Re: Addams Family or Ned Flanders? The FCC Internet Censorship Battle Heats Up

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Brett Glass <nnsquad () brettglass com>
> Date: October 14, 2008 11:50:46 AM EDT
> To: dave () farber net, "Ip ip" <ip () v2 listbox com>
> Subject: Re: Addams Family or Ned Flanders? The FCC Internet  
> Censorship Battle	Heats Up
>
> At 07:33 PM 10/13/2008, Lauren Weinstein wrote:
>
> > Greetings.  The FCC appears poised to push ahead with plans to  
> > auction off spectrum to provide "free" nationwide wireless Internet  
> > service, but wants to make sure that the Internet you access this  
> > way is thoroughly culturally shackled.
>
> So, let me get this straight. The FCC pillories Comcast for doing  
> content-neutral filtering of P2P activity, based on a set of  
> "principles" that say, among other things, that users should be able  
> to access the content of their choice. They then turn around and  
> announce that they intend to auction off spectrum on the condition  
> that users NOT be able to access the content of their choice?
>
> > Another question we might ask -- does it make sense to hand off the  
> > entire nationwide control of this unused spectrum to a single  
> > entity?  Why not make it available on reasonable terms to the  
> > various smaller spectrum-starved regional and local wireless  
> > entities -- we might actually see some vibrant Internet access  
> > competition enabled that way.
>
> Indeed.
>
> Another thing that must be considered is the mandated business model  
> in which the licensee is compelled to give away free service. Our  
> own wireless ISP does give away some free service -- but not on the  
> scale that is being proposed! Due to the high cost of Internet  
> backbone bandwidth in rural areas such as ours (which, again, is  
> kept high by a lack of direct backbone access or reasonable pricing  
> of backhauls), neither we nor anyone else could afford to give away  
> as much as is mentioned in the M2Z proposal in our area. Any  
> provider that did would lose its shirt.
>
> What's more, what would one do to prevent someone from buying a  
> dozen radios, connecting them all to the free service, and  
> aggregating the bandwidth so as to get unreasonably large amounts of  
> bandwidth at no cost? I could see proposing a cap on the price of  
> service (perhaps a sliding one, depending upon the cost of backbone  
> bandwidth). But making any service -- filtered or not -- free to all  
> comers, especially with a mandate to serve high cost areas, would  
> impose an unsustainable business plan upon the provider to which the  
> spectrum was granted.
>
> --Brett Glass




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