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Net Neutrality 10-23-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Analysis: U.S. Elections Will Shape Many Key IT Issues

The winners of next month’s Congressional elections will decide the future of many important telecommunications and information technology issues, including net neutrality, data privacy, and patents. . . .

Among the pieces of legislation topping the dockets are a major rewrite of the nation’s telecommunications laws and potential new rules for how businesses and government agencies manage personal data. Also on the agenda are programs to protect the nation’s critical IT and physical infrastructure, increased funding for education and R&D, and a contentious battle over H-1B visas.

With so many issues at hand for our representatives and senators, InformationWeek takes a close look at five key areas affected by IT policy: communications, data privacy, critical infrastructure, innovation, and jobs and education. . . . .

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 10-22-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

FROM PDF: Nuts and Bolts of Network Neutrality by Edward M. Felten, Center for Information Technology, Princeton University, was released in July 2006.

In this essay, Mr. Felten presents unpacks the murky mysteries of Net Neutrality. The paper is unemotional, understandable, unbiased, and well-written. His stance is detached and instructional stance which leads to a detached, observer’s conclusion.

Read this and Mr. Felten’s work if you need to know what Net Neutrality is about. If you want to know what to do, read MA Bell Monopoly Versus the Free Internet.

Ed Felten Explains, Then Is Silent

Mr. Felten begins his essay by saying

One of the reasons the network neutrality debate is so murky is that relatively few people understand the mechanics of network discrimination. In reasoning about net neutrality it helps to understand the technical motivations for discrimination, the various kinds of discrimination and how they would actually be put into practice, and what countermeasures would then be available to users and regulators. These are what I want to explain in this essay.

Felten offers seven core issues that underpin the discussion. I summarize them here.

  1. The Argument Is Partly about Controlling Innovation. Unlike most networks, the Internet is built with the intelligence at the edges. Routers in the “center” transmit and receive. Three advantages of this are that the intelligence is where the resources — computers, memory, processing power — are; network users own and control the computers at the edge; innovation usually happens faster at the edge.

    Those for Net Neutrality tend to be at the edge. Those against tend to be in the center. Both groups want to control the intelligence and thereby control innovation.

  2. Minimal Discrimination Is a Necessity; Non-Minimal Discrimination Is Purely Economical. When a router in the “center” receives more than it can transmit, it “buffers” incoming packets in memory to wait for an outgoing link. If the buffer is full, the router must discard a packet — any packet.

    One way a router might choose which packet to drop is by assigning priorities. In what Felten calls minimal discrimination the router only discards packets when congestion requires it. A second way, or non-minimal discrimination, drops low-priority packets when they could be sent through. Minimal discrimination is an engineering necessity. Non-minimal discriminatiion is an economic choice.

    3. [Read more…]

Net Neutrality 10-21-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Strong Copyright + DRM + Weak Net Neutrality = Digital Dystopia?
This is a pdf research resource at Educause.

Abstract:
Three critical issues – dramatic expansion of the scope, duration, and punitive nature of copyright laws; the ability of Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems to lock-down digital content in an unprecedented fashion; and the erosion of Net neutrality, which ensures that all Internet traffic is treated equally – are examined in detail and their potential impact on libraries is assessed. How legislatures, the courts, and the commercial marketplace treat these issues will strongly influence the future of digital information for good or ill.

Want to know what you can do?
MA Bell Monopoly Versus the Free Internet — Tell the FCC Net Neutrality Is Not Negotiable

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 10-20-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

The Net at Risk

For those who could not see it. Follow the link above to the documentary.

MOYERS ON AMERICA
The Net at Risk Introduction
watch video with:
REALPLAYER
WINDOWS MEDIA

Click this image on the landing page.

Bill Moyers' The NEt at Risk

Want to know what you can do?
MA Bell Monopoly Versus the Free Internet — Tell the FCC Net Neutrality Is Not Negotiable

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 10-19-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

No Room for Neutrality on Net Neutrality

Imagine the Internet as being like cable television. To access websites of your choosing, you’ll have to pay extra to your Internet service provider (ISP). To put up your own website or blog, you’ll have to pay an additional surcharge to ensure that your website is easily accessible to your friends. If your ISP has a special relationship with, for example, Barnes & Noble, then you may not be able to easily access its rival Amazon.com, or independent booksellers like Pages for All Ages. There’s even a chance that your ISP will decide to block certain content (like political websites challenging its authority) or ban certain devices (like free Internet phone service)––all for your own good, of course.

If powerful interests get their way, this nightmare scenario could easily become the new reality. Up until now, a safeguard called “net neutrality” has prevented this from happening. But at this very moment, the fate of net neutrality rests on legislation pending in Congress.

[ . . . ]

Looking ahead, the stakes are even higher. In the coming years, with increased convergence and decreased numbers of market players, Americans will be forced to rely on single providers to deliver so-called “triple play”––Internet, television, and phone––via one pipe to each household. This creates the potential for one telecom giant to take control over all of these media––not just in terms of pricing, but, without net neutrality, gate-keeping power over all content as well.

Want to know what you can do?
MA Bell Monopoly Versus the Free Internet — Tell the FCC Net Neutrality Is Not Negotiable

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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NET NEUTRALITY PAGE

Net Neutrality 10-18-2006

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Net Neutrality Links

I’m adding this link to the Net Neutrality Page.

Q&A Bill Moyers Bill Moyers By Harvey Blume [via Corrente]

Bill Moyers’ Documentary “Net At Risk” airs Wednesday, October 18 on PBS. See local listings.

MOYERS: The third documentary in this trilogy, ‘‘The Net at Risk,’’ has nothing to do with faith. It is about the fact that 10 years ago Congress carved up the media landscape in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, allowing increased conglomeration of ownership. Almost nothing was known about it at the time. The big media companies didn’t cover it, and didn’t want it covered.

Now they’ll be rewriting the Telecommunications Act. If the big companies have their way, in the dark of the night behind closed doors, they will gain the power to own not only the pipes of the Internet but what goes into those pipes. Giving control of content and access to big corporations will mean that the Internet, the most revolutionary democratic phenomenon of our time, where all of us are equal, will slip through our fingers. I did this documentary to say, Hey people, pay attention. Something is about to happen that will be very hard to change.

Want to know what you can do?
MA Bell Monopoly Versus the Free Internet — Tell the FCC Net Neutrality Is Not Negotiable

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
NET NEUTRALITY PAGE