March 10, 2008 07:01 am
—
Will Net neutrality die before
most people know what it is?
That’s the fear of some experts,
such as Hartwick College’s Howard
Lichtman, who warns of the potential
for large Internet service providers
(ISPs) to control how their
customers use the Internet.
``I think it’s a worry because
a few companies have enormous
power over the Internet,’’ Lichtman,
an associate professor of
computer and information sciences,
said Wednesday.
Internet neutrality means that
ISPs do not speed up, slow down,
block access to websites or direct
traffic in an effort to control how
customers use the medium.
Since its inception a generation
ago, the Internet has essentially operated
without corporate control.
Users have decided which sites to
visit, and websites have competed
for traffic based on their content,
without the help or hindrance of
the phone company.
But in the last year, some ISPs,
including AT&T and Comcast,
have been accused of ``managing’’
their networks, controlling
what users see, hear and do. During
a concert in Chicago last year
piped onto the Internet by AT&T,
the band Pearl Jam made remarks
critical of President Bush and the
words were cut out of the webcast.
After the band complained,
AT&T apologized for the ``mistake,’’
according to the Los
Angeles Times.
And The Associated
Press reported last year
that Comcast has blocked
customers from using Bit-
Torrent, a program that lets
files, such as movies and
music, be transmitted from
one computer to another.
The Comcast story made
waves, and an Internet
neutrality bill has been
introduced to Congress.
The Federal Communications
Commission is now
examining Net neutrality,
and Comcast made Internet
headlines again Feb.
25 after it paid people to
take seats at an FCC hearing
at Harvard University
in Cambridge, Mass.
The giant company acknowledged
hiring seattakers,
but said they were
reserving places for Comcast
employees.
The next day, Sen. John
Kerry, D-Massachusetts,
spoke out against Comcast
online at www.huffingtonpost.
com, saying: ``How big
are the stakes in the so-called
network neutrality debate
now raging before Congress
and federal regulators?
``Consider this: One side
in the debate actually went
to the trouble of hiring people
off the street to pack a
Federal Communications
Commission meeting yesterday
_ and effectively
keep some of its opponents
out of the room.’’
Spokesmen for large ISPs
argued they should be allowed
to manage their networks
to benefit most of their
customers. File-sharing,
for example, uses up more
bandwidth, or capacity, than
other Internet activities and
should be subject to different
rules, they argue.
Steve Barker, chief executive
officer of the Delhi
Telephone Co, a local ISP,
said he sees both sides of
the argument.
``Basically, I believe
there is Net neutrality now
for most users through most
ISPs,’’ Barker said in an email
to The Daily Star. ``As
far as the discussion for
regulation (or) law on Net
neutrality, I have no opinion
either way from Delhi
Telephone Company’s point
of view. Enforcing Net neutrality
will undoubtably
have its good points and
also its detractors.
``I would like to say the
capability is there to regulate
(and) limit the bandwidth
being used by some
customers for some applications,
and the argument can
be made that this opportunity
to limit is beneficial for
the total customer base.
``If a few customers use
the majority of the `pipe’ to
the outside world, then the
ISP will have to increase
the size of that ‘pipe’ ... What
many people miss ... is that
providing access to the Internet
for customers costs money,
and to pay the expenses,
the ISP needs to collect from
the customers. If the costs go
up, the price to the customer
will have to go up.’’
Lichtman, a Time-Warner
customer, said people
are well-aware that a good
connection to the Internet
is expensive.
``I used to pay $15 a
month and I’m paying more
than $40 now,’’ he said. For
that money, he and other
customers should be able
to freely use the Internet
and be assured that ISPs
are investing in their infrastructure
to provide adequate
bandwidth, he said.
Lichtman said that unless
Net neutrality is preserved
by regulation, companies
will be tempted to
increasingly control their
customers’ activities.
``If a large provider takes
over Yahoo, for example,
and wants to steer traffic to
its own site to make money,
it might make it harder for
you to get to Google, a direct
competitor,’’ he said.
And after a few days of trying
to use Google, frustrated
customers may resort to
Yahoo, even if it is inferior
to Google.
Companies also may be
tempted to censor viewpoints
they do not share,
and the Internet’s democratic
character, where
voices have an equal
chance to be heard, is at
risk, he said.
Brian Pokorny, head of
Otsego County’s Information
Technologies Department,
said Net neutrality is
a big part of what has made
the Internet thrive.
``I’m absolutely opposed
to having companies control
which sites their customers
go to,’’ he said. ``The
competition and the freedom
to go to any legal site
is what makes the Internet
great.’’
On the county’s own
network, employees are not
free to surf anywhere, said
Pokorny. ``What we do in
the work environment is an
entirely different issue,’’ he
said. ``But on their own computers,
customers should
decide for themselves where
they want to go.’’
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