The FCC held a high-profile en banc field hearing on February 25 on the future of the Internet. The hearing was held at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., and featured statements by House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet Chairman Ed Markey, (D-Mass.) (see above story), who has long taken an active interest in net neutrality legislation and regulation. The meeting, which also featured statements by each of the FCC's five commissioners and testimony by expert witnesses, focused specifically on network management and general net neutrality issues.
Markey highlighted his early fight against regulation of the Internet, but raised issues he said he hoped the commission would consider as FCC members deliberate the topic. Specifically, he urged the FCC to focus on end-user needs, not the needs of broadband providers, calling Internet freedoms "consumer freedoms"; he said the role of the ISP ends with connectivity, and that network management tools may allow the ISPs to insert themselves as a "managerial" presence. He said the need to manage networks will diminish as bandwidth grows, and that insufficient competition and lack of "true" broadband are the real problems at hand. He urged the FCC to reexamine its broadband policy to enhance competition. He added that any network management should be both "reasonable" and "temporary."
The commissioners each gave statements as well. Chairman Kevin Martin said that any "reasonable" network management must be transparent, with ISPs notifying consumers "if and how" they discriminate packet traffic. He added the FCC is "ready, willing and able to step in" against what it sees as abuses. Commissioner Michael Copps said network management decisions are being made in a "black box" without any transparency at all. Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein repeated the call for openness, also calling for an Internet Bill of Rights. Commissioner Robert McDowell focused on private-sector competition, calling it better than the government at providing broadband. Commissioner Tate, whose arrival was delayed, demonstrated skepticism about the need to regulate the process of managing networks, comparing it to regulation under Title II of the 1996 Telecom Act.
Gilles BianRosa, CEO of Vuze, Inc., then gave a technology demonstration and answered questions about bandwidth management and the relationships between peer-to-peer networks and ISPs. He said the competitive market is possible only with "basic ground rules" and transparency, which may require regulation.
Other witnesses included Marvin Ammori, General Counsel, Free Press; Yochai Benkler, Faculty Co-Director, Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School; Mass. State Representative Daniel Bosley; David Cohen, Executive VP, Comcast; Tom Tauke, Executive VP, Public Affairs, Policy and Communications, Verizon; Timothy Wiu, Professor of Law, Columbia Law School; Christopher Yu, Director, Center for Technology, Innovation and Competition at University of Penn. Law School; Daniel Weitzner, Director, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Decentralized Information Group; David Clark, Senior Research Scientist, MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab; Eric Klinker, CTO, BitTorrent; David Reed, Professor, MIT Media Lab; Scott Smyers, Senior VP-Network & Systems Architecture, Sony Electronics.
Click here for a video webcast of the hearing.
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