Regulations for Net still Not Warranted Despite latest Outcry

REGULATIONS FOR NET STILL NOT WARRANTED DESPITE LATEST OUTCRY
[SOURCE: San Jose Mercury News, AUTHOR: David L. Cohen, Comcast]
[Commentary] As telecom legislation wades through the Senate, a small but vocal and well-financed band of Internet giants -- led by Google and Microsoft -- has been pushing for sweeping new Internet regulations that they call "network neutrality." They say that without such regulations, broadband providers will start blocking Internet-based content and that the Internet, as we know it, will end. Indeed, this hyperventilating about the need to regulate broadband services is nothing new. Various self-anointed critics -- and some tech companies that stand to gain much financially -- warned of a similar impending apocalypse during the interactive television, advanced instant messaging, and "forced-access" debates of the last seven years, and argued in each instance on behalf of sweeping new regulations. In tomorrow's world, a broadband provider might want to help bring health care into under-served rural areas with, for instance, real-time consultative video for complicated medical procedures. But network neutrality proponents would outlaw that advance unless the same network capacity be given to them, for free, to prop up their own commercial endeavors. The antitrust laws already police abuses in these industries, including any potential abuse by broadband providers. Indeed, an increasingly competitive marketplace, together with existing laws, provide more than enough protection against attempts to Balkanize the Internet. We need the freedom to experiment with business models that let us deliver what consumers want. We can get there if Congress focuses on liberating tomorrow's networks rather than regulating today's networks.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/15240713.htm