A Sept 6 Wired article claims that the Justice Department has come out against the concept of Net Neutrality. Without an assumption that providers would be neutral to the content they deliver, providers would have the opportunity to control the rate/cost at which you receive categories of content.
to charge some users more money for loading certain content or Web sites faster than others.
Why and when is this an issue? As I understand the argument, this could be an issue because allowing differential pricing presents the opportunity for providers to shape content delivery to advantage their total business model. For example, DSL providers could slow or charge for VOIP content and cable providers could slow or charge for video content. Phone companies would degrade an alternative to their phone business and cable providers to their video business. This is not the way providers describe their motives – they claim they need to raise more money to upgrade services. The rejoinder is – if this general concern is true, why not simply raise prices and why request the opportunity to be specific about which packets cost what.
The failure of the argument that the “market” will not allow abuse because people will move to services that meet their needs is that not all users have access to multiple providers.
The Justice Department claimed:
However, the agency said it will continue to monitor and enforce any anticompetitive conduct to ensure a competitive broadband marketplace.
I would be more comfortable if the Justice Department would be more specific in describing at least the beginning of a list of practices that would be regarded as anticompetitive.
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