Net Neutrality Pros And Cons: A Potentially Sticky Issue [OPINION] « John Wright | Software Developer | Los Angeles

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[This article ponders just a small bit of the pros and cons concerning Net Neutrality. Understand that I'm absolutely pro Net Neutrality as a policy, but I'm a bit divided on whether or not government should impose regulations to protect Net Neutrality. In the end, it seems like government regulations may be absolutely necessary to protect Net Neutrality, but whether the government will decide to regulate is another issue. Considering all this, Net Neutrality could be a potentially sticky issue for some time to come.]

My simple definition of Net Neutrality is…

“ISPs don’t touch the bits and bytes flowing through their pipes”

In other words, ISPs (Internet Service Providers) remain neutral concerning what internet traffic flows through their networks (or their “pipes”). ISPs just provide dumb pipes for the traffic to flow through. They remain neutral by not actively doing anything to the traffic, like filtering it or blocking it in any way. This is the way the internet has operated since it’s beginning (for the most part).

An example where an ISP acted in a non neutral way is when Comcast actively blocked BitTorrent traffic on its networks. In many ways, this is a fairly small thing they did. All paying customers of Comcast who did not use BitTorrent didn’t notice a thing. Comcast+BitTorrent users on the other hand, we’re stuck and would have been forced to switch ISPs in order to continue using BitTorrent, had the FCC not intervened.

This is small potatoes in comparison to what could be done by a non neutral ISP. Potentially, ISPs could exclude entire websites and networks of websites. They could offer preferred and speedier access to partnering digital media and news outlets. They could do a lot of potentially scary things. By controlling the network in such ways, ISPs could drastically change the internet as we know it to the extent that the network they offer could no longer truly be called “the internet”.

On the other hand, the ISPs own the pipes and who is to stop them from being non neutral? In the Comcast case, the FCC tried to stop them but in April 2010 it’s case was tossed by a federal court…

The question before the court was whether the FCC had the legal authority to “regulate an Internet service provider’s network management practice.” According to a three-judge panel, “the Commission has failed to make that showing” and the FCC’s order against Comcast is tossed.

In many ways this outcome is fair. If Comcast owns the pipes, who is to tell them what they can and can’t do with them? Or who should tell them what services they can and can’t offer? In a capitalist economy, shouldn’t the free market dictate that? Wouldn’t this cause competing ISPs to offer faster and better products? If their service is too restrictive, customers will go elsewhere right? Can’t the free market and net neutrality co-exist without outside regulation?

In an ideal world the free market should provide a lot of natural regulation, but in reality, it doesn’t always provide enough. I’m reminded of Allen Greenspan’s words concerning the 2008 economic downturn…

Mr. Greenspan said he made “a mistake” in his hands-off regulatory philosophy, which many now blame in part for sparking the global economic troubles. He quoted something he had written in March: “Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder’s equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief.” – WSJ

He was shocked that lending institutions didn’t regulate themselves in their own self-interest and the interest of their share holders. My point is that sometimes, regulation is necessary. Net Neutrality regulations may very well be necessary to keep the internet the same open place we know it as today.

But the internet and it’s openness has also created a lot of new issues. The impact of the internet on the world is huge and while it has solved many problems and made things possible that were previously impossible, it has also created new problems. For instance, BitTorrent is commonly used to distribute pirated software, music, movies and more. Pirating software is a lot like stealing, except by making a copy of something, no physical good has been stolen. The main violation is that the creators of the pirated media don’t get any credit for the pirated copy. Don’t the creators have a right to some compensation or royalties for their work? Of course they do, but everybody knows you can pirate it on BitTorrent for free. Who is losing here? We all are to some degree, but most obviously it’s the creators of the work who are losing the most.

So maybe BitTorrent should be blocked. But of course there are other ways to share pirated copies on the internet. Potentially a non neutral ISP might have strong anti piracy policies active in their network. They might also be in partnership with music, media and software companies to provide a convenient solution to paying for digital products. Much like Apples iTunes and App Store. It seems if paying for digital products was easier than pirating them, most people would pay. I also believe that most people would want to pay and make sure the creators of media get paid for their work rather than pirate it.

In Conclusion (I need to wrap this up)
The neutral internet is and has been a means for the little guy to actually compete with major players on this “world is flat” playing field. In turn this has sparked much innovation in technology and brought many benefits and progression. On the other hand some “walled garden” approaches to internet software have proved beneficial for the mainstream (Apple and Facebook?) , arguably helping mainstream users to reduce the information overload that is a side affect of the open and neutral internet. But “walled garden” control at a network level would drastically change the entire foundation of the internet. It’s really scary to think of an internet in any other form than the neutral one we’ve come to know.