Timothy Balcer
My life as an ISP and consultant
I've been involved in The Internet since it was called DARPANET. I have seen many things come and go, including companies whom have tried to monopolize bandwidth, all to no avail.
Thanks goodness that is true! If it were not for Net Neutrality, small players would not have any chance to get the kind of exposure they need to be able to compete in the marketplace. The big players say that it costs them too much money to maintain neutrality, but their costing models are all wrong on that count, and besides I -know- you can make money on flat rate bandwidth. What they want is to have the cake and eat it too, without caring about who gets trampled in the process.
Bandwidth providers can easily scale their costs to meet demand, that's not an issue. What they are afraid of is having to do so, and having customers be more picky about -where- they go for service. With up and coming WiMAX and other offerings, and with the deregulation of Telco (1996) they have actually had to compete, and they don't like that one bit.
This is not about making markets fair, it is about making them unfair to the extreme. It is about monopoly, and about shifting costs to the Businesses, since if they do this, they can offer unapproachable discounts for their services to consumers, and essentially wedge themselves into a pseudo monopoly position. Small providers will no longer be able to compete and the big players will have a hammer lock on the market, thus completely defeating the intent of the 1996 Deregulation act.
These companies are piggybacking on our property. The Internet is a shared resource, no matter that they have a large customer base using their lines to connect to it. Tax Payers developed the damn thing, and we demand it remain neutral! They simply cannot be allowed to dictate how fast or well a web site will come up to one of their customers based on the source providing payment. That would utterly destroy most of the gains we have made.
Below is the prepared speech I was given through Save The Internet. The words are not mine, but I agree with their sentiments.
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Net Neutrality is essential to free speech, equal opportunity and economic innovation in America. Since the FCC removed this basic protection in 2005, the top executives of phone and cable companies have stated their intention to become the Internet's gatekeepers and to discriminate against Web sites that don't pay their added tolls.
This fundamental change would end the open Internet as we know it. It would damage my ability to connect with others, share information and participate in our 21st century democracy and economy. The FCC must ensure that broadband providers do not block, interfere with or discriminate against any lawful Internet traffic based on its ownership, source or destination.
