Free Republic

Network neutrality is a simple concept: ISPs shouldn't play favorites with the content that goes over their parts of the Internet. It's a concept that harks back to the Commercial Internet Exchange (CIX) in 1991 when the first Internet carries agreed to share connections equally with each other. Although CIX is now largely forgotten, it's what started the Internet on its way from a backwater for researchers and schools to the omnipresent network in which we live, work, and play today. Now, Comcast, appears to be the first major ISP to break that old CIX rule of network neutrality. Level...

Level 3 Communications, a central partner in the Netflix online movie service, accused Comcast on Monday of charging a new fee that puts Internet video companies at a competitive disadvantage. Level 3, which helps to deliver Netflix’s streaming movies, said Comcast had effectively erected a tollbooth that “threatens the open Internet,” and indicated that it would seek government intervention. Comcast quickly denied that the clash had anything to do with network neutrality, instead calling it “a simple commercial dispute.” The dispute highlighted the growing importance of Internet video delivery — an area that some people say needs to be monitored...

<p>For all of the hype going on over the FCC's proposed rules about Network Neutrality, it really comes down to a few very short, common sense rules.</p> <p>What is "Network Neutrality"?</p> <p>In short, the rules would force Internet Service providers (ISPs) to treat all traffic equally, period. For such a complex-sounding name, it really is quite a simple concept.</p>

Network neutrality means less technological innovation — and less freedom, too. By Phil Kerpen Following the nationalization of investment banks, Fannie and Freddie, consumer banks, and private insurance companies, taxpayers are likely asking: What’s left for the federal government to nationalize? How about the Internet? Network neutrality, or net neutrality, is the beneficent-sounding name for sweeping new government regulatory power that would prohibit Internet service providers from innovating in their own networks. This could lead to much less broadband investment by private companies, and could potentially force government subsidization, control, and outright nationalization of the Internet. The implications of this...

WASHINGTON - Internet users should be free to surf where they want and download what they please. But shouldn't the owners of the networks that make the Internet possible also have rights? That, in a nutshell, is the topic of debate at a special public meeting of the Federal Communications Commission at Harvard Law School on Monday. Recent events involving Comcast Corp. and Verizon Wireless have raised questions about network owners interfering with customer traffic flow. The meeting also is expected to attract a rally on minority media ownership. The session is the agency's most serious public discussion to date...

Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the Web, has called for clear separation between Internet access and Internet content. Speaking at the World Wide Web conference in Edinburgh on Tuesday morning, Berners-Lee gave his views on the growing battle over Net neutrality. "It's better and more efficient for us all if we have a separate market where we get our connectivity, and a separate market where we get our content. Information is what I use to make all my decisions. Not just what to buy, but how to vote," Berners-Lee told journalists. "There is an effort by some companies in the U.S....

Larry Pratt wrote this letter to Congress: Dear Representative, As Congress considers major legislation affecting the nation's telecommunications structure, particular attention must be paid towards maintaining the Internet as a medium accessible to all, so that the free market might continue to determine which goods, services and ideas prosper. For many years, those few companies whose hardware comprises the "skeleton" of the Internet have had to operate under the concept of Network Neutrality. That is, when selling their services, they had to treat all customers the same… all purchasers of a particular amount of bandwidth paid the same and were...