What We Learned About Network Neutrality This Week

[Commentary] “I intend to protect a free and open Internet,” President Barack Obama announced in his State of the Union address on Tuesday, January 20. For many that was a clear, albeit truncated, reiteration of his statement in November 2014 calling on the Federal Communications Commission to “create a new set of rules protecting net neutrality and ensuring that neither the cable company nor the phone company will be able to act as a gatekeeper, restricting what you can do or see online.” In November, the President asked the FCC to “reclassify consumer broadband service under Title II of the Telecommunications Act — while at the same time forbearing from rate regulation and other provisions less relevant to broadband services.” The broadband access industry believes Title II would saddle them with a litany of regulations on matters such as pricing and how they manage their networks. Seemingly to slow the momentum of the President’s proposal and the call of millions of commenters at the FCC, Republicans in Congress late last week started circulating a discussion draft of legislation that would carve out new authority for the FCC to enforce net neutrality. The Republican legislation is aimed at avoiding common-carrier regulation but would prevent broadband providers from blocking, slowing down or accepting money to speed up delivery of certain websites.