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Nobody's Neutral In Net Neutrality Debate
ygslash writes Michael Wolff at USA Today has a long list of the many stakeholders in the net neutrality debate, and what each has to gain or lose. The net neutrality issue has made its way into the mainstream consciousness, thanks to grassroots activism and some help from John Oliver on HBO. But it's not as simple as just net neutrality idealists versus the cable companies or versus the FCC. One important factor that has raised the stakes in net neutrality is the emergence ("unanticipated" by Wolff, but not by all of us) of the Internet as the primary medium for distribution of video content. And conversely, the emergence of video content in general and Netflix in particular as by far the most significant consumers of Internet bandwidth. So anyone involved in the distribution of video content has a lot to gain or lose by the outcome of the net neutrality struggle.
Is slavery wrong?
Is the First Amendment a good idea?
Is the Second Amendment a good idea?
Are civil/gay/religious rights a good idea?
Etc. etc. Important things matter and people care about them. That's why we call them 'important'.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Who are the stakeholders? Well, let's see:
Only one of these "stakeholders" have opinions that actually matter, and that stakeholder sent "a groundswell of 3 million citizen comments, most of them, presumably, against the FCC's approach" [and in support of regulating ISPs as Common Carriers].
I think we're done here.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
In the case of Time Warner Cable/Comcast and other ISPs who also provide TV services, this is by design. The last thing they want is for you to realize that you don't need to pay them $100+ a month for a thousand channels - only four of which ever have anything decent on. They don't want you to decide that you'd rather stream videos from Netflix, YouTube, Amazon VOD, etc. The speeds they give you are "good enough" for normal web browsing. Any faster risks their monopoly Internet service provider business hurting their non-monopoly TV business and that can't be tolerated.
And just to make sure that Internet video doesn't supplant cable TV, they'll institute caps and "fast lanes" to kill off Internet Video, and keep charging you hundreds of dollars every month. Cable TV service - as it stands now - is going to be dying business a generation from now. The cable providers see this too and are working as hard as possible, short of actually innovating with their service (e.g. IP Television service or ala carte), to stave off the death for awhile longer.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Given: TV will be working over the Internet.
What's great about this new TV over Internet is that it is a lot more flexible than traditional cable TV.
This means more diverse program program content.
It means new content providers.
It means new delivery funding models.
This will challenge the existing access and content providers.
Given: There is and will continue to be a natural monopoly in Internet access to the consumer.
The major access provider is the cable company who has a separate, vested interest in TV.
Question: Would the consumer be better served if this access monopoly did, or did not limit/control how this new TV works.
If the answer is it should not control TV, then how does this work?
How is the bandwidth necessary to support this funded, and at what margin?
Answer: This is silly. If we had fiber we would not care about the bandwidth.
There is likely enough revenue in Internet pay for the fiber, but maybe not with the business models the providers are accustomed to.
The cable folks are in a conflict of interest because is would gut the TV part of cable.
The phone companies don't seem willing to make the leap, which is understandable given that they have no clue as to what regulatory environment they will see.
Municipal Broadband is a possible kickstarter.
We need competition among ISP's, but the natural monopoly prevents this.
One answer is to separate this natural monopoly from the ISP role.
This might make the folks owning the pipes common carriers who sell through separate, competing ISP's.
To be useful, this would have to strike a balance on the price these pipes so that both
a) ISP's can offer service at a reasonable price
b) the pipe owners have an incentive to put in fiber
It's not clear if such a balance is possible with the phone/cable or municipal utility business models.