Net Neutrality vs Government Sponsored Monopolies

01 Aug 06
Politics

This battle has been raging for what seems like forever. Some of you may have no clue what it’s about, and honestly I don’t think most people involved actually have a clue what it’s about. I’m going to break out the points I think are most important. (An aside, I have nothing against monopolies, only when they’re government enforced.)

The gist of it is the big telcos (bandwidth providers) want to be able to charge clients (websites, internet content and service providers) different rates or additional fees for prioritizing their traffic. What does this mean? If Google pays more per megabyte for their connection to AT&T it means their site will always come through faster than other people who do not pay the premium rate.

Conceptually it’s not a terrible idea, in fact it’s almost a good idea for certain aspects. The most common argument is for traffic that actually needs to get through, things like 911 calls over VOIP phone lines. Unfortunately when applied to reality the telco argument falls apart.

The reality of the situation is that prioritizing bandwidth only ever becomes necessary if the bandwidth provider has already oversold their connectivity. Put in simpler terms in my example, AT&T would only ever need to do this because they’ve sold more than they can provide. it’s the classic Springtime for Hitler scam, sell more shares than you have and hope no one comes to see the play. What’s troublesome is it’s ridiculously common.

I believe what’s happened is that a lot of bandwidth providers have done this hoping to save some cash and having lack of forsight. Also in efforts to dominate their markets they’ve underpriced their offerings. Now that the internet is booming more than ever they’re hurting because of their own bad business practices so they are paying MILLIONS to lobby congress and senate to allow them to charge more.

It gets more ridiculous. The bandwidth being used is already being paid for. TWICE! That’s right, because you are paying for your internet connection, that’s the bandwidth going to and from you. The people like google are paying for their internet connection, the traffic that goes too and from them. When you send something to google, you’re paying for it and so are they. When google sends something to you they’re paying for it and so are you.

I don’t know if the original problem is that the providers like AT&T undercharged, oversold, or just want more money… or all of the above. Any way you look at it, it’s pretty ridiculous. The providers should charge what they need to make a profit, and what they can to remain competitive. If they’re not charging enough then that’s their problem and they have to deal with it by innovating or raising prices. They don’t need to invent a brand new charge that is so open to abuses.

I think it’s completely fair that people that pay more money get more bandwidth–but not at the detriment to others. I pay for bandwidth. I have a limit, it’s 2000GB in a month. I’ve never hit that luckily, but if I do I fully expect to pay fees for the extra I use. It’s pretty basic simple economy. The telco’s propositions says something along the lines of those with a lot of money can pay premium and gaurantee preferential treatment because they’ll reduce priority of those paying less. That should never need to occur.

Where does my argument fall apart? Well traffic varies greatly. Sometimes sites have huge bursts in traffic and they want to ensure people can still get there in a reasonable amount of time. So do roads. Build bigger roads, build different paths to the same place. All of this has been in place for decades. The internet is not in danger except for the greed and incompetence of some higher ups.

But this seems to be the way of the world, and the crux of the problem. People do bad business or don’t plan well and think they can use their money to force the goverment to their favour. Unfortunately it is all too true. I posted a bit about that problem here:

Techdirt Article

Edit: In regular fashion, Slashdot has picked up on these exact points, 12 hours later