Businessweek, er, excuse me, "Bloomberg Businessweek"
Google Inc., AT&T Inc., and Verizon Communications Inc. executives are meeting behind closed doors with U.S. officials in talks that critics say reduce the public’s voice in keeping the Internet open.
The companies sought a compromise, in a rare Saturday session last weekend at the Federal Communications Commission, on rules proposed by Chairman Julius Genachowski to regulate how phone and cable companies handle Web traffic such as Google’s YouTube videos.
“These kinds of meetings where the substance isn’t being revealed go against the chairman’s promise of an open, transparent and inclusive agency,” said Gigi Sohn, president of Public Knowledge, a Washington-based advocacy group, in an interview today.
The companies and senior FCC aides have been holding private meetings since June over the regulations, known as net neutrality rules, according to disclosure statements on the agency’s website. Issues include the extent of FCC power over Internet service providers, and whether phone and cable companies can favor some traffic, such as making their own videos run faster.
The FCC may be negotiating a “secret deal” that would keep Genachowski from fulfilling President Barack Obama’s pledge to back net neutrality, said Josh Silver, president of the Washington-based advocacy group Free Press. The agency may be about to “abdicate its responsibility to protect Internet users,” Silver said in an e-mailed statement.
I'm not officially on the net neutrality beat. That's been covered masterfully by Joan. But I've kind of been following the ups and downs out of the corner of my eye all along, and wondering how it is that with so many people loving the way they've integrated the Internet into their lives, we're still at odds over this.
I mean, I think we all understand why giant telecom corporations are against it. They've found a way to premium-ize a universally loved and relatively affordable service and make even more money from providing less service. What's not to love about killing net neutrality for them?
What I find amazing is that there are teabaggers and other assorted nuts whom Glenn Beck has convinced that net neutrality is an evil plot of some kind. I guess I just thought that conservatives would be generally resistant to change and would prefer keeping the Internet the way it is now that they've learned to use it to trade theories about black helicopters.
After all, the most basic way of describing the fight is pretty clear. If you like the Internet the way it is, then you're for net neutrality. If you'd rather pay more money for less service, and have a giant company tell you what you are and aren't allowed to see, then you're against net neutrality.
That's it.
