The Wake

When the U.S. Congress passed the Communications Act of 1934, it established the Federal Communications Commission, an independent federal agency responsible for regulating interstate and international communications of radio, television, wire, satellite and cable. The FCC regulated the rates of telephone companies, controlled business relationships between networks and their affiliates and limited the number and types of services a single person or corporation could own in a single market. It acted as a comprehensive government agency to protect Americans from being screwed by big market forces by encouraging options and competition.

But on Dec. 29, 2006, the FCC approved the $85 billion mega buyout of BellSouth by AT&T, the biggest telecommunications deal in U.S. history.

Out of the ominous shadow of the merger, Democratic commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein forced AT&T, through their holdout approval of the merger, to concede provisions in order to close the deal. The most important concession AT&T made was its two-year agreement to abide by Net neutrality, the provision that allows Web sites to have an equal opportunity to be viewed despite their size or financial prowess - or lack thereof.

By agreeing to recognize network neutrality, AT&T cannot discriminate against or control information going over its network until 2009. It cannot provide a faster lane to Web sites that are capable of paying for more bandwidth, making all Web sites equal, which totally kicks ass.

Network neutrality is vital for a healthy, competitive and innovative Internet and society. Many grass roots organizations absolutely depend on the nondiscriminatory nature of network neutrality. Some sites include: StopGlobalWarming.org, a Web site dedicated to bringing people together to protest global warming; AIDS.org, a nonprofit educational organization and FreePress.net, a nonpartisan, noncommercial organization committed to educating citizens on important media policy debates. These sites, which (like the Wake’s) speak out against what the members feel are injustices, are the types of sites that would suffer without neutrality. Organizations like these don’t have the money to fork over to huge corporate whores so that access to their Web site can happen at a reasonably fast rate. To see American citizens put up with this kind of potential corporate control without Net neutrality would be utterly shameful.

The Internet has provided millions with the cultural and political means to better participate in and benefit our democratic society. Look at the grass roots nature of YouTube. Anybody with Internet access could watch the clip of Sen. George Allen, R-Va., directing a racial slur at a campaign opponent during last fall’s midterm Congressional election. Allen’s popularity dropped following the incident and James Webb’s victory over Allen helped Democrats gain control of the U.S. Senate. Would YouTube have gotten off the ground without Net neutrality?

Everybody knows that grass roots entrepreneurs have made the Internet what it is today. Consider the following cases if Net neutrality didn‘t exist:

Larry Page and Sergey Brin, founders of Google, were two Stanford graduate students in their early twenties when they began working out of their search engine headquarters that was Page’s dorm room. Google now stands as the world’s most popular search engine.

Pierre Omidyar was 28 when he started eBay as a hobby. According to the eBay Web site, Omidyar wanted to experiment with how equal access to information and opportunities would affect market efficiency.

Craig Newmark started Craigslist in 1995 to spread news about events around the San Francisco area. It’s now the seventh most visited English-language Web site, according to craigslist.org

Despite dubious suggestions made by Hands Off The Internet, an organization backed by Internet operators like AT&T and BellSouth, Net neutrality is nothing new. It’s not extreme overregulation by the government, as some might like to think. Network neutrality has been around since the advent of the Internet and has protected peoples’ right to access all Web sites without discrimination. The dispute over network neutrality became prominent in June 2005 when the Supreme Court ruled in National Cable and Telecommunications Association v. Brand X Internet that cable companies have the right to deny rival Internet service providers access to their networks. It gave cable companies the power to control who or what goes over its network, which includes information on the Internet. It sent the protections of Net neutrality down the toilet and gave operators a window to extend their cold hands around the throat of Internet democracy. AT&T and others are just looking to push their profit margins by charging Web sites and Internet users higher premiums to allocate more room for things like online gaming and movie and music downloads that need more bandwidth. Instead of increasing bandwidth for all content, network operators want to be able to discriminate against those who don’t pay extra. There is a financial incentive for them to create a two-tiered system.

In the newly-elected Democratic Congress, there is hope for a comprehensive communications bill that would protect Net neutrality. “The Internet Freedom Preservation Act” of 2007 was introduced by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-ND and Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine earlier this month. With hopeful bipartisan support, the freedom of the Internet can still be salvaged. Grass roots support for Net neutrality is essential and I fully encourage everyone who uses the Internet to send an email to their representatives in Congress to get Internet protections secured. There is still time to show corporate cable and phone companies that we, the people, aren’t going to let them screw with our right to a free and fair Internet.