The "Net Neutrality" debate is one that I've largely stayed on the sidelines of. Not because I don't believe that consumers should have the freedom to choose whatever content they desire, subject to the bandwidth that they have purchased, but mostly because the "powers that be" have essentially turned everything regarding an Internet used first for communication and second for commerce directly on its head. Arguments against "them" are touted as consensus. And basically, the whole thing becomes painful and annoying. I should know. I've been fighting with those who insist that the Net has classes of citizenship (one for the corporate sponsors, one for the geeks, and one for the users) for almost 20 years now.
So what have I learned in those 20 years? Those that have the gold makes the rules, even if their previous attempts have failed so totally that they have to purchase the successes of others, pretend they created it themselves, and then steamroll anyone who was there before and remembers their bumbling prior acts. Thus it has been with telcos who woke up one morning and found that computer networking, which they had tried to destroy back in the 50s, was alive and well and living in several different places, from CompuServ, and AOL, and BBS systems, and FIDOnet etc., all in forms they had no direct control over. They sat back and watched things grow and morph and mutate into a more coherent Internet, then decided that what they needed to do was to set up their OWN conduit in hopes of recapturing their lost control. However, when they were no longer the monopoly player, they found that important things like customer service, reliability, and cost were important issues that would cause customers to actually go elsewhere! They basically gave up, but obviously still wished to maintain control, or at least a revenue stream over all of this communication that is going on despite them.
Then other corporations woke up and found that people were happily using it long before they even dreamed of booting up in the latest version of Windoze, and decided to change all the rules to suit them, take the domain names already in use, then label themselves "content providers" and the rest of us are "passive consumers."
So what's going to happen with "Net Neutrality?" The Telcos will convince (through their very high paid lobbyists) the Congress Critters who still can't boot their own machines, that the only way they can provide the high speed service that people are crying for, is to somehow (they don't tell us how yet) decide for those "passive consumers" what they really need. Arguments like John Quarterman's below will likely be conveniently ignored in the onslaught, and we will all lose. I still have a tiny shred of hope somewhere in there, but I've been disappointed SO many times before that I'm definitely not willing to bet on it.
Real Fast Broadband:
OK, I think I saw some confirming comments about my interpretation of Softbank ADSL's 50Mbps for $25/mo. offering.
For those who don't read Japanese, Try this.
Meanwhile, NTT has decided to get more subscribers than Yahoo Japan by using Fiber to the Home (FTTH). How fast is that? $100Mbps for $31/month.
Show me any U.S. city where individuals can by Internet access at speeds anywhere near that for prices anywhere like that.
Meanwhile, the company that started Japan's most recent broadband push, Softbank, is profitable.
And while U.S. telcos complain they need special treatment to do what Softbank and NTT have already done, NTT is already branching out overseas, offering 100Mbps in other countries. As a demonstration, it broadcast Superbowl XL back to Japan in high definition.
Hey, maybe that's how we'll finally get fast broadband stateside!
-jsq