If you’ve read my columns before, it’s no secret I’m a staunch supporter of net neutrality rules.
For the sake of fairness – and genuine curiosity – I set out on a quest to find a legitimate and well-reasoned argument against the concept.
I believe I found that in the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank promoting public policies based on free enterprise and limited government interference.
While I disagreed with many parts of a Heritage Foundation research paper in November titled, “Beyond Hypothetical: How FCC Internet Regulation Would Hurt Consumers,” I learned a thing or two about the people on the other side of the fence, so to speak.
Let’s recap:
On its surface, net neutrality is a concept designed to – in the eyes of proponents – protect Internet users and content providers from Internet service-provider giants like Comcast, AT&T and Verizon. A set of rules, adopted by the Federal Communications Commission in February, are meant to keep traffic equal on the Web and prohibit ISPs from creating so-called fast lanes, giving paying content providers higher status.
Where the issue gets hairy – and what most of the argument around the topic is centered on – is determining who should be in charge of enforcing Internet rules, or whether there should be rules at all.
Responding to a call from President Barack Obama, the FCC rules put the reins in the hands of the government, effectively regulating the Internet as a public utility much like electricity or water services.
Opponents fall into a spectrum of categories, the most vocal being the ISPs themselves as they want to grow revenues like businesses are designed to do; those who favor small government and less federal regulation; and those who vehemently call for business freedom.
The authors of the Heritage Foundation report, James L. Gattuso and Michael Sargent, conclude the Internet marketplace should “function unimpeded, policed by competition and the same competition laws that apply to other industries.”
Net neutrality rules, they say, would impede business rights and leave Internet users worse off as a byproduct.
In fact, the report says – and perhaps rightly so – net neutrality rules squash ISP offerings that would effectively pull savings away from consumers. The authors argue fast lanes would require content providers to pay costs associated with high traffic, thus keeping consumers from hitting their bandwidth limits and having to pay extra themselves. Bandwidth limits are themselves highly controversial, but with many ISPs using them – including Springfield’s primary choices, Mediacom and AT&T – this argument makes sense. Why shouldn’t content providers that require a ton of bandwidth pay extra to keep their own customers’ costs down? Why shouldn’t they pay extra when they require more bandwidth than other websites? Streaming services, such as Netflix and Hulu, are examples here.
I begin to take issue with this reasoning here.
The opinions presented by the Heritage Foundation seem to leave out a key concept: ISPs do not own and did not create the Internet, so they are inherently different from other companies in that regard. No one truly owns the Internet. The whole idea is that it’s a system of computers and networks that everyone shares. It’s kind of like oxygen.
ISPs simply provide broadband service to others. They are a funnel through which consumers receive videos, photos and information from content providers and creators.
In that, the Internet is unique, not a place with clear confines. Its possibilities are seemingly without end.
So why should ISPs get to create the rules? Then again, is it up to the U.S. government to regulate it? I expect, to some, the answer is the lesser of two evils.
Should giant companies, concerned with revenues above all else, control such an awesome power as the Internet? Or should it be up to bureaucrats, the same category that brought us the IRS and National Security Agency? Shouldn’t the Web – an arguably more important concept than other “public utilities” to come before it – have special consideration?
These aren’t easy questions to answer.
I suspect rules governing the Internet will land somewhere in all camps. It’s ultimately the users who will decide.
When it comes down to it, the fastest, simplest and, most likely, cheapest way to get users the next season of “House of Cards” will reign.
Springfield Business Journal Web Editor Geoff Pickle can be reached at gpickle@sbj.net.
