FCC Chairman makes a bold statement

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler just released some news today about his proposal to move electronic communication to the Title II classification of the Communications Act of 1934.  This would put broadband internet access that we so knowingly love/hate into the same category as other utilities like water, electricity and phone lines. This is by no means a cure-all for the sad state of internet service in the United States, it is a step in the right direction. In his own words (from Wired magazine) 

Originally, I believed that the FCC could assure internet openness through a determination of “commercial reasonableness” under Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. While a recent court decision seemed to draw a roadmap for using this approach, I became concerned that this relatively new concept might, down the road, be interpreted to mean what is reasonable for commercial interests, not consumers.

That is why I am proposing that the FCC use its Title II authority to implement and enforce open internet protections.

Using this authority, I am submitting to my colleagues the strongest open internet protections ever proposed by the FCC. These enforceable, bright-line rules will ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services. I propose to fully apply—for the first time ever—those bright-line rules to mobile broadband. My proposal assures the rights of internet users to go where they want, when they want, and the rights of innovators to introduce new products without asking anyone’s permission.

These so called "bright-line rules" includes several priorities to ensure that ISPs are unable to interfere with lawful digital content, namely 1) no blocking  2) no throttling -meaning no slowing down of data transfers- and 3) no paid prioritization -meaning a content provider cannot pay an ISP for "fast-lane"service.  These 3 rules are to compliment an older FCC requirement for improved transparency between ISPs and consumers, and interestingly enough this will apply to wireless service as much as wired which is new to the FCC table.  This proposal also leaves broad range for ISPs to manage their own network which throws the proverbial bone to cable companies to encourage investment.

The average liberal Joe may see this as a major win for net neutrality in the US, but the battle is not yet won.  Wheeler's proposal still needs to be voted into approval on February 26th with the help of the rest of the commissioners. And the strength of his proposal has yet to be decided when more details are flushed out over the coming months. And sadly, this does not mean your overpriced, underserviced Internet connection is going to be improving any time soon.  There are still going to be monopolistic and duopolistic cable companies running the pipelines, but at least they won't be deciding the content you can access freely. That issue is a whole other beast though.

However, this isn't bad considering Wheeler used to be lobbyist for big cable and wireless.  When he took office at the FCC no one expected him to be so bold. Looks like he wanted to be in the spotlight for a change. Bravo!

Jobs

It's been too long since I last reported in, not for any particular reason except for ignorance. But today I finally have exciting news and probably some changes for what sort of content might come up on my blog.  The exciting news for me is that I finally heard good news back about an internship! After months of applications to development agencies and NGO's, I decided to change course and I started applications for more information technology related organizations, especially ones in Berlin, and I finally heard back from the Free Software Foundation of Europe that they will gladly take me on in August for 3 months.  The easiest way for me to describe the FSFE is as an open software advocacy group that has quite a lot of programs trying to encourage governments and other public institutions to start adopting more open software based programs into their offices.  I'm not sure quite what my jobs will be while I'm there, but I'm excited to actually work as an intern in a field I am interested in.  Also the 2 guys who interviewed me where very nice and the work environment seemed pretty chill which is a major plus in my book.

The other piece of good news is that Erika also got good news about a job in Bonn.  She is going to work at a market research company beginning in March, but I can't remember the name of the company right now.  Even though she will start out as a "trainee" position, she is looking forward to the work because it is a little smaller company so she will have more jobs than just repeating the same analysis process every day.  And if she does well, she will get promoted automatically beginning in January of next year, with more reasonable pay for someone just out of college.  But the important thing is that she has a job, and its in a good location.  Bonn is not a very big city, but they have a lot of international organizations which may prove to be useful for me later when I am searching for jobs.  And there are lots of other cities nearby so if Bonn is not so exciting there are places to visit.

Lastly, my semester is coming to a close and I have just a few more papers to write before my thesis.  I'm going to be writing about the net neutrality debate in the US and since its an ongoing topic there will be plenty of news stories coming up. So I want to try and get some practice writing about it through my blog.  I think writing out the news stories I find interesting on here will help me sort of some ideas and also share some of the news thats happening.  For example, towards the end of FCC will be releasing a long awaited proposal and vote on a new scheme for net neutrality options in the US.  This is looking to be the time where they decide whether to follow the same path as before, with internet service as an information service (Title I), or if they will change it to telecommunications service (Title II), or follow a 3rd, hybrid option.  Long story short, Title I is what the opponents of net neutrality want, and Title II is what supporters of net neutrality want.  The hybrid option is criticized by both, but may be the only option that is feasible. Anyways, the point is that I will start writing more about this as best I know for the upcoming weeks and months. We'll see if I get more or less viewers because of it...