Want Net Neutrality? It’ll Cost You
If you want more affordable Internet access, then you have
to be concerned about higher prices from neutrality regulation. When Net
neutrality emerged in Congress in 2006, a Forrester Research analysis predicted
that if Congress passed it, “Legal costs will shoot through the roof – draining
the pockets of everyone involved.”
Guess who’ll wind up paying? And Net neutrality’s
costs don’t end there.
ISP’s are investing $24 billion in network upgrades this
year to handle the oncoming crush of video streams, movie downloads and other
online traffic. But given the surging growth of online data, even this by
itself won’t be enough. We need smart networks capable of differentiating
between a movie stream that needs prioritization and an email that can be
delayed a few seconds.
But Net neutrality’s complex pricing regulations would
create a legal loophole that pushes the huge cost for tomorrow’s Internet
entirely onto the Net user. A net neutrality law would let Google, Amazon and
other large online companies avoid paying anything toward the cost of deploying
these networks.
Let's be clear: It's wonderful that so many imaginative new
services are migrating to the Net. But basic economics (and common sense)
suggests government should not try to micromanage how the future Internet gets
built, particularly at the expense of ordinary consumers who won't get to
choose if the government decides.
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I want to pay for my traffic. I always have. I don't want some tiered internet. I don't want to have things like "Pay $2.99 for our YouTube Hi-Speed package!" because given the chance to charge exorbitant fees for something simple and cheap to provide, companies will. Especially telecom companies.
Look at cellphones. My cellphone provider charges me 5 cents a text message. Looking at that in bandwidth, it's something like a few hundred dollars per megabyte. This is not their cost, not even close to their cost but, because they control the platform, the servers and they even extend this to control how the cellphone makers do the features on the phones themselves.
Even though my phone has memory banks for litterally millions of text messages, I can only store 30 on my phone without deleting them so I can receive more. There are many more examples of them extracting money for duplicate or artificial restrictions on my data or communications.
This is a result of creating an environment where a utility (something I need) is allowed to be locked down and controlled by one party. I wouldn't advocate Net Neutrality but, I would advocate something along the lines of DSL connection sharing rules for Cable and other internet providers. Basically, these rules said that DSL companies had to share their lines with competitors and the price of a DSL connection shot through the floor, many additional features were given to customers all because companies had to compete. I think Cable companies should have to compete like DSL companies do and that would assure true Net Neutrality in a far more effective and legally free way than passing laws.
This would change the main objection to creating laws being that companies aren't going to self regulate and market pressures can't happen when there are either one or a few providers. By creating rules that force cable companies to provide a way for their competitors to lease their lines like DSL companies, places where only cable is available will have the market pressure for ensuring their freedom and pushing market prices.
Another thing that makes me mad is that telecom companies are data providers. They increasingly want to hold my data and personal information to leverage it against me, make me pay for access to it. Cell phone companies do this when they store you photos online and then charge you data access fees to see your photos from your phone when you have plenty of storage on that phone to locally hold those picture files. Restrict data access programs that can send text messages or voip applications that can send voice calls through a data line instead of paying higher fees for voice calls through the provider even though they are using voip technology on their end to reap the same discounts and benefits.
Without competition, this will naturally occur because it is more profitable for these companies. Regulations should be in place to spur competition rather than forcing the content to be delivered in a certain way.