Category Archives: Internet Freedom

Digital inclusion and who controls the Internet

The Compact with Capitalism: Wheeler’s Net Neutrality Dodge

 

Posted by Tracy Rosenberg on May 24th, 2014
Huffington Post

Rhetoric and reality sometimes diverge. Right now, the future of the Internet is hooked like a fish between two different paths.

On December 16, 2013, I met FCC chairman Tom Wheeler at an Oakland town hall meeting, and I used my two minutes to talk about reclassification, a term that means making whole the regulatory split that is going to create a two-tiered Internet. The chairman nodded, took notes, and at the end of the presentation mentioned the importance of a “network compact”.

I had just finished reading “Net Effects; The Past, Present and Future Impact Of Our Networks” by FCC chairman Tom Wheeler. Perhaps surprisingly for someone so upset by Wheeler’s proposals that if I lived closer to DC I’d have been camping in front of the FCC, I agreed with much of what Wheeler wrote. Continue reading The Compact with Capitalism: Wheeler’s Net Neutrality Dodge

Artificial Scarcity: How Data Caps Harm Consumers and Innovation

 

New America’s Open Technology Institute released this  report examining the use of data caps on wired and mobile broadband service in the United States. The report analyzes the financial incentives that major Internet service providers have to implement these usage limits and research that demonstrates the behavioral effect of these policies on consumers.

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Some Internet Activists Think Obama Didn’t Go Far Enough

 

Posted by Tracy Rosenberg on December 15th, 2014
Huffington Post

When Barack Obama came out publicly for the reclassification of the Internet as a public utility, his announcement indicated that the decades-long battle to maintain neutrality on the Web had entered a new high-profile stage.

From a wonky side discussion found mostly in the technology sections of major newspapers and on computer blogs, net neutrality had suddenly morphed into a national obsession, filling up late-night TV and social-media feeds with one meme after another and finally crashing the FCC’s website with 4 million public comments. Continue reading Some Internet Activists Think Obama Didn’t Go Far Enough

CA Public Utilities Commission Buries Net Neutrality Vote

 

Update October 15, 2014: Only hours before a scheduled vote to authorize the California Public Utilities Commission to weigh in on the federal network neutrality debate and share the overwhelming opinions of Californians that the Internet should be re-classified as a public utility, the item was suddenly withdrawn from Thursday’s meeting agenda for undisclosed reasons. Continue reading CA Public Utilities Commission Buries Net Neutrality Vote