A look at Ben Scott of Free Press. This 30 year-old "ringleader for an emerging political constituency" has become an operator in multibillion-dollar battles involving corporate titans, regulators and consumers debating policies over who controls the media and the Internet. Working mostly behind the scenes, Scott has been a driving force for "net neutrality," a concept that in policy terms has come to mean enforcement of open access online, so cable and telecom operators cannot block or delay content that travels over their networks. Scott and the group's 500,000 members, most of whom joined online, helped sell their argument. Free Press drew together strange bedfellows, including the Christian Coalition, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Gun Owners of America, and helped set in motion a broader debate on the issue that resulted in the recent FCC hearing in Cambridge (MA). Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-MA) also sponsored a bill to strengthen governance against Internet service providers trying to control consumers' Web access over their networks. "Ben has exquisite political judgment and is a key player in net neutrality and wireless issues because he represents a new, grass-roots dynamic in the battle against media concentration and the communications colossus," said Rep Markey, chairman of the House subcommittee on telecommunications and the Internet. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/27/AR200803...
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