FC: Lizard replies to ACLU demanding more Internet regulation

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[Original ACLU press release follows. --Declan]

---

Date: Wed, 10 Jul 2002 09:44:05 -0700
From: lizard <lizard () mrlizard com>
To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>

Well, first off, the Internet always HAS been under (mostly) private 
control. The vast majority of the computers which compose the Internet are 
privately owned, and the owners of those systems have always been able to 
bounce traffic, censor traffic, read traffic, etc.

> "Second, citizens and community groups must play an
> aggressive role in shaping the future of the high-speed Internet,
> especially ensuring that local networks offer a diversity of
> broadband content and services."

Scary stuff.

The value of the Internet has always been in the fact anyone can post 
content. The idea that someone must mandate "diverse content" is rather 
terrifying. What it means, in reality, is that the ACLU is unhappy with 
what people CHOOSE to put on the net, thus, someone (i.e, you and me) 
should be required to fund content which the ACLU finds more pleasing.

For all their pretenses of populism and democracy, the left is extremely 
elitist. When confronted with the raw truth of what the masses WANT to 
read, see, or listen to, they fall back in terror, squeaking piteously of 
'the public interest', all the while ignoring the fact that no one in the 
public is interested.

Anyone who claims that there's nothing but predigested corporate pap on the 
net need only go to http://www.yamara.com/junk/xl970512.html to see what 
true diversity is all about. You'll never, not in a million years, have 
anyone on NPR or PBS tell you how to say "Oh my god, there's an axe in my 
head" in Klingon.

---

ACLU Warns of Threat to Online Free Speech From Cable Monopolies

Technical Report Shows How Cable Operators Can Interfere With Internet
Access

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, July 10, 2002

Contact: Barry Steinhardt, ACLU, 917.349.4893 (on 7/10) or
212.549.2508 (after 7/10);
Jay Stanley, ACLU, 202.715.0818;
Jeffrey Chester, CDD, 202.452.9898

WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today called on the
government to protect the Internet from the power of monopolistic
cable providers and issued twin reports examining the technical and
policy sides of the issue.

"Many people don't realize that if current policies continue, a
handful of big monopolies will gain power over information flowing
through the Internet," said Barry Steinhardt, Director of the ACLU's
Technology and Liberty Program. "Freedom of speech doesn't mean much
if the forums where that speech takes place are not free."

The first report issued today is a 78-page technical study
commissioned by the ACLU -
http://www.aclu.org/issues/cyber/broadband_report.pdf - and prepared
by a Maryland-based telecommunications engineering consulting firm,
the Columbia Telecommunications Corporation (CTC). The second report
is a brief ACLU policy analysis -
http://www.aclu.org/issues/cyber/NoCompetition.pdf

At issue is the ongoing conversion by consumers from a dial-up
Internet (based on slow modem connections over phone lines) to far
faster "broadband" connections (mostly using cable modems). With
dial-up, Internet access is provided over a medium that provides
open, equal access to all: the telephone system. But with the shift
to cable, Internet access must be adapted to a medium that has been
far more subject to centralized control. The danger, the ACLU said,
is that the Internet will come under private control.

"The path out of this predicament is clear," said Jeff Chester,
Executive Director of the Center for Digital Democracy, which
collaborated in preparation of the reports. "First, the FCC must act
to preserve the Internet's open, common-carrier status in the cable
context. Second, citizens and community groups must play an
aggressive role in shaping the future of the high-speed Internet,
especially ensuring that local networks offer a diversity of
broadband content and services."

The report by CTC includes an in-depth examination of two cable
systems (in Portland, OR and Tacoma, WA) and interviews with
officials at two Internet Service Providers that have been excluded
from many cable broadband systems.

Among the report's findings and recommendations:

- There are no insurmountable technical barriers to open access on
most U.S. cable systems;

- Broadband cable companies should adopt a "public interest
architecture" based on principles such as maximizing consumer choice
and competition among ISPs;

- The dominant emerging technique for allowing multiple ISPs on cable
Internet networks, which CTC calls "rebranding and resale of
wholesale services," actually leaves the cable operator in control of
the product. As a result, it creates only the illusion of real
competition and consumer choice, and is not true open access.

"Our finding is that there are no technical reasons why the policies
backed by the ACLU and other advocates cannot be adopted," said Dr.
Andrew Afflerbach, Vice President of CTC and an author of the report.

The ACLU's policy analysis explains how the government is failing to
extend to the broadband Internet crucial regulatory protections that
help keep today's Internet free and open to all. Unless the
government changes course, the ACLU warns, a handful of large
corporations will have both the incentive and the ability to
interfere with the free flow of information across the network.

"Protecting free expression on the Internet is a high priority for
the ACLU," said Steinhardt. "In the same way that we have battled
Internet censorship by the government, we will also fight to make
sure that private corporations aren't allowed to get into a position
where they can dictate what we read and say online."

The ACLU policy analysis and the CTC report are online at
http://www.aclu.org/issues/cyber/broadband.html
The Center for Digital Democracy is online at
http://www.democraticmedia.org




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