TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: Re: Confused About Net Neutrality

Re: Confused About Net Neutrality

Rick Merrill (rick0.merrill@NOSPAMgmail.com)
Sat, 01 Jul 2006 07:38:17 -0400

George Mitchell wrote:

> jmartineau@gmail.com wrote:

>> Hi,

>> How is what the telecoms are proposing different? Are they suggesting
>> that they should be allowed to arbitrarily limit or increase the
>> speeds with which certain sites or traffic can reach me, regardless of
>> what that site and I are paying in terms of bandwidth?

> It's a less confusing issue than the telecoms are trying to make out.
> Robert Cringely has an excellent discussion of the question in this
> week's column:

> http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20060629.html

> As he explains it, the telecoms are almost solely interested in
> creating billable events. If this is correct, then as you
> hypothesize, they want to set any number of arbitrary limits so that
> they can bill you when you exceed the limits.

> George Mitchell

The telecoms are not talking "net neutrality" to bill you and me -- they
are talking about creating different travel lanes for the major carriers
(and rivals). In other words they want to charge your ISP (who might or
might not pass the cost along to you and me) for faster service.

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