Politicians Freak Out Over New FCC Neutrality Moves, Not Realizing They Probably Won't Do Anything

from the I-have-absolutely-no-idea-what-I'm-upset-about dept

Now that I've had some additional time with the FCC boss Tom Wheeler's new net neutrality proposal and have talked to a few lawyers and consumer advocates, I'm starting to think the agency's announcement was almost entirely political theater. All the FCC really said is that it wouldn't appeal the Verizon case, and would begin a meandering public conversation about how to vaguely protect the Internet under shaky Section 706 authority the FCC knows it doesn't have. Layered on top were empty promises about improving competition and some empty threats about reclassifying ISPs as common carriers if they don't behave (which is supposed to be a threat, but every ISP lobbyist on K Street knows they won't do this if they weren't willing to do it already).

In short, the FCC vaguely promised to maybe think about some stuff after a glacial, year long conversation. Cue the absolute, unbridled, partisan hyperbole shitstorm:

"Ranking Republicans called the FCC's efforts to revive net-neutrality rules "a solution in search of a problem," and plan to fight any new rules. Rep. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee will introduce legislation in the coming weeks to block what she calls the "socialistic" proposal. "Federal control of the Internet will restrict our online freedom and leave Americans facing the same horrors that they have experienced with HealthCare.gov," Blackburn said in a statement."

You apparently don't understand that the FCC's proposal won't actually do anything, but you do know it's certainly socialist and freedom killing? The sad part is that issues like a healthy, functioning Internet with competitive balance really shouldn't be partisan at all. It's in the interest or everyone that networks work well and that honest, healthy competition improves service and drives down costs, while limiting the bad behavior of large network gatekeepers.

Well ok, not everyone. If you actually want to understand whether a policy will be good or bad for consumers, ignore all the think tanks and politicians and watch the ISP response. Specifically watch AT&T, which has the biggest lobbyist operations and the biggest mouth when truly consumer-friendly policy gets passed. AT&T supported the original rules because they had oodles of loopholes and didn't cover wireless (Verizon only sued in the hopes of killing off FCC authority entirely). Note how AT&T thinks all this socialist freedom killin' is just a splendid idea:

"AT&T, the second-largest wired broadband provider in the U.S., said it believes the FCC has the authority under Section 706 to preserve Internet openness...."AT&T has built its broadband business, both wired and wireless, on the principal of Internet openness," AT&T said in a statement. "That is what our customers rightly expect, and it is what our company will continue to deliver. That is also why we endorsed the FCC's original rule on Net neutrality, and is why we pledged to adhere to openness principles even after the recent court decision."

Knowing the FCC pretty well after more than a decade of watching them, what I think you'll ultimately see at the end of this new "conversation" is a cross-industry set of self-regulatory voluntary guidelines "prohibiting" ISPs from doing the kinds of things they never intended to do anyway -- like blocking your access to entirely legal websites. There might be particular cases where the FCC pushes for greater transparency in peering debates (especially if the ongoing Netflix standoff doesn't improve), but nothing that will truly rattle any slats. The primary goal here is making sure incumbent ISPs maximize revenues and keep the campaign contributions coming. Consumer protection is just pillow talk. For both parties.

What you won't see in any way (and probably wouldn't be enforceable under 706 anyway) is hard rules governing the more subtle sort of things network neutrality folks should actually be worried about, such as predatory pricing and the use of broadband usage caps as a weapon (like AT&T's "sponsored data"). This, unfortunately for consumers, is considered "creative pricing innovation" by both the current FCC and industry alike, and the only ones who should be freaking out at the moment are the people who are going to foot the bill for all this supposed creativity.

Filed Under: fcc, net neutrality, section 706
Companies: at&t, verizon

Comcast Mega-Corp Shoveling Money At FCC Subcommittee

from the making-it-rain dept

For a long time, people have argued over whether or not corporate lobbying was legalized bribery or protected speech. It's a fascinating argument to me, personally, mostly because I don't understand why we're arguing over such a silly question. Let's just pretend I came up with some kind of awesome prose that dutifully began with a reference to the fact that NSA supporters in our government were paid off by defense contractors, deftly moved on to mention that roughly half of our proud public servants in Congress jump ship for lobbying gigs, and finish it all off with me just shouting the name Chris Dodd at you, and we can all get back to the business of not doing anything to stop this obvious bribery. Or, rather, we can get back to it in a moment, right after I tell you all about how Comcast gives the subcommittee controlling the FCC roughly all of the money.

Comcast has been among the top corporate donors to members of Congress, and following the money shows that they have been focusing their giving on members of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, which has jurisdiction over the Federal Communications Commission.

-House members of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology received $853,525 from Comcast from January 1, 2001 - December 31, 2012.
-Contributions from Comcast to House members serving in the 109th, 110th, 111th and 112th Congresses total $6,678,446 from January 1, 2001 - December 31, 2012.
-Representative Greg Walden, R-Ore., Chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology has received $53,000 from Comcast from January 1, 2001 - December 31, 2012.
-Representative John Dingell, D-Mich., has received $100,775 from Comcast from January 1, 2001 - December 31, 2012 more than any other member of the House of Representatives. He is a member of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology.

These numbers may not seem staggering, but you're thinking about them in terms of corporate levels, not government bribery. In the game of bribing the folks directly involved in overseeing the overseeing body that Comcast has to worry about with their Time Warner merger, they're amongst the top contributors. That's all that matters, not the totals. Anyone else see a problem with this?

Now, what everyone is really waiting for is to see if the Justice Department is going to get involved and scream "antitrust." However, please, please keep in mind that this subcommittee we're talking about was elected to represent the people of their districts and the nation as a whole. And Comcast is outbidding you. And tons of companies are outbidding you. It's difficult to see how corporate lobbying doesn't create a massive conflict of interests, with this serving as a prime example.

Filed Under: congress, fcc, lobbying
Companies: comcast

Cue The Hyperbole And Hysteria: FCC Outlines Timid, Murky Plan To (Maybe) Defend Net Neutrality

from the hysterical-and-useless dept

The dysfunctional hyperbolic screaming match known as the net neutrality debate is about to be doused in napalm. The neutrality discussion has been in a holding pattern since Verizon managed to defeat the FCC's net neutrality rules in court. Despite some press commentary, the loss wasn't quite the killing blow many imagined, since the rules themselves quite intentionally didn't do all that much (no protection for wireless, plenty of loopholes allowing ISPs to blame anti-competitive behavior on network security issues or congestion), and the court ruling did state the FCC still has some authority to regulate broadband ISPs.

That left the door open to a number of FCC options. Would they appeal? Would they reclassify ISPs as common carriers to solidify and broaden FCC authority? Would they give lovely speeches substituting theatrics and show ponies for policy while doing as little as possible? Would they try to draft different rules claiming new-but-still-shaky authority under Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act? Based on what I can see, it's going to be a combination of the last two.

According to an FCC announcement today, the agency is not going to appeal the Verizon loss. Instead, they're going to slowly contemplate new rules governing broadband carriers, using shaky Section 706 authority over net neutrality issues (which many argue don't exist) to fight "improper blocking of and discrimination" of content on a "case by case" basis. The FCC has launched a public proceeding (pdf) and request for comment to determine the structure of the rules. A statement from FCC boss Tom Wheeler makes a numeric list of somewhat-ambiguous promises, then insists the FCC will keep ISP common carrier reclassification on the table:

"2. Keep Title II authority on the table. As the Court of Appeals noted, as long as Title II – with the ability to reclassify Internet access service as a telecommunications service – remains a part of the Communications Act, the Commission has the ability to utilize it if warranted. Accordingly, the Commission’s docket on Title II authority remains open."

In other words, the FCC is warning ISPs that if they don't stay on their best behavior, the FCC will take what in telecom circles is affectionately called "the nuclear option" and broaden its regulatory authority by reclassifying ISPs as common carriers. The problem is that most ISPs and analysts know the traditionally timid and politically-sensitive FCC won't do that, but the FCC apparently hopes somebody somewhere will believe the agency has the spine for such a fight. Most consumer advocates had hoped for common carrier reclassification, arguing that anything else was just uphill legal fisticuffs.

While a good portion of the FCC's announcement is political theater (we'll think about doing some stuff, someday, after lobbyists and partisans water it down to the point of uselessness), there are a few marginally-promising portions, like this bit tacked on to the end:

"6. Enhance competition. The Commission will look for opportunities to enhance Internet access competition. One obvious candidate for close examination was raised in Judge Silberman’s separate opinion, namely legal restrictions on the ability of cities and towns to offer broadband services to consumers in their communities."

Wheeler's talking about protectionist legislation that has been written by broadband ISP lobbyists, and passed in more than 20 states. Such bills generally prohibit a town or city from even voting to improve their own broadband infrastructure -- even in cases where no private ISP will. They're usually awful measures that strip away community rights to protect lumbering, uncompetitive duopolies, and many go so far as to even clamp down on public-private partnerships like Google Fiber. Granted "looking" at a problem isn't the same as fixing it, but even commenting on these awful bills is more than the FCC has done historically.

As this site as long argued, the FCC could protect neutrality by focusing on reasonable, balanced policies that increase broadband competition. What we've gotten instead is empty lip service, with a heavy focus on "digital equality," or shoring up broadband coverage gaps (safe ideas that play well politically and ISPs tolerate because it involves unaccountable subsidies and lazy government auditing). Competition and high prices are subjects the FCC refuses to seriously address (they even refuse to publicize broadband pricing data).

As for the FCC's dubious authority under Section 706 under the Telecommunications Act, it should be noted that there's a push afoot to begin "modernizing" the Act starting this year, potentially making the FCC's shaky footing even shakier. That process is expected to take several years, during which more than a little lobbying time and money will be spent on ensuring the revision erodes regulatory authority over broadband even further. As for any new FCC's new rules, they'll take a long time to craft (again), and you can expect ISP lobbyists to have a better view of the rule-making procedures than consumers or objective experts. The end result will be rules that look good but are hollow and theatrical in nature.

With the neutrality debate so toxic, a better route for the FCC would be to instead focus almost entirely on improving broadband competition to drive prices down and quality up. Unfortunately, while the FCC says all the right things about valuing competition, the agency doesn't want to rattle the slats of deep-pocketed campaign contributors like Comcast, AT&T and Verizon. As a result we get timid, murky policy that perpetuates the status quo, ultimately resulting in mediocre and expensive broadband. On the plus side, if you enjoy large numbers of people yelling at one another with few if any of them actually understanding what they're fighting about -- you're in luck!

Filed Under: fcc, isp, net neutrality, regulation
Companies: verizon

Rep. Eshoo Admits Her Net Neutrality Bill Nobody Thought Would Pass -- Won't Pass

from the spinnin'-wheel dept

Earlier this month we noted how a group of representatives responded to the death of the FCC's net-neutrality rules by introducing the Open Internet Preservation Act of 2014, a bill that aimed to simply bring back the FCC's net neutrality rules (and all of the problems within). The bill, backed by Anna Eshoo was apparently introduced solely as a public relation stunt, given that it had absolutely no chance of passing. After years of distortion, noise and confusion, net neutrality is such an immensely toxic topic in Congress that nobody wants to touch it, assuming Congress was functional enough to pass a bill in the first place.

Speaking with C-Span, Eshoo admitted the bill has no chance of passing. So why bother? According to Eshoo it was the principle of the thing:

"She suggested it was to make a point. "I think that setting a bill down in the Congress of the United States in the form that it is in really reflects millions and millions and millions of people in our country, and most frankly around the world, that want the Internet to remain accessible and open and free to them." She called that an important principle.

Except Eshoo's making the wrong statement on the wrong principles. The rules' dubious legal underpinnings aside, most of the people who recently lamented the death of network neutrality rules forgot, or never knew, that the rules didn't do much of anything useful to begin with. They were based on framework language from the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Google (from Eshoo's district), didn't meaningfully cover wireless networks, and contained a lot of loophole language that allowed for any number of discriminatory network behaviors -- just as long as the network operator proclaimed it was being done for the health and security of the network. The rules did ban outright blocking of content, but that's something no ISP is dumb enough to do anyway for fear of incurring real consumer protections.

It was effectively the industry's way of enshrining rules that had no real teeth but would prevent the introduction of tougher rules. That was, until Verizon decided to have their cake and eat it too -- suing the FCC in an attempted killing blow to erode FCC regulatory authority over broadband. That didn't work, and the resulting loss killed neutrality rules but in some ways left the FCC's ability to regulate broadband ISPs intact. All eyes are now on precisely what track new FCC boss (and former cable lobbyist) Tom Wheeler wants to take this train of dysfunction.

Eshoo might think she's helping by trying to resuscitate the carcass of busted, legally unsupportable and intentionally wimpy neutrality rules "on principle," but the only PR statement that was made was that nobody on either side of the net neutrality debate in Congress actually seems to be entirely aware of what they're fighting over.

Filed Under: anna eshoo, congress, fcc, net neutrality, regulation

Speed Cam Contractor Redflex Accused Of Bribing Government Officials In 13 States

from the nothing-goes-faster-than-greased-wheels dept

Troubled and infamous traffic cam company Redflex is headed for even more trouble and infamy. In its relatively short history, Redflex has so far done the following:

• received an innovation award from the state of Arizona even as the state considered dumping the contractor
• pretty much admitted it ran cameras from 1997-2008 without proper FCC certification
• spent the first six months of 2013 removing more cameras than it installed, for a loss of $3.5 million in revenue
• had its camera systems in San Mateo and Santa Ana, CA declared to be in violation of California laws
• had to refund several thousand fines in Australia after clocking a woman driving at over 100 mph in a vehicle that couldn't reach those speeds
• failed to deliver any data (not just "some" data -- Redflex delivered nothing at all) on its cameras' effectiveness to Denver city officials, thus violating its contract with the city

Given its history over the last half-decade or so, it should come as no surprise that Redflex's ability to secure new contracts allegedly relies on illegal tactics.

A fired executive from a national red-light camera vendor claimed in an Arizona lawsuit that the company provided lavish gifts and bribes to government officials in 13 states to secure new contracts.

The New Jersey Star-Ledger reported Saturday that the bombshell allegations made a 13-page counterclaim by Aaron Rosenberg, former nationwide lead salesman for Redflex Traffic Systems of Phoenix, claimed that the firm “bestowed gifts and bribes on … officials in dozens of municipalities within, but not limited to the following states: California, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Florida, New Jersey, Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia.”

Rosenberg claimed Redflex bribed local officials with meals, golf outings and tickets to professional football and baseball games, calling the expenses “entertainment” or “celebratory tokens.”

Rosenberg lost his job after Redflex was banned from competing for contracts in Chicago by Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Apparently, even notoriously corrupt municipalities have their limits.

“Redflex was fired in Chicago for corruption. Nobody gets fired for corruption in Chicago,” said Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon (R-Monmouth), an outspoken critic of the cameras in New Jersey, who called for an investigation.

(Chicagoans should note that the contractor being considered for new speed cams, Xerox State and Local Solutions, is technically no better, albeit less tainted by outright corruption. Xerox's cameras in Baltimore had a 10-26% error rate when audited, meaning the contractor issued up to 70,000 erroneous tickets in 2012 alone.)

Redflex has, of course, denied this and vows to "aggressively defend" itself against these claims. But this latest claim won't do much to salvage its almost completely destroyed reputation. Redflex isn't alone in its troubles. Contractors and camera systems are facing intense backlash across the nation, especially as evidence of faulty cameras, backroom deals and general incompetence continues to surface.

The accusations against Redflex can hardly be considered a surprise, considering the symbiotic relationship between contractors and city governments that tends to form when a new source of revenue is spotted. As long as the cameras issue tickets and the tickets continue to be paid, no one involved at the city level has much reason to examine the inner workings very closely. And if they've been plied by tickets to sporting events and rounds of golf, it makes it that much easier to drown out the complaints of constituents.

Filed Under: arizona, bribery, california, colorado, fcc, traffic camera
Companies: redflex, xerox

Netflix, YouTube Streaming Gets Worse on Major ISPs, Who In Turn Blame the Deep, Dark Mysteries of the Internet

from the what-the-hell-is-going-on dept

Last week this blog entry by iScan developer David Raphael saw a lot of attention as proof positive that Verizon was violating network neutrality. Specifically, Raphael observed that services using Amazon Web Services accessed from his home FiOS connection (including Netflix) delivered bits more slowly than services accessed on his business FiOS connection. As his supposed nail in the neutrality-violation coffin, Raphael provided a chat transcript from a Verizon rep supposedly "confirming" that the company was throttling select services. This "proof" then bumbled and stumbled its way around the Internet as evidence neutrality had been trampled.

Except as anybody who has spent any time on the phone with a support rep knows, what comes out of their mouths may or may not have any direct tie to this particular plane of reality. It's also worth noting that the kind of Netflix stuttering Raphael saw has been going on for much of the last year across numerous ISPs, long before Verizon's recent court victory over the FCC's neutrality rules. Verizon also denied they were manipulating traffic in a statement sent to all media outlets:

"We treat all traffic equally, and that has not changed. Many factors can affect the speed a customer's experiences for a specific site, including, that site’s servers, the way the traffic is routed over the Internet, and other considerations. We are looking into this specific matter, but the company representative was mistaken. We are going to redouble our representative education efforts on this topic."

While Raphael may have stumbled into Verizon shenanigans, what he saw could also be explained by normal peak network or peering congestion, and we've long discussed the problems with crying net neutrality wolf. Peering relationships are indeed complicated, with ISPs, content companies, and Internet backbone operators all engaged in an endless tug of war over video profits and peering imbalances (I recommend this piece last summer from Jon Brodkin at Ars Technica or this piece from last week by GigaOM's Stacey Higginbotham).

With that as background, fast forward to this week when Netflix released their latest ISP streaming rankings, which show that most of the nation's biggest ISPs have been dropping in regards to their Netflix streaming performance. ISPs that partner with Netflix's Open Connect CDN do better in the rankings, and major ISPs have tried somewhat feebly to claim Netflix's attempt to name and shame them into using their CDN is a sort of reverse network neutrality.

Still, Verizon FiOS (and DSL), Comcast, and AT&T's U-Verse services have seen major drops in the rankings not entirely explained by their refusal to use Netflix's CDN. Being large network operators, you would imagine that they'd be able to explain what exactly is happening to stink up millions of broadband users' Netflix experiences, though Comcast, AT&T and Time Warner Cable refuse to comment to the media on their collective performance nose dive. Netflix also refuses to comment. Verizon, with all of their network expertise, continues to blame the problems on either unknown Internet bogeymen or Netflix:

"We state unequivocally that Verizon’s broadband Internet access services deliver a pristine user experience to our customers at any time of day on every day of the week. This has been repeatedly proven through independent testing by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which has conclusively demonstrated that FiOS Internet consistently delivers both download and upload speeds in excess of what we advertise. In short, our Internet customers often get more than they pay for. How the Internet works can be complicated, and consumers should be aware of the fact that the integrity of their home Internet connection is only a portion of the streaming video quality equation. If their broadband connection is functioning correctly, the source of their frustration and the content they wish to see may be one in the same."

In summation, the only major ISP wiling to comment on why millions of people are having YouTube and Netflix issues on fast connections insists "it's complicated." So what's really happening? One theory du jour is that companies like Verizon are abusing their gatekeeper position and letting their peering points to companies like Netflix saturate in order to gain leverage in negotiations and rhetoric, while giving a leg up to their own CDN or services (like Red Box Instant by Verizon). Verizon's certainly no stranger to these kinds of tactics, but again, there's not enough data to prove that hypothesis, and while neutrality rules are dead, big ISPs aren't exactly eager to do anything to invite new neutrality regulations.

The reality is that despite the best guesses of some very smart people, the jury is out because we lack enough data to make full conclusions just yet. The good news is we should see some more robust data in the coming months as data from collection operations like MLAB comes to light in looming FCC ISP performance reports. In addition, YouTube has started ranking ISPs based on YouTube streaming performance, which will also hopefully shed a little more light on precisely which Internet bogeymen are to blame for your stuttering video feed.

Filed Under: broadband, david raphael, fcc, net neutrality
Companies: at&t, comcast, netflix, verizon, youtube

New Net Neutrality Bill Introduced, Has No Chance Of Passing

from the this-is-not-the-solution-you're-looking-for dept

Well, this was inevitable, but a group of Representatives have introduced a new net neutrality bill, called the Open Internet Preservation Act of 2014, which attempts to bring back the FCC's rules that an appeals court struck down. The bill is more PR than anything else. For whatever reason (actually no good reason at all), net neutrality has become a purely partisan issue in Congress (Democrats for, Republicans against) and based on the fact that this bill only has Democrat sponsors, it means, first off, that it's only going to rekindle the same old fight without solving anything and go nowhere. But, more importantly, it's still the same old situation trying to kludge together a temporary solution for the real problem, which is the lack of a competitive market.

Filed Under: anna eshoo, congress, ed markey, fcc, henry waxman, laws, net neutrality

Losing Net Neutrality Is The Symptom, Not The Problem: Now Is The Time To Focus On Real Competition

from the beat-that-drum dept

For nearly a decade we've been trying to point out that the entire fight over net neutrality is something of a red herring. The concept of a neutral network is quite important for innovation. I think venture capitalist Fred Wilson does an excellent job talking about how much of a problem innovators might face in the future if we actually lost net neutrality, in that it would massively benefit legacy internet players over innovators:

Entrepreneur: I plan to launch a better streaming music service. It leverages the data on what you and your friends currently listen to, combines that with the schedule of new music launches and acts that are touring in your city in the coming months and creates playlists of music that you should be listening to in order to find new acts to listen to and go see live.

VC: Well since Spotify, Beats, and Apple have paid all the telcos so that their services are free on the mobile networks, we are concerned that new music services like yours will have a hard time getting new users to use them because the data plan is so expensive. We like you and the idea very much, but we are going to have to pass.

Entrepreneur: I plan to launch a service that curates the funniest videos from all across the internet and packages them up in a 30 minute daily video show that people will watch on their phones as they are commuting to work on the subway. It's called SubHumor.

VC: Well since YouTube, Hulu, and Netflix have paid all the telcos so that their services are free via a sponsored data plan, I am worried that it will hard to get users to watch any videos on their phones that aren't being served by YouTube, Hulu, or Netflix. We like you and your idea very much, but we are going to have to pass.

But, just because the court this week struck down the FCC's weak attempt at forcing net neutrality rules on ISPs without resorting to classifying them as telcos, it doesn't mean that the answer is to classify them as telcos and give the FCC a broad mandate over them.

And that's because net neutrality fights have always been the symptom not the problem. A symptom of what? Of a near total lack of competition in the marketplace, a problem that has only become worse over time. Telco lobbyists will argue that we don't need net neutrality because we have real competition, but they base that claim on the laughably inaccurate data that the FCC has put together at broadbandmap.gov. The FCC has been releasing totally bogus broadband data for years, and among the problems here are that it counts mobile data services as real broadband competitors, even though the big mobile data providers (often the same as the big telcos: Verizon & AT&T) don't let you actually use mobile broadband as a full time service (not to mention that the speeds and reliability are a lot lower, while the costs are much, much, much higher). The reality is that there is less competition, as you basically still have one cable provider and one DSL/fiber provider in most places, with the DSL/fiber telcos actively trying to get out of the wireline business to concentrate on the more lucrative wireless world.

So, rather than picking a fight that is unlikely to be won (i.e., trying to get a timid Congress and or FCC to back the idea of presenting new net neutrality rules by reclassifying broadband ISPs -- something that is seen as politically unfeasible) it's time to recognize what the FCC should have realized a decade ago, but has always avoided: focus on encouraging real competition.

Two separate articles about this week's ruling discuss this in more detail, and you should read both. First is Ryan Singel's post about how the FCC won't save net neutrality, and we should focus on building real competition. He argues the best path forward is through municipal fiber operations that offer open access to service providers. The big broadband providers have known all along that this is the most effective weapon against their fight for a monopoly, which is why they've lobbied hard to outlaw even the possibility of such competition in a bunch of states.

The other piece to read is former FCC staffer, now Wharton professor, Kevin Werbach's take on all of this, which comes to the same basic conclusion. Congress and the FCC don't have the stomach to reclassify broadband and put in place net neutrality rules, so it's time to focus on the real issue, and that's increasing competition:

The best hope for a dynamic, affordable, and innovative Internet is real broadband competition.

Most of the greatest barriers to broadband competition are at the local level: State prohibitions adopted at the behest of the incumbent carriers, difficulties with zoning and access to rights of way, and limited willingness to invest in the kinds of municipal open access fiber optic utilities that are wildly successful in cities like Stockholm. The FCC has been hesitant to confront these impediments, perhaps because it was so focused on net neutrality.

And the reason it was so focused on net neutrality was because it was unwilling to take on the real issue all along. It would provide lip service to competition, but never make any move to support real competition. But Werbach is correct: local state-level prohibitions have made real competition quite difficult. Getting access to rights of way is the biggest challenge in building a competitive network.

Google Fiber is no solution. It's only available in a few places, and there are no indications that it will go national. And, despite early promises to run its network on an open access basis, Google has since backed away from that promise. That's a big problem. Still, what we have seen is that real competition can make a difference. Whenever Google shows up with Google Fiber, boradband connections suddenly, magically get better for customers of competing broadband ISPs as well.

That's how competition works. It drives investment and innovation. I have tremendous respect for Marc Andreessen, but I think he is wrong in thinking that there can't be significant investment in broadband with net neutrality in place. Everything else he says in that link is correct though: faster, better broadband is key to all sorts of economic opportunity, but there's no evidence that we get that when there's no competition (and no net neutrality). Instead, what we need to do is to drive real competition.

That can be at the network level, but making it easier for local providers, whether municipal or (better yet) locally owned, or it can be at the service level. We've talked before about Australia's efforts to build a fiber network across the entire country, but then let service providers compete on the network. Those are all plans that can work. The focus needs to be on competition, because once you have real competition, the net neutrality issue fades away.

Why? Because any service provider that tries to double charge Netflix or Hulu or Spotify to get to you becomes an option that users will leave. Competition keeps broadband providers honest. But dishonest broadband providers have spent years making sure there is no real competition, and since the government refused to take on this real issue, it instead focused on some weak net neutrality rules.

Those rules are gone.

What they've left exposed is a broadband market that's massively lacking in competition. It's time to fix that problem.

Filed Under: broadband, competition, fcc, net neutrality