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More historical perspective on net neutrality
As the politics of the Internet have shifted over the past several years away from discussions of monopoly (or duopoly) control of the last mile (or first mile), the more it becomes clear to me that the telcos have achieved a powerful win.
By even making the debate be about “net neutrality” the very nature of the war has changed, for the worse (worse for us, better for the telcos).
Let’s look again at the history of the net here. Nobody forced the telcos at gunpoint to offer Internet service. In fact, the telcos were late to the party. But now that they have squeezed out all the competition that actually DID want to offer DSL service (such as CLECS), the incumbents now cry foul, that it’s “not fair”, that they can’t make enough money on Internet service. Boo hoo.
Those with knowledge of the history of local telephone service have seen this before. They first squeeze the competition out and then declare that they need to raise rates to make money. Except this time, it’s not quite so easy, because they have not squeezed out their only remaining rival for Internet access services: the cable companies. So the poor telcos actually have to offer competitive pricing. Yipes. That hurts. That’s not a Telco’s core competency and they aren’t accustomed to having to.
So of course they turn to what they do know - the legal and political systems. And for the most part, the net luminti have fallen right in their trap, pawns in the telco’s game.
What the telcos and their political allies managed to achieve by shifting this debate to one framed around “net neutrality” is let everyone forget that nobody forced the telcos to go into the Internet service business and nobody is forcing them to stay in it. If it’s bad business, get out. If it’s really that bad, nobody else will want to offer it either. Oh but wait, maybe they know somebody else might actually WANT the business (such as all those companies they squeezed out before to create this monopoly mess we’re in now).
So which is it? Is Internet service a bad business or a money maker? If it’s bad, then why are they fighting so hard to be in the business? If it’s good, why are they fighting so hard to tell everyone how bad it is?
Bill Gurley: Will the cable providers “break” the IP network?
Bill Gurley, of Benchmark Capital, provides some interesting insights on the future of the Internet and major issues of the next 10 years. It’s a good article, covering several different topics, but one thing that really stands out is the potential of the cable companies “breaking” the net as we know it. The cable providers dominate broadband in the US. Bill speculates that they might find it in their best interest to limit and control what users can do with their Internet connection:
…It is quite easy for a cable company to insert a half-second delay in its IP network. This delay will go unnoticed by standard Web users but would quite negatively impact the quality of after-market VoIP clients like Skype and Vonage. This would allow the cable company to “charge” for its own voice services. In other words, customers would pay extra to have their IP network back.
That’s pretty scary stuff. Cable companies “breaking” Skype and open-SIP VoIP to make their own VoIP products look better. I wouldn’t put it past them.
…What’s more, over the past 12 months, Comcast has terminated the accounts of users who use more bandwidth than the company prefers. Lackluster support of the “open cable” initiative over the years offers further proof that cable companies want as much control over the user experience as possible.
The question is, will users let them get away with it. One wonders. Considering that most users think the Internet is web surfing and email, they just might.
I like Bill a lot. He is a smart guy and I encourage you to read the whole article.
FBI asks for broad expansion of wiretapping laws
As I predicted, the FBI has asked for new laws to facilitate broad snooping at broadband internet service provider facilities. The first question is what will this mean for end-to-end encryption. The FBI wants to force Vonage, 8×8, AT&T, and other broadband telephone providers to enable easy wiretapping, but what about pure P2P systems like Skype (and even peer-to-peer SIP)? How will they force end-users to provide easy wiretapping of themselves? When will the government outlaw encryption, so that only the outlaws will have encryption?
From FBI adds to wiretap wish list:
If the FBI’s request is enacted, it will be very expensive. And, more importantly, my argument is that it doesn’t really help solve the real problem either. Why aren’t the existing laws enough? What’s wrong with getting a warrant and going to a particular service provider and getting the data they need? In fact, they already have greatly expanded wiretapping powers as part of the USA Patriot Act so they don’t even need court approval in many situations as things are now.
So to me, it looks like a lot of money wasted for no practical benefit. It will have little effect on real criminals since they can just use encryption and they will be the only ones using encryption if encryption is made illegal.
One potential positive side-effect of this kind of regulation is to push more functionality to the edge. If service providers cannot introduce new products to fill needs for users due to bureaucratic governmental red-tape, users will buy edge-devices to fill those needs (as they did for home routers).
Plan for ‘terror market’ scraped before it got off the ground
On Monday, the Pentagon announced a highly controversial plan for a terror futures market (see news story) that immediately drew harsh criticism. Accordind to AP “[Sen. Ron] Wyden said $600,000 has been spent on the program so far and the Pentagon plans to spend an additional $149,000 this year. The Pentagon has requested $3 million for the program for next year and $5 million for the following year.”
The crazy idea involved “setting up a stock-market style system in which investors would bet on terror attacks, assassinations and other events in the Middle East. Defense officials hope to gain intelligence and useful predictions while investors who guessed right would win profits.”
Today, CNN is reporting that the plan has been cancelled, shortly after Tom Daschle denounced the program on the senate floor as “an incentive actually to commit acts of terrorism” and calling the program a “plan to trade in death.”
The whole thing is just surreal.
