Over the weekend AT&T gave us a glimpse of their plans for the Web when they censored a Pearl Jam performance that didn’t meet their standard of “Internet freedom.”

During the live Lollapalooza Webcast of a concert by the Seattle-based super-group, the telco giant muted lead singer Eddie Vedder just as he launched into a lyric against President George Bush. The lines — “George Bush, leave this world alone” and “George Bush find yourself another home” were somehow lost in the mix.

“What happened to us this weekend was a wake up call, and it’s about something much bigger than the censorship of a rock band,” Pearl Jam band members stated in a release following the incident.

Indeed. AT&T routinely rails against Net Neutrality as a “solution without a problem.” They say Net Neutrality regulations aren’t necessary because they wouldn’t dare interfere with online content. At the same time they tout plans to become gatekeepers to the Web with public relations bromides about “shaping” Web traffic to better serve the needs of an evolving Internet.

Such spin needs to be held up to the light of experience. AT&T’s history of breaking trust with their customers includes handing over private phone records to the government, promising to deliver services to underserved communities and then skipping town, pledging never to interfere with the free flow of information online while hatching plans with the likes of Cisco, Viacom, RIAA and MPA to build and deploy technology that will spy on user traffic.

The moral of this story is never trust AT&T at their word. The company acts in bad faith toward the public interest and will do whatever it can get away with to pad it’s bottom line — including sacrificing the freedoms its users have to choose where they go, what they watch and whom they listen to online.

Our friends at the Future of Music Coalition have done great work to mobilize hundreds of rock bands against such censorship but it’s a threat that concerns everyone.

AT&T’s vision of a better Internet – “Your World Delivered” — is not one that is shared by the more than 1.5 million people who have spoken out in favor of a neutral, affordable and accessible Internet for everyone. For us the Internet isn’t about one company delivering our world. It’s about simply offering a high-speed connection at reasonable rates — and then getting out of our way.

Too often in the give and take of media policymaking it’s government officials that are giving, corporate giants that are taking, and the public that’s left with little in the exchange.

This was the case yesterday as the Federal Communications Commission decided to sell off licenses to an invaluable chunk of public airwaves with few conditions to ensure that Americans gain from the deal.

FCC Commissioners

The spectrum in question — the 700 MHz band – will be returned to Americans after TV broadcasters shift from an analog (and spectrum hogging) format to a more compressed digital signal.

Closing the Gap

These airwaves represent our last best chance to connect tens of millions of Americans to an open and affordable Internet. They can carry a wireless Internet signal through concrete buildings and over mountains – a signal that can single-handedly close the digital divide for people in both rural and urban America, who are now being bypassed by the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Comcast.

With the agency’s decision, however, it’s more likely that this same phone and cable cartel will use their political and financial muscle to further consolidate its control over wireless Internet access in the country. The same companies already dictate “wired” broadband access for more than 96% of residential users.

These politically-connected corporations don’t see this new spectrum as a chance to blow open the marketplace. They see it as a threat to the status quo — an Internet business model where they dole out access at higher prices for slower speeds compared to services in many Western European and Asian countries.

The FCC had the opportunity to change this. Had the agency attached conditions to open the 700 MHz band, they would have unleashed the creative forces of the marketplace onto an Internet that is now suffocating under the weight of the providers.

More than a quarter-million citizens filed comments to the FCC urging the agency to inject such broadband competition into the marketplace by creating a so-called “third pipe,” a national wireless Internet network to compete head-to-head with DSL and cable.

A proposal put before the agency by public advocates, consumer organizations and technology companies would have helped make this “third pipe” a reality. Their solution: create one nationwide wireless Internet license that would be offered to new competitors on a wholesale basis – a model known as “open access” that has proven immensely successful for European nations.

Repercussions from a Bad Decision

In America, open access would pry open the market to new businesses, start ups, entrepreneurs and providers, spurring competition and innovation while driving down costs to the consumer. It would be a boon for the mobile Internet, at a time when a flurry of new devices such as the iPhone are coming available to users.

Instead the FCC chose a course that will keep us behind the pace of countries that have embraced open networks.

Our last, best chance to propel us into an era of Internet innovation and creativity was squandered by an agency that too often confuses corporate welfare with public service.

The FCC decision should be a call to arms for consumer advocates, public interest groups, Internet entrepreneurs and concerned citizens across the country. Unless we amplify calls for true open access, the repercussions of this sell off of the airwaves will be felt for generations to come.

Media ownership in this country is facing the largest crisis of ownership since the era of William Randolph Hearst’s yellow journalism. Rupert Murdoch could possibly acquire the Wall Street Journal and expand his North American empire to include a national TV network, national cable news network and a national paper.

Guest Blog by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I - Vermont)

Amid all the hubbub, a more nuanced issue is slipping through the cracks. The airwaves that carry UHF in the 700 MHz range will become vacant as the U.S. transitions to Digital Television in 2009.

These airwaves could beam wireless all over the country-through mountains, forests and walls-and the auction is scheduled for next January. On Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission will set the rules for the auction. Now is the time to support “open access” provisions in these rules. Without “open access” the U.S. runs the risk of handing over the Internet to corporate interests for at least another generation.

A dawning awareness of the perils of media consolidation has emerged in Congress. Legislation has been introduced challenging media ownership as well as the FCC’s devastating 2003 decision that would have expanded corporate control.

In the case of the spectrum auction the choice is clear: allowing third parties access to the network as wholesalers is the only way to break up the oligopoly telecoms hold over the Internet.

AT&T and Verizon want you to believe that “open access” provisions in the auction rules will interfere with the free market. They claim the market, left to its own devices, has produced an abundance of wireless goods and services. But in reality America’s Internet infrastructure is ailing.

According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, we’re ranked 15th in the world in terms of broadband access. We’re limited to two choices for providers whereas Europeans have dozens. At this late date, telecom objections to “open access” don’t add up. The market has favored corporations, not consumers.

Proposed auction rules pay lip service to “open access.” True, they would allow unaffiliated devices and services to connect over networks but this neglects the vital issue of wholesale. “Open access” must mean that third parties can access the network as wholesalers to generate real market diversity.

This issue transcends corporate control. Like the auction of a rare diamond, the spectrum is a precious natural resource. Public officials have only got one shot to get the balance right between public and private interests and that means a helping hand to wholesale to generate competition.

Strengthening “open access” provisions can only reinforce innovation. When Apple’s iPhone debuted last month many consumers were disappointed because they had to switch to AT&T. The reason: an anti-competitive business deal that makes AT&T the exclusive carrier for Apple. Strong “open access” provisions ensure you won’t have to switch to an exclusive provider (on top of cancellation fees) just to use your next-generation gadget. They ensure the freedom to choose any network you like.

The definition of “open access” must also be expanded to cover content. Subscribers must be ensured unlimited access to content of their choosing.

At this pivotal moment in the history of media, Americans should demand that the FCC support “open access” in three ways in the upcoming auction. “Open access” must mean free use of devices and services over all networks. Second, it must mean unfettered access to any and all content. Finally, “open access” must mean wholesale provisions to optimize competition among service providers and break the grip that giant telecoms hold on the future of the Internet.

In Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal, FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell served up the journalistic equivalent of expired lunch meat, a rancid op-ed on America’s digital decline aptly titled “Broadband Baloney.”

The article was designed to discredit a recent report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which ranks the United States 15th in the world in broadband adoption — down from fourth place in 2001 and 12th just six months ago.

Something’s Rotten at the FCC

But McDowell’s piece is a rotten mix of industry talking points, misdirection and outright falsehoods.

For instance, McDowell criticizes the OECD for counting broadband adoption per capita rather than per household. But he neglects to mention recent data from the U.K. firm Point-Topic and the International Telecommunications Union that ranks the United States 24th in the world in the percentage of homes subscribing to broadband.

McDowell then lays the blame for poor U.S. broadband performance on geography. He claims that the United States is “75 percent rural,” but according to the Census Bureau, only 21 percent of the U.S. population lives in rural areas. That’s almost exactly the same level as Canada — which has a far higher level of broadband adoption.

McDowell also indicates that the European markets aren’t competitive because cable modem deployment is not widespread. But the countries ahead of us in the rankings all have vigorous competition between providers operating on the same technology platform, as well as between broadband providers using different technologies.

Whereas U.S. consumers have at best two choices of home broadband providers – the local phone or cable companies — citizens of European and Asian countries often have more than a dozen.

As a result, Europeans and Asians pay less for much faster speeds than are available here. This competitive marketplace is made possible by the use of “open access” policy — something that was invented in the United States but later abandoned under intense pressure from phone and cable lobbyists.

McDowell’s willingness to uncritically accept industry spin and ignore all the signs of failure in the U.S. broadband market is deeply troubling. And his indifference has real-world consequences: the loss of millions of jobs to overseas workers ready and able to serve the needs of the 21st-century digital economy.

If you’re looking for a meaty analysis without all the baloney, download Shooting the Messenger – a new report from S. Derek Turner of Free Press that dispels industry myths about the sorry state of the U.S. broadband market.

Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) is opening the lines to public feedback on whether a new national broadband strategy is the right solution to America’s Internet blues.

For four nights, beginning Tuesday on the blog OpenLeft.com, Sen. Durbin will engage in a frank conversation with site visitors. According to the senator, this process will help him draft broadband legislation to be introduced this session.

The goal is to push forward policies that will make the Internet an accessible and affordable engine for free speech and innovation.

Such policies could also help return the U.S. to front-runner status against Western European and Asian countries that now offer their citizens faster speeds at lower costs.

Legislation 2.0

Durbin has publicly committed to writing broadband legislation based on the public discussion that occurs. This is a bold new direction in lawmaking and a leap of faith for any Senator — especially as it defies the conventional wisdom in Washington that media policy is best left to “experts” from the industry.

“I think we need more public participation and transparency in the way Congress crafts significant legislation,” Senator Durbin wrote about the live blogging experiment. “This is an approach to legislation that has never been tried before. If it’s successful — as I believe it will be — it may become the way lawmakers approach drafting bills on other issues like education, health care, and foreign policy.”

We certainly hope so.

By and large our legislative process has been hijacked by corporate interests. No where has this harmed and distorted public policy more than in the telecommunications sector, where large phone and cable companies have bought up legions of lobbyists to hold the line against Net Neutrality and Open Access.

Despite massive public support for these issues most of our legislators stand mute for fear of upsetting the status quo.

Meanwhile, access to this most crucial public resource slips from our hands and into those of a few corporations that seek to maximize profits by stifling competition and innovation and controlling user choice.

“[B]roadband policy is one of the most important public policy issues today,” Durbin wrote. “Frankly, America does not have a national broadband strategy, and we are falling behind.”

Washington Needs a New Boss: You

The Internet is humankind’s single most important invention. Its prospects for engaging more people in the democratic process are only now beginning to be explored. Last night’s YouTube debate opened new territory for public involvement in campaigns. The public must have a seat at the table before legislators attempt to craft any legislation that could affect this openness and accessibility.

“At stake is not a set of wonky policy details, but a fundamental vision of how Americans communicate and relate to each other,” writes Matt Stoller of OpenLeft. “With the internet, we can put everyone and every lobbyist on a level playing field, and have a genuinely open contest of ideas.”

Join the forum. Tell Senator Durbin what you think.

= = = =
UPDATE: My summary of the Tuesday night forum with Sen. Durbin. Wednesday night’s discussion is on Net Neutrality. Now would be a good time for everyone to chime in.

We were encouraged on Wednesday when Google lined up behind a real notion of an open Internet — taking a position that consumer advocates and public interest groups had long supported.

Now, the search giant is putting money — in the amount of at least $4.6 billion - behind their pledge, agreeing to buy into a plan to bring real “open access” to America’s wireless Internet.

On Friday, Google CEO Eric Schmidt sent a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin, stating that all companies licensed to use a soon-to-be-available chunk of the “700 MHz band” should provide (1) open applications, (2) open devices, (3) open wholesale services, and (4) open network access.

These four conditions are the true definition of open access, which has fostered innovation, competition and better user choice in Western Europe and Asia.

True Open Access

In the wireless world, open access would free millions of cell phone users to connect to an open Internet via any device or carrier. It would also blow open competition across wireless networks currently locked by a few dominant carriers.

Under such a system the new iPhone wouldn’t need to be shackled to a carrier such as AT&T, which leverages exclusive control of the network to cripple many iPhone applications, stifle new ideas and competition in the marketplace and limit what users can do on the wireless Web.

Opening the ‘Third Pipe’

Here’s the kicker. Schmidt concludes in his letter, “should the Commission expressly adopt the four license conditions requested … Google intends to commit a minimum of $4.6 billion to bidding in the upcoming auction.”

Google’s bid relates to the pending auction of a chunk of the airwaves to be returned to the public by television broadcasters in 2009. By opening these airwaves to wholesale competition the FCC would spur the creation of a wireless Internet alternative to the entrenched cable and phone duopoly that controls high-speed “wired” connections for more than 96% of residential users in America.

Opening a “third pipe” of Internet access for American consumers is especially vital given the phone and cable company plan to discriminate against content over their land lines. If this threat becomes real, AT&T could strike a deal with a major retailer that would speed connections to the online shopping site Walmart.com, while degrading user’s ability to surf to the Walmart protest site Walmartwatch.com.

By undoing Net Neutrality these Internet service providers seek to overhaul road rules that have kept the Internet a level playing field since its inception.

Calling Martin’s Bluff

Martin Now Holds the Keys

Schmidt’s billion-dollar guarantee handily erases the telco talking point that open access conditions would short the U.S. treasury billions of dollars in auction revenue — as no company would be willing to bid on spectrum that’s been tied to such requirements.

The $4.6 billion minimum likely came as a surprise to Chairman Martin who has been pushing a half-cocked notion of open access — freeing devices to operate across networks but not freeing the networks for competition beyond the few companies that control wireless access today.

Missing from Martin’s definition of open access is the provision that all license holders lease these airwaves on a wholesale basis — a model that has sparked Internet innovation in France and elsewhere.

“Google’s point is that high speed Internet access is just that — access,” explains Susan Crawford. “Google wants the pipes to be commoditized, to be as open as possible so that, like the Internet itself, this transport can make possible all kinds of innovation, economic growth, and creativity.”

If smaller companies could gain access to a slice of the 700 MHz band, they would be able to offer services rivaling those of the telephone and cable giants, resulting in a consumer market with greater choices at lower costs. “When Americans can use the software and handsets of their choice, over open and competitive networks, they win,” Schmidt wrote Martin.

Upping the Ante for a Better Internet

Google’s move ups the ante at the FCC, according to Harold Feld of Media Access Project: “In a stroke, the Google letter changes the nature of the game. Google has now guaranteed that the feds will make their auction projections — but only if they include real open access.”

This is the position that certain SavetheInternet.com members – including the nation’s leading consumer advocate and Internet rights groups — put forth months ago when we urged the FCC to structure the auction to foster the development of high-speed wireless services to compete with the telephone and cable companies.

It makes perfect sense to us that this position is gaining currency in the business world as well.

A report released today decisively shoots down many of the myths that telecommunications lobbyists and shills have manufactured about the health of America’s Internet.

The report, “Shooting the Messenger,” urges policymakers to focus on the real problems that have caused America to fall dangerously behind the rest of the world in Internet adoption – competition and availability.

Mythical Mike McCurry

The report’s authors at Free Press believe the root of the problem to be the “cozy duopoly” of cable and broadband providers that stifle competition and innovation while driving costs to consumers through the roof.

These same companies – including AT&T, Verizon and Comcast – have unveiled plans to block or degrade Internet users’ access to Web sites and services by erecting new toll booths on the Internet. This threat to Net Neutrality has compelled more than 1.6 million Americans to write Congress demanding legal protections for Internet freedom.

Earlier this week people from every corner of the country flooded the FCC with comments, twenty to one in support of full Net Neutrality protections.

Dismissing the Shills

Shooting the Messenger’s findings dismiss many of telecommunications industry’s excuses for America’s failures compared to the rest of the world – and prescribes policy solutions that would make our Internet more open, affordable and accessible to everyone.

Recent data from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) ranks the U.S. 15th in the world in broad penetration per capita, down from fourth in 2001 and 12th just six months ago. The OECD data are not alone. Reports from the International Telecommunications Union, United Nations and Communications Workers of America demonstrate nationwide problems with access, speed and affordability.

The near absolute control phone and cable giants have over America’s Internet is being bolstered by a Washington establishment that’s loath to upset this imbalance of power.

Papering Over Failures with Telco Talking Points

Instead of addressing America’s digital decline, federal policymakers and industry representatives have attacked the methodology of researchers. Fully expect that they will ’shoot the messenger’ in response to Free Press’ new report or attempt to obscure the findings with a feckless veneer of telco talking points dressed up as independent research.

Report author S. Derek Turner said, “no amount of industry spin can excuse the problems caused by lack of broadband competition, or the irreparable harm to our economy if we fail to address the mounting crisis.”

The Free Press report found that the critiques leveled at the OECD report fall apart under scrutiny. No matter how one measures broadband penetration the United States still ranks 15th among the 30 OECD nations.

“There is absolutely no correlation between a country’s population density and its broadband penetration,” the report finds. Despite what telco shills have said, the geographical size of the United States doesn’t explain the poor state of broadband adoption and availability.”

According to Communications Daily, the Bush administration’s top Internet official, NTIA Assistant Secretary John M.R. Kneuer, claimed that America has already met President Bush’s goal of universal broadband access. Kneuer’s based his claim on the recent increase in the availability of data-enabled cellular networks.

But a cell phone is no substitute for a true broadband connection — “and if these phones were counted, the United States would fare even worse in the world rankings,” the report finds.

The Solution: Competition, Accessibility and Neutrality

While U.S. consumers have at best two choices for a wired broadband connection, in Europe consumers have many choices — sometimes dozens — among providers on just a single platform.

Such competition brings new innovation into the market while driving down prices to the consumer. It also safeguards against the types of Net Neutrality abuses that the phone and cable duopoly explicitly have in store for American Net users. [For an understanding of how France has outpaced the U.S., read this article published today at BusinessWeek]

“International rankings do matter,” Turner said. “This is not just a point of pride. Each spot the United States slips represents billions in lost producer and consumer surplus, and potentially millions of real jobs lost to overseas workers.”

The Prescription: Policies that Work

It’s no surprise that those selling high-cost, low-speed broadband want to defend the status quo. AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and their many Washington flacks are desperate to assert that everything is peachy in broadband land.

There’s no need to upset a thriving free market, they crow, while quietly pressuring Washington to pass laws that lock in their near total control of our connections to the Net.

What’s more worrying is the near total abdication by elected and government officials, who are allegedly in place to protect the public interest.

Policymakers who are serious about America’s economic and social well-being should reject the distraction of excuses and focus on policies that bring open, affordable, high-speed broadband access to all Americans.

The public has already spoken out on the issue. We don’t need more federal handouts to industry, but policies that work for us all.

The results are in at the FCC. Tens of thousands of public comments supporting Net Neutrality flooded the agency before they closed their official inquiry on Monday.

In a landslide of public support, well over 95 percent of the comments called for rules that prohibit phone and cable companies from seeing through their plans to become the new gatekeepers to the Internet — deciding which Web sites and services users get to download before others.

Kevin Martin. Are You Listening?

Internet users from all 435 congressional districts used SavetheInternet.com’s online tools to urge the FCC to protect Internet freedom. Net Neutrality supporters include a full range of small business owners, students, churchgoers, bloggers, political candidates, educators and activists who took the time to tell the agency that protecting Net Neutrality is fundamental to their family life, work and interests.

Our Internet Runs on Neutral

“I am living the American dream because of Network Neutrality — my games have been used in thousands of schools all over the world,” says Karen Chun, a single mother and owner of a successful online educational games business. “Without Net Neutrality, my little Web site would have been consigned to oblivion because I wouldn’t have been able to pay the fees the ISPs want to charge.”

Kelly Jones of Portland, Ore., told the FCC that “corporations are not, and have never been, qualified as gatekeepers to American communication and growth. If the FCC believes in true democracy, it must ensure that broadband providers do not block, interfere with or discriminate against any lawful Internet traffic based on its ownership, source or destination.”

Take Note Chairman Martin

Sens. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) — co-sponsors of the bipartisan “Internet Freedom Preservation Act” — sent a letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin urging the FCC to reinstate Net Neutrality rules.

“We see that thousands of people have submitted comments describing how a free and open Internet benefits consumers and telling you the discriminatory practices planned by their Internet service providers would substantially harm their online experience,” Dorgan and Snowe wrote the chairman. “We hope you take note of these thousands of public comments urging you to protect Internet freedom.”

Since 2005, when the FCC removed Net Neutrality protections from the books, the heads of the biggest phone and cable companies have repeatedly stated plans to discriminate against Web sites that don’t pay their added tolls for access.

A Public Landslide

The Commission opened its Net Neutrality inquiry in March, asking for comment on why keeping the Internet neutral is important; how phone and cable company efforts to discriminate against content online affect everyday lives; and whether the agency should enforce rules that would prohibit such discrimination.

For every single comment opposing Net Neutrality there were more than 20 calling upon the agency to enforce rules that would stop the telcos’ gatekeeper plans.

Let’s put this into perspective: Were this a presidential campaign, one candidate would have carried at least 47 states. An outpouring like that doesn’t raise questions about where the nation stands on an issue. The FCC’s job is to protect the public good – and the public is saying decisively that we want Net Neutrality.

Once again, people have sent a clear mandate to Washington. Internet users want competitive and affordable services. They don’t want phone and cable companies to manipulate the free flow of information and distort the Web’s level playing field.

When will the FCC listen to people beyond the Beltway and enforce full Net Neutrality?

Public comments flooded the Federal Communications Commission on Monday, the final day for the agency’s Net Neutrality “Inquiry.” With very few exceptions the public voiced overwhelming support for rules to ensure that the Internet remain free of gatekeepers.

Tens of thousands of people told their own stories using SavetheInternet.com’s comment action tool.

Sen. Olympia Snowe

Earlier today, Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) added their voices. In a letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, the senators stated that Net Neutrality is “crucial to the democracy and economic growth of the United States.”

They urged Martin to heed the thousands of comments from small business owners, single moms, students, bloggers, concerned citizens, political candidates, social services workers, green thumbs, dog lovers, an Esperanto enthusiasts and others who are concerned that discrimination from phone and cable companies would “substantially harm their online experience.”

Snowe and Dorgan write:

“When users log onto the Internet, they take a lot of things for granted. They assume that they will be able to access whatever Web site they want, when they want to — and if they have a good broadband connection, they expect this to happen at a high speed, regardless of what Web site they choose. They also assume that they can use any feature they like, anytime they choose — watching online videos, searching for information, making purchases, and sending emails and instant messages. What they are assuming is Internet Freedom, the principle at the core of the Internet’s DNA. The idea is that the Internet should be open and free, restricted by no one.”

Sen. Byron Dorgan

According to the senators, these assumptions are no longer safe. In 2005, the FCC removed the nondiscrimination rules that had guaranteed Net Neutrality since the Internet’s inception. “We urge the Commission to take affirmative action to reinstate the rules that enabled the Internet to flourish,” they conclude.

Snowe and Dorgan are the authors of a bill in Senate that would accomplish just that. The bipartisan “Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2007” would ensure that Internet users enjoy competitive and affordable services without telecommunications companies using their networks to distort the Web’s marketplace of ideas.

In their letter to the FCC Chairman Martin, Sens. Snowe and Dorgan note several instances where phone and cable companies state their intention to discriminate online — favoring the content of one business or Web site over that of others — despite their repeated claims in the media to the contrary.

“If there were a competitive broadband market we would not need to be as concerned about the discriminatory intentions of some providers,” they write. In America’s Internet marketplace, phone and cable companies have a 96 percent share of the residential market for broadband.

The senators conclude:

“Given the lack of broadband competition, the ability and incentive of broadband providers to discriminate among content providers, the public statements from executives of leading broadband providers, and the concerns of Internet users across the country, we are confident the FCC will gain a better understanding of the necessity to protect Internet freedom.”

You would think that this filing, added to the deluge of pro-neutrality comments from the public, would compel the FCC to make the right decision.

Stay tuned.

The slick ads for Apple’s “revolutionary” new iPhone promise to “put the Internet in your pocket.” But the only way to get one of these gadgets is to sign on with AT&T — which limits what you can do and where you can go on the wireless Web.

You don’t have to own an iPhone to know why this problem persists: The big mobile phone companies lock their devices so they won’t work on other networks, cripple innovative new applications, stifle competition and restrict access to their “preferred” content.

Think about it. The cable company doesn’t tell you what kind of TV to buy. You can plug any toaster into the wall at home without the power company’s permission. Whether you have a PC or Mac, you still can go wherever you want on the Web. Why shouldn’t your mobile phone work the same way?

Ma Bell Doesn’t Work

On Wednesday Professor Tim Wu testified before Congress that there’s “something weird” about America’s wireless market. “It’s not like consumer electronics or software markets. It’s not like the Internet.” Instead he compared the current wireless market to the old vestiges of the AT&T monopoly model. “It’s that model which has failed us.”

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Today, Free Press launched FreetheiPhone.org – a campaign to demand an open, competitive wireless Internet for everyone.

While the iPhone is the current fascination, this issue goes well beyond one single gadget. It’s about a dysfunctional wireless system that stifles innovation and competition across the country, while stemming the free flow of information we need.

Real Open Access

What we need is real “open access.” Real open access unlocks networks for innovation and wholesale markets for competition. Until we have this, the iPhone – and wireless handheld gizmos like it — will never reach their full potential.

Earlier this week Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin reportedly proposed something that is a small gesture towards open access. His plans would allow for device interoperability — imposing what’s known as Carterfone principles on a sliver of the spectrum. Merely unlocking devices is only a half-step in the right direction; it leaves us with the same few companies that are trying to undercut innovation and leave us with a slow, expensive network and a vast digital divide.

They can get away with this because there’s not real competition. You should be able to unlock your device and use it on any network. You should be able to choose from many providers, competing for your business with better service, lower prices and new innovations. And you should be able to access all content and services without interference from corporate gatekeepers like AT&T or Verizon Wireless.

Breaking Open the Spectrum

That’s real open access and politicians in Washington have the power to grant this wireless freedom.

Martin’s FCC is about to auction off a valuable portion of the public airwaves that could connect tens of million of Americans to a real open access Internet. This “spectrum” – the 700 MHz band – is so powerful it can carry wireless internet signals through concrete buildings and over mountains. It could connect tens of million of Americans to the new mobile Internet via cheaper gadgets that work in every corner of the country.

“I think that we have a great opportunity with the 700 megahertz to create an open platform that will make sure that we have competition and choice and innovation in the future,” Rep. “Chip” Pickering (R-Miss.) said earlier this week.

“Openness is creating a wholesale market. It is creating interoperability for devices so that you can use a device, whether it’s an iPhone or another device, with whatever function you choose. If you want to go to a Wi-Fi or WiMax spot and use it, or if you want to have the access to other networks, you can do so. That’s openness in wholesale.”

Pickering is joined across the aisle by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) in support of a growing consensus for real open access in America. These two powerful congressmen sit on the subcommittee that – with the FCC — will help determine the future of the mobile Internet in America.

They need to know that the public cares.

If we open up our airwaves to new competitors, protect your freedom to go where you want online, and unchain the devices — not just the iPhone but whatever comes next — we can create a new kind of mobile Internet, one that is truly open and accessible to all.