIP traffic is technically difficult, but not illegal, and blocking specific types of internet traffic is on the increase.

Google, eBay, and Amazon could form their own consortium to spend the many billions of dollars needed to buy parts of the spectrum, and build a high-speed, nationwide wireless network.