Save the Internet - AlterNet.Org

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AlterNet.Org

 

 

Save the Internet

 

By Jeffrey Chester, AlterNet.

Posted April 27, 2006.

 

With the help of Republicans in Congress, mammoth telecommunications

companies are fighting to restrict your internet freedom.

 

Imagine, wanting to donate money to a charity and not being able

to open the nonprofit's web page because of the charity's inability to

afford the dominant internet provider's fees required to make the page

efficient? Imagine the millions of life-saving dollars these charities

will lose if lobbyists get their way? What if your child is sick, and

you can't gain access to a support group's page because the support

group can't afford the fees? Or even scarier, imagine not gaining

speedy access to a politician's views because the specific provider is

against his or her ideology?

 

--Who's the Boss? star Alyssa Milano

 

Will the internet in the United States become, in the words of AT & T

(SBC) CEO, their company's private " pipes " ? Or will it remain, as the

Supreme Court cited in 1997, " the most participatory form of mass

speech yet developed " ? These two very different perspectives reflect

what's at stake in the growing fight now in Congress over the

internet's future.

 

A growing movement of online users, public advocates, internet

" visionaries, " bloggers, and online corporations are fighting to have

Congress enact what are called " network neutrality " safeguards. Such

rules would preserve the internet's essential democratic structure:

All content would be required to flow into our PCs and digital devices

in a fair and nondiscriminatory manner. Network neutrality would help

ensure that internet serves the interests of diversity of speech. As

the new Savetheinternet coalition put it, network neutrality is the

equivalent of the internet's First Amendment.

 

But an unfettered open road is directly at odds with the broadband

business plans of AT & T (formerly SBC), Comcast, Time Warner and

Verizon. The cable and telephone industry see enormous revenues as

operators of a private internet toll-road. How has the internet -- so

diverse and unwieldly -- fallen into their hands? The answer is (of

course) the Bush administration. Heavily lobbied by the cable and

phone giants, the Bush Federal Communications Commission has been

eliminating the rules that required the internet to operate in a

nondiscriminatory manner.

 

Under the " old " policy governing what's called the " dial-up " internet,

the public was guaranteed that their internet service provider (ISP)

had to treat all online content in an unbiased manner. ISPs couldn't,

for example, speed up the email or websites they liked, or decide to

slow down content it didn't like (such as from a peace group). The

former rules also permitted the public to choose from literally

thousands of ISPs to connect them to the internet. Such federal

safeguards have, sadly, now bitten the digital dust.

 

It's all about broadband

 

Verizon, Comcast and the others had former FCC chair Michael Powell

and current chair Kevin Martin strip away these rules because they

were an obstacle to their plans to dominate the high-speed internet,

or broadband, market. If a purely open and nondiscriminatory internet

remained, then anyone could distribute a movie or video program -- a

serious threat to the cable industry's monopoly over TV distribution.

 

No one needs a " Ma Bell " anymore to bring us telephone service.

Practically anyone can now use the internet to provide phone service

(known as voice over internet protocol, or VoIP). In other words, if

the internet remained a real First Amendment friendly pipeline, both

the cable and phone industry would see their profits and power

evaporate -- fast.

 

But it wasn't only to prevent competitors that spurred our new

broadband bandits to action. With the federal nondiscrimination policy

now toast, the phone and cable companies could embark in earnest with

plans to -- in their words -- " monetize " digital distribution. Through

their sole control over America's residential broadband pipes (they

have more than 90 percent of the market), they planned to set up a

multitiered and pay-as-you-go private internet highway.

 

There would be a new fast lane, giving the content owned by the phone,

cable and other media giants, the fastest preferential treatment.

Video and multimedia programming owned by AT & T and Comcast, for

example, would be received lightning speed on PCs, digital TVs and

mobile devices. Those that couldn't afford to pay would be relegated

to what the phone and cable lobbyists derisively called the " public "

internet.

 

This so-called public lane would be the equivalent of a digital dirt

road, easily marginalized by the majority of the public that has come

to enjoy ever-faster and more efficient connections. A slew of Silicon

Valley tech companies, including Cisco, have built broadband delivery

equipment that allows a phone or cable company to make business

decisions about every packet of data that travels over its lines.

 

Imagine a private air traffic controller working for Airline X. Its

planes would be given priority takeoff and landings -- while

competitors and others slowly circle overhead. Only those who could

afford to make a payoff (such as huge fees or a cut of their business)

would be afforded similar treatment. The Bells and cable hoped that

with this control over the data lines, their broadband content

competitors would crash and burn.

 

The cable and telephone broadband scam, however, is now meeting

intense opposition. First, there is a growing opposition movement

against the privatization of the internet. Led by Free Press, there is

a new " savetheinternet.org " coalition,

http://www.savetheinternet.com/

representing a diverse group of activists, users and experts from

across the political spectrum, including Gun Owners of America, the

United Church of Christ and Craigslist's Craig Newmark.

 

Earlier in the week, this group and MoveOn.org

http://civic.moveon.org/save_the_internet/

helped flood the halls of Congress with emails and online petitions

calling on the Congress to enact safeguards for " network neutrality. "

The power of the cable/telco alliance to determine the future of the

U.S. internet has also alarmed many of the country's most powerful

online companies -- such as Google, and Microsoft. They have

launched their own new coalition, called " Don't Mess with the Net.com. "

http://www.dontmesswiththenet.com/home/

 

The GOP -- led by Speaker Dennis Hastert and House Energy and Commerce

Chair Joe Barton (Texas) -- is firmly in the grip of the broadband

monopoly lobby. Yesterday, Barton's committee rejected a network

neutrality provision, 34-22 (sponsored by Rep. Ed Markey, among

others). Helping the Republicans defeat the internet freedom measure

were five Democrats, including Edolphus Townes (N.Y.), Albert Wynn

(Md.), Charles A. Gonzalez (Texas), Bobby Rush (Ill.) and Gene Green

(Texas). (It was the endorsement of Rep. Rush, a former activist, that

permitted the Republicans to call their broadband bill a bipartisan

effort).

 

But the growing outcry to protect the internet led to House Democratic

leader Nancy Pelosi's formally endorsing the network neutrality call.

There is now growing optimism among " save the internet " supporters

that the Senate, which will soon take up a broadband communications

bill, will endorse a neutrality rule. A bipartisan plan to do just

that has already been prepared by Sens. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and

Byron Dorgan, D-N.D.

 

Federal rules to ensure that the internet remains a democratic medium

of expression is essential if the United States is to ever become a

more just and civil society. In the emerging era, the nature of what

will be a ubiquitious broadband communications system will greatly

define us as a culture. It must be one where the voices of those

calling for justice, health care, environmental protection and peace

can resonate as loudly as the commercial messages brought to us by

Time Warner and AT & T. Network neutrality, or internet freedom, is a

necessary and critical step to make sure such voices are part of the

mainstream -- not exiled to the digital dirt road.

 

Sign the petition HERE

http://civic.moveon.org/save_the_internet/

 

or contact your rep HERE.

http://civic.moveon.org/call/signup.html?cp_id=327 & mode=house

 

 

Jeffrey Chester is executive director of the Center for Digital

Democracy ( http://www.democraticmedia.org ).