The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is expected to detail a new proposal today that will feature rules for how Internet service providers manage and route traffic on their networks.
The proposal, which is expected to advance with three out of five votes from the FCC, will be announced by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski (pictured) and is likely to include two new guidelines for dictating how companies like AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Charter Communications treat different packets and applications on their networks.
The Washington Post reports that the FCC is expected to vote on the new rules in October, possibly culminating in a final rule in the spring of 2010.
An FCC source told the paper:
Be they entrepreneurs or innovators or consumers or less powerful voices, a principle on transparency is about knowing how large carriers manage traffic on networks and understanding how their content will be treated ahead of time so no one is surprised. So a CTO of a fledging start-up isn't shocked when a new product that got angel investment won't actually work on the Time Warner system, for example.
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Now to just wait for the telecom companies to pull the exact same crap with net neutrality that big pharma has been pulling with healthcare reform.
Big Pharma hasn't been doing all that much, as there isn't anyone talking about increasing regulation on pharmaceutical companies. All anyone talks about for health care reform is insurance companies and evil doctors.
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He was dead when I got here.
Funny story, almost every version of health care 'reform' includes a portion that will allow pharmaceutical companies to hold the rights to any drug they make for 12 years, rather than the 7 Obama had suggested. It's been suggested that this was done because Obama feared big Pharma funding ad campaigns against his push would derail it. Looks like it happened without their help.
And yeah, those evil insurance companies, making a profit. How dare they? How dare they employ millions? And those evil doctors, how dare they expect to make some money after spending hundreds of thousands in school. Crazy talk.
As far as evil goes in insurance companies the problem is all the limits they place on healthcare. You have to go to specific places for them to cover. You can't already be sick with some weird catches as to what is considered preexisting. Yes they want to make money and deserve to but they get greedy and attempt to make more by rejecting those who really need healthcare, and that is bull.
"... a principle on transparency is about knowing how large carriers manage traffic on networks and understanding how their content will be treated ahead of time so no one is surprised. So a CTO of a fledging start-up isn't shocked when a new product that got angel investment won't actually work on the Time Warner system, for example."
So the goal of Net Neutrality is not to prevent ISPs from crippling particular products, but to require them to disclose the fact that they are crippling particular products? Why does that strike me as tantamount to the FCC telling ISPs that it's perfectly okay to do precisely the things that are the opposite of neutral?
Thanks a whole fucking lot, FCC.