mikehudack:

continuations:

The argument that competition among wireless carriers will take care of this seems disingenuous at best when we have all of four carriers left of which two control the bulk of the market.  This is an oligopoly in which (even without any talk among carriers), the natural game theoretic equilibrium is one where none of the carriers provides net neutrality and all accept payments from incumbents.

So what could actual net neutrality look like when codified?  It could be as simple as saying: carriers can charge people only for their bandwidth (up and down) and cannot accept other payments.  In this scheme endusers still pay for bandwidth (as they do today) and bandwidth caps are possible.  Youtube still pays for its bandwidth.  But Youtube cannot pay for faster delivery, cannot pay for being excluded from consumers’ bandwidth caps etc.  As it turns out — and this is again critical to emphasize — that is the status quo!   A status quo that has brought us tremendous innovation and sufficient investment by carriers in bandwidth despite their griping.

Finally, to all those who would say that the government doesn’t regulate what people can pay and cannot pay for in other areas, that is of course wrong.  You can pay a taxi for taking you from A to B, but paying the taxi to go above the speed limit is not legal.  You can pay to get a liver transplant, but you can’t pay to get one faster than others.  We full well realize that safety and ethical concerns matter.  So does innovation.  Net neutrality is all about protecting innovation while still providing the funds for carriers to invest in network growth.

This is the least shrill analysis I’ve seen so far, but the bottom line remains just as daunting. The unfettered Western Expansion of the internet appears to be coming to an end. Unlike the entrenched old media models, the internet still provides for unique and creative forms of disruption and innovation. Your speed, however, may vary.