Net Neutrality–Again?

Rep. Waxman, the House sponsor of an attempt to pass legislation to direct the FCC’s decisions on net neutrality, has withdrawn the bill for lack of support.  This ends, at least for the moment, another of Congress’ attempts to create telecom policy through explicit legislation.  It’s not the first time bills have been dropped; since 1996 virtually every attempt to change policy has died without coming to a vote.

I still believe that Title II classification with reasonable wholesale rates (the Canadian model, for example) is workable, and in fact might be more logical given the range of services that are likely to migrate to IP without being part of the Internet.  IPTV and carrier voice, as well as enterprise services, fit that model.  The FCC has to weave a complicated ruling to protect both the Internet and the business model for IP-converged services.  Title II is the best way to do that.

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